Information Management

My organization of files and information
I have a 4GB flash drive that I keep everything on with a directory structure as follows...

o1 Serpents Campaign (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=1173774)

Within this foder are two folders, a DM folder and a Player folder. In the DM folder are the following folders...

• Campaign Newsletters
• Adventure Episodes
• Encounters
• Supporting Characters (NPC's)
• Treasure Parcels
• Campaign History
• Maps
• Player Information
• Past Files
• Graphics

I generally move or copy graphics and maps from the Graphics folder listed above when I use them in the campaign. I also will extract pages from Dungeon Magazine and place them in the Adventure Episodes folder and then delete them or move them to Past Files folder when I'm done running that particular adventure.

The Player folder has a similar folder structure where I copy information from the DM folder so I know what information I've given the players.

04 Adventure Information (Conatains Dungeon and Dragon Magazines in seperate folders)

07 Graphics (folders within to store NPC pictures, maps, and clipart)
Additionally I keep a 1.5 inch white d-ring binder with tabs in it with the same folder structure used in the DM folder on the Flash Drive so that if I print anything out I can keep it organized too.

It took some time to organize everything this way, but once it was done I noticed that I could focus more on world, plot, and encounter building and when I had an idea for an encounter or adventure I could quikly type it up and throw it in a folder to easily find and build off of later.

Email with James Wyatt

I recently emailed James Wyatt, the D&D design manager at Wizards of the Coast. Since he runs and plays in various games I asked him for some advice on Treasure Parcels, he responded with the following...

"I humbly think they're the easiest method of treasure distribution the game has ever had. Because parcels aren't specifically tied to encounters, you can give them out any time and in any way you want to.
And because you have a list of parcels you can cross off, you don't have to keep a running tally of how much gold you've given out, just check off parcels as you give them out.

* I handle them by writing a list in my notebook of the 11 parcels I need to give out over the course of each character level (11 because I have a group of 6 players). Because I don't do a whole lot of prep for my game, I leave the magic items blank ("level 5 item") and just write down the gp values of the other parcels. I give out parcels when the inspiration strikes me, but usually at the end of an encounter or a session. But sometimes in the middle of a fight, like when vines started coiling around Turuk, turning his armor into life vine armor.
When the characters reached 2nd level, I still had a couple of parcels I hadn't given out, so I copied them onto the same page where I wrote the list of 2nd-level parcels, to make sure I catch up. I spent a little time a couple of weeks ago looking at what items I had given out so far, seeing who didn't have an item, and penciling in items meant to appeal to the other characters. At some point, I might ask the players for wish lists, but given this group I'm not sure I'll get much of a response!

* I'm pretty sure that Mike does pretty much the same thing in his lunchtime game. Periodically he'll send around an email asking what magic items we have so he can make sure he's keeping up and giving out items that appeal to all the characters.
* Andy uses wish lists, and actually has us set up on a rotation, so the characters take turns finding items from their lists. If I'm lax in giving him a wish list, and my turn for an item comes up, I might find an unspecified 7th-level item and have the freedom to choose what it actually is."

Blogging

From reading someone's blog post I thought I'd give this a try and see how it looked. The person started out saying to place a picture that caught the reader's attention and then lead into the bog with large gripping text.

After the large paragraph of text you could then go in and write what your current post was about. I thought I would start with a snowflake and the reason I chose the image being that I'm a designer for an industrial refrigeration company. We install refrigeration systems in warehouses for cooling or freezing product before it is shipped out to restaurants and stores.

Some markets around the U.S. aren't doing so well but we've been fortunate that the food industry seems to be strong. How's your industry and the company you work for doing?

Campaign Thoughts

I've been building up ideas and treasure parcels for a sequel to a Campaign called Sword of Seprpents that I've been running on-and-off now for about seven or so years. The campaign started using Dungeons & Dragons Second Edition and evolved to Third edition, but the sequel will be done in Fourth Edition. See Serpent Campaign in the sidebar to the right for more details.

A blog by Greywulf has an interesting blog called Confessions of a Lazy DM (http://blog.microlite20.net/tag/lazygm/), but I don't see his ideas as "Lazy" per say, I see them as creatively efficient. I use quite a number of these "Lazy" techniques myself because I feel that a good in depth background, story, and descriptive world building are more deserving of my time than building encounters. A good combat is important, but shouldn't be a place where lots of time is burned away when you could be creating a nasty memorable villain or some incredible backdrop where the encounter will take place.