How and Where I Prep - February RPG Blog Carnival

This month's RPG Blog Carnival is hosted by Leicester's Ramble, and the topic is about when and where you write and/or do your game prep.

Most of my prep is done in the evenings, usually too late in the evenings, as both my energy and creativity are flagging. But that's usually when I have free time. Free time to write it down, anyway. I spend about 3 hours a day in the car, 4 days a week, and I hate for those to be wasted hours. A lot of the time I listen to audio books, mull over ideas in my head, and even try out NPC voices where no one else can hear me.

Super helpful Alicemonster the Charismatic

My computer is in the corner of my dining/game room, in an overly large corner desk. I usually have one or both of my dogs at my feet, and some movie soundtrack playing in the background. Lately it's been a lot of Tron Legacy, John Carter, Star Trek (various), and of course Conan the Barbarian. Tonight, as I write this, it's Star Trek The Next Generation Best of Both Worlds.

I keep my books handy. In the picture above it's the Rules Cyclopedia and the 5e Monster Manual. Not in the picture, but within easy reach are the DCC core book, the rest of my 5e books, Castles and Crusades PHB, Frank Mentzer's Basic D&D, and a number of zines as well as my dice.

What I work on depends. Sometimes it's just a random (or like this one, not so random) blog post. If it's a session report, I'll have my notes handy. If it's session planning, then it depends on what game I'm prepping for. Standard is whatever rulebook is appropriate. Lately that means 5e.

For my Wednesday night Adventure's League, I'll also have the Horde of the Dragon Queen book handy, as well as the Hack & Slash remix pages up on the computer.

My Friday night Weird New World group, I'll have a couple of Dyson's zine's handy, as well as Vornheim and my copy of Michael Curtis' DCC Adventure The Chained Coffin.

For Saturday's Stonehell game, obviously the main book is Michael Curtis' Stonehell volume 1. I'd have volume 2 handy, but I'm still waiting on Curtis to get the damn thing published!

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So how and where do you do your prep?

And if you want to get ahead of the game, March's topic is Best GM Ever, hosted by Creative Mountain Games