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Just reviewed my notes from last session... "Keybone". Just that one word. From a 4 hour session. Thanks, me.

Never met a DM that couldn't give a better recap than players.

On our first session the DM just said "I'm not keeping a diary for you, choose someone to do it". And that's how I became the official "lore guardian" of our group.

3:30 #1 calendar notes 4:45 #2 session journal 6:35 #3 session planning notes 8:35 #4 Future Plot Points 11:10 #5 level tracking 12:05 #6 a to do list 12:40 #7 downtime activities 13:40 #8 game world notes

Not gonna lie I didn't realize how much I was lacking at my note taking for my games

To Do List : prepare a To-Do List. A real useful video !

Hi Luke, I am writing to thank you for this and the many other D&D videos you have hosted. I am an autistic DM. The autism brings its own challenges before I even start to look at the challenges of rejigging a pre written campaign or the challenges from players. Your videos often crystallise my thoughts on how to move forward on issues or how to resolve them. No small number of them have brought up issues before they have occurred at the table. Only to have them occur the very next week / session. Thank you! Your videos make it easier for me to process the inoformation quicker, than it would for me to sit down and read the books from scratch. In short although I have not taken all of your advice, you have made me a significantly better DM. Due to my autism I am unemployed/unemployable. I would love to contribute financially to you as you have be been the most most helpful channel out there of all the videos I watch. Thank you so very much.

Note taking: -track dates, times, major events, future and past events, effects and spells, long rests -sessions journal -bullet points/goals for the new session -future possible plot points -level tracking and when they gained it -to do list -downtime activities that have already happened -game world notes like nps, places etc. and changes the players made to the gam world.

Bonus 9 from my own experience. Write down the pcs assumptions about things whether it's right or wrong. Could be used as fuel for something else later down the line.

I'm am really bad at taking notes. Up until now it hasn't been a problem, because I still remember everything important from this year's sessions, but if they ever get back in a town they were in before and want to meet a specific character, then I am fucked.

I've asked my players if they mind if I record our online sessions... this is the only way I'll remember what happened :P Bonus for them though: short story videos with the highlight of the session. Smol the Kobold was an NPC who lost himself to the darkness, so I created a commemorative short video. They loved it!

Specific calendar notes is a good idea. I'm finding that it's tricky to even keep track of how much my party owes the innkeeper. Tracking something as mundane as expenses day to day would help.

They're excited for old man commoner as a DM now. But wait until they find out he only runs original brown book D&D.

The check boxes and your overall notes are so nice and clean.

Because I'm an improvisation DM, and my players tend to perceive things differently, I task my players with different aspects of note taking. One player is the Treasurer, and one is the Lore Keeper. When we begin the next session, I always open with my statement. "Behold my heroes and the tales they tell! Who would like to recount the events of the last session?" Between the Lore Keeper and other players (because some take everything as a competition, including note taking), I not only get a grasp of what hooks they took up, and how they perceived what I said or what happened. It's not only a great way to measure engagement, but a way to help remind me. Otherwise my notes are a series of post-its and scraps of paper with names, monsters, concepts and such that I eventually scribble into a log. Besides, I have a pile of resources that I have written for Nerdarchy that I can draw upon (Out of the Box Encounters) as well as a full unpublished tome, a stack of homebrew monsters, magic items and spells. This gives me the freedom to improv and let my players handle the bulk of the note taking. I might change my plots and concepts to reflect better ideas created (unknowingly) by the players. I also track time loosely. For example, unless it's a spell duration, events happen "around this time", "sometime later that evening", or are triggered by a choice the players make or location that the characters arrive at. Sure, it's a little gamist, but my players seem to like it.

I am very glad I watched this video, your note taking is very methodic. I normally have no problem recalling what happened in each session and remember events from even the very first sessions of a now 2 years long campaign but I sometimes forget descriptive details - so I used to simply keep a document with descriptions and status grouped by location or subject (what things, places and people _are_ rather than what happened). This way is so much more organized, thank you, I'm sure some of my friends will love this.

I just want to appreciate the Heroquest Screen. Fond memories of a 10th birthday that changed my life as I was handed that box!

"you're the DM, you gotta do EVERYTHING"

this was actually very thorough, I always had problem categorizing my notes, thanks

Luke, I deeply appreciate your DM insight, and the subtitles. Comment for the algorithm!

DM: Let's play D&D Also DM: Pulls out HeroQuest gm screen.

Say that you don't completely suck might be a disservice. This is some solid advice here, thank you so much.

As a beginner DM, this video is very helpful, thank you!

I take general notes in my campaign, but not as detailed as you do. Totally gonna borrow some of your ideas. Great video!

