Comments on: Tools of the Trade: What Gaming Software do you use?

By: Wimwick

Wimwick — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 04:24:44 +0000

Gamefiend, our sessions are interesting as most of us have our laptops out on the table when we play. One of us hosts the server and we all connect and view the maps via our laptop. On rare occassions someone will borrow a projector from work and we’ll display the map on the wall. Our group has never really embraced the mini movement.

Whoever is playing remotely just connects up via maptools. We use Teamspeak for voice communication. It works out rather well, though the individual playing remotely gets the short end of the stick as they miss most of the jokes told at the table.

I believe the new beta release for maptools has an initiative tracker built in and the macro features are fairly robust.

We should be writing a review on it within the next month or so. It’s a big part of how our group games and some really neat software.

By: gamefiend

gamefiend — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 01:42:28 +0000

I will check that out. Thanks!

By: Ladislaus

Ladislaus — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 04:24:05 +0000

For initiative tracking software, you may want to take a look at the most recent version of “Trackwork”:
http://www.playwrite-blog.net/tag/trackwork/

By: apotheon

apotheon — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 23:06:32 +0000

What requirements do you have for an initiative tracker? What do you want it to do?

Other than the GIMP, which I use for editing world maps, I mostly use software I write for myself. Once in a while, one of those tools ends up online. I don’t have any initiative tracking utilities, though, so I figured I’d ask what you would want out of such a tool and see if there’s any set of features I’d find compelling enough to want to write my own.

By: Rendragon

Rendragon — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 15:18:58 +0000

Thank you so much for this post! I just stumbled upon your blog this evening and like what I see. Admittedly, I do not use a whole lot of software at this time for my paper-based games. The one bit of software that I absolutely can’t live without, however, is “Personal Brain.” It can be found at http://www.thebrain.com/. I use it to keep my addled mind in order. Even the free version is useful for mind-mapping. The paid version lets you attach files, images, etc..

Thanks again.

By: gamefiend

gamefiend — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:18:45 +0000

@Wimwick –what is the setup you’re using to host the remote players? Do you have video? I’m very curious to know more details on that.

@Tom –welcome! yeah, I suck with Bezier. I could get used to it, but I need to spend my time with other things these days.

@JackofHearts — will definitely take another look at MapTools. I’ve used TokenTool in the past, and will be using it for my new online game definitely.

@Gregor — welcome! Pimp away! I’ll check these out. The Dice Tray does look cool.

Now, one piece of software I forgot is freemind. I use this for brainstorming and mocking out adventures. Between this and crawlnotes, I can flesh things out pretty rapidly these days.

By: Micah

Micah — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:01:47 +0000

*sigh* No love for Obsidian Portal

For me, it’s:

Obsidian Portal

Hypertext D20 SRD (still the best)

AutoRealm (very rarely, I almost never make maps)

By: Granger44

Granger44 — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 14:50:29 +0000

I use InitTool currently for initiative, combined with a dice roller (DiceChucker from Asmor), and OneNote for note taking and tracking.

I’d love to find something more along the lines of a combat manager to do everything (or as much as possible) but the note taking. There are several interesting candidates out there each with their pros and cons. The candidates include Turn Watcher, Virtual Combat Cards, InitTool (using custom properties), and Trackwork.

By: Gregor LeBlaque

Gregor LeBlaque — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 08:24:57 +0000

I haven’t pimped the tools I’ve written much recently, but since one of them is an init tracker I’ll put a link here

http://home.earthlink.net/~evildm/dd3e/tools/index.html

I’m pretty proud of my Dice Tray. I used it religiously when I played 3e, but so far the math in 4e is so simple (or at least easily read off power cards) that I’m back to physical dice.

By: JackOfHearts

JackOfHearts — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 00:17:38 +0000

Dundjinni for maps.

Google Sites for campaign wiki.

Teamspeak or Ventrilo for voice chat.

MapTools for online play (includes an initiative tracker, macros for abilities, etc – you need to look at this and all the development that has been done on it specifically for 4E)

TokenTool for making tokens for MapTools

Gimp for making tokens for my live game.