Clint_L
Legend
Note: this was already brought up in another thread but I can't find it, and having played around with it, I think it deserves it's own thread as this, for me, is becoming a game-changing tool. But I want to give all credit to whoever first posted about using Notebook LM for a campaign on this forum. I first became familiar with this tool through my work.
Notebook LM is an AI that is integrated with Google, but it is very different from generative AIs such as ChatGPT in that you can restrict it to just using the material that you supply...such as all your notes and all other material, including character sheets, images, and even sounds that you create for a D&D campaign. I have found it extrenely useful for collating and distilling all of that material and then helping me see story threads and possibilities that were sitting right there but easy to miss in all the complexity of a campaign. It is also very good at suggesting bespoke elements to add to the campaign, and helping you quickly build out your own ideas.
For example, I just decided that I need a puzzle trap element leading up to an epic encounter, and asked it to suggest something that posed a challenge for each character, based on their skills, attributes, and personal journey, that would fit in tonally as a kind of build-up to what will be the captsone event of a six month arc. It went through everything I'd written so far, everything the players had given for character notes, and every session outline so offer some really rich ideas for me to iterate on.
So, this is fantastic, because it's all being drawn from my own work (and a bit of my players), and it isn't trying to replace me but allowing me to see order within the chaos, so to speak, so that I can build a more cohesive story. And it doesn;t "forget" what we were working on, because it's all contained in the notebook (which easily accesses files, docs, etc.).
Another strong feature is that you can build separate notebooks for separate tasks. So, aside from my main campaign notebook, I made another that is just character notes from the players and the session summaries (I write these up and add photos at the end of each session). So this notebook is very player facing in that there are no secrets, but anyone can use it for recaps, to build stuff for their own character, etc.. To test it, I had the "studio" feature of Notebook LM create a podcast recapping the campaign so far. I think it did a phenomenal job of distilling many hours down to a very listenable summary and analysis which will be perfect for players to use to refresh themselves, or for new players to use as part of the onboarding.
Notebook LM is an AI that is integrated with Google, but it is very different from generative AIs such as ChatGPT in that you can restrict it to just using the material that you supply...such as all your notes and all other material, including character sheets, images, and even sounds that you create for a D&D campaign. I have found it extrenely useful for collating and distilling all of that material and then helping me see story threads and possibilities that were sitting right there but easy to miss in all the complexity of a campaign. It is also very good at suggesting bespoke elements to add to the campaign, and helping you quickly build out your own ideas.
For example, I just decided that I need a puzzle trap element leading up to an epic encounter, and asked it to suggest something that posed a challenge for each character, based on their skills, attributes, and personal journey, that would fit in tonally as a kind of build-up to what will be the captsone event of a six month arc. It went through everything I'd written so far, everything the players had given for character notes, and every session outline so offer some really rich ideas for me to iterate on.
So, this is fantastic, because it's all being drawn from my own work (and a bit of my players), and it isn't trying to replace me but allowing me to see order within the chaos, so to speak, so that I can build a more cohesive story. And it doesn;t "forget" what we were working on, because it's all contained in the notebook (which easily accesses files, docs, etc.).
Another strong feature is that you can build separate notebooks for separate tasks. So, aside from my main campaign notebook, I made another that is just character notes from the players and the session summaries (I write these up and add photos at the end of each session). So this notebook is very player facing in that there are no secrets, but anyone can use it for recaps, to build stuff for their own character, etc.. To test it, I had the "studio" feature of Notebook LM create a podcast recapping the campaign so far. I think it did a phenomenal job of distilling many hours down to a very listenable summary and analysis which will be perfect for players to use to refresh themselves, or for new players to use as part of the onboarding.