Some gold here. I will definitely be referring back to this video more than once

You're by far the best D&D tips channel I've found. I've learned so much from your videos

Thanks, Currently taking notes on how to take notes. Good video, this definitely helps!

This is a great video to have a good system breakdown on note taking! Love it!

Well, I made a calender now for my groups, so thanks for that! I liked the video, keep up the good work.

Me, still a fledgling DM: *glances at my notebook which only consists of enemy HP and combat initiatives* But we also play over Discord voice chat so I have a lot of stuff I’ve pinned in the chat like my house rules, loot the party found, and quests they have completed and that are still available (I’m running Icespire Peak). These tips will definitely help me for future games. Also: KITTY!

For my current campaign, at 250 sessions in, I am using a OneNote timeline that I share with the players, that is a running bullet point narrative of what happens in the sessions. I also use OneNote pages for world lore the players know and/or have encountered. - I do this because my last campaign was only notes in my incomprehensible handwriting on a series of unlined notepads, and when I would try to find information and names from sessions ago, I would often be unable to find anything. - I also have notes that the players can't see.

There is one thing I do, and that's let a player keep a journal, of course this has to be voluntary work but at my tables there is always someone willing to be the "game journalist" and that helps a lot since it frees me for other things. The essence of the game journalist is to write down everything related to the story as it develops, I as the DM will keep track of other notes and things.

Just discovered this channel, great advice, great videos, applicable to any edition (my group runs older editions because none of us like 5e)

Thank you very much for this! I'll start a campaign soon and the last time I tried we just did like 3 sessions (all chaotic), so I'm trying to get pointers to get more organized and this will be very helpful

I audio most of my game sessions. Very helpful!

Love your content. Im newish to 5e as a DM. Your videos have helped alot.

Great video!! Very informative

Haven't watched it yet, but I know I need it, thank you

I'm about to dm for the first time this Saturday I'm glad to see this

Video starts at 3:30 but after that it is helpful. :)

Bacon is delicious, lol. It blew my mind that one of your players rolled up a new character in 3 minutes! I don't even think I could choose a name I was happy with in such a short amount of time... Let alone their class, background, ability scores, voice, personality, memories, culture, clothing design, facial/ body/ hair features, connections... How could they possibly... And how the heck did you write them in so suddenly??? We must play VERY different games. If my character died (or anybody at the table, honestly) I'd have to spectate sessions until I was able to find a point in the journey to be integrated in a way that wasn't contrived. The fact that I would be grieving the person I just lost- losing my PC or any of the ones at my table would be DEVASTATING. Add to that the time it would take to draw up a new character that fit in the world and was their own character. The character I have now took roughly 6months- a year to make, primarily because we had the time while we played another campaign... I'd still need a month to make a character though. Sitting with the details is important to me! 3 minutes... I can't grasp that...

Instant sub! Can't wait to learn from you and hopefully improve my games!

Love your channel Mr. Dungeon Master sir!

This was so helpful!!

Been GM'ng (DM) for 26 years, and there are a LOT of pearls of wisdom here.

The reason I ask players for a recap us so that I can see what they thought was important and what wasn't

Awesome info, thanks for making these great videos.

Nice. Just out a minute ago. finally something to spice up my day!

I experienced things like this work. Check list before the thing. Took years but now it second nature.

Hey there Luke! Thanks for this VERY IMPORTANT video, haha. No seriously. My D&D note taking skills are... well, they are lacking. So this has been very useful!

Very helpful notes on notes

Nice Hero Quest game screen :)

Thanks for the great tips.

It’s fun reading notes. Sometimes you’ll find funny irrelevant stuff like: 1) The Tiefling monk threw away a severed nose that he found from a goblin corpse. 2) The bard used a thunderwave. Probably some consequences from the sound. (Not really irrelevant) 3) The cleric wearing a long cloak watched his wizard teammate tear off inner sleeves to patch up a person.

As someone who's weirdly good at recalling things, I just do notes after the session. In-game notes usually just end up as "nervous boi" or "[character] started stripping". Yeah...

