Help keeping track of tiny details

Okay this is probably more a straight DMing advice thing but I dunno there may be some roll20 tools to help. I'm struggling to, keep track of everything.I feel I've tried everything I can think of, but I keep forgetting all kinds of small details. Like my party's wealth, what items they have, remembering to check the status symbols, food, water, the fact its night, their levels, their hirelings, their milestones, if they have used their dailies/action points yet, and dozens of other things. I keep trying to keep it all in my head but it keeps falling out. I tried making a character sheet to keep track of all this but I never remembered to reliably update it making it useless. And it didn't matter as by the end of the session I had forgotten most of what I would update with and I couldn't update mid session without slowing everything down. I tried making a party leader to do this for me but he couldn't. So I don't know.

Devlin M. said: Okay this is probably more a straight DMing advice thing but I dunno there may be some roll20 tools to help. I'm struggling to, keep track of everything.I feel I've tried everything I can think of, but I keep forgetting all kinds of small details. Like my party's wealth, what items they have, remembering to check the status symbols, food, water, the fact its night, their levels, their hirelings, their milestones, if they have used their dailies/action points yet, and dozens of other things. I keep trying to keep it all in my head but it keeps falling out. I tried making a character sheet to keep track of all this but I never remembered to reliably update it making it useless. And it didn't matter as by the end of the session I had forgotten most of what I would update with and I couldn't update mid session without slowing everything down. I tried making a party leader to do this for me but he couldn't. So I don't know. I keep a physical notepad handy when I play on roll20, just as I do when playing at the kitchen table. I also use one handout as the "Player's Journal" that everyone has access to and can edit. I keep some GM notes there as well, and I often update/correct the Journal after every session. At the start of the next session, everyone reviews the Journal as a reminder. I have the players recap the last session as a reminder for everyone(including me) what transpired on the last adventure. It's nice to hear what the player's think has/is happening. :-) Player's should be responsible for their own character's details. I trust the player's to be honest and if I think there is some "fudging" or non-housekeeping going on I'll make some "adjustments" as needed (GM Fiat).

Vince said: Player's should be responsible for their own character's details. I trust the player's to be honest and if I think there is some "fudging" or non-housekeeping going on I'll make some "adjustments" as needed (GM Fiat). Agreed 100% Although I am running the game, it is a collaborative effort. I worry about those details the players cannot control: NPCs, Monsters, "Milestones" as the OP calls them, etc. And I trust my players to manage the details which they can control: rations, water, torches, wealth spent, etc. As long as I'm comfortable that the players staying on top of those things (and in my current campaign, I am very comfortable) then I trust them to manage it. But, as Vince says, if I ever got the sense that they were letting those details slip, then I would pause the game and conduct what would best be described as a character "audit". I have not had to do this with my current Roll20 campaign, but I've done it before. It's nothing confrontational, it's just a line by line check of who has what and how much. This gets everyone back on the same page, and reminds the players that it's something I take seriously and they should too.

In addition to the outsourcing mentioned above, I wrote the cron script mainly because there was about a 30% chance that I'd remember the elemental the wizard in a game I was running liked to summon, and the rest of the time we had to retcon in turns for it half a round later when someone finally remembered it. The same applies for other scripts: the more details you can offload onto something which is great at keeping track of details (e.g. a computer), the more attention you'll have available for the bigger things.

For me a notepad and pen is essential. A macro doesn't work as intended, jot it down. The players use rations, jot it down. Player A uses 4 healing potion but you are sure he only had 3... check his inventory and then strike him down dead with a lightning bolt for daring to try and cheat... Ok so the last one is an extreme reaction but the point others made is that players should take as much of the burden as possible off the DM's shoulders. By allowing you more time to manage the important game related matters they get a richer experience, if they aren't willing then maybe they aren't right for the campaign and should be removed? Now to prevent this from being a general RPG discussion and therefore potentially relegated to off-topic and referred to reddit I would certainly suggest a couple of roll20 based options: 1) Use a separate campaign as an inventory management system (there is a script out there than i use which gives a graphical inventory option... its a LOT of work to set up though). The advantage is that you can have it open on another tab and quickly switch back and forth, deleting rations, potions, scrolls etc. Checking if player A does in fact have the boots of jumping required to clear the ravine... 2) Use the GM notes in your players character sheets as quick reference. That way shift+double clicking on a characters token will quickly bring the sheet up so you can see the notes. 3) Have a 'DM's Magic Note Pad' handout, always have it open and in edit mode then double click the header to minimise the handout. Then whenever you need to make a note but can't find the pen you just dropped off your desk while celebrating that critical hit on the party tank you can just double click the header to bring the handout up and make your notes before double-clicking to minimise again. Net result is that there are many things you can do to keep up to speed but ultimately not everything can be managed in play, in which case notes that you can act on as a clean-up after the session are essential. As for plot lines etc, I tend to set out the main points in a spreadsheet etc allowing plenty of room in-between for setting side quests, random encounters and organic growth. However, as long as there is a start and an end, how they get there is entirely up to you... my campaign evolves after every session as new ideas and plot twists come to mind based on the players actions and revelations of their backstory. Just remember to have fun though :)

What I have done over the time I've been here is to write the info on a notepad then either edit a handout (for gm stuff) or force the players to track it in the campaign forums in specific threads. If they forget to update something and it doesn't match your notes in the handout, oops looks like they misjudged their rations or something.

I recommend TokeNotes whole heartedly <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1760741/script-t" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1760741/script-t</a>... And if you want, vote it up if you like it too! <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1932224/tokenotes-offical-support-for-them/#post-1932224" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1932224/tokenotes-offical-support-for-them/#post-1932224</a>