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Post by l7arkness on Nov 30, 2016 19:40:26 GMT
There is so much you can do doing it this way ive done a ton of research on the subject but never bite the bullet to try it out.
Some of the cool stuff you can easily do:
spell markers (like grease, or wall of stone, fireball or any breath weapon) have a sight range for each character torch/fire light markers revealing what they light up have hidden doors/traps GRIDED CHARACTER MOVEMENT ON A NON GRIDED MAP! ...
I believe that this is the best of both worlds for a quick and relatively cheap d&d experience that rivals custom terrain
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Post by DnDPaladin on Dec 1, 2016 9:13:56 GMT
Automatic Line of sight with fog of war based on where the characters are. some software designed just for that makes the game much more tacticals. unfortunately you still need to put the tokens on the software where the player placed his characters, that way the software knows where the players are.
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Post by Meph on Dec 1, 2016 10:45:50 GMT
I have given it lots of thought and looked at Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, and several other lesser known softwares. If I use any of them it will most likely be Roll20. Having line of sight based fog of war is nice but not critical. I can manually manipulate it like my example here in photoshop easily and for no additional cost. Either way, I won't know what I am going to use until after christmas when I build my table. Until then I will just keep playing with different ideas.
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Post by l7arkness on Dec 1, 2016 13:56:29 GMT
I have given it lots of thought and looked at Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, and several other lesser known softwares. If I use any of them it will most likely be Roll20. Having line of sight based fog of war is nice but not critical. I can manually manipulate it like my example here in photoshop easily and for no additional cost. Either way, I won't know what I am going to use until after christmas when I build my table. Until then I will just keep playing with different ideas. thats sorta what i was talking about, i personally use paint.net and was thinking of more open levels like forests and fields for the sight templates for small dungeons you obviously dont want your people to see through walls. I hope your build goes good id like a progress photo if you have time, it would be nice to have if i ever convince my DM to go digital
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Post by DnDPaladin on Dec 4, 2016 6:53:41 GMT
I understand from a point of view where fog of war works on rooms only. but i actually meant that there are softwares on the net for this kind of exact setup, that actually give fog of war (per characters) meaning that when its one characters turn, the board fog of war changes to reveal what that character sees. making the game much more tactical from that stand point.
but again, depends on what you actually wanna do. just wondering how you'll manage fog of war though ?
tell your players to look away while you change fog of war or you are just going to blindly try to remove fog of war without looking at the under laying layer ?
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Post by huntertreat14 on Dec 4, 2016 15:44:58 GMT
Just a quick suggestion for fog of war. If your doing it on a screen this may not apply at all to you.
I dont see a lot of people do this but I had the idea a while back and I see no reason it wouldnt work. What if for fog of war instead of using black construction paper or whatever, you use black cloth. I thought this would be a good idea because when you reach down to expand the fog, instead of having to lift up whats laid down all you have to do is slide it back and fold it over/under itself.
Just a thought.
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Post by sgtslag on Dec 4, 2016 22:53:26 GMT
huntertreat14 , I've done this with my Steading of the Hill Giants game, only using black paper. You are correct, paper means you have to reveal an 8.5 x 11 area, usually. To be honest, I found the whole process very tedious. I've tried using cloth, as well, but I found it quite heavy over the top of my card stock models, which got knocked down by it, as I was trying to uncover things. Compare this concept to drawing out the room on a vinyl battlemat: the vinyl has nothing on it, and it only takes usually <2 minutes to draw the room dimensions out. I've played with Dwarven Forge setup's, I've played with fully scaled, 3D dungeons (the Steading, where 1"=5 feet), and I've played with vinyl battlemats (1"=5 feet), as well as true Theater of the Mind game play. To be honest, I very much prefer the battlemat approach for its simplicity, fog of war ease, speed, and my players tend to favor this approach, as well. Everybody plays differently, but go into it with your eyes wide open: each approach has its pro's, and con's; each technique has its own "speed of deployment"; each technique has its own costs, and versatility issues. I have found that when I lay out a full dungeon, the players will sometimes just blast past it, or turn away from it entirely, so it can prove to be a complete waste of time and effort, on my part. I like giving my players freedom, so I am OK with this, most times... Choose your approach wisely, based on your players' interests, and styles. Most of all, remember to have fun with whatever approach you take -- feel free to intermix them, as well! Having said all of that, however, when I play a fantasy miniatures game ( When Good Villagers Go Bad, 2e BattleSystem, BattleSystem Skirmish), as opposed to playing RPG's, I want full 3D, as much as I can muster. Cheers!
