Ad-Hoc D&D

There isn't much that you can't do these days as long as you have the right gadgets. This became especially true last night, as I found myself in a situation where a couple of friends wanted to game but I didn't have any of the regular stuff one would need to run a small encounter (monsters, map, dice, DM books, etc...). That is when I pulled out a pair of devices that are rarely ever out of arm's reach: my iPod, and my phone.

There are 3 big iPod apps that I want to spotlight, though I only needed one of them last night. No DM with an iPod Touch (or iPhone) should be without these three apps. And any player who has either of those devices and is worth his salt will have at least two of them. The first is Dice Bag, which, as the name implies, is a simple dice rolling application. It has your d4 - d20, and also includes the percentile roll, and the standard 3d6 and 4d6 (drop the lowest) that one would typically use when creating PC's for a 3.X game (or perhaps Pathfinder; don't know, and honestly don't really care).

The next application, and I may have mentioned this in the past, is i4e. This app is a basic character sheet, with you always on your iPod. Its great for players to track their PC's in combat, but it does lack a few things that have stunted me in the past. First, it does not include Action Points. Secondly, it doesn't record gear. It records your weapons, but not armor or other items that you may have. The other thing that needs to be looked at by the designers is including power listings. I created a warden, I had to manually enter each and every power that my PC has. It didn't include my racials (which would've been useful had I remembered them myself - different topic, different day) and certainly didn't include any of my powers from PH2 or Primal Power. So designers, if you're reading this, FIX THESE THINGS!!! Otherwise, I love that app. "You want to hear about my character? Okay!" Of course, no one wants to hear about your PC, but again, different topic, different day.

The third app is DMs Tracker which is an initiative/combat tracking application. I haven't actually used this app yet, but from what I understand it works similar to Fantasy Grounds or Masterplan, but is really just a bare-bones approach. Because of my lack of usage of this app, I really don't have much to say about it at this time.

Those things are all on my iPod, and you can find them just as easily at the iTunes store. No jailbreak required!

Actually, the players had dice so I really didn't even need to use my iPod (but could have, that's the point). It was my phone that did most of the heavy lifting for me. Now, if I had an iPhone, or at least had been in a wi-fi zone, I wouldn't have needed the phone (I'm trying to say, would've only required one device -- overlooking the fact that the iPhone/iPod Touch will only allow you to have a single app open at any given time...). I didn't have any of my books or grids, but I did have my minis! So I needed an encounter.

Using my phone's Internet capabilities, and my D&D Insider Subscription, within minutes I had downloaded a module from Dungeon Magazine from WotC's website. Taking only another minute or two to find an encounter and get the basics in my head, we were able to play a quick session of D&D without any prep, or warning. The players grabbed up some PC's that were lying around, and we got to play some ad-hoc D&D. And it was good.

1d4+5 is an RPG blog with a heavy D&D (4E) flavor. It is updated once or twice a week without warning. Be sure to give me credit for any material that you use from my musings, and you can follow DM_Ron on Twitter. Keep rolling those 20's!!!

Technilogical Advances in Modern DM-ing

The birth of 4th Edition was one of the biggest things that ever happened to make the life of a typical (or not-so-typical) DM easier. And everyday more people make it easier and easier. Podcasters and bloggers such as myself bring you advice to bring to your gaming table to get the most out of your gaming; but its the programmers that bring some of the biggest things to the table. The majority of the table-top gamers out there are unaware of this.

On Saturday I was playing in a one-shot delve with one of the local Meetup groups. The DM had his laptop, which to me isn't that uncommon anymore, but when I found out what he was using it for it blew my mind. He was using Fantasy Grounds to keep track of initiative. It didn't seem that great to me until he showed me what else it did. The program kept track of conditions, HP, defenses, attacks, recharges for the enemies, saving throws, you name it, the program made sure it was taken care of before it would move on to the next creature in initiative.

Now, I'm sure most of you have already heard of Fantasy Grounds, so I decided to see what else I could find. At http://www.asmor.com/programs/digitalsquire/index.php I found Digital Squire, a program designed for players to use so that the table doesn't get cluttered up with a bunch of papers and books. Its designed to be used in conjunction with D&D Insider's Character Builder and D&D Compendium, but if you're not a subscriber you can still use the program just fine, but you'll have more work to do. If you're a non-subscriber, you can still download the Character Builder, but you'll only be able to use that to build a PC up to 3rd level. Digital Squire works like Fantasy Grounds, but for the player to keep track of his PC. It will track most conditions, and I think they're working on an update to cover what's missing. This is also a free program, but it is more designed to be used with an internet connection. If you don't have a connection where you're playing, don't worry; you can download a stand-alone version as well.

I also discovered DMs Tracker, an app for your i-Phone or i-Pod Touch! It costs about $4 and is used as an initiative/combat tracker. You have to enter all the information before starting your game session, so its a little lengthy of a process, and it too is missing one or two conditions, but it'll track your combat similar, but not equal to, Fantasy Grounds. But for $4 compared to $40, if you don't have the money DMs Tracker is the way to go.

When I dicover some more good ones I'll let you all know! If anybody else knows of any other good programs/applications post it in the comments! Tomorrow, back to our regularly scheduled programming on 1d4+5!