D&D General Best VTT for the most players?

[Don Durito]

Global settings. You can globally set token options so that any bewly created token inherits the global preferences. You do this in the game settings, not from inside the VTT. As for why the choices were made, Roll20 supports a large number of games and styles of play. I, frex, rarely have named tokens so it would be more painful to me to have names on by default.
Yes you can go in there and change the settings (and change the settings might even work sometimes).

But it's the default towards a really anal and overly controlling GM style that I find offputting. I certainly wouldn't say it particularly supports a large number of styles of play - that's giving far too much credit. If you either wrestle with it enough (or alternatively barely use it) you can make it support alternate styles of play - but it's pretty clear it's designed around a default style of play.

For character sheets, I'm not sure what your issue is? You can do sheets and nacros, and add bew macris directly to the sheet, or to a token, or to a player, or all three. They don't really fight each other, so I don't follow tge issue.

Ok this is my issue.

If they had a good interface for setting macros then character sheets wouldn't really be necessary and house rules would be much simpler.

Ergo - character sheets being difficult to edit and macros being linked to closely to character sheets, means it's very difficult to hack a game to make it work how you want. But the possibility is there (if they wanted to enable it).

...which is just repeating what I already said but in slightly different words.

 

[Ovinomancer]

But it's the default towards a really anal and overly controlling GM style that I find offputting. I certainly wouldn't say it particularly supports a large number of styles of play - that's giving far too much credit. If you either wrestle with it enough (or alternatively barely use it) you can make it support alternate styles of play - but it's pretty clear it's designed around a default style of play.

Huh? The ability to be able to select the default behavior of new tokens through global settings is indicative of a controlling GM? Or, my choice to not show nameplates is controlling? If you have enough tokens in close proximity, nameplates on each clutter the screen, sometimes overlapping other tokens or bleeding through walls be ause they float below the token. I prefer showing only a few nameplates because it reduces clutter -- I create unique tokens for unique NPCs and monsters and am free with information to compensate. So you can't possibly mean I'm controlling because that makes no sense. That leaves the former option, that being abke to set defaults how you want is controlling, but I just can't follow your point here.

And the default setting for everything is "off," so not sure what you're assuming the default playstyle is.

Ok this is my issue.



Ergo - character sheets being difficult to edit and macros being linked to closely to character sheets, means it's very difficult to hack a game to make it work how you want. But the possibility is there (if they wanted to enable it).

...which is just repeating what I already said but in slightly different words.

You can add custom macros and attributes directly to a character sheet. This is, in fact, the easiest way to port macros between games -- crossload the character sheet.

The underlying reason there aren't easily customized sheets is due to compendium compatibility. The drag and drop of compendium items like spells, equipment, and class abilities/feats means that character sheets need to have somewhat complex coding.

If it bothers you so much, though, there are many other fine VTT products. I suggest you shop around. This isn't snarky, it's an honest suggestion -- you shouldn't have to put up with a hobby tool that frustrates you.

 

[Don Durito]

Huh? The ability to be able to select the default behavior of new tokens through global settings is indicative of a controlling GM? Or, my choice to not show nameplates is controlling? If you have enough tokens in close proximity, nameplates on each clutter the screen, sometimes overlapping other tokens or bleeding through walls be ause they float below the token. I prefer showing only a few nameplates because it reduces clutter -- I create unique tokens for unique NPCs and monsters and am free with information to compensate. So you can't possibly mean I'm controlling because that makes no sense. That leaves the former option, that being abke to set defaults how you want is controlling, but I just can't follow your point here.
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I can turn a nameplate on or off. That's fine. What's not intuitive obvious is that if I do that players still can't see the nameplate unless I also go into advanced settings for the token and enable them to see the nameplate.

This is extremely frustrating. I'm proceeding in a game with the assumption that I've enabled all the players to see each other's character names and enable each other's tokens. I'm also assuming that if I label one goblin as "goblin boss" who has been clearly described as such then players can see that. But then I discover they can't and after searching around I find that the option "show nameplate" in fact only shows the nameplate to the GM.

Now I can see why you might want an option where the GM can see nameplates but players can't but it's seems deeply strange that should be the default. I would imagine most people would assume "Show nameplate" does in fact show the name plate - especially as it's difficult for the GM to know exactly what the players can see.

This is typical of the way Roll20 works. It's unintuitive and to let players do anything or see anything you have to select options that really ought to be default. If you use dynamic lighting you're going to get tripped up a time or too by the "players see light" option which you have to tick even for the light that there token emits.

I mean for god's sake if you assign someone a character sheet you have to seperately assign them the right to edit it. Yes it's just underneath, but I guarantee almost everyone is going to forget to do that a least once because it's unintuitve that you should have to do that. (And how often would you give someone a character and not allow them the ability to edit it? What a strange default option?).

And yes you can eventually figure out that you can change the settings from outside the game. That hardly contradicts the point I made that it was unituitve and finicky.