This is my first time DMing, and I knew I wouldn't be able to handle it all, so I actually asked my group to keep track of some things. I asked one to keep track of all the party loot (they have a loot page, where they write everything they gather, and then they divide up the loot into individual inventories), and another was assigned to keep the party journal. The bard wound up keeping the party journal, as that seemed entirely appropriate. Then, she was sick, but insisted we play without her, and her daughter played both her character and the cleric, and took the notes. She was less involved in the adventure, but Good Lord, the notes she took! She's the official note-taker now, I think, just because she is amazeballs at it, and we don't mind waiting to give her a chance to complete her drawings. We can all take a potty/snack break, while she does her thing. We then start each session by her reading off the notes she took the time before. Did I mention they are REALLY good notes? Now that I see the notes as they are here, I'll still keep my own notes, such as keeping track of dates and times for spells and stuff, and actions that have potential consequences, and other things that aren't in the printed adventure guide. I have decided I need to add at least one personalized thing for each character. I already know I'll need to track the phases of the moon, because of the chance of lycanthropy. But knowing that I can leave the nitty-gritty details to the players to track, for themselves, is a real load off my back. I appreciate it, and they get to practice keeping track of things for themselves, which, in my opinion, adds to their experience. That said, I am glad I saw this video early in our adventure (they've only been playing for three in-game days, now). I still have so much to learn. I was keeping track of things for potential consequences in my head. MY head. My disabled stupid head. What was I thinking? I mean, I have problems remembering things from the beginning of the session, by the end of the session. Thank God my whole family is so patient with me. We look at this game, not just as a fun bonding time with family, but as mental therapy for me and my mom, who sometimes remembers that she has brain damage. Ha. But our doctor approved, so we press on. I sure hope I'll remember the different notes I should take, next time we play. I think I'd better watch this video a few more times, to let it sink in. It's not just "what happened this session." I can leave that to our wonderful journalist. I need to write down dates and times, especially for spells and curses and other effects, potential consequences of actions, and I have already forgotten everything else he mentioned. Yep, gotta watch it again. And I should probably get my notebook, and write it all down.

Just one thing to add: Specifically take note of everything you improv as soon as possible. You won't believe how much better the memry of 3 players is, than the one of 1 DM when it comes to details like the made up name of some random person the group met or the layout of some random streets in a huge city you had them walk by trying to find a shortcut back to their inn going home from the market.

I keep alot of notes myself the hardest thing I tend to find for me TOA game is keeping track of time for homebrew diseases some PC get. Be great to find ways to help keep track of date and times in sessions then from what I normally seen.

Yes. Yes. YES. All of this. These are essential note taking tips for any GM.

Thanks this helped a lot!!

I keep an in-depth campaign journal that is almost in a story format on Homebrewery for my players, complete with relevant pictures. It's nearly up to twenty pages now and is a great resource for both my players, and me as the DM, to review to remember what is going on in the campaign.

Useful video... I took notes!

Great video today my friend

I tend to keep a lot of information about where the campaign is gonna go in my head, and didn't have much trouble. For the past events, I just kinda record our sessions anyway (not necessarily for that, just as a record for the future and because I think they're funny). One of my players made us several google sheets to track NPC ship crew, and ship inventory, XP, and a couple other things, which is just amazing. As much as I hate working with Excel, I think all groups should have it. Duration of effects like Revenant time or Geas or whatever I track with counters, since we play in TTS anyway. But not gonna lie: a few of my NPCs might have had their name change a couple times, and summer and autumn might have lasted longer than they should have. And It's entirely possible I didn't know what year it was in the world until a month ago.

Thanks again!

I find it's a good idea to do a colab recap. Give them(the players) the majority of what happend to them as a group and then ask your players if and what effected them. As I don't always get down everything. As I have a plan to follow/modify while they only have to remember what happend to them. I have all the NPCs and stuff to take care of.

This I why I got a world anvil account. My notebook was looking confusing and just plot notes. Though I do still have a problem of updating it on new info, always a bit behind 😅 luckily I'm good at remembering what my players do, though not the random things that I say.

I use a tool called Campaign Logger to manage all this with a Tag based philosophy and it works like a charm.

I write a sort of session outline and use that as my notes at the table, then add little notes about what the players actually did with that bullet point. I also design cities before my players visit them so I have a big folder of shops and npcs that I can go back and reference when someone has a question about where they bought that one thing again. Not going to say it is perfect, but it is working so far. Designing a city takes me a couple weeks of lead time, so as soon as my party gets a way to travel to new places rapidly I will be in a pickle. Right now they are limited to teleportation circle, so they can only go to places they have already been, or take some time to travel there.

your good at this

gotta take the notes

Our group levels up REALLY slowly, and we like it that way. :-) Playing 10 years? You'll be between level 8 and 12.

When I started DMing for friends I made a steam group and invited all my group into it and made a discussion where I would summarize the session right when it ended and I was clear with them, they could add to that discussion if there were specific notes they wanted to keep track of, because I was only going to put a simple bullet point short hand version. I did it this way so everyone could refresh their memory at any time: At home on their PC, on their phone through the app. I also did this because I'd got everyone a tabletop program so we could play remotely, as an option, since sometimes our sessions would go late enough that people start falling asleep at the table, so they'd have an option to play remotely and go straight to bed. Unfortunately our schedules were also super skewed shortly before I started DMing and people were bad about getting back to me about when they were available, so I wound up canceling the campaign. (A year and only about 5 sessions) Thought about establishing a group so a bunch of DMs could do this or look in on the notes from others games for ideas, but I don't know many DMs, there are other places sort of doing this and there's dozens of niche dnd-ish groups on steam already.

