Should I use Maptools for my Online Game

[Raileth]

This might be a bit of a provocative question (especially in a maptools forum), and apologies up front if I offend anyone with it, but hopefully I'll get some constructive comments / advice.

I'm looking to start a new online campaign (either Pathfinder or Shadowrun) and am currently looking at virtual tabletop applications. I've narrowed my search down to maptools and roll20 and was looking for some helpful advice to finalise my decision.

I've used maptools before in a face to face game and once id worked out the quirks of using java 6 and how to setup tokens etc was pretty impressed. I especially liked the dynamic lighting and sight features (which while not perfect were very impressive) as well as the flexibility of the tokens / properties and macros. My concern is that it would appear (and I may be wrong here) that the development of the tool isn't progressing. I appreciate that development is done by a few talented people and its not funded, but the latest version is now over a year old and I haven't seen anything to suggest a new build is in the offing, in fact the last post about a build 1.4 is now over a year old (other than the feature requests). In addition it would appear to be quite complex to setup a session for playing over the web (port forwarding etc) - although I appreciate this is something you probably only have to do once.

On the other hand I have also been looking at Roll20. Unlike maptools this appears to be in a state of development and has some level of funding. However it doesn't appear to be as flexible as maptools and whilst not a major issue requires payment in order to make use of their version of dynamic lighting. It also appears to be pretty simple to setup for use on the web although there is the disadvantage that you 'have' to use it online.

Hopefully you can see my quandary, as I don't want to invest the time and effort in maptools if it is a dying beast, but likewise don't want to go with Roll20 if it is always going to be less than maptools.

so if anyone has some constructive comments / advice I'd appreciate it. (I've also posted this in the Roll20 forums as well so hopefully between the two will get some good pointers)

Thanks

[jfrazierjr]

I appreciate that development is done by a few talented people and its not funded, but the latest version is now over a year old and I haven't seen anything to suggest a new build is in the offing, in fact the last post about a build 1.4 is now over a year old (other than the feature requests).

Just to be CLEAR, the next build will STILL be in the 1.3 line.. Hopefully, it will be the last one but that will depend greatly upon any found bugs and if we think we can live with the bugs/oddities that can't be easily "changed". There are several people around who have submitted bug patches which will be included in the next 1.3 build as recently as a few days ago AND those have been committed to the source code repository. The issue is that the process to create a build is currently extremely complex and due to that as well as security requirements(specifically, the secret key required to build the signed certificate for the java web start version), there is only one active developer who can do that. This person travels quite a bit for his job and thus has little consistent time(most of the time when he is on the road, he is on a crappy internet connection... and when he is home..well he needs to spend some time with his spouse to keep good will for all the time he is not available during the week.) Generally, the only time he has consistently available is during times when he has a period of not being on the road which is not very often.

1.4 however, is a totally different beast... It is the next version and it won't have any end user testable stuff for quite a long time. We are waiting for 1.3 to become officially closed so that we have a starting point for 1.4 HOWEVER, another one of the developers has actually re-written the parser component which will be included in the 1.4 code, so in a way, development on 1.4 has officially started in a manner of speaking...

Hopefully you can see my quandary, as I don't want to invest the time and effort in maptools if it is a dying beast, but likewise don't want to go with Roll20 if it is always going to be less than maptools.

It's not dying, but just like many other things, priorities go through ups and downs. When I was a teenager, I played D&D Sat/Sun for 4-9 hours each day. Played less during college years... Got a job a job and then got married and did not play ANY for 10 years(part of this time was prior to marriage though.) Started playing again once a month for about a year... skipped 6 years and then started back and now am playing (mostly) once a month for the past 5 years. What should concern you would be if the MapTool forum started drying up(or the Dev team just blatantly said no more RPTools.. but that won't happen IMHO)

[Full Bleed]

This is a legitimate concern, especially for anyone looking to start into MT.

The issue is that the process to create a build is currently extremely complex and due to that as well as security requirements(specifically, the secret key required to build the signed certificate for the java web start version), there is only one active developer who can do that. This person travels quite a bit for his job and thus has little consistent time(most of the time when he is on the road, he is on a crappy internet connection... and when he is home..well he needs to spend some time with his spouse to keep good will for all the time he is not available during the week.) Generally, the only time he has consistently available is during times when he has a period of not being on the road which is not very often.

