A New DM Tale of learning FG

[Danimal66]

Thanks to a great deal of advice here I took the plunge for Fantasy Grounds on Steam. The goal to convert my 5th edition D&D group which is currently going through Hoard of the Dragon Queen and is at chapter 6. I thought I might create a thread to post notes and possibly gain insight from veterans as I attempt this journey. I hope this is allowed.

I started off by buying a single license on Steam with the Complete Core Pack (i.e. Players handbook not sure why it's just not called that) and the Hoard module. I questioned if buying the module so close to the end was worth it but determined for learning the game it was.

I'm a visual learner and hate reading manuals, especially on wiki's. I'm also a tinkerer and like to learn by trying. It was clear right off the bat that was not going to go so well. While there are many video tutorials out there, some official and some not. There was not really one good set i could find, Almost all were useful in some way but when you want the answer to a single question watching a 40 minute video which may or may not answer it is a gamble. If i find really good videos or get suggestions I will add them as I go.

I found the best method for me so far is when I hit a snag, google the question and I usually end up in these forums. I still would love a wire to wire tutorial on things but so far this is my approach. Anyway I decided to lay out my objectives for my first FG session.


Open the PHB
Open the Hoard Module
Create a Character
Transfer my players characters from roll 20;.


I didn't think that would be so bad...

First thing I've think I learned, I say think because I fully expect people to correct me. You can't just open the content and look at it. Meaning I can't just open the PHB or Hoard Module, I needed to create a campaign and then go into my library an enable the content. This is covered in the official video here (https://youtu.be/nurEMR4JJeU?list=PL3h0dIaiayC_AW7djpTlriZEtg2WBCCv p).

So I created a campaign called Those Guys (my gaming groups name) and enabled the D&D content. To my knowledge I have done this correctly. My thought process is once they move on to Rise of Tiamat. I purchase that, enable it in thi campaign and disable hoard if I like. That could be a totally wrong assumption but hey we're learning here.

Next step was looking at the Hoard content, it took a minute to realize that when I clicked on something like Story and saw nothing that there were tabs below the window for different chapters etc. I looked at all the items, tried to open some maps which i did but they opened so big they didn't fit on the screen. I decided learning how to use the module could wait as there looks to be a good video tutorial (https://youtu.be/QrQ3jHv3-so?list=PL3h0dIaiayC_AW7djpTlriZEtg2WBCCvp) on that.

Using the video I linked to above I just created a random character to get the feel for things. I'll admit up front after about 5 minutes I said to myself; "This is wasting time lets transfer a guy in from Roll 20" I know there is a character import utility but frankly I didn't think it possible from Roll 20 but I plan to try that with my Hero Lab Pathfinder campaign. So it was time to start manually creating a guy.

I transferred 2 characters over to the campaign. Meaning I created 2 new characters in the Those Guys campaign and copied stuff. I'm still under the assumption what I did above with the campaign is correct or I'm a little screwed. The first character was a 5th level Dragonborn Paladin, the second a Human Barbarian also 5th level.

The first PC took 1 hour and 45 minutes and the second 15 minutes... <drops Mic and leaves> With the first PC I was learning how everything worked and using my google search method for answers. For example creating the Paladin I started with a new guy. Dragged over his race and class from the library. Really nice how it adds everything and prompts you for choices. I then click on the spyglass and bumped his level to 4. Nothing new was added, surely i didn't need to manually add everything? Nope google search and I found out just dropping the class on the spot multiple times level the PC and gave him is new abilities.

Spells are still a bit of a mystery. I have them added and they work but I'm not sure what the different states are such as group, preparing etc. but that is for another time. It was a good time spent learning what automatically updates, what doesn't (like AC) and while i still have questions (If a PC uses a long sword with 2 hands how does he roll the versatile damage?) they are all minor. Using the actions tab was a trait and essentially having the PHB at my fingertips was too me the biggest gain. I'm sure there will be bumps like tracking abilities that have been used and need a short or long rest (my players are lazy and I had a good system in roll 20) but I see the potential.

Once I knew what I was doing creating the Barbarian PC took 10-15 minutes. This is with everything like backgrounds, bonds, ideals. It so flipping awesome I didn't need to type that stuff.

Tonight I add the other 3 PC's and hope that I haven't done anything wrong. Once they are in I will figure out how to connect with a player and get an idea what he can see. Right now that is my biggest mystery and I wish I could be running the campaign and also connect as a player to see what is going on.

