Time tracking

[heyes]

Newbie here,

I'd love to have a way to show rounds/turns/ etc passing in combat. I imagine it as a window that has a series of scriptable buttons. You could click a button that advances turns, rounds, seconds, minutes, that sort of thing. In turn I imagine it being possible to tie this into the various states. That way you could impose a state or halo and when you do a little pop up window asks you to set the duration of the state/halo etc.

I apologize if this has already been covered or if this is in the wrong thread.

Heyes

[Azhrei]

Please check the InitiativeTool forum, or for a tool that works within MapTool check out the initiative Panel inside MapTool.

[Threid]

That way you could impose a state or halo and when you do a little pop up window asks you to set the duration of the state/halo etc.

There is quite a bit of buzz about doing something like this in Maptool, but no breakthroughs yet. Nonetheless, it remains an intriguing idea.

I know that the initiative panel in Maptool keeps track of rounds. Is there any way the "round variable" could be incorporated into macros? If so, could developers add a "turn variable" as well, that tracks whose turn it is?

For (a grossly oversimplified) example, in round 1, the turn variable would equal 1. If there are ten combatants, and it's player 5's turn, the turn variable could be 5. The round/turn variable for that turn could be concatenated into 1.5. An effect begins that ends at the end of creature 5's next turn. The macro asks how many rounds the effect lasts, and whether it ends at the beginning or end of the turn. The player enters 1, end. The macro removes the state/effect when the round/turn variable equals 2.6.

I don't have much programming know-how, but I'd like to know if something like this could be implemented. Or, if it's in development (or there's a thread about it), I'd like to be directed to it.

[jay]

Init tool does something like this. It keeps track of rounds and current initiative, among other things. You can add timers into the initiative order that will count down until the round and initiative they expire and then flag the GM when that happens. The timers can be scripted so that certain things happen every round on the timer's turn and when the timer expires.

[Threid]

Is there any plan to integrate InitTool with MapTool macros?

[jay]

There have been plans to integrate them for a long time.

[Azhrei]

Integration is a bit problematic for a few technical reasons. Some day it will, I'm sure.

[Rumble]

I know that the initiative panel in Maptool keeps track of rounds. Is there any way the "round variable" could be incorporated into macros? If so, could developers add a "turn variable" as well, that tracks whose turn it is?

The Initiative Panel and associated functions do allow some of this to happen. You can track the current round and which token currently has Initiative, which is a couple of the pieces of the puzzle. It doesn't quite know "turns" inside of a round, though.

I've written a framework for D&D 4th Edition that automates the application and expiration of conditions (so if a token is Dazed until the end of the "dazer's" next round, it will automatically remove the Dazed condition at that time). So it's possible (albeit complicated - there are at least 8 different "timing" elements, and something like 50 states in my framework).

The thing that's missing are event-driven capabilities. In my framework, players and the GM must click macros to Start and End their turns, so that the initiative timing and counting is properly handled; there's no "onGetInitiative" or "onLoseInitiative" type events (which would be very handy). Something more sophisticated like InitTool's timers would be equally handy.

[jay]

Init Tool supports the events Rumble is talking about as well. They are all defined in this post.