Help a GM get the most out of a laptop!

[Lappy9000]

Well, I finally got a laptop. Aside from other nice practical uses, I imagine it can be used to spice up my sessions quite a bit. However, after years of using 'notes' on scratch paper and nothing more advanced than a whiteboard for initiative, I'm at a bit of a loss for where to start.

Does anyone who runs games with a laptop have any suggestions?

[Dsurion]

EDIT: My bad, I thought this was in the 3.5 subforum

Spoilering the D&D stuff...

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My first step was to download the SRD here:

http://dndsrd.net/

Easily searchable and very easy to find things. And unlike the more popular d20srd.org, you don't have to have an active internet connection =)

I keep all of my pertinent information for a given session in one document (usually dated, too), usually with vague outlines of what I'm going to be doing, notes for certain situations, and very occasionally exact phrases to read aloud.

...Or, pretty much everything you'd likely be doing on paper anyway.

It's also highly convenient to store character sheet backups and such. Or, if you REALLY need to for whatever reason, use a dice-roller program.

[Volos]

Dice roller programs can terrify players. I was clicking through the SRD, looking between two different monsters since the wizard just summoned some minions and they were fighting an orge mage. They thought I was clicking for dice rolls and got all cautious. It was a bit of meta-gaming on their part, which turned out to be harmless fun for me.

On a more serious note though, you can use your laptop to display amazing images to your players. These can be maps of the campaign world, portraits of NPCs or monsters, or even visual puzzles that the players will have to figure out. If a well placed sound effect will add to your narritive, use it! If low volume music can help to set the tone, then let it play.

[Oracle_Hunter]

I run all my games off my laptop - but I bet I do it rather inefficiently.

For D&D I use:

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- Microsoft Word for "DM's Notes," general bookkeeping (e.g. in-game calendar, loot), setting notes and adventure notes. I often keep up to a dozen such open at a time for easy switching.

- Microsoft Excel for combat. I use the "highest-to-lowest" to keep my Initiative straight and to note conditions & HP.

- (4e Only) DDI for all rules questions and quick-reference for Player powers and such. Requires an active internet connection.

Initiative & note-taking are the two areas that I get the most boost out of my laptop. By keeping all my notes in different documents I can easily find what I need to reference and never risk losing important bits of information. Initiative tracking via Excel means that I can easily slot people into and out of order without losing track of whose turn it is and when a round ends.

[valadil]

The most useful thing for me is Dropbox. It's an app that shares a folder on your computer between several different machines. It means I can take notes at work and have them show up at home.

[Asheram]

Initiative tracking via Excel means that I can easily slot people into and out of order without losing track of whose turn it is and when a round ends.

Excel can also be wonderful as a dice roller.
Using the RANDBETWEEN(bottom,top) and turning off the automatic calculations you can make quick rolls for spells, attacks, initiative, at the press of a button.

[GeekGirl]

Personally, I don't like dice rolling software. I like real dice, but thats just me.

I use my laptop for story note, and monster sheets mostly. I want to start using it for initiative, but haven't yet. I write my note during the game down in a notebook still and copy it over to word later.

For 3.5 I usually have

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Sometimes my player some across things I didn't plan for.
http://www.dnd-wiki.org/wiki/SRD open.

[Cyrion]

I use mine to keep track of spells and feats to keep us from having to search a million books when we don't remember where it came from. I've used Access, but you could use Word or Excel depending on what you want it to be able to do.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

If you have a projector or large TV where you play, you can use it for maps. I ran a dungeon crawl last semester for which I made all of my maps electronically and then, using GIMP's layer function, covered it with black and gray layers so I could reveal the map in sections at a time. It really makes dungeon crawls fun when players can see their characters exploring the dungeon levels and see how far they've come.

[Xyk]

It is MUCH easier to secretly roll a dice program than to secretly roll dice. Also, notes are more easily organized and changed on a computer than on paper (no erasing or scratching out). I have a map on my computer, as well as books and books and books. You can scan you player's sheets so that you can see them on your magic screen.

Prepare to have a ton of windows open.

[ericgrau]

www.d20srd.org
maptools

Write all of the PC's and monsters important stats in Excel. The following formula will add a d20 to a cell: =ROUNDDOWN(A1+20*RAND()+1,0) . Replace A1 with the cell that you want to add d20 to. All the random numbers will change every time you edit the sheet. My favorite way to do this is to delete an empty cell, essentially doing nothing while still triggering a sheet edit. Bam, instant secret skill checks from the entire party. Or initiatives, etc. Heck use the data => sort routine to put the PCs in order. It'll change the random initiatives again so you won't know what they were but the PCs will still be in order, so who cares.

If you want to get extra fancy, try =IF(B1>=$C1, "PASS", ""). Put all the check results in the same row. Replace $C1 with a cell that contains the check DC in that row. Don't forget the $ in front of the letter. Replace B1 with the check result. Bam now you also see all the PCs that passed the check. if you put all the check resuls in the same column (not the same row) then use C$1 instead of $C1 and likewise put the DC in that column.

