I am currently playing D&D 4th edition and will be DMing soon. The party consists of 7 characters (mine included, even though I am a DM). I will be running a quest that I created myself and hopefully getting the party from level 6 to level 8.
I want the game to run smoothly, so how much information should a DM be responsible for? Should I have a chart where I record the current HP of all the PCs, as well as the current status, defenses DC and other PC information? Should I have a copy of each power my PCs have in hand to use? What about the monsters information?
I ask this because, running through pages from the DM Guide, the PHB and the MM is a hassle and asking the players their stats also takes time away. I want to be prepared and want to know what information should the DM keep tabs of when a battle is occurring.