D&D 5E The Nature of the Shield Spell

[Sword of Spirit]

While that is nicely laid out, do you actually need all of that information? The main items I'd have thought are just the static ones like AC and passive perception and possible Spell DCs of casters or do you sometimes roll a player's save in secret to keep the mystery for something?

A scrap of paper with just the things you mentioned takes care of most of it.

I add the other things because we do sometimes roll things in secret, as well as using knowledge-type skills extensively to tell what basic starting info to give to characters, and languages are a thing in our games (for both communication and assumed character knowledge).

But really, just a few notes will work. I just like things organized.

I always find it funny when people say things 'slow down the play', how much faster are you getting by cutting out 10 sec of time a round in a 3 round combat? Saving 30 sec really speed up the game.

If every player is asked their AC every round of combat, or asked their Passive Perception every time you need it, etc, yeah, it can add up over the course of a campaign. It also breaks up the flow of the game. It would be like asking, "Are you sure you want to take this action?" every time someone declares their action. Or I can take 5 or so minutes and transcribe that info onto scrap paper about once per level.

 

[Mort]

. The DM should always have his player's stats in front of him. It just baffles me that so many DMs want to ask their players what they rolled each time, or "What's your AC? Does X hit?" Holy crap! You need players' AC all the time, just write it down!

It's certainly good and useful to have the players relevant stats. A cheat sheet like the one you use should be standard

That said, I got in the habit of, usually, just stating the number (such as for AC). Take AC in 3e - flat-footed AC? touch AC? regular AC? buffed AC? much easier and faster for me to just state the number and have the yes or no from the player than to keep track of all of those.

5e flattened this out, less factors, but the principle is still there.



Sent from my SM-G930V using EN World mobile app

 

[Tanin Wulf]

I always find it funny when people say things 'slow down the play', how much faster are you getting by cutting out 10 sec of time a round in a 3 round combat? Saving 30 sec really speed up the game.

I've played Exalted... once you can save me 5 or 6 minutes a combat... well, soon we'll be talking about real time!

 

[Sword of Spirit]

It's certainly good and useful to have the players relevant stats. A cheat sheet like the one you use should be standard

That said, I got in the habit of, usually, just stating the number (such as for AC). Take AC in 3e - flat-footed AC? touch AC? regular AC? buffed AC? much easier and faster for me to just state the number and have the yes or no from the player than to keep track of all of those.

5e flattened this out, less factors, but the principle is still there.

Yeah, I was talking with my roommate about the difference in our 3e games where you really couldn't keep track of AC. One of the great things about 5e is that you usually can due to concentration limiting the number of AC altering effects that might happen.

Just saying, "The goblin swings at Marcus: 17", and then starting to roll damage in case the player replies with "Hit" rather than "Miss" is a reasonable way to speed things up.