Auto-Focus Cameras

Set your games up to automatically switch cameras as objectives are completed. This minimizes how many times the GM has to click around on the screen to swap what camera is in focus. The more games they’re watching, the more helpful this becomes.

You can set this up in Settings → Game Settings → Objectives → Open an Objective → Set Primary Camera.

GameSense and Specific Objectives

GameSense Puzzle Completions are a large contributor to having more efficient GMs. GameSense uses the cameras in your games to check off objectives as complete as players progress. It’s the equivalent of using a sensor to complete an objective, but can be added after a game is built. Read more about GameSense here.

As far as specific objectives, we recommend splitting objectives into task based checkpoints, rather than large puzzles with multiple steps. This allows GMs to quickly know exactly where groups are in a game and then provide an accurate hint. Read more about specific objectives here.

Good Hints and Autohint

Autohint is intended to assist Game Masters and make it easier for them to watch multiple games at once. When a hint request comes in, the hint popup will automatically select the first hint for the active objective and have a timer ticking down. Game Masters can change the selected hint, type a custom one, or send the selected hint before the countdown ends. If no one interferes, the first hint (that has not been sent yet) will be delivered to the countdown screen in the room.

You can edit settings for Autohint within Game Settings for each game. You can set the amount of time before a hint will send automatically. This can be overridden from the Game Master page or turned off at any time. Review our recommendations for turning on Autohint here.

Game Masters can also reply to hint requests faster if the hints available are accurate and helpful without having too many options. Read our recommendations around hints here.

Custom GM Hint Chimes

Many of you will already have this set up, but we recommend assigning each game its own unique hint chime. When a hint is requested, this sound will play from whatever device you’re using to monitor it. This sound helps pull GM focus to the specific game requesting help.

You can assign a custom hint chime in Settings → Game Settings → GameMastering → Chimes. There are a few options in the chime library or you can upload your own.

LifeLine

LifeLine is our in-room speaker integration. Installing an approved speaker in your game allows us to connect to it and pull the audio from groups directly into Drawbridge. It also allows your GMs to speak directly into games from the GM page in Drawbridge. We can collect hint response time data, % of spoken hints vs written hints, and spoken nudges given.

Being able to talk to groups directly from the GM page and do it quickly can save a lot of time for GMs. They don’t need to spend time typing up a response to groups with a question or typing a custom message telling the group to stop doing something.

More info on LifeLine here.

Accurate Ahead/Behind Timers

The Ahead/Behind Timer is the easiest way to determine how a group is doing in a glance, as long as the timing is accurate. The best way to find out how long objectives are taking groups is in Game Statistics. Select a game in the top left corner to see the average amount of time groups spent on each objective in the Objective Game Averages table.

You can edit your Ahead/Behind Timer in Settings → Game Settings → Objectives → Open an Objective → Adjusting Duration (minutes).

Current Tasks

Current tasks are always displayed in the top right corner of the GM page. They’re a quick summary of what the players in the room should be doing. This can help jog a GMs memory quickly. Also a helpful place to put answers to puzzles.

You can edit Current Tasks in Settings → Game Settings → Objectives → Open an Objective → Task.

Event Buttons on Relevant Objectives

Buttons that trigger events can be added to the objectives that relate to that event. These buttons will appear beneath the objective titles, but also in the current task box while the objective is active. Intended for users with M3 game control or devices in Drawbridge. If pulling from M3, these do have to be “events” not “devices.”

These buttons make it easier to trigger things in games quickly by making them more accessible and clearly visible without having to open the event or device menus. They also reduce the likelihood that GMs will trigger the wrong prop.

You can edit event buttons in Settings → Game Settings → Events → Open an Objective → Add an Event.

Device Dashboard

Allows GM’s to see when certain objects are placed correctly and give more accurate hints. In order for this to work, props have to be wired so that each object is its own device in M3.

You can edit/add devices to a dashboard in Settings → Game Settings → Devices → Open an Objective → Add Device.