MapTool video tutorials(with audio)

mrobviousjosh · Post by **mrobviousjosh** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 12:34 am

Darigaaz wrote:
mrobviousjosh wrote:
snikle wrote:oooh intro to decks!
I would like to see what everyone's getting so worked up about.
Me too. I dont remember any RP games that use decks.

Deadlands (the original for calculating starting stats instead of rolling). I know there are also critical hit cards that some people want to use, regular cards for actual "poker" games and such for their characters to play, Call of Cthulhu had some cards for the game (I can't remember what for though), the Street Fighter RPG used cards for maneuvers every round (you had to choose what you were going to do with a card), Star Wars Saga Edition uses "force cards" to keep track of usage, and D&D: Ravenloft had some tarot cards that you could play with. Whew. But, yeah, the original deadlands is the only thing I can think of that actually called for using actual cards in the rulebook. My favorite card to draw- the Joker. You not only had max attribute points for that stat but you were given a "mysterious past" which you and the GM had to flesh out. Pretty cool if you ask me.

RPMiller · Post by **RPMiller** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 1:00 am

One of the best systems out there uses decks. It is called Savage Worlds and if you haven't seen it, go buy it, or even better try it out for free:

http://www.peginc.com/Games/SavageWorlds/main.htm

Cards are used as the initiative system.

That said, since decks will be tied into tables, dice can be as well, and now all kinds of possibilities are available.

Note: It is from the same folks that made Deadlands.

torstan · Post by **torstan** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 5:01 am

Come on people, has no-one ever had their players find a Deck of Many Things? Trevor is about to add an Artifact to maptool!

Whoever draws the ace of spades is in a whole world of trouble...

Also, it would make for a cool (though not precisely accurate) way of doing a bag of tricks, with each card being a different creature.

However - back on topic, the tutorials are looking really good Brad. They also seem to have got a lot more people on to the boards and past the initial learning curve of maptool. Well done!

brad · Post by **brad** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 9:01 am

And this is not just about RPGs either. With the card deck you suddenly open up maptool to just about any board game. I already have maptool running the old Dungeon board game really well, but with card decks it will be perfect. As soon as the card deck is working I am putting Vampire: Prince of the City, Settler, and Zombies in just off of the top of my head. That way you know what happens when too many players happen to cancel on a game? You break out a cool board game! Or you could easily make up a game of your own... Hmmm.... That is a cool idea. You could make games like Vampire: Prince of the City, that are really close to actually role-playing, but there is the board and you don't need a gm. Original Maptool games. Actually I have started doing that to Dungeon. It will kind of be like a dungeon crawl with no gm. The possibilities are endless!!!!

But, I suppose we should get back to the thread topic. Thanks torstan. I am currently doing the last run through on all the basic tutorials. Increasing the screen size, adding intro and credits, and making any final changes that I have in my changes notebook. That is at least for a few months until I have to revisit and make changes for all the new features and upgrades that trevor will have added

, that will make some of the tutorials outdated.

Beefy mongoose · Post by **Beefy mongoose** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 11:02 pm

Phergus wrote:Don't use IE to save pictures from the Dundjinni site. Use FireFox.

i use msn and it doesn't work

SDShannonS · Post by **SDShannonS** » Sun Feb 03, 2008 1:59 am

By the way, the collection of artwork can be downloaded from here. It's the CSUAC of the Dundjinni artwork. I believe it's all fantasy-based but I'm not positive of that.

More information can be found here

Google is your friend. =o)

SDShannonS · Post by **SDShannonS** » Sun Feb 03, 2008 2:45 am

Okay, so having downloaded and installed them, they're definitely not all fantasy. Some amazing artwork covering fantasy, modern, post-modern, sci-fi, etc. Lots of great stuff there.

And as stated above, it amounts to about 600 MB total.

Shannon

brad · Post by **brad** » Sun Feb 03, 2008 7:03 am

SDShannonS thanks! That is the big gmsparlor thing. I think I will just link to that from my Resources section as the Beginners Library. That is a great start for anyone. All organized and ready to go. Thanks again for finding that!

Phergus · Post by **Phergus** » Sun Feb 03, 2008 11:46 am

Beefy mongoose wrote:
Phergus wrote:Don't use IE to save pictures from the Dundjinni site. Use FireFox.
i use msn and it doesn't work

Actually you use Internet Explorer. MSN is an ISP/web portal.

You can download and install FireFox from here.

Or you can use Free Download Manager. In your case I would get the Lite version.

Harry · Post by **Harry** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 7:17 pm

Hey guys,

I just wanna say I've been using Fantasy Grounds for a good while now to run games. I've been absolutely convinced FG2 was the best choice out there for anyone regarding online tabletops. I knew of MapTool, had tried it, discarded it.

Tonight I came by here out of a mix of bored curiosity and procrastination, and watched these videos.

My basic reaction: Are you kidding me?

I'm converted. There is so much stuff MapTool does that FG2 doesn't even begin to cover, I wouldn't even know where to start. Map layers. Portraits. Flexible player views. Powerful tokens. Hidden and GM-only layers. Lighting. Multi-line macros. Player drawing. Easy image management. GM drawing that actually works. Fog of war that actually works. ...I'm just scratching the surface of the stuff I noticed. And these are just the basic videos?

Whoa.

Anyway, just a quick note to say I would never have had the faintest idea of any of this if not for these vids. I would never have given it enough of a chance. Excellent job, seriously. You guys need to put all of these up on Youtube or something. They are your best promotion.

wrathgon · Post by **wrathgon** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 7:29 pm

welcome Harry, and if u want to see what other features are in the works go to wall of features
http://rptools.net/wallOfFeatures/wof1_3.php
(and u can donate to see ones u want to be added in next release)

glad to have u here

brad · Post by **brad** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 8:08 pm

Welcome aboard Harry. Glad you gave MapTool a second chance. Some other virtual table tops may have started development a long time before MapTool and so had a good head start on features. But, the RPTools.net team's fast rate of development and creativity seems to have gotten to the point that MapTool and it's related tools are catching or blowing by the competition.

mrobviousjosh · Post by **mrobviousjosh** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 9:10 pm

brad wrote:Welcome aboard Harry. Glad you gave MapTool a second chance. Some other virtual table tops may have started development a long time before MapTool and so had a good head start on features. But, the RPTools.net team's fast rate of development and creativity seems to have gotten to the point that MapTool and it's related tools are catching or blowing by the competition.

This is especially true because most of the users give feedback and the team listens! So many other developers do what they want to without regards to the users. It's really nice MapTools is the opposite.

Emryys · Post by **Emryys** » Sun Feb 10, 2008 1:46 am

SDShannonS wrote:By the way, the collection of artwork can be downloaded from here...

There used to be zipped versions for non-DJ users, are they available?

brad · Post by **brad** » Sun Feb 10, 2008 8:00 am

Well, that collection can be used by anyone, not just DJ users. If you are talking about the zipped collections of art off of the dundjinni forum. Go here

http://www.gmsyndicate.com

And go to the Map Tools(Art Packs). Nothing is organized but there is zip file after zip file of dundjunni forum art, labeled by what month it was posted on the forum.