The Timekeeping Window helps in calculating traveling time and keeping track of the current date and time, as well as give the current weather.
The top line is the current time, in hours, minutes and seconds. The second line is the current date. A row of buttons beneath the date is used to increment the time or date by the marked duration: 1 round, 20 rounds, 20 minutes, or 1 week.
Below the Daylight label the position of the sun in the sky is displayed. Night means it is dark and the sun provides no light. Twilight means the sun is below the horizon but it is near enough to provide some light. Sunrise/Sunset is when the sun is above the horizon, but still close to it. Day is when the sun is fairly high in the sky.
When this box is checked, clicking one of the buttons to add time (1 round, Take 20, 1 hour, etc.) will also add the appropriate number of rounds to all the creatures in 'Current Encounter'.
For example, you run a battle for a few rounds, and on round 10 (which is also 10:15 AM), Marcus casts Barkskin, which ends in 2 hours (round 1210). The battle ends on round 20. The PCs keep moving in the dungeon, so you add to the current time using the 1 Round or 1 min buttons for example. As you do so, the round number is adjusted to match (adding 1 minute will add 10 rounds, 1 hour is 600 rounds). Let's say that one hour and 57 minutes pass between the end of the first battle and the beginning of a new one. When you click 'Start Combat', Marcus finds that his Barkskin spell ends in two minutes (20 rounds). If a condition expires while you add time, there will be a line added in the Combat Log .
The maximum round number possible is 32000, or about 53 hours. If you use the Timekeeping window to add more than 53 hours, the round number will say "53h+", meaning that it has been more than 53 hours since the last combat started. Click Start Combat to reset the round # to 1.
Note: changing time directly in the display above the checkbox (clicking the up/down arrows or editing the values) will not adjust the rounds. This feature was in versions prior to 2.06 but as it caused bugs was removed and will not be put back.
The textbox holds any notes about what happened to the characters during their adventures. You can use the Word Processor Commands to edit the fonts and also insert Adventure Hyperlinks . The Add Date, Add Time and Add Weather buttons add, at the current cursor position, the current date, time and weather conditions respectively.
When you first start DM Genie, it uses the normal Earth calendar, but you can customize both the calendar and time. Use the File->Customize Calendar/Time menu to open the Calendar.TXT file that is saved in your campaign's \Data\ directory. Follow the instructions in it to customize the calendar and time. You must restart DM Genie for the changes to have an effect. You can:
- Change the number of months, their name and number of days.
- Change the days of the week
- Set the date that winter starts (important for weather, see Weather Generator )
- Set the number of seconds per round, seconds per minute, minutes per hour and hours per day.
- Set the planet's rotation axis angle (affects the sunrise/sunset times)
- Set the moon's period and name. This is not displayed in this version of DM Genie
- Set the winter solstice date.
(Feature not available in Player Genie)
This displays the weather that was generated for the current date and time. Nothing is displayed if you have not generated weather, or if the date set is before or after the year that was last generated. To create weather for one year see the Weather Generator .
Report Changes: Check this box if you wish to add a line to the Events Log when the weather changes because you have incremented the time or date. Only changes in precipitation are reported, such as: “Light rain starts at 8:00 AM, stops at 10:30 AM”. When increasing the time by a day or more, the daily weather summary is displayed instead of the hourly changes in weather.
Severe Only: Check this to only report heavy rains, thunderstorms, tornadoes or other severe weather.
Rules Effect: Descriptive text giving the effect on rules – note that these aren't automatically applied.
See also Movement Speed and Distance Traveled
and Reminders .