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Babale
2012-01-09, 04:07 PM
Hey guys! I have a problem.

I play D&D over Skype. A lot. And in order to show people their positions, I found a very simple solution: I have an Inkscape file with 3 layers. At the bottom is the Background layer, where I have the background of the map: Rooms, walls, etc. Above that, I have a Grid layer, which is as simple as it sounds. Finally, I have a Token layer, where I put the players and monsters (Which I, or one of my players, make in Inkscape). When the players get in a fight, I take a screenshot of the battlemat, send it to them over Skype, and then we go through the actions. I constantly update the map, and at the end of the round, take a new screenshot. This is really easy and convenient, since I can put HP totals and initiative scores as text over the tokens.

However, two of my players have very slow internet connections, which means that it can take nearly a minute to send the files over (even though the file is only a simple picture). Further, in a game with 6 players who are fighting 20 mooks at once, it gets difficult to remember where each one is between the beginning and end of the round; but uploading pictures after every move is even harder. So, I need a program that will:

1) Let me and all of my players log onto it, and be able to view the map.
2) Allow me to put in a background, a grid, and the tokens, preferably on separate layers.
3) Allow me to move tokens around, and for the players to see the movement.
4) Allow me to make certain areas of the map unviewable.
5) Allow me to keep track of HP totals and initiative on the same program (Optional)


Does anyone know of such a program?

Mazeburn
2012-01-09, 04:31 PM
Googledocs is likely your best bet, it's not exactly what you're asking for but it can certainly do the background images on layers, put a grid over and place player tokens. Might get a bit chaotic, but using groups would help that, though there's sadly not layers like in Photoshop (it's more vectory, with seperate objects, like Inkscape). To cover things up you could just stick a big square or whatever over it, and you could also stick your HP and initiatives in a Google Spreadsheet and have it on the next tab. Probably the best thing you'll find that everyone can connect to. :) I'm impressed you can do much Skype gaming at all, lag would be fatal for me!

Excession
2012-01-09, 04:38 PM
You might want to look at MapTool from http://rptools.net/

It's not nearly as good a drawing program as Inkscape is all.

Babale
2012-01-09, 04:41 PM
I just had an idea, check my logic on this: screen sharing! Is there a way, in skype, to only share one window? I want my players to view the map, not the monster the srd is open too...

Edit: wait, you need skype premium for groups... Is there a screensharing program?

Mazeburn
2012-01-09, 05:28 PM
The only one I've used is VNC (http://www.tightvnc.com/download.php), which seems to be okay. But if it's taking minutes to download one image, why would downloading dozens of images by screensharing be any faster? xP

Babale
2012-01-09, 05:36 PM
True, I guess screensharing would lead to crippling lag... Gametable is a bit complicated, is there a good tutorial for it?

Drglenn
2012-01-09, 05:54 PM
Virtual Daivve (http://www.4shared.com/file/0Rf_B32T/VirtualDaivvev1023p9Java-16.html) has all the stuff you want (though you can't hide enemy hp as far as my group's experimentation has found), it also has a built-in dice roller and macros to set up the most common dice rolls you're going to use.

Its designed for D&D 4e but you could just as well use it for other editions

bigstipidfighte
2012-01-10, 06:54 AM
I'm gonna second MapTool as being a very good program, although it'll take awhile to learn all the functions. I'm currently getting a feel for it myself as a DM, but I have seen it used to great effect as a player.

dobu
2012-01-10, 07:36 AM
Teamviewer[1] is like VNC [2] and is able to just submit a specific window.

[1] www.teamviewer.com/
[2] http://sourceforge.net/projects/tigervnc/ for example. There are many implementations for vnc, ultravnc, tightvnc..