The Top 10 Digital Tools I Use to Prep and Run D&D Games

By Luke Hart

Today in the Lair, I’m breaking down the top ten digital tools I personally use to prepare and run my Dungeons & Dragons games. These are the tools that help me stay organized, reduce prep time, and keep sessions running smoothly—whether I’m running a game in person, online, or some hybrid of the two.

By the way, are you a NEW GAME MASTER feeling a bit overwhelmed by everything involved with running a role-playing game? If so, the Secret Art of Game Mastery can help. Get over 100 years of GM experience distilled into practical, easy-to-read advice.

1. Microsoft OneNote (or Evernote)

If I had to pick one digital tool that I rely on more than any other, it would be Microsoft OneNote. I use it constantly to keep my campaigns organized and my brain from melting.

I use OneNote for several critical parts of my DM prep:

• Campaign planning, including long-term plots, villain notes, and major story arcs
• Session prep, where I plan upcoming sessions and keep notes on what actually happened in previous ones so I don’t forget important details
• Campaign setting information, such as NPCs, factions, organizations, locations, and bits of lore that might come up later

One of the biggest strengths of OneNote is how flexible it is. You can organize things however your brain works—tabs, pages, subpages—and easily jump between them during play.

It also syncs seamlessly across my desktop, laptop, and iPad, which is huge. I can prep at my desk, reference notes at the table, and tweak things on the fly without worrying about version control or missing files.

If you’re not a fan of OneNote, Evernote is a solid mostly-free alternative that fills a very similar role. The exact tool matters less than the habit: having a single, searchable place where everything about your campaign lives.

2. D&D Beyond

Love it or hate it, D&D Beyond has become increasingly indispensable for me—especially when I’m running games online.

On the player side, I use it almost exclusively for character creation and management. It makes building characters fast and intuitive, and I can easily share my purchased content with my players so everyone has access to the same options.

When paired with the Chrome extension Beyond20, dice rolls made in D&D Beyond automatically show up in virtual tabletops, which is incredibly convenient and speeds things up at the table.

From the DM side, D&D Beyond shines in a few key areas:

• Pulling up monster stat blocks quickly, often with multiple tabs open during combat
• Using the encounter builder to rough out fights
• Looking up spells, rules, and reference material on the fly
• Accessing both player-facing and DM-only maps from modules I’m running

That said, D&D Beyond does not replace physical books for me. I still find it much easier to sit down and read a physical book, flip through pages, and browse content naturally. For deep reading and inspiration, physical books win every time.

The biggest downside to D&D Beyond is the price. Rebuying content digitally can get expensive fast. But despite that, it’s a powerful tool, and one I use constantly—especially in online and hybrid games.

3. A Virtual Tabletop (VTT)

I love tactical combat. I love grids. I love positioning, movement, and interesting battlefields. But many of my games are online where I simply cannot set up physical maps and miniatures. That’s where a Virtual Tabletop, or VTT, becomes essential.

A VTT gives you a digital battle map, player tokens, fog of war, and integrated dice rolling. When paired with D&D Beyond, dice rolls made there can automatically appear in the VTT, which keeps everything fast and clean during play. This works beautifully not only for combat, but also for exploring entire dungeons room by room.

I personally use Foundry VTT and Roll20, depending on the game and the group. Roll20 has the advantage of letting you buy official D&D content—modules, monsters, maps—which can save you an enormous amount of prep time. If you’re running a published adventure, spending the extra money to get the module inside your VTT is often worth it. That $25 or so can save you hours of setup.

There are other VTT options out there as well, but regardless of which one you choose, if you enjoy tactical play and run games online, a VTT is no longer optional—it’s a core DM tool.

4. Music – Tabletop Audio

Music is one of the most powerful tools a dungeon master has for setting mood and atmosphere. A good soundtrack can instantly make a dungeon feel ominous, a tavern feel lively, or a boss fight feel truly epic.

My go-to source for this is Tabletop Audio. It’s free, easy to use, and packed with tracks specifically designed for tabletop RPGs. You’ll find ambient dungeon loops, city soundscapes, combat music, and everything in between.

I also occasionally pull from classic soundtracks—Conan the Barbarian and Conan the Destroyer in particular are fantastic for gritty fantasy games—but Tabletop Audio covers most of my needs without any hassle.