[randomhero00]

Let's see.

Use microsoft excel for initiativ/ hps.

Use word or whatever for story line.

use calculator in place of a ton of dice if you have the right program.

use it to keep track of loot and everything that's gone on.

[The Cat Goddess]

It is MUCH easier to secretly roll a dice program than to secretly roll dice. Also, notes are more easily organized and changed on a computer than on paper (no erasing or scratching out). I have a map on my computer, as well as books and books and books. You can scan you player's sheets so that you can see them on your magic screen.

Prepare to have a ton of windows open.

I occasionally roll dice and "take notes" for no reason other than to make my players wonder what is happening.

[Seerow]

Also encouraging the suggestion of a dice roller for hidden rolls here. Still roll real dice most of the time, but when you for example need spot checks, or a sense motive check, and dont want the players to be suspicious, just use the dice roller.

Maptools is also really nice if everyone has a laptop, or if you have a bigger screen you can put maptools on everyone can see.

[GeekGirl]

I occasionally roll dice and "take notes" for no reason other than to make my players wonder what is happening.

Same here.

Maptools is also really nice if everyone has a laptop, or if you have a bigger screen you can put maptools on everyone can see.

As nice of a program as maptools is, I hate using it. One of my groups uses it all the time (our DM lives kinda far), I like what it tries and its a cool idea, but I just don't like actually using it. Also as DM my Laptop is the only one allowed at teh table. Few exceptions to the rule, but its easier to not let people have them than avoid the distraction they can cause.

[Goober4473]

The most useful thing for me is Dropbox. It's an app that shares a folder on your computer between several different machines. It means I can take notes at work and have them show up at home.

+1 to this.

Notes, initiative order, etc. are all really nice to have on Notepad, and you don't need to print out your NPC stats.

I also keep as many books in PDF form on my laptop as I can, and only bring physical copies of books the players might need to pass around.

[Edit]: If you have internet access where you play, it gets even more useful. You can Google soem setting info on a published setting, load up a dice roller without needing to download one in advance, etc. And if everyone at the table has a laptop, you can keep an IM client open in order to send secret messages to individual players. Plus, realtime updating character sheets on Google Docs.

[alchemyprime]

I will admit, I use my laptop a LOT for D&D. I write up custom monsters or set up encounters on it in OpenOffice Writer, use OpenOffice Calc to track initiative, HP, statuses, and etc. I have tons of applications to help set up encounters, and use it to keep notes on awesome stuff that happens for later battles.

Oh, the fighter has an intense fear of insect related demons now? Wunderbar... The wizard has a hatred of trolls? Lets toss a few around.

It works out really well. Also, I can keep reference cards of all the monsters as cards. Very useful. Thank goodness for the Magic Set Editor.

And my favorite thing to do is get nice background music from video games and movies. The battle gets that much more intense with music from Van Helsing, Batman Begins or Kingdom Hearts behind it.

[Friv]

I maintain a small campaign wiki. During the session, I can update the wiki's calender and session notes, and between sessions the players can refresh their memories about things that they might otherwise forget.

[SexyPlantLover]

"Welcome, to the world of tommorrow!"

I use my laptop in so many ways: campaign notes, premade maps and modules, pdf copies of books, hooked by hdmi to my tv to show images to the players, and my favorite way is random generators. here are a couple of my favorite links.
need a treasure pile or wagon of items: http://donjon.bin.sh/d20/treasure/
much fun was had with a maze trap in 3d: http://www.astrolog.org/labyrnth/java.htm

i still use solid dice for my games, and insist on them at my table, although anyone who wants to bring their laptop can.

[alchemyprime]

"Welcome, to the world of tommorrow!"

I use my laptop in so many ways: campaign notes, premade maps and modules, pdf copies of books, hooked by hdmi to my tv to show images to the players, and my favorite way is random generators. here are a couple of my favorite links.
need a treasure pile or wagon of items: http://donjon.bin.sh/d20/treasure/
much fun was had with a maze trap in 3d: http://www.astrolog.org/labyrnth/java.htm

i still use solid dice for my games, and insist on them at my table, although anyone who wants to bring their laptop can.

All ways I use mine too! One I just thought of:

Put your Slideshow on Random and make a folder of pictures of monsters and a folder of pictures of treasure and rewards. Then let the right arrow key decide what to dole out!

[Toofey]

I hate to say it but I always found the use of a laptop to be an impediment to live play. I've tried using it as my reference (I'm faster with the books in front of me and can use not having the laptop in front of me as an excuse not to look up obscure materials on the fly because one of my players may remember something from one that should give them a +X, It's not about the bonus, it's about the lost time)When I tried using them for maps etc... I Just didn't like how things came out, and the maps on the computer couldn't be used for fights so I was still drawing those maps anyway (I keep a sheaf of newsprint and a pack of crayons for such things)

I use my computers as my books when I'm doing prep work outside of play, but like I said at the top it just never worked for me DMing.

