Hover Notes: Discussion

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trevor
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Post by trevor »

Phergus wrote: Well it is probably a bug or mistake but the Player clients show a little grey box down in the corner for any object that has GM notes
Bug, I thought I had fixed that :P
Phergus wrote:It allows the GM to separate the descriptive, mood-setting text from the rules derived specifics in the GM's Notes.
The content is actually html which would make it trivial to create blocks of information distinct for different purposes. It would be easy to have a "Room Description" paragraph and "Details" paragraph all in the GM notes section
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darkeness66
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Post by darkeness66 »

An interesting topic. Peoples wants are as diverse as their gaming styles, and that I think is one of the things that must be addressed. Is map tools only for a select few (or a select few who follow a certain gaming style)? I don't think that is anybodies agenda.

Another key question is what is map tools going to evolve into? Will is saty freeware or at some point is this going to go commercial? If it's going to go commercial and be competitive with what's out there now, it has to be versitile and well constructed with ease of use a key factor for both players and DM's.

Personally, I like having options. Sometimes I go into anal detail on maps when I create them and there are other times (too often sadly), when I am just plain lazy. When I read dorponds post about his vision for map tools I thought.. wow! That's a lot of work, but wouldn't it be cool.

Personally, during a game, especially online, dealing with 6 players all asking me, what's in the room again? or what's that statue of again? are distractions I don't need. I prefer using skill checks whenever possible, but for sometimes I have better things to do than explain what's in each and every room when it can just as easily be put into a players note for the characters to read themselves. That way I can be working on moving those invisible kobold rogues up behind the paladin while the party busies themselves on poking around the room (and the notes I put there).

and really, does it matter whether I type the room description when I build the map & put it in a note or type it during the game session when I am going to make typoes and miss important key features because I am rushing?

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galneweinhaw
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Post by galneweinhaw »

Funny thing darkeness66.

I was discussing with on of the players in my group today about the benefits/problems of becoming more video game like.

What is the difference between a video game and Table top? I mean the REAL difference, not whether you physically roll a piece of plastic or the computer does it, or whether you move your mini or drag a token over a map.... it is, we determined, one major thing:

1. The ability of a GM to handle non-linear events, ie creativity.

I believe anything that could be done by a program such as maptools, that does not get in the way of a GM to be creative, can only free up more time for me, as a GM, to do the one thing I can do that a video game can't.

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Post by galneweinhaw »

And now, for a less philosophical post...

Some things I encountered in my map making tonight:

1. Could we darken the notes a little more? I think it is at 50% right now, maybe 65? I had some trouble reading it on a detailed light background (just a plain light background is fine, it the details in a light background that messed me up)

2. How are stacked markers handled? I have a large background tile that takes 16 squares that has a note on it, but it drowns all the notes of my object stamps on top of the stamp. Maybe object markers should override background markers?

That's all for now =)

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Post by dorpond »

galneweinhaw wrote: 2. How are stacked markers handled? I have a large background tile that takes 16 squares that has a note on it, but it drowns all the notes of my object stamps on top of the stamp. Maybe object markers should override background markers?
I thought it worked on the same stacking rules. In other words, if the objects are on top of the background stamps, then you can see the hovers.

I found that certain stackings are difficult but I don't really see a way to fix that besides droping an Information Icon instead of putting the notes on the stamp. For example, I had a throne base, then a throne on top of that, then a skeleton on top of that. The skeleton had a little more alpha channel than the actual image so the skeleton image was almost the same size as the throne which caused it to be hard to get a hover but that was the fault of the image sizes.

But yeah, I thought hovers worked the same as stacking so your objects should have shown if they were on top of the backgrounds. That's the way it should work, anyway... (I would think) *shrug*

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Post by ego093 »

About the whole "video game" comment:

Neverwinter Nights has a GM and can handle non-linear storytelling / interaction. It's also a video game. Personally, I don't see the point in MT becoming NWN Lite (it's been done better), but then again I don't see the point in MT becoming Illustrator Lite either (again - it's been done better). I just think the real difference between MT and these other tools is focus. Feature creep is a real problem for open source apps and I think we're just beginning to see that happen in MT. I'd just hate to see MT go down the road of PCGen where it becomes super "powerful" and utterly useless at the same time.