If you’re not using music at all, I highly recommend trying it. You don’t need anything fancy. Even subtle background audio can dramatically improve immersion at the table.

5. Donjon

Whenever I sit down to prep an adventure, there’s a very high chance I end up on Donjon at some point. It’s one of the most useful all-in-one DM utility sites out there.

Donjon offers a wide variety of tools, but the ones I use most include:

• Monster lists, sortable by type, Challenge Rating, terrain, and more
• Random generators for treasure, encounters, dungeons, names, and other prep elements

It’s especially useful when you need something right now. Need a quick dungeon layout? A treasure hoard? A list of appropriate monsters for a region? Donjon can get you there in seconds.

Even when I don’t use the results directly, Donjon is fantastic for inspiration. Sometimes a randomly generated idea is all you need to spark something better and more tailored to your campaign.

6. Fantasy Name Generators

Naming things is deceptively hard. You think it’ll be easy, and then a player asks an NPC’s name and your brain immediately bluescreens. That’s why FantasyNameGenerators.com is permanently bookmarked for me.

This is my go-to tool for generating names on the fly—both fantasy names and real-world names pulled from specific cultures. Need an elven noble, a dwarven merchant, a Tiefling cultist, or a random dock worker with a vaguely Slavic name? It’s all there.

What I really appreciate is the speed. I don’t want to stop the game to think up names, and I don’t want every NPC to be named “Bob” or “Steve.” This tool lets me maintain immersion without breaking momentum, which is huge at the table.

If you’re not using a name generator yet, start. Your players will absolutely notice the difference.

7. DungeonScrawl

Whenever I need to create custom maps for my online games, DungeonScrawl is what I reach for. It allows you to quickly create battle maps, regional maps, and world maps that export cleanly as image files you can drop directly into your VTT.

The tool is fairly easy to learn, and you can produce usable maps fast—even if you’re not particularly artistic. That’s important, because as a DM, I want tools that support my creativity, not ones that demand I master graphic design just to make a dungeon.

I don’t use DungeonScrawl for every map, but when I need something custom—especially for a key location or set-piece encounter—it’s invaluable.

8. 5th Edition Spellbook App (Android)

This is one of those tools that’s so convenient it’s easy to forget how useful it really is. The 5th Edition Spellbook app lets you quickly look up spells, sort them, and reference spell details on the fly—and it’s free.

I use it both as a DM and as a player. Being able to instantly check spell text without flipping through books or juggling multiple browser tabs speeds the game up noticeably.

Some groups have a strict “no electronics at the table” policy. Personally, I would never run a game that way. Tools like this—and many others on this list—make the game smoother, faster, and more accessible. Used responsibly, digital tools are a net positive for tabletop RPGs.

9. 5th Edition Encounter Calculator

I use an online 5th Edition Encounter Calculator constantly when I’m building encounters for my games. It’s fast, simple, and does exactly what I need it to do without getting in my way.

5^th Edition Encounter Calculator for 2014 D&D

5^th Edition Encounter Calculator for 2024 D&D

You input the number of players, their levels, the monsters you’re using, and their challenge ratings, and it spits out an estimate of encounter difficulty. Yes, you can do this inside D&D Beyond—but if I already know the CRs of the monsters I want to use, this tool is often quicker.

Now, I’ll be the first to say that encounter balance in 5e is far from perfect, especially at higher levels. But having a quick baseline is still incredibly helpful. It lets me sanity-check encounters before a session and make informed adjustments rather than flying completely blind.

10. Online Dice Roller

Finally, there’s the humble online dice roller. I used to the one on Wizards of the Coast’s website, but it looks like they took it down. That’s fine. Any decent digital dice roller works just fine.

Sometimes I don’t want to dig out physical dice. Sometimes my desk is completely buried under books, notes, and maps. And sometimes I just want to open a new Chrome tab and roll some dice without thinking about it.

Digital dice are quick, clean, and practical—especially when you’re already running your game digitally or juggling a dozen tools at once. They’re not flashy, but they’re incredibly useful, and I use them all the time.

100 Years of GM Experience at Your Fingertips!

Are you a NEW GAME MASTER feeling a bit overwhelmed by everything involved with running a role-playing game? Are you a VETERAN GAME MASTER looking for new tips and tricks to take your games to the next level? Look no further than the Secret Art of Game Mastery.

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