[Mask_of_winter]

You can connect as a player by opening a second instance and using localhost as the address.

[Nylanfs]

There are a couple of "Lets Learn FG & DMing" sessions that a few people have scheduled, you might want to try and get in on one of those.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?24752-Tutorial-For-New-5e-DMs-Players-Thr-6-18-8pm-EST
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?25078-A-quot-help-quot-session-for-new-player

[chrisiav]

Your experience is very similar to my own. Its not a very intuitive system (which is neither good nor bad) but once you get the hang of it, it all flows smoothly. And most of the processes seem to come from the same foundation so once you learn to do one thing, moving to some other aspect of the program can be figured out that much quicker. I laughed when you mentioned creating PCs. My first or second were very frustrating but then I started just pumping them out left and right. It was funny when I had a PC building session/practice run with some prospective players. I had to make sure I stayed patient when they were having problems figuring character building out. I had to keep thinking back to how hard a time I had my first time through.
One warning, if you are not computer/IP proficient, do not give up. Come here and try to get one of the guys to help. Damned got me up and running in like 5 minutes. Left to my own devices, no way I would have ever figured it out. I certainly appreciate that the guys here are so helpful and I'm nowhere near knowledgeable enough to know if changing the connection process is possible but a priority should be to make the hosting ability much more automated.

[Danimal66]

You can connect as a player by opening a second instance and using localhost as the address.

Thanks, I'll try that if I can figure out how to open a second session in Steam.

[Danimal66]

There are a couple of "Lets Learn FG & DMing" sessions that a few people have scheduled, you might want to try and get in on one of those.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?24752-Tutorial-For-New-5e-DMs-Players-Thr-6-18-8pm-EST
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?25078-A-quot-help-quot-session-for-new-player

The DM Session sounds awesome but unless I am mistaken that is from June with a date of 6/18.

[Danimal66]

One warning, if you are not computer/IP proficient, do not give up. Come here and try to get one of the guys to help. Damned got me up and running in like 5 minutes. Left to my own devices, no way I would have ever figured it out. I certainly appreciate that the guys here are so helpful and I'm nowhere near knowledgeable enough to know if changing the connection process is possible but a priority should be to make the hosting ability much more automated.

I'm pretty proficient in it so we'll see how that goes at some point this week.

[Nylanfs]

Danimal, find the actual exe file and launch that instead of the steam link to get a second instance.

Yes it's from June, but those two have expressed interest in having several of these. And there are other's also there was one massive one that was 3 hours, but I'm having problems finding that post.

[Trenloe]

Thanks, I'll try that if I can figure out how to open a second session in Steam.
If you're running in Windows 8.x then you can right-click on the running Fantasy Grounds icon in the taskbar and select "Fantasy Grounds", this will launch another instance of FG. Don't run more than one player instance of FG connected to the same campaign at the same time. Just run one GM instance and one player instance connecting to localhost at a time.

[Danimal66]

Entry 2 - The Connection

Last night while I continued to add my players character sheets one of them was online so I decided to try and connect. To see what he could see with the hope it would lead me to other questions. Well mission accomplished.

The player is playing a Dragonborn Warlock and as fate would have it I was in the middle of creating his character so we tried to connect and no luck. I knew my stupid Uverse Router would block the port but i was hoping that maybe it would work without my involvement. Funny thing is I was able to connect to his demo version right away. Well after tinkering with Uverse awful tools to open a port I finally got it to work.

Ken (the PC) came in and was able to select his character. At one point he disconnected and logged in again, I was under the impression his character would be stuck to him from some documentation i read but he had to select him again. I went through his character sheet with him. Showing him how to roll dice for ability checks etc. I then showed him how to call up information, we started with skills. He clicked the brown cirlce to get information and got an error message about the module not being loaded.

I was a little confused, I thought players would be able to access anything I had. Luckily this didn't occur with his abilities, spells etc. Just on the skills tab so no idea what that is about.

I added a weapon to his inventory and it appeared for him. I showed him how to use it in the actions tab. he was loving it. I asked him to click on his library tab to see if he could in fact see my core pack information and he couldn't. That's too bad i was going to have him add his own spells. I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong or he needs to buy the pack. So if someone could let me know in this one please?

