So I've attempted GMing a couple times over the years, and a big issue I've always had is with keeping everything in my head. I'm not great at notetaking, and I'm curious if anybody has any tips about what to focus my attention on, and/or any notekeeping tools they use? I've seen a couple of those story writing things like Campfire and I don't want to dive in and learn a system (and more importantly pay money) if there are better options around.
You can set up a "folder" with separate "notebooks" on different campaign aspects inside. One notebook is solely for jotting down potential ideas, so it's very sparse and doesn't make much sense. Another notebook is specifically for building the world of the campaign: player characters and their backstories and the history of the world (for me). A third notebook I have is for the planning and recaps of the sessions presented in an outline.
So for a note of "Session X" the week before, I'll recap what happened last time for myself (I also actually verbally recap at each session), and then make an outline of potential paths, usually about 3-4. For example, if we leave off in a town where something important happened, my potential paths would be:
Leave Town
Investigate Plot A further
Further idea of what NPCs that can help with Plot A
Investigate Character A's Backstory
Think of what the player may want to do and come up with supplements
The Next Thing I Might Want Them to Investigate In Case They Don't Pick Up On The Hints
Those are usually where I start off on pre-planning. I also make sure to remind my players of information their characters would know to help them make decisions. Then on the day of the session, I will highlight in green what actually happened. If the players improvise something, I'll jot down what they did as a new section of the outline of whatever path they went with. Evernote also makes it easy to copy+paste between notes and you can even paste links to other notes to quickly jump between them.
It is handy as can also access via phone when out and about.
I have each tab set as a table:
Region
Location (towns/villages inside a region)
Place (buildings etc in a location)
NPCs
Players
Plot
Session log
Then have different table properties for each tab. Another main thing that is handy is you can @ anything you have referred to else where and it does a two way link. This page is linked to the other one and the other one now shows a link back to this one.
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All posts come with the caveat that I don't know what I'm talking about.
I take copious notes during a game. About 2ish A5 pages of points per hour. I keep a binder with sections for each PC including key backstory, goals and plot developments. I also keep a section for key locations or NPC’s. Like a tavern the group bought, where it is and who they hired to run it. And then I keep a seperate notepad which is essentially an ideas journal.
I've been using excel (or google sheets) almost exclusively for my dnd prep for about a year now and I honestly prefer it to any specialized tools I have tried in the past. During the game, I just take notes (either on paper or on my laptop with notepad) of what important things happened, npc names I came up with on the fly,... and organize them in a sheet later on.
You could always record the gaming session and review the recording later, and makes notes from it.
Although this works, it is extremely time consuming.
We play online using Foundry VTT, and I have a session notes journal entry and several others for things like NPCs they have met, interactions with those NPCs, and other things I have told them. I also pre-make a lot of stuff ahead of time so I can refer to it as we play. Fortunately Foundry allows you to have folders and sub-folders so it makes things easy to track. But if you don't have that, OneNote can do the same thing.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I know you said free, so my solution as I use it isn't for you, but when I am preparing I use Obsidian Portal because I can hyperlink by typing [[Character]] or [[Town]] or whatever. I can link everything together and bounce through all my notes very quickly. In the game itself, I can add just as easily, which I usually just use the Adventure Log for that and then add content later to the other areas as needed (new NPCs, where we diverged from the trail and anything notable that needs to be added to the background or changes to the story path). You can do the same thing with a Wiki. As a player, I'll take my notes very similarly and afterwards develop out things I know about the world and people we have talked to so that if I need to find them again I have a shortlist of links I can click through.
You could always record the gaming session and review the recording later, and makes notes from it.
This is sort of what I do. After we finish the session, I write down, in 5-7 paragraphs, what happened during the session. If I can't remember anything, I check the recording.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Homebrew (Mostly Outdated):Magic Items,Monsters,Spells,Subclasses ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
So here is another idea I should have mentioned...
I ask one player after each session to write up an in-character journal or diary entry. So far they have been pretty good about it, although once in a while someone waits until the day of the next session to submit it. I then post them to a website but you could easily just email them around. It allows the player to RP a little bit in between sessions and "get into" the character's head, but the 22 or so journal entries we have also serve as a great log of what has been done so far.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
As a record of what happened each session I told the players that their character would start the next game session with advantage if they wrote up a summary of the previous game session - either from an in-character point of view, or an out-of-character point of view.
It saves me having to write up the summary :-)
Of course, it doesn't include all the notes I need to make about what the players don't know happened during the session.
It also helps me understand what the PCs think is happening (which isn't always what's really happening).
One of the reasons I don't use pre-made adventures is because I have a hard time following them.
So I write all of my modules. I write out in advance the days story line and any major dialog. By the time I run it I know it very well. Then I don't need to take notes, I can go back if necessary. By the time my current epic is done I will have enough material to write a book.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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So I've attempted GMing a couple times over the years, and a big issue I've always had is with keeping everything in my head. I'm not great at notetaking, and I'm curious if anybody has any tips about what to focus my attention on, and/or any notekeeping tools they use? I've seen a couple of those story writing things like Campfire and I don't want to dive in and learn a system (and more importantly pay money) if there are better options around.