With all due respect to Az and all he has done to keep things going after Trevor faded away, I think it's about time that someone else be groomed/offered to step up and pull the cart for awhile. Be it a matter of available time or just being burnt out, Az is going through much the same issues Trevor did when we lost him. Both hung on longer than they probably should have and the releases suffered for it. Development on MT virtually exploded when Az first took the reigns after such a long drought. I'm not sure if anyone would step up, but at this point it should be on the table.

Related issue: We (forum readers) all know that java 7 won't work with the current MT, and now even if you are running Java 6 and you've updated to update 39 it won't run right with that either (had to walk back several players last week because of that)... getting update 38 is actually a pain now... and it's only supposed to be officially offered through Feb according to java.com anyway. In short, next month it's going to be an extra hurdle for new users (like the OP) to get things up and running (unless the various versions of Java 6 update 38 can be put on the rptools site to assure that people can get it... and I figure that's probably a bad idea.)

[aliasmask]

Installing MT does require a modicum of computer literacy. Between setting up the router for hosting, installing the correct version of java and having MT point to the correct version of java are three steps people are not used to doing. But once those things are done, you're golden.

I've dabbled with Roll20 and as impressive as it is, it's still just an acorn compared to the oak tree that MapTool is. We have a very loyal and active community and I don't see MapTool dying anytime soon. One of my biggest disappointments is the lack of a new build to fix the major bugs, which I think have been fixed, just not implemented. For me, it's like building a 1000 piece puzzle only to realize 1 piece is missing, very frustrating.

But MapTool, even AS IS is great and I don't see any real competition in the near future. There are plenty of hopefuls out there, some with nifty new features but MapTool's macroscript still is the most powerful tool for online Virtual Table Top gameplay. There are some other really nice tools that can supplement MapTool, but for implementing game mechanics, MapTool is the way to go.

[Raileth]

Just thought I'd reply to this post to say thanks for the replies, between here and the posts i made on Maptool I have decided to start with Roll20, have paid my subscription and am now in the process of learning / setting everything up. For those of you who are interested my decision was based on the following reasons:-

1. As I said originally although maptools has more functionality, there is an issue with Java and whilst I am pretty computer savvy, i dont fancy spending hours setting everything up for the game.

2. It would appear that the version of Java that maptools is run on will no longer be available after the end of February, and there is no sign of an update. This is probably my main reason as i don't want to be running a game on a platform that isn't readily available to both me and my players, whilst there has been development on fixes there is still an issue with releasing them to the wider public. roll20 seems to actively develop and release updates / new features.

Thanks for the replies - if you're interested in the replies on the equivalent maptool forum they can be found here:-

http://app.roll20.net/forum/post/65682/ ... post-67005
Grant

[aliasmask]

I think you mean the end of public updates to Java 6, not the end of availability. All java versions are still available for download in their archive.

I should make a 2 minute how-to-video showing how to install MapTool and java for Windows. I am a little disappointed in your decision, mostly for the overstated reasons as to why. But I see it as a messaging problem.

Despite all the posts and directions given on site, I just had one of the players I'm gaming with have connection and macro problems. That's because he's still running java 7, *face palm*. Along with the video maybe I'll create a batch file to confirm everything was done correctly or have it generate the mtcfg.txt file and shortcut to MapTool program. Actually, I'm looking at an MSI installer right now. Making MT a one click install will definitely help in the java configuration department.

[wolph42]

I think you mean the end of public updates to Java 6, not the end of availability. All java versions are still available for download in their archive.

I should make a 2 minute how-to-video showing how to install MapTool and java for Windows. I am a little disappointed in your decision, mostly for the overstated reasons as to why. But I see it as a messaging problem.

Despite all the posts and directions given on site, I just had one of the players I'm gaming with have connection and macro problems. That's because he's still running java 7, *face palm*. Along with the video maybe I'll create a batch file to confirm everything was done correctly or have it generate the mtcfg.txt file and shortcut to MapTool program. Actually, I'm looking at an MSI installer right now. Making MT a one click install will definitely help in the java configuration department.

well... I think it would be even better if b89 is released! Still even with b89 released it might be a good idea to make a small 'how to get started with MT' vid.

So @ the OP: check the rptools forum regularly as it should not be that long before b89 (java 7 compatible) is released and that would in one go take away the issues you perceive.

[Jagged]

2. It would appear that the version of Java that maptools is run on will no longer be available after the end of February, and there is no sign of an update. This is probably my main reason as i don't want to be running a game on a platform that isn't readily available to both me and my players, whilst there has been development on fixes there is still an issue with releasing them to the wider public. roll20 seems to actively develop and release updates / new features.