I started adding spells and then we got to questions. I still haven't read up on spells because I couldn't find anything. I have no idea the difference of states like preparation, combat and standard. That is a high priority because I have 3 spell caster in the group so I need to know how this works, how they check off spell slots etc.

Next I opened a map, he couldn't see it. I just guessed my way through the menus and share it with him. It brought up the question can I share things with individual players or only the group? add that to the find out about list. He had the same issue with maps I did. When it opened it was gigantic. The only way to fix it i have found is too drag it up and then resize the window and use the mouse wheel to zoom out. It would be nice if maps opened contained to the table top screen size. So figuring out maps is on my list specifically;
- How to resize them correctly
- How the mask tool works. I turned this on for a map and can't figure out how to turn it off.
- What is the difference between a DM and player map. i.e. I like the maps with the npc's on them for use.

Ken asked me what the numbered spots were across the bottom of the desktop. I had no idea, we stuck some dice down there and it seemed like an area to save custom dice roll combos?

I revealed an image to him. He close it, now it was in his image tab... COOL.

That' about all we did, i would of love for him to be able to drag stuff from the library and finish his PC. It would of been a good learning experience. I hope I am missing something in that regard. If my players all need to buy a class or core pack too that seems a tad ridiculous.

[kylania]

Re: Modules: Read the info about Modules on the Wiki (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Library#Module_Activation). You as the GM can set modules as GM Only (red stop sign icon), available to players (green checkmark icon) or automatically loaded for players (green lightning bolt). As a player Ken would have to go into Library, then click the Modules button, then swipe the book next to PHB Deluxe to load that module locally for him so that the shield icons and other links to that module would work locally. For things like basic rules you might want to set them to the lightning bolt so they don't have to do that, just know it'll increase the download upon connection for them.

To share a text or image with a single player or to give a single player an item drag and drop it on their portrait in the top left of your screen.

The numbered slots are hotkeys (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Hot_Keys). They are F1-F12 as well as Ctrl-F1, Shift-F1, Alt-F1 and any combination of those keys. You can drag dice, or commands or links down to those and either click the button with the mouse or hit the appropriate F key to execute the shortcut.

For the spells thing you can refer to the Character Sheet wiki (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/5E_Character_Sheet#Actions). Preperation lets you set all the information for your spells, which ones are prepared vs just known and how many slots you have available. Standard and Combat limit the amount of information displayed so you can easier see the spells without extra information in your way.

[Danimal66]

Re: Modules: Read the info about Modules on the Wiki (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Library#Module_Activation). You as the GM can set modules as GM Only (red stop sign icon), available to players (green checkmark icon) or automatically loaded for players (green lightning bolt). As a player Ken would have to go into Library, then click the Modules button, then swipe the book next to PHB Deluxe to load that module locally for him so that the shield icons and other links to that module would work locally. For things like basic rules you might want to set them to the lightning bolt so they don't have to do that, just know it'll increase the download upon connection for them.

To share a text or image with a single player or to give a single player an item drag and drop it on their portrait in the top left of your screen.

The numbered slots are hotkeys (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Hot_Keys). They are F1-F12 as well as Ctrl-F1, Shift-F1, Alt-F1 and any combination of those keys. You can drag dice, or commands or links down to those and either click the button with the mouse or hit the appropriate F key to execute the shortcut.

For the spells thing you can refer to the Character Sheet wiki (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/5E_Character_Sheet#Actions). Preperation lets you set all the information for your spells, which ones are prepared vs just known and how many slots you have available. Standard and Combat limit the amount of information displayed so you can easier see the spells without extra information in your way.

This was so helpful, thank you!

[Griogre]

Entry 2 - The Connection...
snip

Next I opened a map, he couldn't see it. I just guessed my way through the menus and share it with him. It brought up the question can I share things with individual players or only the group? add that to the find out about list. He had the same issue with maps I did. When it opened it was gigantic. The only way to fix it i have found is too drag it up and then resize the window and use the mouse wheel to zoom out. It would be nice if maps opened contained to the table top screen size. So figuring out maps is on my list specifically;
- How to resize them correctly


Maps are opened on the player's computers at the size the DM opens the map at. Maps open at the max size of the image if possible, if not then the max size available. This is the huge map effect you are seeing. To fix this when you open the map drag the bottom right corner of the map to a reasonable size. Keep in mind that you may have a larger monitor than that player on a laptop. I usually go for like 600x600 or so (the players can adjust their frame size and zoom as well). If you first set the frame smaller then share the player's get the size your shared the image at. If you make your own adventure modules set the size of large maps by dragging the bottom right corner prior to exporting and the image frame size will be remembered.



