'Low Tech' Tabletop...Can someone point me in the right direction.

[Moschops]

Hi!

I'm relatively new to the program, and am looking to set up my play space in a pretty low-tech manner.

I don't want to use most of the automated features, all I want is the ability to track tokens, spell effect templates, roll dice, and draw maps.

The first three things are simple enough, but drawing maps has me vexed. I've read that you can use Photoshop and a tablet and then hotsave and reload files to draw maps like you would on a battle mat, but is there a simpler way?

Also, is there a way to label tokens so they can be numbered for tracking purposes?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

[LordEntrails]

Hey, welcome to the forums :)

FG won't create images for you. You need to create it in something like Gimp, PhotoShop, Campaign Cartographer, etc. You can draw over an image with some real basic tools, like circles, freehand, etc, but very crude.

If you add tokens from an encounter to the Combat Tracker and then to the map, their is an option to auto-number the entries in the CT, and therefore with the tooltip when you hover over the token.

[Zacchaeus]

Hi Moschops, welcome to FG.

You can't draw maps in FG except on a very basic line style; to draw anything like a reasonable map you are going to need some kind of drawing or map making package. You'll find details of some option here (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?20879-Map-Making-Software-summary) but there are others available as well.

As for your other questions we'll need you to tell us what ruleset you are interested in playing (D&D 5E, 4E, 3.5, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds etc). Most of the main ones supported by Smiteworks have numbered tokens and those are tracked via the combat tracker which also handles combat dice rolls, damage, effects etc etc.

[Moschops]

Thanks for responding!

I've figured out how to use pre-generated maps, and have already made a few using Photoshop. That's all well and good, but my groups tend to be very improvisational, and I end up having to create encounter areas on the fly. At a real table, we always used battlemats with wet erase markers, and I could crank out an ad-hoc encounter area pretty quickly. The drawing tools, and you pointed out, are woefully inadequate for the task, so I find myself looking for solutions.

I haven't experimented with it yet, but I read that you can create a blank file and have that file ready to use as a map in FG. At the same time, open the file in Photoshop, draw on it, save it, and then update it in FG. I'm pretty sure I could do this pretty efficiently, but I was hoping someone might have found a quicker or better way or if there was some feature or mod available that I'm not aware of. Either way, it seemed like asking the folks here would be a good start.

With regards to the tokens, I was hoping there might be a way to display the number of the NPC somewhere on the token. This seems like something that could be modded, but I don't know how complicated that would be to pull off. The existing way works, but I was hoping there might be a way already built in that I'm not aware of.

Thanks again for taking the time to respond!

[Moschops]

Hi Moschops, welcome to FG.

You can't draw maps in FG except on a very basic line style; to draw anything like a reasonable map you are going to need some kind of drawing or map making package. You'll find details of some option here (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?20879-Map-Making-Software-summary) but there are others available as well.

As for your other questions we'll need you to tell us what ruleset you are interested in playing (D&D 5E, 4E, 3.5, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds etc). Most of the main ones supported by Smiteworks have numbered tokens and those are tracked via the combat tracker which also handles combat dice rolls, damage, effects etc etc.

I'll be doing Pathfinder, but I don't really want or need the automation. All I need is the ability to roll dice, move tokens, and most importantly, draw maps on the fly.

Thanks for your reply!

[LordEntrails]

I think the enhanced layers extension works for PF. That gives you the ability to have layers on your map. You can then use tokens to drop in trees, furniture, etc on either a blank or bland map

And don't hesitate to ask when you have questions, a few of the folks around here are pretty friendly :)

[Zacchaeus]

If you have more than one of the same NPC on the CT or map then FG automatically adds a number to the NPC name which is displayed on the CT and on the map (This is the default - you can turn this off or make the numbers random using the Add: NPC Numbering option under Combat (GM) options section). You can also add the NPC's name to the token using the Token (GM) option Token: Show Name. You have various options including showing the name or showing on hover etc.