I just use evernote (without a subscription).
You can set up a "folder" with separate "notebooks" on different campaign aspects inside. One notebook is solely for jotting down potential ideas, so it's very sparse and doesn't make much sense. Another notebook is specifically for building the world of the campaign: player characters and their backstories and the history of the world (for me). A third notebook I have is for the planning and recaps of the sessions presented in an outline.
So for a note of "Session X" the week before, I'll recap what happened last time for myself (I also actually verbally recap at each session), and then make an outline of potential paths, usually about 3-4. For example, if we leave off in a town where something important happened, my potential paths would be:
Those are usually where I start off on pre-planning. I also make sure to remind my players of information their characters would know to help them make decisions. Then on the day of the session, I will highlight in green what actually happened. If the players improvise something, I'll jot down what they did as a new section of the outline of whatever path they went with. Evernote also makes it easy to copy+paste between notes and you can even paste links to other notes to quickly jump between them.
I like to use Notion.
It is handy as can also access via phone when out and about.
I have each tab set as a table:
Region
Location (towns/villages inside a region)
Place (buildings etc in a location)
NPCs
Players
Plot
Session log
Then have different table properties for each tab. Another main thing that is handy is you can @ anything you have referred to else where and it does a two way link. This page is linked to the other one and the other one now shows a link back to this one.
All posts come with the caveat that I don't know what I'm talking about.
I take copious notes during a game. About 2ish A5 pages of points per hour. I keep a binder with sections for each PC including key backstory, goals and plot developments. I also keep a section for key locations or NPC’s. Like a tavern the group bought, where it is and who they hired to run it. And then I keep a seperate notepad which is essentially an ideas journal.
I've been using excel (or google sheets) almost exclusively for my dnd prep for about a year now and I honestly prefer it to any specialized tools I have tried in the past.
During the game, I just take notes (either on paper or on my laptop with notepad) of what important things happened, npc names I came up with on the fly,... and organize them in a sheet later on.
You could always record the gaming session and review the recording later, and makes notes from it.
Although this works, it is extremely time consuming.
We play online using Foundry VTT, and I have a session notes journal entry and several others for things like NPCs they have met, interactions with those NPCs, and other things I have told them. I also pre-make a lot of stuff ahead of time so I can refer to it as we play. Fortunately Foundry allows you to have folders and sub-folders so it makes things easy to track. But if you don't have that, OneNote can do the same thing.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I know you said free, so my solution as I use it isn't for you, but when I am preparing I use Obsidian Portal because I can hyperlink by typing [[Character]] or [[Town]] or whatever. I can link everything together and bounce through all my notes very quickly. In the game itself, I can add just as easily, which I usually just use the Adventure Log for that and then add content later to the other areas as needed (new NPCs, where we diverged from the trail and anything notable that needs to be added to the background or changes to the story path). You can do the same thing with a Wiki. As a player, I'll take my notes very similarly and afterwards develop out things I know about the world and people we have talked to so that if I need to find them again I have a shortlist of links I can click through.
This is sort of what I do. After we finish the session, I write down, in 5-7 paragraphs, what happened during the session. If I can't remember anything, I check the recording.
All stars fade. Some stars forever fall.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Homebrew (Mostly Outdated): Magic Items, Monsters, Spells, Subclasses
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If there was no light, people wouldn't fear the dark.
So here is another idea I should have mentioned...
I ask one player after each session to write up an in-character journal or diary entry. So far they have been pretty good about it, although once in a while someone waits until the day of the next session to submit it. I then post them to a website but you could easily just email them around. It allows the player to RP a little bit in between sessions and "get into" the character's head, but the 22 or so journal entries we have also serve as a great log of what has been done so far.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
As a record of what happened each session I told the players that their character would start the next game session with advantage if they wrote up a summary of the previous game session - either from an in-character point of view, or an out-of-character point of view.
It saves me having to write up the summary :-)
Of course, it doesn't include all the notes I need to make about what the players don't know happened during the session.
It also helps me understand what the PCs think is happening (which isn't always what's really happening).
Yes I give Inspiration to the person who does it.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Oops, yes that's what I meant to say "inspiration", not just "advantage".
Yeah, I also use a table
Person/Place/Thing | Motivations | Allies | Goal
Enjoy my magic items, spells, monsters, my race, and a few feats. And GIVE ME FEEDBACK... or else.
Like what I say?
⬐ Just press this little guy right here.
One of the reasons I don't use pre-made adventures is because I have a hard time following them.
So I write all of my modules. I write out in advance the days story line and any major dialog. By the time I run it I know it very well. Then I don't need to take notes, I can go back if necessary. By the time my current epic is done I will have enough material to write a book.