- How the mask tool works. I turned this on for a map and can't figure out how to turn it off.


Where you turned on the mask you also turn it off. :) Right click the map -> Layers (4 o'clock) -> Mask (3 o'clock) turns on the Mask. To turn it off do the same thing but this time you will see "Delete Mask" where Mask was before. You have to confirm the mask delete since it can be a disaster in a real game. The radial menus change with context.



- What is the difference between a DM and player map. i.e. I like the maps with the npc's on them for use.


There is no difference between them from FG's standpoint. If a module has both types of maps typically you run the game on the player map. The GM map if one exists typically has secret doors and traps and other things on it you don't show the player. A well put together player map with map pins and encounters will make a GM map superfluous 90% of the time. Practically speaking you should always mask a map before you share it with your group if they are not suppose to know everything on the map. This is because once you share the map they can open it and look at them. Another gotcha is that players see the map names. If you are making your own adventures be careful with you names and keep them generic. A map called "Orc Ambush" tends to give away the encounter... ;)

[Trenloe]

Funny thing is I was able to connect to his demo version right away. Well after tinkering with Uverse awful tools to open a port I finally got it to work.
Only the GM needs port forwarding the players don't.


Ken (the PC) came in and was able to select his character. At one point he disconnected and logged in again, I was under the impression his character would be stuck to him from some documentation i read but he had to select him again.
The player is assigned as the owner so other players can't select the PC (unless the GM releases ownership). You still need to decide which PC(s) you will use for the session when you log in.


I added a weapon to his inventory and it appeared for him. I showed him how to use it in the actions tab. he was loving it. I asked him to click on his library tab to see if he could in fact see my core pack information and he couldn't. That's too bad i was going to have him add his own spells. I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong or he needs to buy the pack. So if someone could let me know in this one please?

You need to "allow" access for each module you want to share with the players: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Library#Module_Availability


It brought up the question can I share things with individual players or only the group?
Drag the link of the object you want to share to the PC portrait on the desktop.



So figuring out maps is on my list specifically;
- How to resize them correctly
- How the mask tool works. I turned this on for a map and can't figure out how to turn it off.
- What is the difference between a DM and player map. i.e. I like the maps with the npc's on them for use.
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/The_Basics#Windows
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Images



Ken asked me what the numbered spots were across the bottom of the desktop. I had no idea, we stuck some dice down there and it seemed like an area to save custom dice roll combos?

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/Hot_Keys

I'd recommend spending some time going through the sections of the Wiki User Guides: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/wiki/index.php/User_Guides

This thread might also help: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?24644-Advanced-Fantasy-Grounds-Usage-5E-Ruleset-Edition

[Nylanfs]

So name every map "Orc Tickle Ambush". :)

[kylania]

So name every map "Orc Tickle Ambush". :)

I vote to have that be the default for everything. No longer <New Story> or <New Image> just always <Orc Tickle Ambush>.

[Xorn]

I lot of things your struggling with might be a little more intuitive if you check out a few of the tutorial videos out there. *cough*Likemine*cough*

I aimed my tutorials at people that have never used FG before, player perspective, DM perspective, and an adventure building video to wrap it up. Then there's another series in the videos section that covers everything in much more detail. Take a look at them, and see if they help you get a head start.

[Von Stalhein]

Viz. players accessing modules, you need to set the correct permissions in the Library -> Modules screen as the DM. Click "Libraries" in the bottom right, then on the screen that opens, choose "Modules" in the bottom left. You'll see a list of module files (i.e. the "e-books" of rules) that you own for this ruleset (5e in this case?). You'll see at the bottom of the Modules screen three icons: a tick, a cross, and a thunderbolt. If you want to ensure that players have access to a module (e.g. Basic Rules) make sure you drag-and-drop the "Thunderbolt" icon onto the similar-shaped space for that module (just to the right of the little book icon). This will force the player client to download that module from you. I am pretty certain that, if you do this, the Skills will work as you expect them, and he will be able to access all spells, etc. It definitely isn't the case that he needs to buy anything.