And please stop trying to 'help'. I didn't ask for help. I am in fact making Roll20 work. You're just wasting time because so far you've told me nothing I don't already know. If you want to argue then argue but it's condescending to spuriously assume ignorance.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I can turn a nameplate on or off. That's fine. What's not intuitive obvious is that if I do that players still can't see the nameplate unless I also go into advanced settings for the token and enable them to see the nameplate.

This is extremely frustrating. I'm proceeding in a game with the assumption that I've enabled all the players to see each other's character names and enable each other's tokens. I'm also assuming that if I label one goblin as "goblin boss" who has been clearly described as such then players can see that. But then I discover they can't and after searching around I find that the option "show nameplate" in fact only shows the nameplate to the GM.

Now I can see why you might want an option where the GM can see nameplates but players can't but it's seems deeply strange that should be the default. I would imagine most people would assume "Show nameplate" does in fact show the name plate - especially as it's difficult for the GM to know exactly what the players can see.

It's the default because the default is "off." Show name is off, has sight is off, emits light is off, show bar 1 is off, nameplate is off. The default isn't a gameplay style, it's "option off."

Again, if this is an recurring issue, go to the game settings (on the game homepage, before you launch) and configure the default. You can even propagate the new default through every character/token you've already set up.

I'll agree the two switches are frustrating, but there's a number of people who want nameplates for GMs and not players -- especially if you have a limited token library or need to keep track of which duplicate is the real one. All of the player permissions are on the tab "Advanced" under, oddly, "Player Permissions." They didn't do a terribly good job of hiding them.

This is typical of the way Roll20 works. It's unintuitive and to let players do anything or see anything you have to select options that really ought to be default. If you use dynamic lighting you're going to get tripped up a time or too by the "players see light" option which you have to tick even for the light that there token emits.

Not everyone agrees that "all options on" should be the default. Some people do weird things like play boardgames on Roll20, and nameplate or sight aren't things that need to be on for that. The default is that you get to turn on the options you want -- they don't guess for you which those are.

I mean for god's sake if you assign someone a character sheet you have to seperately assign them the right to edit it. Yes it's just underneath, but I guarantee almost everyone is going to forget to do that a least once because it's unintuitve that you should have to do that. (And how often would you give someone a character and not allow them the ability to edit it? What a strange default option?).

It's automatically in the journal if you set someone to edit a sheet. The other option is for allowing others to view the sheet without control. My PC's are set to 'in everyone's journal' and only editable by the owner. This isn't a control issue, it's because accidents happen.

And yes you can eventually figure out that you can change the settings from outside the game. That hardly contradicts the point I made that it was unituitve and finicky.

Yes, you set the defaults for the entire game from the settings for the entire game. It's a bit odd, but it makes a kind of sense if you stop to think about it.

And please stop trying to 'help'. I didn't ask for help. I am in fact making Roll20 work. You're just wasting time because so far you've told me nothing I don't already know. If you want to argue then argue but it's condescending to spuriously assume ignorance.

Your complaints leave off how to address the issue you're complaining about. Sure, you may know how to work with it, but how would I guess -- you've left that bit off. I apologize if my trying to assist you in getting better results has interfered with your grousing; certainly, we all need an outlet during this recent unpleasantness. But, please don't assume I can read your mind. Frex, your complaint in this immediately preceding post was that Roll20 aims toward a controlling GM style you dislike, but you switched to 'intuitiveness' here, so the nature of your complaints is shifty. That and the reason for the default is a much simpler and less sinister 'options default to off.' I recognize you'd like to less work to start with how you'd like the game, but we've already identified a difference between your preferences (nameplates start on) and mine (the start off), so there's not a good default setting. "Off" is at least value neutral, unless you insist on imputing motives that don't exist. Heck, the dev staff for Roll20 love to play games that don't have compendiums or character sheets already, so you can't say they have some default GM style they're forcing on you because their styles are all over the place.

I'd suggest looking for a non-negative motive before you decide that something you have to turn on is that way because other people are forcing a GMing style upon you or just trying to make things harder.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Reading your post made me take a step back and try again. I looked at the pixels of the image I was trying to use which were 812 x 473. Under the page settings I entered those into the second (px) box. I switched the page scale to 60 miles, and reduced the cell width by .25 and that shrunk the grid to match the scale on the 3E FRCS map so I just used the reference point f Westgate to Urmlaspyr which is 60 miles and it came out right. See the pics. I cant articulate what I did or figure out how to do it again, I think I'll just have to use trial and error for each image until I do figure it out.

I matched your settings... and it works fine? I mean, it's not a big map to start with, but the zoom gets down to a reasonable amount of closeness. I've got about 3/4 of the map on the screen at maximum zoom, which is way more than you're showing. I'm stumped.

