How do you organize your Home Brew?

[DethStryke]

Hi!

A'koss, I use Dragon Naturally Speaking at work (I'm a surgical pathologist and I use it to dictate diagnoses). This type of software has come a long way from those sold 3-4 years ago. The voice recognition is VERY good and I have used it to surf the net and enter large quantities of text into the computer. I am currently using it in conjuction with DM Genie to enter the adventures instead of typing.

The software is pricey, and of course I would not recommend buying it solely for gaming, but if you have it, or otherwise can try it out you can see for yourself if it is good.

Primarchone

How does this stack up to the bundled speaking tools in the Microsoft Office Suite? I assume it is better, but if anyone has tried both and has an opinion, I'd be very interested.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

I've got piles of notes too. As I want to keep a complete archive of the campaign, I'm thinking I'll probably start scanning the old documents so I can keep everything electronically.

 

[SWBaxter]

I just put everything vaguely text-based into OpenOffice documents. Maps I tend to hand-draw and then scan in. Various hardcopies exist when I print things for reference or for players to use, but as much as possible the master copy is the one sitting on my hard drive. Since I often have a need to store stuff for multiple campaign settings (one or perhaps two "live", some dormant, and a variable number in active development) which often use different rulesets, keeping them on the computer is the only way I can keep everything straight.

 

[AuraSeer]

I keep my homebrew organized by sorting it into wine racks, first by similarity of ingredients and then by date bottled. For instance, all the mead is together in one place, all the melomels and fruit wines in another, metheglin in another and so forth. In a given rack, each vertical column contains bottles that were all filled on the same date.

Or did you mean something different?

 

[primarchone]

How does this stack up to the bundled speaking tools in the Microsoft Office Suite? I assume it is better, but if anyone has tried both and has an opinion, I'd be very interested.

My impression of the Office suite one is that it is more of a helping aid for the handicapped. Its very bareboned with several simple functions to basically navigate the OS. Granted DNS is marketed as such as device as well, but the realm of options, customization and overall interphase with several popular word processing programs makes DNS pretty darn good compared to even other dedicated voice recognition software, let alone MS Office's meager addon.

More importantly, DNS can be trained. Meaning, the more you use it, fine tune it and add to ins vocabulary, the less and less mistakes it makes until you reach that point where mistakes are few and far between.

I have followed speach recognition software for many year. At the beginning they were.... well... crap.

Then I tried version 6.0 of DNS. I was mighty surprised with its accuracy. Its currently in its eigth edition and interfaces well will all the modern programns (like office 2003).

Mind you, I'm a neophyte with this program, its has so MANY features, I have barely scratched the surface of everything it can do. I keep learning more things (and I'm still using 7.0 at home, version 8 has more features!).

Still, at around 180 bucks, unless you have a lot of other uses for it, may not be an option for just passing text to the computer.

However, I have found it a great boon for my hobby pass times, since I wargame as well and I find it useful for dictating battle reports, rule revisions and a host of other game related things, besides dictating campaign logs and adventure outlines.

Primarchone

 

[Davelozzi]

Mine is fairly unorganized. I have a notebook that I use for notes that I need to refer to (or make) during sessions. Then I have a number of files saved on my harddrive that cover different things like a few major NPCs, the calendar, language info, history, etc. It only really comes together in my head.

 

[A'koss]

A'koss, I use Dragon Naturally Speaking at work (I'm a surgical pathologist and I use it to dictate diagnoses). This type of software has come a long way from those sold 3-4 years ago. The voice recognition is VERY good and I have used it to surf the net and enter large quantities of text into the computer. I am currently using it in conjuction with DM Genie to enter the adventures instead of typing.

The software is pricey, and of course I would not recommend buying it solely for gaming, but if you have it, or otherwise can try it out you can see for yourself if it is good.

Hmmm... It's actually not all that expensive all things considered (especially when you're used to buying apps like Adobe Creative Suite...). I have a brother who owns his own computer store so I'm usually able to get software on the cheap.

Thanks, it definitely sounds like it's worth exploring.

Cheers!

 

[Wild Gazebo]

I have several thousand pages of crinkled paper describing two campaign worlds. I took each of those sheets and crammed them delicately into my organizer (an old cardboard box). I then used a permanent marker and labelled the organizer 'useless papers' stuffed it into my hall closet between my wife's knitting suppies and our cat's litter box. It seems to work for me.

Other than that I separate my notes by region, organization, history, and PC envolvement (which changes the world quite significantly over the 15 years I've run it). Oh, and I try to separate my 'in game maps' and 'design maps' 'cause I do so love handing out innacurate and/or poorly drawn maps. Oh, I do colour-code the top right corner of the sheets for quick reference and always maintain shortlists of NPC names and titles per region on separate sheets, again, for quick reference. Yeah, I guess that would be my best advise...I make extensive use of one page summaries and only look up things if I absolutley have to.

I'm not entirely sold that organization would make the experience any better: I love the feeling of digging through my stacks of well-worn paper. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy.

 

[Edgewood]

Mine is fairly unorganized. I have a notebook that I use for notes that I need to refer to (or make) during sessions. Then I have a number of files saved on my harddrive that cover different things like a few major NPCs, the calendar, language info, history, etc. It only really comes together in my head.

That's pretty much how I have things right now. I'm running two separate campaigns in the same game world and are happening roughly within a month of each other in terms of gametime.

The information about my gameworld though is scattered. Although I can truely admire someone who can have at their fingertips, all of the details of their gameworld in some stage of completion, I just can't seem to find the time to really commit myself at that level. Having said that, I plan to organize a rather large sized binder so that I can access information alot easier. Another problem is to decide just how far do you go with the details about your gameworld. I don't want to get bogged down in writing some lengthy historical event if the players don't get to really know about it.

Then there's the question of how I organize the binder. What order should the information go in?

 

[Blue]

I use a combonation of computer files and printouts.

The "primary storage" is on my laptop, with a system for naming files to find things easily. I try and keep files very focused. One city, one encounter, one group of NPCs, etc.

For a session, I print out the relevant info ahead of time. Nothing like havign real paper for jotting down notes, names of minor NPCs, HP for an unexpected battle, looking at multiple pages at once, etc. Between session the handwritten notes (and any mental notes) get typed in - not only does the doubel usage (at the session and transcribing) help me remember, but this way I have it at a later point.

I like having just the info I'll expect while running. While I do have a number of folders of older stuff that may come up (or I may still need next session), my "this session" is usually 10 pages or less. I even will print out monster stat blocks from the SRD to minimize flipping around.

If I really need something else, out comes the laptop so I have everything. But that usually doesn't happen unless I forget to print something out.

Cheers,
=Blue