You can share individual items with players. To do so, you drag-and-drop the resource's "pin icon" onto the player's portrait in the top-left of the screen. By "pin icon" I mean the dragon's head (Wizards' 5E theme) or little brown shield (default 5E theme). Some resources (e.g. story, items, personalities) have this icon in the top-right of their own page when open. For images, you need to drag-and-drop from the images list (since the "pin icon" doesn't exist on the image window itself). In any case, dragging-and-dropping in this manner will make the resource visible to that player. It's easy to tell who is looking at a resource: you will see a miniature version of that PC's portrait in the bottom left of the resource's window (e.g. bottom left of the image, bottom left of the story area).

As for map size, think of it this way: when you open a map in FG, you are just opening a raster image. So the image will open at whatever size it actually possesses (e.g. 1000 x 1000 pixels). If your screen resolution is smaller than the image, the image will expand off your screen. As GM, if you're acquiring your own images to use in your game, the simplest thing to do is to resize them to an appropriate size using an external tool before the game (e.g. I use IrfanView, but any image editor can resize, of course!). Top tip: if you're resizing an image, do not place it in your campaign's Images folder before resizing, otherwise FG will remember its initial size and you'll get a massive pixelated image (yes, this is a bit of an annoying bug, but hey - it helps keep you organised, have one general "cool images" folder on your desktop, and when you want to use something in FG, resize it to taste, and drop it into campaign images).

If you want to keep the map at a high resolution, so you can "pan and scan" it like a computer game level, so to speak, resizing is achieved by dragging the corner handles of the image window. If the image extends off of your screen, you can left-click to drag the image up-and-left until you see the bottom-right corner, and then start making the window smaller. This will keep the image at the same zoom level, but make the window its inside smaller (cropping the visible area, though non-destructively - you can hold down the middle mouse button to pan around a map which extends beyond the border of its own window).

In the top left of the image window, you'll see a "toolbar" of tools. The far left icon activates mask mode. First of all, this will mask the image. Secondly, while the mask icon is on (the mask figure will be a bit darker) you'll get an "eyeball" style cursor. Left-click and drag on the image to cut away squares of the mask. Hold down shift while left clicking to make a freeform outline of the area you want to demask. You can delete the mask entirely through the right-click radial menu, in Layers -> Delete Mask. There's also a button to turn mask mode (the eye cursor) on and off in the radial menu, Layers -> Enter Mask Mode/Exit Mask Mode/Enable Mask (which one shows up depends on whether there's a mask already, and whether you're currently in mask mode or not, obviously).

An image (a map) is the same image/map for both the DM and the player (assuming the DM chooses to share said image). However, there are some differences in how it is displayed. Obviously, DM's can see "beneath" the mask, while players cannot. When you place PCs and NPCs onto the map from the Combat Tracker, NPCs who are not visible to players on the tracker, will not be made visible to players on the map. (The little "eye" icon on the far right of a creature's combat tracker entry: transparent means not visible to players, opaque means visible.) When an NPC's token is "under" the mask, it is always invisible, no matter whether it is set as visible or not on the Combat Tracker. Note that you can also control the visibility of tokens if they are not linked to a creature on the combat tracker. By default, tokens under the mask will be invisible, but visible if not under the mask. You can force visibility or invisibility by right-clicking the token and choosing the Visibility submenu (in the northwest position on the radial menu, an eye icon).

The numbered spots on the bottom of the screen are quickslots. Almost all drag-and-drop stuff can be dropped into a quickslot for rapid access. E.g.: rolls from a character sheet, links to library entries, links to images, story entries, personalities, modifiers from either a character sheet or the modifiers screen (top-right of the desktop) and so on. I tend to use the quickslots to keep oft-consulted rules entries handy. Just drag-and-drop the shield icon/dragon's head icon to the quickslot. The quickslots can be activated by clicking them, or by pressing the function keys on your keyboard. There are also additional "sets" of quickslots available by holding down Shift, Control, or Alt, (or any of those in combination, also).

[Moon Wizard]

Please note, do not use "force load" (thunderbolt) option for adventure modules. Not only will players be able to see everything in the module, but all the maps will be loaded into memory.

Regardless of the module settings, individual records can always be shared by the GM when they right click and select Share menu option, or by dragging into a specific PC portrait on the upper left.

I usually don't force load anything in my games. I just set the player modules to Allow, and the GM modules to Disallow.

Regards,
JPG

[ddaley]

Just run one GM instance and one player instance connecting to localhost at a time.

What happens if you try running 2 clients? Is that like "crossing the beams?"

