Help me understand best use of CombatMaster

Hi everyone, total n00b to CombatMaster. Obviously a lot of work and thought has gone into it. I do have it up and running, all the functions seem to work as advertised. I have not used it in a live game yet, I wanted to be proficient with it before adding it to the live game. But I've been practicing with fake encounters with me running every combatant. Now... can someone help me understand how to use it efficiently? I just don't "get it." I think I'm so confused by the fact that it seems permanently docked into the chat window, I can't figure out any way to pop it out and use it as a separate window or floating window. Therefore every round I find myself having to scroll back up the chat window in order to find and access CombatMaster. Or I have to call it back up every few rounds as it gets pushed out of view by incoming messages. I feel like I'm just not doing it right. Is that how people actually interface with it, by constantly scrolling back up, or typing !cmaster into chat again and again to keep it in view? Or do you launch it and then count on the players to keep it cycling? I really wish I could find a video of someone explaining how to use it properly, or failing that, even just a video of someone using it well in their game. Thanks for any insight. I definitely feel like this is a "me" problem and that I just don't understand the best ways to use it. Maybe I'm still running combat "the old way" and I need to completely change my understanding. Whatever it is, I need some outside guidance.

make a '!cmaster --main' macro on the macro bar but even then, you don't really use the main window.  Personally the main reason I ever go to the main menu mid encounter is sometimes to fix a statusmarker but I actually gave up on having cmaster run statusmarkers a while ago, its just easier to handle it all in our heads.  Its one of those script concepts that sounds cool to a programmer but is too tedious ingame to really matter.  Players don't like having to press a bunch of buttons for tedious tasks.   If you have random internet people that you are not friends with, you are going to need to trim cmaster down significantly as its assumed you are not playing with dicks when you run this script.  For starters, you need to turn off the announce things for turns cause every player can click that button and advance the turn and theres no way to know which dick is doing it.  Next, probably turn off turn order countdowns cause random internet players and casters hate it when you time them.  If you use statusmarkers managed by cmaster you need to install statusinfo alongside cmaster.  If the players roll their initiatives you will need to jump through some hoops at the start of every combat encounter as the script seems to be designed around rolling initiatives for everybody or having the DM roll initiative first.  If the turn order doesn't start working right, you need to use the cmaster 'Sort" "Pause/Suspend" and then finally "Play" once everyone has rolled.  Also as of right now, in the current version, you should go in and disable animated rotating turn order images cause there is a bug with it that is messing with editing the turn orders manually if that matters.  

Managing Conditions via token markers is pretty much the only thing I use Combat Master for! The rest of it I "do in my head" as DM Eddie says.

CM is designed to turn on/off features you don't like or need.   However, StatusInfo isn't compatible with CombatMaster.  StatusInfo was integrated into CM.  Don't run those two together.   As far as initiative goes, it's up to you.  You can configure CM to not roll initiative at all.  It will verify that a turnorder has been populated before starting combat.  So have everyone roll, and then start up combat. Otherwise, CM will roll initiative or you can configure it to use Group Initiative (another very useful API).    I have CM roll initiative, and then use Group-Init to add NPCs into later rounds.   CM can have advantage rolls, but that requires advantage is set on the character sheet (for OGL).  Otherwise, if someone has advantage on initiative (somewhat rare but does happen), I have them roll a second time off their char sheet and then adjust the turnorder accordingly Turnorder can be configured to auto-sort.  I hardly ever use the sort button, but it is there if needed.  The Pause Button is only for the timer. There's also a stop timer button. I don't use timer's myself.  Some DMs do.  Pause or click Pause a second time to restart the timer.  There is a hold combat button.  That saves off combat and then restarts it.  I don't use this but it's there in the event that you have to stop game mid combat and come back in a week or two.    This functionality can be shut off.   Rotating images have been fixed.  New version available on my github.  

Hey Joel,  I'm a lazy DM and find combat master the ultimate tool for me. Its really opened the door and makes me feel comfortable DMing big fights. Before I started using Combat Master (and other APIs) I was constantly forgetting things when I try to keep it all "in my head". I loved story telling in D&D but the book keeping is the most stressful to me. Here a few ways I'm using it: - Like DM Eddie said create a macro !cmaster --main so you don't need to scroll if you need to use the main window.  - I also have a macro to start combat, just select all the tokens you want and run: !cmaster --turn,start --main. (My players are happy for me to role initiative for them to speed the game along). Note: all the controls/conditions/spells for CM can be turned into macros depending on how you want to use it e.g. Show Conditions on a token: !cmaster --show,assigned. I have a player that constantly uses a frightened effect so setup a macro for  adding that condition: !cmaster --add,condition=frightened,duration=?{Duration|1},direction=?{Direction|-1} - Managing spell conditions and concentration. You have to teach CombatMaster the spells your players are using but once done it can automatically add concentration when relevant. Then when the concentrating player takes damage it will prompt you that they need to do a save to remain concentrating (it will even calculate the DC). It will also count down in rounds how long the effect/spell will last for.  - Allows players to click a button or macro to finish the turn, helping avoid asking if they are finished and moving the turn order yourself. I play with a good group and I haven't had the issue of them being dicks and clicking the next button to be funny. You do need to train your players to do it though. - Customization for adding conditions or markers, I have added a "Held Action" and "Disadvantage till next turn" that drops off automatically at the start of that player/enemies turn.  - If you allow players to see NPC conditions on the NPC turn it can help them make decisions without you as DM reminding them they are e.g. blinded. - Exporting your settings to another game, I have over the pandemic added 55 spells to CM and just keep bringing the same CM settings into every new session. Hope this helps mate, I don't think there is a right or wrong way to use CM. It just comes down to what you want in a game. Essentially I didn't want to remember everything in my head or have a notepad of everything I'm trying to remember. I can also run big encounters e.g. 30 enemies vs 5 players without breaking a sweat and the players will be the slowest part of combat.

Also, I always use the main menu.  It quickly assigns or unassigns conditions.  See, I'm lazier than Jared.  I'm too lazy to create macros