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Post by DnDPaladin on Dec 5, 2016 12:23:45 GMT
completely agree with SGT here. this is also why im not playing with fog of war. i just pull out maps and terrain when i need to for a room.
as for black cloth... DMG talked about fog of war last year and he showed both methods. black cloth and black paper.
one thing though, you cna cut black paper and thus can have much better control over your fog. much like what DMG did with his.
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Post by Meph on Jan 17, 2017 3:59:14 GMT
Next week my party begins and possibly finished Wave Echo Cave, wrapping up Lost Mine of Phandelver. Wave Echo Cave is huge and I really didn't want to try and lay it all out so I decided next week will be our first foray into a digital layout. I will be displaying it on the wall and we will run combat on the table using a battle mat. I found a great remade version of Wave Echo Cave on Cartographer's Guild where they did proper 5 foot squares instead of the 10 foot squares they did in the original map. I pieced the 2 maps together in photoshop, blew them up and created about 40 layers. Every hall and room is individually blacked out so I can show and hide any part of the map. I am planning to run fog of war and even darken it behind them as they go. This is gonna be fun.
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Post by margaret on Jan 17, 2017 18:59:05 GMT
Your threads on running the Lost Mines of Phandelver have been a great series on using different options for tabletop and digital mapping!
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Post by sgtslag on Jan 17, 2017 21:51:30 GMT
We really are spoiled for choices... Back in the day, we had a few, simple options: Theater of the Mind; using dice for representing PC's, and monsters; maybe a few figures (lucky if they were painted -- using gloss enamel model paints from Testor's!); or if you were wealthy, you might have had some cardboard dungeons...
Today we have a smorgasboard: from Theater of the Mind, up to digital projections on the tabletop, with pre-painted mini's running around the projected image, to full-blown 3D such as Dwarven Forge! It is truly incredible how things have changed in the past 30 years... I love it! Cheers, and game on!
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Post by Meph on Jan 17, 2017 22:42:19 GMT
Thanks margaret , I really wasn't sure many were reading my game thread. It doesn't get much feedback. sgtslag, I am really enjoying utilizing all these options. Depending on the week I might be in the mood for one style or it just comes down to convenience like this week. I do believe though that once I get around to building my table I bet the most weeks I will probably fall back to digital and work on large set pieces for epic battles. It definitely frees me up to work on the big pieces rather than keeping up with having a set for every week.
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Post by kgstanley81 on Jan 17, 2017 23:39:54 GMT
I read all your threads, I just don't comment on all of them, I would love to be able to do all this, we use mostly the DM tiles, because they are quick, and we travel to the American legion to play after my dad is done with scouts
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Post by Meph on Jan 18, 2017 0:05:02 GMT
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Post by sgtslag on Jan 18, 2017 0:42:56 GMT
Just be careful setting mini's and stuff on that surface -- don't press down, or slam them! LCD stands for, "Liquid Crystal Display." With normal use (read, "No Abuse!"), it will work splendidly, for years to come. I've seen a number of folks do this, building custom gaming tables to allow it to be sunk in to the surface. Great setup's, but you do need to have a digital map to work with... You might want to consider covering it's screen with clear Contact Paper (matte, not glossy finish; translucent vinyl, used to cover cupboards, available at Wal-Mart kitchen section), to protect it from scratches. Again, it just depends on how much prep work you care to do. It is hard to beat the TV screen with a gorgeous full-color map layout. I love the idea, but for me, it tends to turn the RPG session into a mini's game. I play 2e BattleSystem/BattleSystem Skirmish, and 2e AD&D, so I do it all, already. Each game has a different feel, and I love them all. I just tend to do so much impromptu RPG'ing that this kind of setup is rarely practical for me. For my BS games, however, it is all about mini's, terrain, and such. Your game, your approach. Keep sharing, I love the eye-candy, and the write-up's. Cheers!
