callahan09
April 8th, 2016, 15:58
First of all, I installed my program at D:\Games\Fantasy Grounds (basically, this is where I install all of my computer games). It turns out that I keep needing to access that folder along with my other RPG items to copy images to the FG folders, etc, so I can access things within my program. So for me, I figured out that I'd rather it be installed in my RPG's path (so basically I'd like my path to be D:\RPG\Fantasy Grounds instead of where I have it now). What do I have to do to move the folder? I do not have the Steam version of the game, so I don't think I need to worry about anything with Steam. I was thinking of just cutting & pasting the folder from \Games\ to \RPG\ and seeing what happens, but I thought better of it and maybe I should get some official advice first.
Secondly, about those images I am copying, well, I've got a personal collection of a few thousand token & portrait images that I wanted available to me in FG, and it seems the only way to use one in FG is to have it here:
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\campaigns\{CAMPAIGN}\images\
And I'd have to copy the image to that location for every campaign that wants access to the image? So if I have 3 campaigns and want to use the same image in all 3, I have to have 3 copies of it (one for each campaign), PLUS I like to keep a separate copy of course in my original repository, so that's 4 total copies, just as an example. I feel like I'm missing something and this can't possibly be correct. The only other way I can think of to do it would be to package images into a module and then load the module in each campaign that wants access? I can see that this would probably be better than to do it by manually copying the image to each campaign images folder, but I'm not sure if it's still the best way and I'm not even sure the best particular way to create such a module. Would it be best to make it using PAR5E or to make it in-app by copying images to a campaign folder, then using the module export feature to package them in-app?
Then for tokens, there are:
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\tokens\host\
and
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\tokens\shared\
Is this the only place tokens can be stored to be loaded in the game?
Then there's the issue of character portraits. As in the actual image that's used on the upper left corner of the character sheet. Is the only place that you can load a character portrait the following folder?
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\portraits\
For instance, I create a story entry for my characters where there is an in-depth character bio with a link to a full-size portrait image of the character. I use this same portrait for the upper left corner of the character sheet portrait. It seems to me that I have to store this image file TWICE in order to use it in both places? Once in the campaign images folder, and once in the program data portraits folder? Is this right? Seems bad to me, but I've yet to figure out a different way to do it.
And finally, as I mentioned before, I have a very large collection of images & tokens I would like to use, and at one point I moved the entire repository to the respective locations for FG to access, and then when I went to load the application it would freeze (Windows "not responding" notice) and crash, I guess because the program didn't like there being such a large amount of content to load? I'm not sure exactly what FG actually does when data exists in its folders, but based on this, it seems like it actually somehow loads it up at launch, in which case there must be limits to how many images you can put in the folders before the computer memory and/or perhaps bandwidth just can't handle it all? So what's the deal with that? Is there any good way for me to maintain my repository and have it all somewhat easily accessible for use at a whim in FG, or do I have to know exactly which files I want in which campaigns and manually copy those files to the campaign when I want them usable in the campaign? If that's the case it makes it quite a bit more difficult for me to get what I want into the game when I want it.
Secondly, about those images I am copying, well, I've got a personal collection of a few thousand token & portrait images that I wanted available to me in FG, and it seems the only way to use one in FG is to have it here:
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\campaigns\{CAMPAIGN}\images\
And I'd have to copy the image to that location for every campaign that wants access to the image? So if I have 3 campaigns and want to use the same image in all 3, I have to have 3 copies of it (one for each campaign), PLUS I like to keep a separate copy of course in my original repository, so that's 4 total copies, just as an example. I feel like I'm missing something and this can't possibly be correct. The only other way I can think of to do it would be to package images into a module and then load the module in each campaign that wants access? I can see that this would probably be better than to do it by manually copying the image to each campaign images folder, but I'm not sure if it's still the best way and I'm not even sure the best particular way to create such a module. Would it be best to make it using PAR5E or to make it in-app by copying images to a campaign folder, then using the module export feature to package them in-app?
Then for tokens, there are:
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\tokens\host\
and
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\tokens\shared\
Is this the only place tokens can be stored to be loaded in the game?
Then there's the issue of character portraits. As in the actual image that's used on the upper left corner of the character sheet. Is the only place that you can load a character portrait the following folder?
...\Fantasy Grounds\ProgramData\portraits\
For instance, I create a story entry for my characters where there is an in-depth character bio with a link to a full-size portrait image of the character. I use this same portrait for the upper left corner of the character sheet portrait. It seems to me that I have to store this image file TWICE in order to use it in both places? Once in the campaign images folder, and once in the program data portraits folder? Is this right? Seems bad to me, but I've yet to figure out a different way to do it.
And finally, as I mentioned before, I have a very large collection of images & tokens I would like to use, and at one point I moved the entire repository to the respective locations for FG to access, and then when I went to load the application it would freeze (Windows "not responding" notice) and crash, I guess because the program didn't like there being such a large amount of content to load? I'm not sure exactly what FG actually does when data exists in its folders, but based on this, it seems like it actually somehow loads it up at launch, in which case there must be limits to how many images you can put in the folders before the computer memory and/or perhaps bandwidth just can't handle it all? So what's the deal with that? Is there any good way for me to maintain my repository and have it all somewhat easily accessible for use at a whim in FG, or do I have to know exactly which files I want in which campaigns and manually copy those files to the campaign when I want them usable in the campaign? If that's the case it makes it quite a bit more difficult for me to get what I want into the game when I want it.