Just to put this in perspective for a minute, as anyone working in a corporate IT environment will tell you, there are plenty of reasonably high profile products out there that haven't moved to Java7 yet* AND you will also find that a great many corporation won't be moving to Java7 just yet.

As a side issue, I wonder if Oracle may change their mind regarding updates for 6? Where I work we are considering non-Oracle Java ahead of Java7.

But regardless of that, good luck with your game.


* like the *hack* *spit* support desk software we use :p

[aliasmask]

Here's what I have so far:

Code: Select all

REM No brainer JAVA install batch.

REM Create mt.cfg file with correct javaw path
echo MAXMEM=1024> mt.cfg
echo MINMEM=64>> mt.cfg
echo JVM=%HOMEDRIVE%\Program Files\Java\jre6\bin\javaw.exe -Xss3M>> mt.cfg
echo PROMPT=false>> mt.cfg

REM Set variable if 64bit system
wmic OS get OSArchitecture | findstr 64-bit > tempfile.txt
set /p TEMPVAR= < tempfile.txt

IF NOT "%TEMPVAR%"=="" GOTO GET64
REM GET32 6.38
REM 6.39 http://javadl.sun.com/webapps/download/AutoDL?BundleId=73922
start iexplore.exe http://javadl.sun.com/webapps/download/AutoDL?BundleId=71310
GOTO END
:GET64 6.38
REM 6.39 http://javadl.sun.com/webapps/download/AutoDL?BundleId=73923
start iexplore.exe http://javadl.sun.com/webapps/download/AutoDL?BundleId=71311
:END

The challenge so far was finding the BundleId for 6u38 of java, because I thought there was some regex bug in 39... but I just installed that one and it started just fine, so the final batch (or whatever) will probably dl 39. I ran across a weird echo bug when setting STACKSIZE and the line would not print. Also, the mt.cfg values are really sensitive where I could not add a space after a number or else it would fail to load. I was going to have the batch generate a shortcut, but I'll let the user do that.

[wolph42]

is it possible that the backslashes "\" are ignored somehow as you dir path looks a bit odd.

[Vhex]

@Wolph I think the forum code display may have taken the slashes out.

@Alias For a little more lightweight version, you could leave out wmic and just check for the existence of %ProgramFiles(x86)%

Code: Select all

IF EXIST "%ProgramFiles(x86)%" GOTO 64Bit
GOTO 32bit

You probably want to use SystemDrive instead of HomeDrive since it's more likely to give you the right path (although both can be wrong). A more accurate representation is %ProgramFiles%\java. The most accurate is %JAVA_HOME%, but that's not set for most people not running JDK (and even some that are).

The reason you're having a problem with Stacksize is because the number you're using is valid for an error level and it's being interpreted as such. You can just escape the character to fix it:

Code: Select all

ECHO STACKSIZE=^2>>>mt.cfg

I'd recommend using that as the start maptool batch file instead of just an install batch file. Only prompt to install if the java version is wrong. If you really want to make an installer, you're better off using something like NSIS.

[aliasmask]

Thanks for all the tips. I knew my solution was "hacky" at best which is why I haven't posted this in the HOW TO section yet.

@wolph - oh yeah, now I see what you're talking about. Vhex is right and the forum filter took out the slashes, weird. I wouldn't think it would do that in a code block.

[Vhex]

Hacky or not, it fills a need no one else has filled and I'm glad to help (and yet, too lazy to do more than offer tips~).

I could actually build the installer in NSIS if someone else wants to maintain it. I'm very good at the design and deliver aspects, I'm very bad at maintenance and updates. I also tend to disappear for months at a time when work gets busy so I wouldn't want people relying on me for updates.

[aliasmask]

Well, the reason I was doing this was as a bandaid to the current problem with people not being computer savvy enough to install the correct version required by MapTool. Also, this is a windows only solution. I don't know if Mac users have an issue with java installs. Hopefully once b89 comes out there won't be a reason to maintain this.

If you can build something cleaner and easier to use I'm more than happy to pass the buck while you feel motivated. Once you create the build I'll post a test forum so we can make sure it works on various windows OS's and then post it as a quick fix or at least a GOTO link for people with java problems.

[JML]

I don't know if Mac users have an issue with java installs.

Up to Snow Leopard (10.6) we're "stuck" with Java 6, so no problem with MapTool.
Going from Lion (10.7) and up you can install Java 7 if you wish and thus get all the joy of checking what Java version your MapTool software is using