Popped for Fizzletock!

I always tell my players that I won't do the recap because I don't want to give them any accidental hints by giving some of their actions more significance in my recap then they would have given them in there own recap.

The main reason I like the others to note keep my games, is that I can tell what they engaged with and follow those plot threads

Is there a maximum height from which the DM is to be suspended?

Does anybody else have a backup character that can “ trigger on death “. I find it makes things a lot easier and a lot less sad. For example, my aasimar bards body has 2 people inhabiting it. Lindsey Steele, a peace loving pop star bard who controls the body usually, and Abigail dare, a violent but lawful good paladin angel. As soon as Lindsey dies, Abby springs forth from her corpse covered in radiant armor as a paladin.

I never been good at taking notes, but I will try

Love how this follows right after How to be a great gm's note vid

The fact that I keep hardly any notes on my sessions is probably a limiting factor in why I find it terribly difficult to run more than one game at a time :-o

Great video! This should be a Patreon reward (nudge nudge)

I used to disguise this by doing a pop quiz at the start of each session for "bonus exps" disguised as checking if others were taking notes.

My notes are pretty simple. I have player notes that I created for the online game with the names of the other characters and their professions, the things they are actively working on and the names of important characters they've recently met. Behind the screen I have a Campaign Log that's just a Word Doc I keep updating. It is a combination game planner and session log. So I started with the main plot in an outline and some associated side plots I wanted to run. During Session zero I fleshed out how my first session would run including a reasonable layout of the starting town. At session end I cleaned up any notes and started the plan for session 2 including the stats for their first planned encounter. Right now we're on session 20 with 19 sessions behind us in the log and each town they've traveled through has notation about the town history people and places. Each battle they've fought has NPC stats and some of the enemies that survived those battles were copied and pasted into encounters in later sessions.. A lot of the additional side quests and main campaign bullets were closed up as part of the session notes in prior campaigns. A lot of encounters that the players delayed or avoided were pushed on to future sessions. Right now there's notes to an entire city the PCs never visited below Next session's notes. As we're wrapping up this chapter it's something I'll likely hold onto for the when I start the next chapter.

The best tip from my irl games i can share is get a kinda cheap voice recorder u can probably get a mp3 player with voice recording capabilities for 10-20 bucks and this can record the session so you can take notes after the session also useful cuz you can copy the file if a player needs a copy rhis allows me to focus on immediate notes that will be needed in the same session and keeps the game flowing cuz the players know that they can find out the random npcs name later

Comments are good for the KZfaq algorithm! Also, I think CMDR Strayn is Commander Strayn if it’s an Elite Dangerous name.

I have begun a multi coloured highlighter system for NPC's used and where I put them into the world,from my various lists of characters. Luckily most are completely stol---borrowed from books I own. Any fantasy series with a character index inside is Mana from the gods

In #2 Session Journal, what kind of things would you put under "Pre-Session"? Out of character things like scheduling, confirming earned XP, etc.?

The HeroQuest board is just 😙👌

Some good ideas.

We used to have a player steaming/recording sessions, which was great for quickly reviewing sessions a few days in advance. Unfortunately, that player left the game and we're on our own now. I take notes during sessions, but they tend to become less detailed over time.

I give out inspiration to my players if they can accurately recap the last session.

The most important notes to take that I've found have been NPC notes. Kind of like how a Telltale game pops up with "*character* will remember that." I have a spreadsheet of how each PC interacted with notable NPCs and the NPCs' thoughts on those interactions. From that you can really breathe life into the denizens of the world, have gossip spread, and come up with interesting quests.

I usually take notes during the session after something big happened and afterwards go back and put more detail into them. And ALWAYS mark down the name of a new NPC or else my players will have my head if 6 sessions down the line Mark the traveling salesman becomes Mike.

One of my favorite tools: If the party fails to stop the BBEG in the first campaign, the next campaign is set as Grim Dark as a result.

I have my players recap because what they distinctly remember tells me what interests them, and if maybe important details I thought I made clear didn't stick in their memory

Played both sides of the board, can't recap to save my (or others) life what we did last time as players, as a DM you never fully switch off from your world

Great video. Is that One Note you're using?

The campaign I'm running has been going on for two years and some change now. I'm making liberal use of history checks for players who don't keep good enough notes. Tis quite enjoyable giving cryptic hints at something they should probably remember... and would easily remember if they took notes. "Hey DM, have I previously met this NPC that's being really friendly to me?" "Roll history" "5" "She seems familiar to you. Maybe a long lost cousin?" (...She's the daughter of a character twice murdered by the party.)