Honestly though, It's sometimes helpful when a player has one with the materials accessible.

[AslanCross]

I've been using a laptop with DMing from the start.

1. I use it extensively for prep. I use OneNote for writing up statblocks, modifications to modules, and any other thing I can do pre-game.

2. I use it as a reference during the game, but I tend to print out statblocks too. I look up things much faster on paper, however, things like the SRD I can easily look up online.

3. Music. The group likes BGMs for games.

[TheThan]

Lap tops are wonderful Dm screens since they naturally block the view of your notes from your players.
But if you need a list of things you can use your shiny new lappy for here are some.

Campaign notes
NPC/ monster stats
Store pictures of places/npcs/ other things
Digital backup character sheets (also gives you access to the players’ sheets so you can keep an eye on them, or just use it to check stats, saves etc without having to ask).
You can store rules on your lap top, I believe the SRD for 3.5 is a free download.
Internet access gives you access to tons of resources like this website for instance.
Maps of areas/battle grids/dungeons/towns, etc (particularly good if you’ve got a touch screen laptop
Dice roller programs
Combat tracking, keeping track of spells, special abilities, HP, initiative etc.

[mathemagician]

Maptool was mentioned before, and should mentioned again, if you combine with a projector/TV, it can be used to support a lot of automation or just function as a battlemat. By automation, I mean you can actually fully integrate your character sheet: click on a button to use your stealth check, or make your attack roll (and verify that it hit or miss without revealing the enemy's defense) etc. It's got great support for fog of war, and vision, if you connect a 2nd laptop to use as the players view.

There's some pretty extreme projects out there, like this digital game table ;)
http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/13391...medium=1339130

Now that would spice up your computer! One guy even built a frame to point a projector down, and then used foam to sculpt 3d terrain then projected the maptool interface onto it.

But I digress.

Maptool is also completely system agnostic- it has exploding dice for shadowrun, fudge dice, etc.

The rptools.net forums are really active too- Maptool is very much community driven, and as such, people have fully functioning frameworks for various systems (4e, pathfinder, nWoD I believe, and more), but will also bend over backwards to help you get your own system into the mix.

[Cirrhosis]

in place of Word or Open Office, i'd suggest evernote (unsurprisingly, you can find it at evernote.com) for campaign/character notes. opens faster, allows easy management of multiple notes, syncs it all to their servers so you can access and edit the notes from anywhere you can log in to evernote (including an iOS device, like the iphone), can clip and store chunks of PDFs and websites as notes for quick reference. in short, it's useful. i stopped using word processors for game notes almost immediately after i started using evernote.

in the unlikely event that what you purchased is a Mac (you probably would have mentioned it), SpellbookMaster is fantastically useful for 3.5/pathfinder games (it can be found here: http://petteri.kamppuri.fidisk.fi/spellbookmaster/).

[Tyndmyr]

Does anyone who runs games with a laptop have any suggestions?

1. Maps. Downloading maps from the internets is lovely.
2. Playlists. Some good background music is fantastic.
3. Dice roller. I prefer real dice myself, but some swear by these. Or at them, depending.
4. Character sheets. I'm a fan of myth-weavers. Being able to log on anywhere and tap into a laundry list of premade characters is quite handy.
5. The SRD. Finding rules with a quick search is quite handy. If you've already got it up in a browser window, it'll only take you a second or three to find the exact rule you need without slowing down the game.

[LibraryOgre]

Here's a few things I use mine for:

I have a spreadsheet I use for data collection during a session. It's pretty customized, so I don't think it would be useful for you, specifically, but I keep

*Session notes (especially monsters killed and treasure not yet allocated to XP)
*Character notes (notes about characterization of NPCs, especially, but also race/class combinations, PC names, HP tracker, etc).
*Loot, as in what magic items everyone currently has, and what is in their bag of holding.
*XP calculation (I'll set up little formulas to run it all out for me, then add things together in another column)

I'll occasionally set up background music and such (especially using the Quest for Glory soundtrack), but most of my groups find it distracting.

I have, in the past, loaded apropos pictures onto it, so I could show people what they're seeing; lacking artistic ability, it's usually kinda off, but enough to get them the idea.

I prefer to roll my dice, so I don't use a dice roller.

Part of it is going to be making sure that the laptop HELPS. Don't have a laptop for having a laptop's sake. I think it's great for session notes and the occasional multimedia, but I distrust it for anything that I'd want a custom program for.

[Tyndmyr]

Loot is fantastic. I do prefer pre-rolling loot for monsters, so they can use it in a realistic fashion. There are some various calculators out there online for this as well.

[LibraryOgre]

Loot is fantastic. I do prefer pre-rolling loot for monsters, so they can use it in a realistic fashion. There are some various calculators out there online for this as well.

In C&C, I've actually come up with several pre-rolled loots for various treasure types.

[Nepenthe]

I recently started using FreeMind to map out my campaign notes.