[Trenloe]

What happens if you try running 2 clients? Is that like "crossing the beams?"
Yes, don't do it. It might work for a while, but two or more player instances on the same computer are writing/accessing the same client cache files which can give cache corruption (leading to unexplained errors/functionality) or outright client crashes. One GM & one Player instance on the same computer is fine, two or more player instances is not.

[Xorn]

I myself prefer to leave my maps large, so that when I zoom in, they still look nice. I usually aim for about 50 pixel grids, simply because I find that my map window when I share it tends to use about 50 pixels per square of screen realestate.

So when I first open a dungeon map that has a 50 pixel grid it's HUGE, extending well off the screen. Just hold Control and left-click-drag up and left. Ctrl-Left-Drag is the shortcut to resize an image window. So you can very quickly make a window small. Then I put the top left corner where I want it, then resize the bottom right corner to where I want, and then zoom in and out (mousewheel) and pan (middle-drag) the map, and share it with the players.

[Trenloe]

So when I first open a dungeon map that has a 50 pixel grid it's HUGE, extending well off the screen. Just hold Control and left-click-drag up and left. Ctrl-Left-Drag is the shortcut to resize an image window. So you can very quickly make a window small. Then I put the top left corner where I want it, then resize the bottom right corner to where I want, and then zoom in and out (mousewheel) and pan (middle-drag) the map, and share it with the players.
To expand on these useful instructions: When the image is shared with the players it appears in the centre of their screen at the size/zoom the GM has when sharing. Then the player can further size, zoom and move the image window, and when you've done this once within a campaign, the size and position of the window will be saved individually, be it on the GM side or the players side. So when the GM or player opens the same window in future it will have remembered the size and screen position. The GM can override this by synching the image view.

[aquaknightus]

Entry 2 - The Connection

Last night while I continued to add my players character sheets one of them was online so I decided to try and connect. To see what he could see with the hope it would lead me to other questions. Well mission accomplished.

The player is playing a Dragonborn Warlock and as fate would have it I was in the middle of creating his character so we tried to connect and no luck. I knew my stupid Uverse Router would block the port but i was hoping that maybe it would work without my involvement. Funny thing is I was able to connect to his demo version right away. Well after tinkering with Uverse awful tools to open a port I finally got it to work.

Ken (the PC) came in and was able to select his character. At one point he disconnected and logged in again, I was under the impression his character would be stuck to him from some documentation i read but he had to select him again. I went through his character sheet with him. Showing him how to roll dice for ability checks etc. I then showed him how to call up information, we started with skills. He clicked the brown cirlce to get information and got an error message about the module not being loaded.

I was a little confused, I thought players would be able to access anything I had. Luckily this didn't occur with his abilities, spells etc. Just on the skills tab so no idea what that is about.

I added a weapon to his inventory and it appeared for him. I showed him how to use it in the actions tab. he was loving it. I asked him to click on his library tab to see if he could in fact see my core pack information and he couldn't. That's too bad i was going to have him add his own spells. I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong or he needs to buy the pack. So if someone could let me know in this one please?

I started adding spells and then we got to questions. I still haven't read up on spells because I couldn't find anything. I have no idea the difference of states like preparation, combat and standard. That is a high priority because I have 3 spell caster in the group so I need to know how this works, how they check off spell slots etc.

Next I opened a map, he couldn't see it. I just guessed my way through the menus and share it with him. It brought up the question can I share things with individual players or only the group? add that to the find out about list. He had the same issue with maps I did. When it opened it was gigantic. The only way to fix it i have found is too drag it up and then resize the window and use the mouse wheel to zoom out. It would be nice if maps opened contained to the table top screen size. So figuring out maps is on my list specifically;
- How to resize them correctly
- How the mask tool works. I turned this on for a map and can't figure out how to turn it off.
- What is the difference between a DM and player map. i.e. I like the maps with the npc's on them for use.

Ken asked me what the numbered spots were across the bottom of the desktop. I had no idea, we stuck some dice down there and it seemed like an area to save custom dice roll combos?

I revealed an image to him. He close it, now it was in his image tab... COOL.

That' about all we did, i would of love for him to be able to drag stuff from the library and finish his PC. It would of been a good learning experience. I hope I am missing something in that regard. If my players all need to buy a class or core pack too that seems a tad ridiculous.

I am going to tackle the whole Uverse port problem tomorrow. Seems I am following in your footsteps!

