The Combat Pad initiative tracker is the ultimate tool for managing combat in your favorite roleplaying game. It is a wet- and dry-erasable board with a steel core, so the included magnets stick right to it! It is portable—about the size of a sheet of paper—so you can take it anywhere you're gaming.
Use it to quickly and easily track turns. Write the PC's, enemies', and friendly NPC's names on the player magnets using a wet- or dry-erase marker, then place them in initiative order. Use the blue magnets for PCs, black magnets for enemies, and green magnets for NPCs. Hash marks label positions 0–35, making it easy to put the magnets in the correct initiative order. When the order changes, simply slide the magnets to their new places.
The turn indicator magnet points to whose turn it is; never accidentally skip someone again! As the round progresses, slide the turn indicator to point to the next player; it's now that player's turn. At the end of the round, the turn indicator will point to the next round magnet.
The next round magnet serves as a reminder to move the round indicator magnet. The round indicator points to the current round number, so you'll always know exactly which round it is! Write which round spells and effects expire in the notes section of the Combat Pad (e.g. "haste ends round 10"). Additionally, the notes section is a great place to record damage or anything else necessary to make combat run smoothly.
For tactical groups, delaying and readying guides make it simple to synchronize attacks—enemies beware! Slide the player magnet to the proper guide and avoid the confusion common with other initiative tracking methods.
The Combat Pad is extemely usefull very easy to clean and has saved alot of trees now that I dont have to use paper for my combat notes anymore. The only thing keeping me from giving it 5 stars is quality of its construction. The magnets are very easy to rip if you dont take the utmost care when removing them from the die cut page that they are shipped to you in. I would recommend this item to anyone just take care when you pop out your magnets.
I just got mine and I love it.
It's useful for every gaming system that has some kind of ini combat system.
This one will be one of my favourite tools as a game master.
I give it ony 4 stars, because I would like it more if the metal sheet would reach all the way to the borders (I am afraid the borders will get dog ears) and if the magnets would be a bit stronger so they don't slip off so easy.
Oh and don't throw away the frame of the magnets.
With only a little bit of work I got almost a dozen additional magnets to use for the board.
I bought the GameMastery Combat Pad at Gen Con this year on a whim thinking I would give it a go to see how it worked. 2 months later it has become an essential piece of kit for my games.
Initiative is now quicker to set up, quicker to run and more manageable for me as everything is on one A4 sized pad. It's also sturdy and wipes clean easily leaving no residue.
I bought this at one of my two FLGS and have used it in 4E D&D Encounters games. I find it very useful for quick pre-packaged games but not for home games. The magnets are useful for names and initiative and simple status marks but not more. The large space to the left allows me to track hit points individually. Thus, each monster or PC requires a separate reference card or paper to be useful. This is not terrible, as the Encounters format presents the monsters with the tactical data; but in my home campaigns, I don't print out the monsters I'm going to use - I use tabs in a web browser, even for custom monsters, and Excel to track status effects, defenses, and whatnot. Sorting by initiative is easier using Excel, though delaying a turn or part turn is easier with the magnets.
In all, this is a *very* good product and only a larger pad and larger magnets would improve it the way I use it. I won't limit it based on the way I use it, as I can probably configure my home campaigns a little better anyway.
I will just add my vote here, people before me said just what I feel. It is a great help for any GM, speeds things up nicely and looks good. The board itself is solid in making, no complaints.
Only 4 stars because I almost ripped one of the magnets in half trying to get it out of the magnet sheet, another one got a tad damaged.
