My First Character(s)

[Jan van Leyden]

Due to Coviod 19 we'll be switching from real-life gaming to FG. I'll be the DM and eill have to manage all the stuff.

I tried generating my first PHB character with FG: a human fighter. So much everything looks fine but:

Are Fighting style implemented in any way? If so, how can I select it?
Is Second Wind implemented? If so, shouldn't I see it on the Actions tab?

I kept the thread's title vague on purpose. There'll probably some more questiosns to ask... :o

[Marmus]

I am probably not the best person to answer right now (I am at work), may I suggest checking out Fantasy Grounds College? https://fantasygroundscollege.net/ They also have a Dischord channel. All very helpful stuff for learning FG.

[Zacchaeus]

Fighting styles do not come up as an option; you have to deal with that manually.

To add things like Second Wind; open the ability from the abilities tab. Then switch to the actions tab and then drag and drop the ability into the actions tab. You'll then need to go into preparation mode and sort out the number of uses.

Some resources for you:

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?46965-New-Character-Creation-Videos
https://fantasygroundsunity.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/FGU/pages/884824/5E+Character+Sheet
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?27336-Effects-The-Complete-Fighter-Package

[Jan van Leyden]

Thanks for your kind answers and the helpfull links! Is there, by chance, a ressource which lists all the stuff *not* completely handled? Not only character creation but for playing as well?

[Zacchaeus]

Thanks for your kind answers and the helpfull links! Is there, by chance, a ressource which lists all the stuff *not* completely handled? Not only character creation but for playing as well?

No, there isn't.

Whilst FG does a lot of automation there are limits to how far that the developers want to take that so as not to restrict people from being able to do things that they might want to do. Hence, for example the character sheet is editable by the players. Once you've played a few sessions you'll get a good handle on what is and isn't automated.

[Jan van Leyden]

Okay, here's the next question: I have used Manage Characters from the launcher to generate a character on behalf of a player. How do I load/add/whatever this character to a campaign?

[Zacchaeus]

Okay, here's the next question: I have used Manage Characters from the launcher to generate a character on behalf of a player. How do I load/add/whatever this character to a campaign?

Open Manage Characters and open the PC Window and click the blue export button. Save the file wherever you want. Open your campaign and open PC window and click the blue import button and navigate to the place you saved the character.

Note if you are creating characters for a campaign it is way better to create them in the campaign itself; thus saving you all of this hassle :)

[Jan van Leyden]

The transfer of the cahracters has worked, thanks to Immortal, Greater Deity!

I've tried my hand at sharing images. It works pretty easy, but can I "unshare" an image as well? Or do the players have to close it on their side?

Can I reset the Combat Tracker or do I have remove all participants by hand and manually set the number of rounds to 9?

I assume that there's no Undo option during combat?

Can one do a group roll for surprise, like all four Goblins perform their Stealth check at once?

[damned]

Use the menu button to delete enemies.
Dont delete players. Leave them in the CT.
Rest the round by setting it back to 0 as you have found.
Right click an image in the Image list and choose unshare.

[Zacchaeus]

You can also unshare anything by clicking on the 'P' or 'S' symbol on the item in the list. In any list click on the All button at the bottom of the list and see what's shared. Click on the P or S to unshare.

There's no undo button but if for example damage is applied incorrectly you can undo it by holding down CTRL and dragging the damage done from the chat window back onto the target to 'heal' them.

There's no facility to do multiple skill checks for NPCs but you can do this for players in the party sheet.

You can change the round number just by clicking on it and typing the number you want. The CT will also reset to one when the players take a short or long rest

[Jan van Leyden]

Now for a curious question:

I did a proto-session with a single player in which he generated his character on the server. When he logged in again later, he couldn't see/load his character, only the pre-gens from LMoP. When I started a second instance of FG on my machine and logged in using his name, I did see his character. ccording to the chat-window, he entered his name correcctly.

What did the player possibly do wrong?

[Zacchaeus]

Make sure that the player logged in with the same user name as the did when they created the character.

In the PC window it should say who owns the character.

Note also that the Lobby server has had some issues over the last day or so and the player and DM instance may have gone out of sync. You can try clearing the ownership of the character by right clickng on it and selecting clear owner.

[Jan van Leyden]

I assumed as much, but it looked ok yesterday. Would the player see two entries in his connection history, if he typed the name differently?

Anyway, I'll clear the ownership, if this situation persists.

[Jan van Leyden]

Clearing ownership did the trick; seems it was just a hick-up. The other players accessed their characters without any problem. My crash course for the players yielded several more question:

- Can character trade or hand over items between each other?
- How is the rogue's sneak attack (extra damage) implemented?
- Can one save the chat?

I am, admittedly, a bit nervous... Tomorrow's the day of our first game.

[Zacchaeus]

Players can add or take items from the Party Inventory - provided you have enabled the option - Party: Show Inventory to Clients. They can't 'trade' between themselves in any other way.

To aply sneak attack damage create an effect in the actions tab Sneak Attack; DMG: 2d6 and set the target to self and the duration to on next roll. More on effects here (https://fantasygroundsunity.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/FGU/pages/884913/5E+Effects+for+Advanced+Automation) and in these videos (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?41478-Effects-Videos-for-5E).

Chat is saved in a file called chatlog.html in the FG Data/campaigns/Campaign Name folder.

[Jan van Leyden]

Thank you, Zacchaeus! Guys are you fast on this forum, that's something like life-support. :o

[Zacchaeus]

Even faster on Discord https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?36377-Official-Discord-Server :)

[Jan van Leyden]

Our first session went quite well. I was, admittedly, a bit stumbling aroun in FG, and didn't work in the most efficient way, but the players were very satisfied with the experience. Onca again, thank you for all your help, which made this possible for me!

[LordEntrails]

Glad to hear it went well. As with most things, the more you do it the easier it gets.
Happy Gaming :)

[Jan van Leyden]

We'll have a training session today and I promptly ask my next question:

The User Manual (5E version) talks on page 35 about "The GM has the option of locking player movement of tokens on the map." Well, easy enough: I can't find this option neither on the maps context menu jor under options...

[Zacchaeus]

Not yet implemented in Unity. Those instructions are for Classic.

[Jan van Leyden]

Ah, well. I'm using FGC.

[Jan van Leyden]

Ah, wait a minute: is it Lock Tokens from a tonken's radial menu?

[LordEntrails]

Yep :)