I am not currently involved in a Dungeons & Dragons (D & D) game, as we have only been able to meet about 4 times this year, and the game I was Dungeon Master (DM) for was put on hiatus so that I could focus on other things, and maybe get more regular attendees.
However, one thing I found particularly useful was my cell phone’s digital camera feature. I would take my cardboard tiles that have landscape printed on them and lay them out to create a place for the miniatures to fight creatures, when I was planning for a gaming session. The problem was trying to remember where to put everything later.
I started taking pictures of my layouts while planning. Especially if the landscape needed to change and I had to re-use some of the pieces, I’d need to take photos of each stage of the landscape. This came incredibly handy, because I didn’t have to pull it up on my laptop where the players might see things and spoil the fun. I’d just pull out my cell phone and take a look at my photos there and have things laid out exactly as I wanted.
This isn’t just handy for planning – you can also photograph exactly which squares your player’s miniature figures are in during a battle that has to pause because you’ve run out of time to play for that session. That makes it easy to break down and clean-up, and then set it all back up exactly as-is for the next session’s continuation of that same battle.
I know this isn’t an original idea; I’ve heard of guys using Polaroids and other such tricks to keep their setups from session to session. This is easy and convenient, and I hope any of you still playing D & D find this tip useful.
For more tips that are practical and useful, check out MyThings.com.
