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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cherno" data-source="post: 6084248" data-attributes="member: 6704531">Edit: All maps and assets can be downloaded here:Sandraiders.zip<a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/qns4xeljfjelbip/marauders.zip?dl=0" target="_blank">Marauders.zip</a><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/2rzm82cw1gvccmd/bloodsand.zip?dl=0" target="_blank">Bloodsand.zip</a><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/iv1wqrike332ucv/veiled.zip?dl=0" target="_blank">Veiled.zip</a><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/52mw1nkqt31hh2z/misc.zip?dl=0" target="_blank">Misc.zip</a><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/biplrsfycvzdehm/Rocks.zip?dl=0" target="_blank">Rocks.zip</a>***Note: Even though I played D&D 4E, this is more about using the Maptools program and less about the game itself***Hello fellow hobbyists,after playing around a bit with maptools and creating some content for <a href="http://forums.rptools.net/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=9002&start=90" target="_blank">a planned Shadowrun campaign</a>, I kinda lost interest and wasn't sure how to balance the characters in a combat-centric scenario.However, I realized that <a href="http://www.lead-adventure.de/index.php?topic=40811.0" target="_blank">an old project of mine that was never started in earnest</a> could see the light of day by using maptools! D&D 4E Dark Sun, using Rumble's excellent Slim framework. I tested out the other 4E frameworks but my needs are very specific as I am using maptools solely with face2face sessions for art presentation, world map display/traveling, and most importantly combat resolution. For the combat itself I pretty much only need to keep track of HPs and conditions as well as keeping an overview of monster powers and stats. Thus, the Slim Framework is the best choice with it's character sheet option and ease of use, although <a href="http://forums.rptools.net/viewtopic.php?f=58&t=15488&start=585" target="_blank">it took some time to work out some quirks</a>.[sblock=1]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/raiders2uvptbgakuh.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock][sblock=2]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/raiders3ewrul9aj7y.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock][sblock=3]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/raiders3dlzadkiko2.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]Yesterday was the big day and after having dinner with my two buddies we all played D&D 4E for the first time.I manged to set up the techical infrastructure in time so everything was ready just when we were finished eating. It took a few moments to get a connectgion via WLAN between the two laptops used, and another few until maptools found the server, but in the end it all somehow worked. There were some hiccups during the 8-hour-long session (we played till 5 in the morning  :shock: ) because my notebook is pretty old and slow and sometime froze for a few minutes, but it never crashed, so the program Maptools itself is reasonably stable.After two hours, just as when we wanted to start the second adventure, the server wasn't able to load the next map, no matter what, it always said "caching 8/9" or something like that while loading, but it never finished. I suspected a too large mapsize to be the case, so I tried to copy the campaign file to the server to check if it could at least load it as master, itself, but for some reason the campaign file was the only one from my maptools files that couldn't be copied. either this was because of some weird sharing properties or because it was being used on the server, either way we got it to work by closing the server AND sharing it for all network users, and after that all worked flawlessly. Another issue I had was that error messages kept popping at one point when playing the prison encounter, I think it had something to do with the VBL doors. It was irritating but since I could just close them as soon as they appeared it didn't affect the game itself.So in the end, I think it all worked better than expected and I was suprised that we were able to finish all I had planned for the night with just a little bit of downtime due to technical difficulties.Long story short, here are some pictures with annotations.Power Cards and Character sheets, all laminated / put into sleeves[sblock=4]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/rimg36475vk781ojl2.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock][sblock=5]<img src="http://[IMG]http://www.abload.de/img/rimg3652wvklpi0k48.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/img][/sblock]Me as DM left, gaming buddy checking out his power cards on the right[sblock=6]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/rimg3657b9ukgh6cjhw.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]The big TV to which the client laptop was feeding it's image[sblock=7]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/rimg3662b0kuyszjtc.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]We played through a short encounter I designed from scratch, the Mul Fighter and Human Wizard had been captured by slavers and marched through the desert, when a fierce sandstortm struck and everyone became disoriented. When the all was silent again, they were the only ones around, so they grabbed to leftover gear scattered about and cut their bonds. they soon came upon a desert prison where they slew some guards and the guard captain, and freed to prisoners who were also captured by the slavers. Now each player had two characters to play, and they left the compound and reached Altaruk to start the Dark Sun Campaign Setting introductory adventure "Sand Raiders" which they barely survived (well, the Dwarf Warpriest got killed by a swarm of Silt Runners, but the leader of House Wavir promised to see if there's anyone around that could perform a ritual to bring him back from the dead.).Some Screencaps from my DM laptop:First Sand Raiders encounter, Not the info tokens on the escarpments which provide info about skill checks to climb them, and the two blast/burst templates which were moveable by players should the Wizard wish to cast Freezing Coud, Burning Hands or similar. the red and green info tokens are for start and end encounter descriptions. The yellow cross provides tactics information.  The red X to the left under the Silt Runner means that this enemy is not used in this scenario becaue I had to downgrade the encounters as there were only 4 heroes and not 5 as in the original campaign encounter.[sblock=8]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/untitled0huuuk5j7b.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]Last Sandraiders encounter a.k.a. "The Big Fight". Things got pretty messy here after the Silt Runner Inciter cast some nasty spells. Not the freezing cloud template near the entrance which damaged quite a few Runners.  The red 3x3 template is the Psionix blast from the Inciter and created difficult terrain. the big Ssurran picture that's halfway visible in the top left corner can be made visible and dragged to the play area should a character succeed in a nature test to find out more about this creature.  The Info token in the middle provides the room description straight from the campaign and can just be read out loud easily without having to look into the book.[sblock=9]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/untitled2qgu6c3ljs6.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]Late in the fight, the Dwarf is dying after being surrounded by three enemies.[sblock=10]<img src="http://www.abload.de/img/untitled3lauk6r9j9z.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />[/sblock]</blockquote>

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