What is the best (most effecient) way to use a laptop while DMing

[dreaded_beast]

I feel the laptop can be a very useful tool while DMing. I have used one in every session that I DM.

However, I am not sure if I am using it to it's maximum potential. In all honesty, I believe the best thing from my laptop I have seen so far is a dice-roller and an XP calculator.

I also have the SRD and some session notes on the laptop, but I am starting to find that it is easier for me to look it up in the actual books or just print out my campaign notes and read them from paper.

Any suggestions on how I can make better use out of my laptop while DMing?

 

[Setanta]

I like DM's Familiar a lot. There are other in game aids, like DM Genie and Roleplaying Master, that people tend to really like as well. DM's Familiar has a lot of great features, making it easy to lookup monsters, feats, spells, etc. from a wide variety of sources. The combat management is very helpful as well. He has a free demo on his site. http://www.paladinpgm.com/dmf/

 

[pensiv]

I keep all of my NPC stats, the PC stats, the adventure outline and details, maps, creature stats, etc on the laptop. Essentially, almost everything is on the laptop. I let the players use the books at the table, but I reference rules from my copy of CMG's SRD Bundle

 

[evildmguy]

Ideas for your laptop

Greetings!

I have a laptop when I game and here are the tools I use on it when at the table. I mention them because I have found them to be extremely helpful! Many of them could be used even if there is no computer available at the table.

CCPro - Mapping software. I also use Fractal Terrains as well. This is a great mapping program! I have used it a lot and really like it!

(I have tried NBOS and it is good but I liked CCPro better, fwiw.)

Realm Overseer - I have Realm Overseer 3D, which allows me to convert my 2D maps from CCPro to a 3D format! I don't see a lot of use at it at the game although I have. It is a great tool. I don't think the company is supporting it anymore, though, which means that newer symbols are not supported.

TreePad Business Edition - A very good tree view with notes software program. It allows internet links, links to programs, embedded pictures and more! It has a great search capability as well. I am using this for all of my notes on the campaign and it is working well.

MSExcel - I use this to track combat and it works well. (For d20, I have a combat manager that I found on enworld.org but I think it was removed.) I also use this to track xp given as well as some character information. I also created a population spreadsheet to simulate population growth.

MSWord - I was using this for my campaign notes and other notes but Treepad has good (enough) word processing abilities and is easier to jump back and forth between notes. So, I haven't used it much since I got TreePad.

Milieu's WeatherMaster program - This is a very good program. I tested it against Kami's and it was much better due to the reports it can generate. It doesn't have much room for a log of events but as I use TreePad, this wasn't critical for me. I also wanted to generate the weather years at a time, and this does it well. It can't easily change generated weather, though, because it treats weather as an ongoing system. However, each day can easily be created as needed. A very good program.

(I did see that one of the d20 programs has a weather generator as part of their program. While WeatherMaster still wins for reports, it was good.)

Legacy - A genealogy program. I am using this to track the royal and noble houses. It is a LOT of work but will help out greatly and have some excellent reports.

BLAZONS - I use this program as it creates the word version of the heraldry. However, support has been terrible and the website hasn't been updated in over a year. It is good program and very helpful but these have really soured my experience with it.

Translators - I also found a language translation program to be able to fake some of the languages of my world. I use real world languages and try to be consistent in my speech, since I don't speak any other languages fluently!

Web - I am fortunate enough to be connected to the web via a wireless network so I can use the web to find things while playing. This helped me find some riddles during the session and I don't know if the players noticed! It does require knowing what you are looking for but it has been a great help.

FreeMind - This is some mind mapping software that is freeware. I haven't used it much yet but it will be very helpful in creating organization charts, like the thieves' guild, or any guild. I have found one that allows notes against each node, which would be nice, but it was very expensive. So, I accept that!

Obviously, I don't use all of them at every session. However, they have really helped me create my own world, track things that are happening in it and allowed me to have rich details in my game that don't bog down play.

I also use a digital audio recorder to record the session. I do find myself listening to them later if I need to remember something for my notes. I am still learning how to use it well. One thing I am doing is making index marks in the recording and then noting why I made it.

I am considering getting a web cam to have a visual recording as well but have limited myself to audio for the moment.

I have a printer connected to it to be able to print out anything I need or if my players need something as well. That is very handy!

I hope this is helpful! Have a good one! Take care!

edg

 

[Hand of Evil]

Dialog of descriptions - If you have time you can record your DM dialog of what the players see, this is a replacment of the DM box in modules. You can do sound effects too, the door creaking open, the dripping of water, fading foot steps, even create mood with light background music.

 

[DMFTodd]

Efficiency

If you're talking efficiency, then you have to ask yourself what your spend a lot of time doing in-game. The answer to that is probably - Combat. So if you'd like to be more efficient, then a getting your laptop to assist in combat would be the thing to look for.

A program that can keep track of initiative and make attack/damage rolls for you is going to tremendously speed up your combats. DM's Familiar does this as does Roleplaying Master, DM Genie, and GM Gen. I know that some people think having the computer roll the dice is heretical but there's no question that it will greatly speed up your game.

After combat, I find that looking up rules can slow things down. Does spell X effect constructs, does this monster have SR, how do you do a bull rush again, etc. A program that could help you find those answers quickly is helpful. DMF does that as well. Other people use HTML versions of the SRD (nice, but what if you have extra info to add?).

 

[Aluvial]

SRD, SRD, SRD!

Download a hyperlinked copy, it's the best.

I also use an XML program that has all of the spells, skills, monsters, feats, and charts in one place.

Three clicks to anything in the book that matters, especially the monsters and spells.

Aluvial

 

[Eccles]

Errr... SRD, XP, and Treasure Generation.

Contrary to everyone else who uses laptops, I find that setting the fights up on the machine slows me down a lot. I'm still using index cards and dice.

Besides, I like dice, dammit. Not to mention one of my players is sufficiently paranoid that he doesn't trust me to set up a true random roller on my laptop. Which I think is out of line, but never mind.

Still - it's the Treasure Generator which is the best bit. I *hate* rolling for blinking gems!

 

[AutoSponge]

XP calc, NPC generator, excel spreadsheets of the PCs (printable to PDF), all of my campaign notes in a GSNotes database (exports to HTML or PDF, it's about 110 MB now), every book I own as a PDF (most have bookmarks), maps with overlayed 6-mile hex grid in PDF, overland travel calc (still in testing so far), treasure generator, random wilderness encounter generator (it's a huge excel file I keep adding to), mass combat generator, campaign cartographer with the Forgotten Realms Atlas, DM's Familiar for fast lookup of non SRD things (especially dragon mag feats and spells), NPC equipment generator, demographics model spreadsheet, economic model spreadsheet, NPC background generator (not so happy with this one, maybe I'll work on it again soon), and all of the 3.5 index PDFs.

I don't use my laptop for dicerolling anymore. I prefer to roll everything in the open where the players can watch.

 

[pjrake]

I use it mainly for music. My laptop is hooked up to the net and with Rhapsody I have access to a variety of music.

Also my laptop is plugged into the TV and use it to show images.

PJ