ToA Hexcrawl map - tokens or stamps to "reveal" terrain? (FGU)

[pablomaz]

Hey, guys.

What's the best practice for revealing Tomb of Annihilation Chult map hexes? Using mask is not practical and many times revealing a hex under mask also reveal letters that would spoil the hexes around it.

For this reason, I was experimenting with two options, both using small (23x23, 5,5kb) png files: tokens or stamps (de facto painting that one hex map with said stamp).

As you can see in the cropped image below, which has both tokens and stamps, side by side, there's really no difference in the end result. Sometimes erasing stamps is messy, they don't seem to respond as expected, so I have to close and then reopen the image so it will finally go away. Handling tokens is much easier.
38608

My concern is demanding too much of the systems running maybe one hundred tokens or stamps in a few months, as they explore Chult.

What's the best practice here?
Tks!

[LordEntrails]

Isn't there a player map with text removed?

If not, I would use stamps myself. Tokens can move easily be moved and are not on layers etc. No idea what might happen with a thousand tokens or stamps on an image though. But again I would think stamps would be handled better, but no practical experience either way.

[pablomaz]

Isn't there a player map with text removed?

If not, I would use stamps myself. Tokens can move easily be moved and are not on layers etc. No idea what might happen with a thousand tokens or stamps on an image though. But again I would think stamps would be handled better, but no practical experience either way.

Yup, there is a map. That's the one I'll be using, filling it with the tokens and/or stamps.

Yeah, tokens can be easily moved. Good point. Thanks for your insight. Let's see if anyone else can weigh in.

[Zacchaeus]

I don’t have further insight for you other than what I said on Discord. Use the mask and reveal hex by hex. You don’t have to be super accurate. Use the player map with no text - not the one that’s blank in the middle - the full colour one. Superimpose the one that’s blank over it and mask it then unmask the bits the players see initially using that map as your template. Use the provided pins to track the players location and where they think they are or use the provided tokens.

I would hesitate to use hundreds of tokens since I think that will eventually slow things to a crawl.

[pablomaz]

I don’t have further insight for you other than what I said on Discord. Use the mask and reveal hex by hex. You don’t have to be super accurate. Use the player map with no text - not the one that’s blank in the middle - the full colour one. Superimpose the one that’s blank over it and mask it then unmask the bits the players see initially using that map as your template. Use the provided pins to track the players location and where they think they are or use the provided tokens.

I would hesitate to use hundreds of tokens since I think that will eventually slow things to a crawl.

I'm hesitating, Zacchaeus, but the hex art I bought yesterday on DMs Guild is too damn pretty to let them go so easily;) ...But I appreciate your inputs as well.

Guess I have to try it e see if things will work. I'll let you guys know how it turned out. If someone else shows up and adds something, I'm all ears...

[Ecks]

I'm currently running ToA in FG Classic. What I ended up doing was buying the Chult maps from the artist (https://prints.mikeschley.com/p1010232766) and creating a composite map that combines the blank hex map of Chult with the full color detailed map of Chult. I edit it after each session to reveal the hexes the party has been to. For example (small section to avoid any spoilers):
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=38611&d=1597712324
One reason I went this route is the party had seen some areas of the map from a high vantage point, and I wanted to differentiate between locations they had seen and ones they had visited. The other reason was so I didn't need to manually reveal the mask layer without a guide.

I edit the map using GIMP. The basic idea is to have two layers - one for the blank hex map and one for the full detail player map. Then just delete the blank hexes as they are revealed. I did a few other things, like adding in labels as they discovered locations, and I removed the "undead area" highlighting.
A couple things to note:
1. Scale the map to a reasonable resolution for FG (I'm using 2048x2746, 1.8MB).
2. I've seen issues where after I updated the map, the player's were not seeing the image. Clearing the player cache seemed to resolve this.

All that said, I just tried Zacchaeus's suggestion in FG Unity, and I'm thinking if I had started this campaign out in FGU I would've probably gone with this approach. It was really quick to take the "Players-Chult-Complete" map, add a layer with "Player Map Chult Unpinned" over it, and then use that as a guide for revealing the mask area. I changed the hex grid size to 23 and it lined up perfectly. This makes it a lot easier to reveal using the mask tool. Definitely faster than what I ended up doing for FGC.

[GavinRuneblade]

Worldographer has a built-in tool to reveal hexes. You can run it in a separate window linked to whatever you use for audio to share with your players and reveal as needed.
See the video here for some examples of how it works: https://worldographer.com/

[lostsanityreturned]

Something to help people who want to skip some of the tedium map wise. May also have my weekly travel generator in it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G_1dweZoq6myjfGtZDHN6u5jGz2IHKcb/view?usp=drivesdk

[doredras]

FWIW, I was thinking this through recently too. I created a simple, small, hex-shaped token and covered hundreds of hexes with it, with custom tokens underneath for the meaningful locations that would be revealed when the blank token was removed.. I used the image layering extension to layer tokens and prevent players from adjusting the blanks. Then I had some folks connect to the table and load some stuff, look at what it did to FG's memory usage. Seemed fine, which makes sense - FG is just loading one instance of the tiny token into memory and then duplicating it a bunch on the screen. I can't speak to if it mysteriously slows down after hours/weeks/months of play, though. I can't imagine why it would, but I don't know enough about FG's architecture to say.

[pablomaz]

I'm currently running ToA in FG Classic. What I ended up doing was buying the Chult maps from the artist (https://prints.mikeschley.com/p1010232766) and creating a composite map that combines the blank hex map of Chult with the full color detailed map of Chult. I edit it after each session to reveal the hexes the party has been to. For example (small section to avoid any spoilers):
https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=38611&d=1597712324
One reason I went this route is the party had seen some areas of the map from a high vantage point, and I wanted to differentiate between locations they had seen and ones they had visited. The other reason was so I didn't need to manually reveal the mask layer without a guide.

