Players that don't keep track

[ThomasBJJ]

Well, reading some responses has (as I had hoped) inspired me a little bit.

I think next game, I'm going to do things a little different. I'm going to assign each player a record keeping task for the session, and i will rotate the responsibilities or randomly assign them each week.

Some of the things I think I'm going to have them do:

1 player keeps track of initiative for all the combats for the evening. OR... maybe the character with the highest Initiative roll for the encounter will keep track.

1 player keeps track of all treasure and items aquired, and who has them, where they got them.

1 player will keep track of spells prepaired and cast

1 player will keep track of all characters current hit points.

Hmm... what else should I delegate to them?

 

[ThomasBJJ]

"Oh, I don't need to write down the dragon's hp- I'll keep track in my head. No, he's still fine. And he's still got more than enough spells. And all the treasure he needs, until you defeat him and loot his 35 gp and potion of feather fall. Well, yeah, he was using a wand of lightning bolt on you but it's out of charges now, he used it up. I remember how many it had at the start of the fight."

Ha ha ha ha!!!!!! YES! That's what I'm talkin' bout.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

As a DM, I usually ask for a pretty strict accounting on the order of:
"It ain't written down, it don't exist."

As a player, I always keep track of that kind of thing too. (Although playing my elvish cleric recently, I always forgot to keep track of her dexterity bonus to armor class increasing when she cast cat's grace--I could've saved her a lot of damage if I'd done that).

OTOH, the last DM I played with didn't want us to keep track of arrows or rations. Not even the arrows my cleric had cast GMW on. (I did anyway for those arrows--it would've felt like cheating if I didn't). Still, those were pretty much the only things we didn't keep a strict accounting on.

 

[Duncan Haldane]

Well, reading some responses has (as I had hoped) inspired me a little bit.

I think next game, I'm going to do things a little different. I'm going to assign each player a record keeping task for the session, and i will rotate the responsibilities or randomly assign them each week.
...
Hmm... what else should I delegate to them?

Be careful not to come across as too distrusting. Rather than "I don't believe you're doing this properly" make it "let's get a little more detail here"

I've got my players doing it for the story hour I'm hoping to put up soon.

Along those lines I get players to keep "quotable quotes" and also names of individuals and places that I make up as we go.

Good luck,

Duncan

 

[the Jester]

I really think that keeping track of who has what is extremely important. As an example, if the rogue scouts ahead and finds himself ambushed by a mummy, and just happens to have the necklace of missiles the party just found (but nobody wrote it down or declared who had it) then he has just gotten a totally easy encounter compared to what it would have been like if he didn't have it.

This can be (isn't always, but CAN BE) a real problem in some games, and as a dm I just don't tolerate it. There have been two occasions that I can recall when the party has lost a cool magic item because nobody bothered to write it down. I'm serious about this one, and I think that in a campaign that is going to have any versimilitude tracking this stuff is important.

The hardest thing to enforce this on is rations. That and small change (at least once you're above ~3rd level and there isn't much copper in your pocket anyway). But for the small change, I've found that characters usually toss the barkeep a couple of gp for their food, drinks and rooms for the night and call the change a tip.

Rations are tough; but with create food and drink, living off the land, etc. it isn't nearly as much of an issue.

Ammo, charges on a wand, and especially spells and hp's (and psionic pps)- imo and imc- MUST be carefully tracked.

 

[ThomasBJJ]

The thing is, the more "work" they can do during the session, the better a job I can do DMing the game.

As I player (& DM) I enjoy the resource mgmt. aspect. But the main thing to me is, as a game, it's supposed to be "fair". And that goes both ways. I wouldn't want to play in a game where I thought that my character was never in any danger because the DM would not let him die. Nor would I want to escape the impossible to climb out of pit-trap by using the rope in my pack that I never bought.
As a DM, it's not "fair" to try to maintain some sense of realism and believability, and have the PC's not following the physics of the campaign.

 

[Duncan Haldane]

The thing is, the more "work" they can do during the session, the better a job I can do DMing the game.

That's true, and that's why I asked my players to help me.

Also I think it helps the players focus on the session rather than getting distracted if they aren't in a scene, etc.

Duncan

 

[bloodymage]

Well, reading some responses has (as I had hoped) inspired me a little bit.

I think next game, I'm going to do things a little different. I'm going to assign each player a record keeping task for the session, and i will rotate the responsibilities or randomly assign them each week.

Some of the things I think I'm going to have them do:

1 player keeps track of initiative for all the combats for the evening. OR... maybe the character with the highest Initiative roll for the encounter will keep track.

1 player keeps track of all treasure and items aquired, and who has them, where they got them.

1 player will keep track of spells prepaired and cast

1 player will keep track of all characters current hit points.

Hmm... what else should I delegate to them?

Initiative OK

Treasure OK

Spells No Way-That's the spell caster's responsibility and no one else's. If it ain't written down, it ain't there!

Hit Points No Way-I'm not gonna let some other bozo keep track o' my hitpoints! If they don't do it, drop 'em on the 2nd hit. "I was keepin' track, and by my calculation you're eatin' dirt!"

Delegate that they should take care of their own damn characters. If they don't, you will and they won't like it one bit! Ya need to get some rat bastard DM in ya!

 

[Zappo]

They keep track of spells, major gold variations, magical items' charges, but sometimes a torch, an arrow, or a couple silver pieces vanish or appear. I've wrote a program to help me keep track of those things, but somehow my totals and the players' totals seem to deviate every now and then. I don't really mind, as long as it's minor stuff.

 

[Thanee]

Just as a fun side note... in the AD&D group of a friend of mine they once had that situation, where the DM 'angrily' said, that from that moment on (they were in the middle of some dungeon) they only had whatever they had written down on their sheets and nothing else!

One player responded: "Ok, then I put down my pig and let it run into the corridor!"

About the question:

In our games the players keep track of pretty much everything, initiative, damage, ammunition, treasure (for unidentified items we write down the page number next to it, in case of a published adventure for ease of reference), spells and so on.

Bye
Thanee