By the by, that's not exactly how you're supposed to align a map, and it's not a terribly good way to get the scale right, but doggone it, it worked out pretty well -- it's very, very close to right on. Even if you're having issues with the zoom, you deserve a some kudos for getting that to work as well as it does. Kudos to you.

 

[R_J_K75]

I matched your settings... and it works fine? I mean, it's not a big map to start with, but the zoom gets down to a reasonable amount of closeness. I've got about 3/4 of the map on the screen at maximum zoom, which is way more than you're showing. I'm stumped.

By the by, that's not exactly how you're supposed to align a map, and it's not a terribly good way to get the scale right, but doggone it, it worked out pretty well -- it's very, very close to right on. Even if you're having issues with the zoom, you deserve a some kudos for getting that to work as well as it does. Kudos to you.

Thanks for the props. It works for now and maybe I'll figure out a better way to do it in the future. I'd like to understand the process better, like if X=Y then do "Z" to get the results you want, but OTOH Im not going to spend too much time on it.

To answer your question why it only zooms in so much on mine, I cropped the map to show only the Inner Sea region so that's probably why your seeing a difference.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Thanks for the props. It works for now and maybe I'll figure out a better way to do it in the future. I'd like to understand the process better, like if X=Y then do "Z" to get the results you want, but OTOH Im not going to spend too much time on it.

To answer your question why it only zooms in so much on mine, I cropped the map to show only the Inner Sea region so that's probably why your seeing a difference.

Ah, yes, if you use a much smaller sized map, you start running into the "small map" problem I talked about above. Which is one of the reasons setting the map dimensions equal to the image dimensions isn't the preferred way to do it.

Aligning maps is probably the most annoying thing to do with Roll20.

 

[R_J_K75]

Ah, yes, if you use a much smaller sized map, you start running into the "small map" problem I talked about above. Which is one of the reasons setting the map dimensions equal to the image dimensions isn't the preferred way to do it.

Aligning maps is probably the most annoying thing to do with Roll20.

Saw you edited your earlier post regarding image pixel size you mentioned in your last post. I need to sleep on it and give it another read tomorrow. Im going to find the original image of tbe FR map I used to crop the inner sea and try to get a clearer full image into my Roll20 game for Wednesdays session. Keep you posted.

 

[Don Durito]

Your complaints leave off how to address the issue you're complaining about. Sure, you may know how to work with it, but how would I guess -- you've left that bit off. I apologize if my trying to assist you in getting better results has interfered with your grousing; certainly, we all need an outlet during this recent unpleasantness. But, please don't assume I can read your mind. Frex, your complaint in this immediately preceding post was that Roll20 aims toward a controlling GM style you dislike, but you switched to 'intuitiveness' here, so the nature of your complaints is shifty.

"you switched to 'intuitiveness' here, so the nature of your complaints is shifty. "
Really?

These are the first two lines of the first post I made in this thread that you replied to and which began this exchange.

I've found Roll20 to be very oddly designed.

It's both very unintuitive and very finicky.

This was basically my entire thesis, as it were from the beginning. (Followed by three paragraphs in support of that basic point.)

If you weren't arguing with that, no wonder this exchange has been so pointless.

 

[Ovinomancer]

"you switched to 'intuitiveness' here, so the nature of your complaints is shifty. "
Really?

These are the first two lines of the first post I made in this thread that you replied to and which began this exchange.

Well, yes. You started at bad default settings and unituitive interfaces, which I tried to help with, then shifted to something being an overly controlling GM style you dislike (never did establish what exactly that was), which I tried to help with, and then shifted back to uninituitive. You've never really engaged my responses, just shifted your point of attack to maintain a gripe that it's too fiddly and has an intended style of play enforced by some nefarious default.

It is fiddly, cause options, but you can globally set your preferwnces to reduce your fiddle level. Is that in neon flashing lights? No, but it is in the attached wiki and the tutorial videos. Not sure what level of "guessed what you wanted before you showed up" you want, here.

The second is even easier: options start turned off. No nefarious intent, no default enforced playstyle (although I'm really unsure how a GMing style is forced by not being able to hang nanes on tokens -- do you have nametags on your minis at the table?)

This was basically my entire thesis, as it were from the beginning. (Followed by three paragraphs in support of that basic point.)

If you weren't arguing with that, no wonder this exchange has been so pointless.

Well, I provided direct responses, which were met by different objections like "default playstyle" and "controlling GMs". It seems your objections are slightly more broadly based than "unintuitive." But, that's okay. I stopped trying to help you and started answering in case anyone else had a similar problem and was looking for some help. I'm fine if you dislike Roll20 or imagine it's set up on a way to push you to GM in a way ypu don't like because options default to off. I don't own stock. I'd be happy for you if, tomorrow, you announced that Fantasy Grounds does everything you want and is super intuitive. Or Astral, or whatever. No one should have to deal with a hobby tool that causes undue frustration or paranoid ideation.