That said - I think pop-ups for GMs fit perfectly with the virtual tabletop paradigm and really enhance the usability of the application. So... I think we're all on the same page with the current functionality.

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trevor
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Post by trevor »

galneweinhaw wrote: 1. Could we darken the notes a little more? I think it is at 50% right now, maybe 65? I had some trouble reading it on a detailed light background (just a plain light background is fine, it the details in a light background that messed me up)
Do you mean less translucent ? Fiddle with it and find the value you like and send it on over :)
galneweinhaw wrote:2. How are stacked markers handled? I have a large background tile that takes 16 squares that has a note on it, but it drowns all the notes of my object stamps on top of the stamp. Maybe object markers should override background markers?
My bad. Currently I'm holding the markers in an unordered collection, I knew better, but took the lazy way out. I need to change it to an ordered list so that you will get the hover of the topmost marker.
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trevor
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Post by trevor »

darkeness66 wrote:Will is saty freeware or at some point is this going to go commercial?
For the record, MT will always be freeware :)
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Post by trevor »

ego093 wrote:Feature creep is a real problem for open source apps and I think we're just beginning to see that happen in MT.
Feature creep is something we are very mindful of, and I too get the "we're bloating" icky feeling fairly regularly, and use it to direct feature inclusion and implementation. Which is also why we need you all, the community, to help make sure we don't get off track !
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darkeness66
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Post by darkeness66 »

Glad to hear that this will stay freeware :D too bad Wotc couldn't give you some support to get the online gaming community jump started. Even though I am pretty conventional when it comes to my gaming style, I have defiently become an addict of map tools in my games and really enjoy the versitility and creativity that it offers me when it comes to making battle maps.

As things stand now I am pretty happy with the way map tools works. Some tweeking on light & vision would be nice (I know it's on the "to do" list) and inclusion of a voice chat fetaure, but other than that it certainly meets my needs for an online gaming platform.

I have to agree about the bloating issue. Sometimes you can have too many options. Unfortunelty that relates to what I said earlier about gaming styles. What might be right for me is incomplete and trivial to others.

Pretty maps and cool looking functions are nice, but it really is about roleplaying. There once was a time when all I had were some notebook paper, cheap dice, a #2 pencil and a few paper back books and I was in roleplaying heaven! My how times have changed...

Anybody rememeber when keep on the borderlands and isle of dread first appeared? :shock:

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Post by galneweinhaw »

darkeness66 wrote:There once was a time...
..when we used coins for every creature. Heads= alive, Tails= dead.

I think I saw it mentioned before to have an advanced and basic feature list?

Is there an outline somewhere of what maptool is, like a guideline boundary to stay within?

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trevor
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Post by trevor »

galneweinhaw wrote: Is there an outline somewhere of what maptool is, like a guideline boundary to stay within?
The original mantra was "Just a battlemap" If it wasn't a feature that fit in that definition, we didn't do it. We've blurred the lines a bit over time I think, but that's pretty much the baseline.
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trevor
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Post by trevor »

trevor wrote:"Just a battlemap"
Actually I think it was more like "strictly a battlemap replacement". The idea being that other VTs at the time were focused on too many things and the were too inflexible, or wasn't Good Enough because it was spread too thin.
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Post by Emryys »

I think the core features for online VGT gaming should be a shared map, multimedia sharing (pics, sounds, charts) and communication of the GM/Players characters with enhanced chat via macros, and perhaps sheets containing macros and interactive character information.

Hover notes are a nice idea and I like Dorponds take :)

As long as the candy doesn't rot the teeth, we won't have to much bloat... ;)
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Post by Dalna »

How about an easy way to send the information form the hover to the chat window...IE could we have a third option is the hover information could be sent to the chat window when someone double clicks on the object. Keeping the map clear is my main concern. Say I have a market with lots of stalls. I would like to see this in chat.

Player1 >> The text of the hover. This way if several people are doing things each player can see the hover. I kinda would rather the object gets a border (or another way to distinguish it) around it and not have hovers myself. Would rather use the chat window so that hovers don't imped vision movement or whatever.

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