Stamp documentation or Forum link

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 1:52 pm

I am trying to read up on stamps and can not find any docs or the forum(s) the the process is discussed.

Help the idiot please?

Post by **trevor** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 2:29 pm

Heh, actually stamps were just barely introduced right before you joined our happy crew, so the details are a bit behind.

Here's the idea (perhaps this could be the start of the docs, if someone wants to take it and inject it in the docs wiki):

Stamp: A token that sits above the background and under regular tokens

Background: A token that sits above the background image, but underneath the grid.

Other than the rendering order, backgrounds and stamps work the same way. They are not selectable under regular use. Instead you must select either Stamp or Background layer in the Token Panel (it will get a gray border around the selected layer).

Selected stamps and backgrounds have blue-white dashed borders, this makes it more obvious that your are working with stamps/backgrounds instead of regular tokens (which have red-white dashed borders)

To create a stamp/background, select a token and double click it (or RMB->Properties) change the token type to Stamp or Background.

By default stamps/backgrounds follow the same sizing principles that regular tokens do. That is, by default they will fill up exactly one cell. You can change this behavior by RMB->Size->Free Size. When a stamp/background is free-size and selected, there will be a small black box in the bottom right corner, click-drag this square to resize the token.

You can rotate stamps/backgrounds in the same way as regular tokens by RMB->Set Facing. By default the facing rotation will snap to the carnidal directions, holding down CTRL will allow you to free-rotate.

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 2:47 pm

Sweet Deal, Thanks for the info Trevor.

Post by **trevor** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 3:27 pm

anytime, feel free to add notes to this forum thread for anything you find, whether it be a primer for new people, gotchas, or feature requests (trust me, this is allllll new stuff we're working with here, a work in progress) and we'll make sure it gets put into the formal docs

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 4:01 pm

Yeah I am trying to figure a way to help more. Just not sure what that might be though. Time is the biggest issue. 4 kids does not allow for alot of free time. This is much like something I had thought through in my head but do not have the correct programming skills any more. I am really loving playing with it as I develop a campaign.

Post by **trevor** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 4:27 pm

Actually, the biggest help is to report back your play and testing experience, and post your ideas

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 4:43 pm

Okay so far so good. I am trying to figure out how to add tokens to MAPTool I obviously download them from the galleries or make my own. I am not sure of how to get them seen in MAP tool.

Also when MAPTool is install via the Web install, where does it install?

I understand that there are layers now

Botom to top

MAP
BACKGROUND
STAMP
TOKEN

Correct?

Could it be map more obvious as to which layer is selected? I know you can tell in the Token folders based on which one has the little dotted line around it, that is very hard to quicly see. If the widow name had the layer select or it was diplayed much like when a map is not viewable by the players.

Post by **trevor** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 4:52 pm

To add a directory hierarchy to the image explorer:

File->Add Image Explorer Path

You are correct about the layers. The rptools team have been discussing that exact problem. We should have a better solution in the next couple releases.

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 5:02 pm

trevor wrote:To add a directory hierarchy to the image explorer:

File->Add Image Explorer Path

You are correct about the layers. The rptools team have been discussing that exact problem. We should have a better solution in the next couple releases.

Thanks for the answers...

And MAPTool installs where?

Post by **trevor** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 5:04 pm

oh, right, it keeps its internal files in ~/.maptool

which for the windows world is:

c:\Documents and Settings\<username>\.maptool

Big_Mac · Post by **Big_Mac** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 5:07 pm

Great, Is there a way to move it. I know it's not huge but I keep my C: drive for only OS related files all other get installed on D:.

Phergus · Post by **Phergus** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 5:19 pm

Big_Mac wrote:Great, Is there a way to move it. I know it's not huge but I keep my C: drive for only OS related files all other get installed on D:.

Sure. Download the ZIP archive instead and use that.

Azhrei · Post by **Azhrei** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 7:22 pm

Or move your My Documents folder to a different location. Windows has the ability to make that change, but I don't remember where/how.

Phergus · Post by **Phergus** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 9:21 pm

Azhrei wrote:Or move your My Documents folder to a different location. Windows has the ability to make that change, but I don't remember where/how.

If you right click on My Documents and select Properties you can change the location on the Target tab.

But that doesn't change your home directory which is under:

c:\Documents and Settings\<username>\

as Trevor had indicated.

For Big_Mac the easiest thing to do is to just download the zip to wherever he wants it and run it from there.

Post by **trevor** » Thu Aug 31, 2006 9:37 pm

Actually, there's a minor detail that you might not know, MT caches all of the images it has seen for quick reference later (getting a map from a server on a different machine, for example), so it does tend to add up the cache in the .maptool directory.

I suppose I could put in a hidden preference for cache location for the hard core users that want to adjust it.