Ecks, I thought about editing the image using Gimp, but then I could only update the map between sessions. Also, editing files in FGC always led to the issue you mentioned. Without a simple clear cache button in FGU, it would be another source of trouble. Thanks!


Worldographer has a built-in tool to reveal hexes. You can run it in a separate window linked to whatever you use for audio to share with your players and reveal as needed.
See the video here for some examples of how it works: https://worldographer.com/

Huh... That's an option. I'll take a look, thanks!


Something to help people who want to skip some of the tedium map wise. May also have my weekly travel generator in it.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G_1dweZoq6myjfGtZDHN6u5jGz2IHKcb/view?usp=drivesdk

I'm digging into it as soon as I reply everyone in this thread, thank you!


FWIW, I was thinking this through recently too. I created a simple, small, hex-shaped token and covered hundreds of hexes with it, with custom tokens underneath for the meaningful locations that would be revealed when the blank token was removed.. I used the image layering extension to layer tokens and prevent players from adjusting the blanks. Then I had some folks connect to the table and load some stuff, look at what it did to FG's memory usage. Seemed fine, which makes sense - FG is just loading one instance of the tiny token into memory and then duplicating it a bunch on the screen. I can't speak to if it mysteriously slows down after hours/weeks/months of play, though. I can't imagine why it would, but I don't know enough about FG's architecture to say.

Hey, doredras. You're talking about FGC, right?

[FantasyGroundsNOOBnD]

I'm a bit late to the party, but I've got experience doing this with tokens, but in reverse. I added black hex-shaped tokens over the unmarked map and removed the tokens as the PCs explored. In its fully masked form, it would take 25 to 30 min to load, freezing the program in the process. Once loaded, moving and deleting tokens usually had about a 1s delay. The tokens appear to slow the load speed exponentially because I have since removed less than a quarter of the tokens and it now only takes ~10 min to initially load the map and it functions without delay. So just a warning as you add more tokens, you'll likely start seeing things slowing down towards the end of the campaign.

[nightphox]

i know this is an old thread but im trying to replicate what you described here. I have the two map layers, but im not sure how to unmask the bottom layer from the top (essentially deleting the top layer hex by hex as we go), am i missing something?

[Trenloe]

i know this is an old thread but im trying to replicate what you described here. I have the two map layers, but im not sure how to unmask the bottom layer from the top (essentially deleting the top layer hex by hex as we go), am i missing something?
Welcome to the FG forums!

The process @Ecks desribes does not unmask the top layer, they are editing the top layer image outside of FG in GIMP.

[nightphox]

Welcome to the FG forums!

The process @Ecks desribes does not unmask the top layer, they are editing the top layer image outside of FG in GIMP.


Sorry i am referring to what Zacharrius said on the thread.

"I don’t have further insight for you other than what I said on Discord. Use the mask and reveal hex by hex. You don’t have to be super accurate. Use the player map with no text - not the one that’s blank in the middle - the full colour one. Superimpose the one that’s blank over it and mask it then unmask the bits the players see initially using that map as your template. Use the provided pins to track the players location and where they think they are or use the provided tokens.

I would hesitate to use hundreds of tokens since I think that will eventually slow things to a crawl."

[LordEntrails]

Sorry i am referring to what Zacharrius said on the thread.

"I don’t have further insight for you other than what I said on Discord. Use the mask and reveal hex by hex. You don’t have to be super accurate. Use the player map with no text - not the one that’s blank in the middle - the full colour one. Superimpose the one that’s blank over it and mask it then unmask the bits the players see initially using that map as your template. Use the provided pins to track the players location and where they think they are or use the provided tokens.

I would hesitate to use hundreds of tokens since I think that will eventually slow things to a crawl."
So this isn't using layers, it's applying a Global Mask to the whole image, and then manually revealing the appropriate parts of it. See:
Working with Images as the GM - Fantasy Grounds Customer Portal - Fantasy Grounds (atlassian.net) (https://fantasygroundsunity.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/FGCP/pages/996640166/Working+with+Images+as+the+GM#Enable-or-Disable-Global-LOS-Mask)
Toggleable Toolbar Functions - Fantasy Grounds Customer Portal - Fantasy Grounds (atlassian.net) (https://fantasygroundsunity.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/FGCP/pages/2415460356/Toggleable+Toolbar+Functions#Map-View-Modes)

[Trenloe]

Sorry i am referring to what Zacharrius said on the thread.

"I don’t have further insight for you other than what I said on Discord. Use the mask and reveal hex by hex. You don’t have to be super accurate. Use the player map with no text - not the one that’s blank in the middle - the full colour one. Superimpose the one that’s blank over it and mask it then unmask the bits the players see initially using that map as your template. Use the provided pins to track the players location and where they think they are or use the provided tokens.

I would hesitate to use hundreds of tokens since I think that will eventually slow things to a crawl."
Ah, OK. The mask is not a new layer, it is simply a mask over the whole image that you remove to display areas in the whole overall image.

Some info on the controls for using the mask is available in the Wiki here: https://fantasygroundsunity.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/FGCP/pages/996640166/Working+with+Images+as+the+GM#Enable-or-Disable-Global-LOS-Mask

[claedawg]

The way I resolve this issue on my hexcrawl maps is to make an NPC and give PCs access to that NPC (party view needs to be allowed). Have the map set with no light. Give the NPC a light that only covers up to 3 hexes/squares around it. I also add a light (size depends) to any major points of interest that are known or have been discovered. The players can then move the NPC around and LOS takes over (make sure token lock is on so you have to confirm movement). You can mark some areas with LOS blockers for more control.