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Post by Meph on Jan 18, 2017 0:56:12 GMT
I only set the minis on the screen to test it out. I am going to pickup an ultra thin sheet of lexan this week. Lexan is much softer than plexi and wont scratch like it. It will sit on top of the screen. My players are all about the mini. I ran Theater of the Mind a couple weeks ago and a couple players told me they really didn't enjoy it. They missed the minis and having a visual representation during combat. I am fine with that.
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sgain
Cardboard Collector
Posts: 22
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Post by sgain on Jan 18, 2017 21:10:04 GMT
I've got a buddy who has a screen built into his gaming table - he and his players really love it and I have to admit, it looks really cool. I personally like to have my 3d stuff on the table so I use a 55" tv to display the maps and other things (handouts, images ect.) using Fantasy Ground 2. I also use it for some lighting effects since you can change the display color in FG.
I really do like the look of that LCD screen though.
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Post by tauster on Jan 18, 2017 21:54:36 GMT
Thanks margaret , I really wasn't sure many were reading my game thread. It doesn't get much feedback. Don't let yourself get discourage by lack of feedback. Feedack doesn't always come instantly - sometimes someone reads your stuff weeks, months or even years later. Remember that what we all share here is basically here forever (yes, I'd like to be an optimist, this time) and if I take a step back and look at what a humungous amount of ideas and creativity we have accumulated in this community in just a few years... Long story short: keep up posting!
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Post by Meph on Jan 20, 2017 22:23:25 GMT
So the more I work on this digital layout, the less interested I am in it. I worked on it today after work and got a 2 monitor setup going. The dungeon displayed full screen on the 46" with photoshop and the layer bar displayed on the 15" which I had at my DM spot at the table. It was setup for me to unveil all the locations at will and sized properly but the more I sat there looking at it, the less it felt like D&D to me. I have shown these pics before and gotten a lot of great feedback about the space, but one thing I absolutely hate is the size of the tables. I have 4 old computer tables pushed together creating this huge space. At one point our group was 9 players plus me. Now we have 6 players and I find it to be one too many players. Growing up we always played with a 3-4 man group. We didn't have a big pool of players so we just played with what we had. I really miss the smaller more intimate group. As you can see in the pic above, the tables are huge but I find it unwieldy at times. I have to get up and walk around the table to draw on a map or layout tiles. Everything about it is a chore for me. The players love it because they get all kinds of space at the table but I hate it. Part of the plan with the digital table is for me to push maps without having to walk around the table but once the novelty of the technology wears off (and it had quickly for me) then it loses it's attraction to me. I am starting to really push my group a lot more in the role playing aspect and plan to go with more overland encounters and less lengthy dungeons. That being said, I think less is more. I just started watching Acquisitions Inc. lately while I have been crafting stuff and I really like the simplicity of the table they use. I am considering maybe building a table similar to this. I also mentioned my idea of building a large square coffee table and making a setup with couches/chairs around the coffee table but got some push back from a couple players. To me that is the idea setup I would prefer. It really gives a more relaxed gaming area, very close to the TV on the wall for displaying things, and because it's a lower table it gives a better perspective for all the players. I am open to all sorts of idea so if you have any, feel free to post them. I am not interested in a huge table for more than 8 total people. I also am not interested in anything like the "Sultan" table, it just seems too cluttered for me. If it's feasible I would love storage for books, minis, maybe even an area for a laptop. I want to get away from a big bulky screen or anything that really separates me from the players. So.....give me some ideas.
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Post by Meph on Jan 20, 2017 23:10:11 GMT
Ya know I remember seeing a table here that I found really interesting. Of course after a quick search I found it again and of course, it's curufin's. You never seem to amaze me with the stuff you come up with. I really like your layout. So the real question is, do you still use this table and what have you found you don't like about it or would change? Do you have some actual dimensions handy? Fortunately I have the space for a table as big or small as I want. Your table looks to address my concerns. It has the space to do what you want but still keeps you close enough to the table to layout terrain or draw on a mat. Also any pics of the table in actual use? For those that don't know what I am talking about, this is the thread of Curufin's table. dmscraft.proboards.com/thread/2434/curufins-gaming-table-rolling-carts
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