[Crymoricus]

Thanks, I'll try that if I can figure out how to open a second session in Steam.

Find your actual Fantasy Grounds folder and open the .exe from there. Throw away that steam shortcut.

Danimal, when it comes to learning what the player experiences, this is the way to do it, and I think it's the most important thing you can do when your first starting out as DM in Fantasy Grounds. When you're in an actual game, you won't want to do it because of screen real estate, so fire up your two instances now and start goofing around. The basic learning process would be something like:

1. "How do I do X?" (find out how to do X)
2. Practice X, even if it's something as simple as preloading an image for the first time. Do the right-clicks several times so that it becomes natural.
3. "What effect does X have from the player's point of view?" (perform X and check instance 2 of FG)
4. "Do I need to modify how I perform X based on what the player experiences?" (find a different way of performing X if so)

[Nyghtmare]

To add to the theme of this thread:

I purchased this game this past Tuesday (ultimate license and all of the available 5e releases).

I started messing with it on Wednesday — including setting up the PCs from my Roll20 campaign.

Saturday night, that game that I had been running on Roll20 I played in FG instead, with extremely minimal issues (just mainly a little handholding for the players, who had not messed with the software as much as me, since I had to figure it out and all).

So purchase on Tuesday, start diving into it on Wednesday (mainly Wiki and YouTube videos), playing my full "Princes of the Apocalypse" campaign on Saturday — so much for those naysayers that claim that this software it not intuitive in the least and that everyone should stick to Roll20 (I doubt I would even want to run a game on Roll20, after seeing the Combat Tracker and combat in general).

A modern day success story? ;)

[Trenloe]

Really nice to hear Nyghtmare. :)

[Danimal66]

To add to the theme of this thread:

I purchased this game this past Tuesday (ultimate license and all of the available 5e releases).

I started messing with it on Wednesday — including setting up the PCs from my Roll20 campaign.

Saturday night, that game that I had been running on Roll20 I played in FG instead, with extremely minimal issues (just mainly a little handholding for the players, who had not messed with the software as much as me, since I had to figure it out and all).

So purchase on Tuesday, start diving into it on Wednesday (mainly Wiki and YouTube videos), playing my full "Princes of the Apocalypse" campaign on Saturday — so much for those naysayers that claim that this software it not intuitive in the least and that everyone should stick to Roll20 (I doubt I would even want to run a game on Roll20, after seeing the Combat Tracker and combat in general).

A modern day success story? ;)

That's great, it would be beneficial to this thread if you linked to some of the videos you're mentioning.

[Blahness98]

That's great, it would be beneficial to this thread if you linked to some of the videos you're mentioning.

Just mention Dulux-Oz's name 3 times in a mirror and he will appear with a signature full of videos..

[JohnD]

Just mention Dulux-Oz's name 3 times in a mirror and he will appear with a signature full of videos..
Or a scary mask making stabby stabby motions with a hatchet.

It's 50/50 what you get.

[Nyghtmare]

That's great, it would be beneficial to this thread if you linked to some of the videos you're mentioning.

Actually, it was mainly the ones from the official Fantasy Grounds YouTube channel... plus a few that came up from searches when I encountered specific issues/needs.

Plus some non-video searches for learning stuff like Parcels and Encounters.

The information that I needed to figure this all out was easily accessible and findable through Google. :)

[dulux-oz]

Just mention Dulux-Oz's name 3 times in a mirror and he will appear with a signature full of videos.


Or a scary mask making stabby stabby motions with a hatchet.

10673
You called?

[dulux-oz]

Actually, I know I'm late to this thread, but every single "issue/question" that you've raised, Danimal, I covered in my Tutorial Video Series - which is on the FG Wiki Video Page (and also available from the links in my sig ( :p @ Blahness)). And while I can appreciate wanting to drop in and get started right away and not have to sit through 40 minutes of vid to get an answer to a single question, I designed the Series to be used by people exactly like yourself: visual learners who like to get tactile with what they are learning about.

So, if you haven't done it already I strongly recommend that you take a look - they'll save you a bunch of time and frustration in the long-run. Then, when you've gone through mine on the CoreRPG (because the CoreRPG forms the foundations of most of the RPGs we play with FG and so about 80% of what you need to know) have a look at Xorn's and damns' because they're both good too.

Or next time it'll be me in the mirror with the hatchet ;)