Separate NPC token control from party vision and movement

[Lo Zeno]

I'm running a 5E campaign with my group; three of my players (a Warlock with Pact of the Chain, a Ranger and an Artificer Battle Smith) have one or two NPCs each that follow them (animal companion, familiar, steel defender, homunculus).
I give them control of the NPCs (the usual dragging of the NPC onto their character's portrait) of course, but this doesn't give them control over the token movement of said NPCs, nor does it allow the characters to see (with LOS enabled) what their familiar/animal/controlled NPC can see.

I know I can enable the Party Vision and Movement, and that would solve the problem; but my players really like the fact that they see only what each players' character(s) can see, and not the rest of the party, as they feel that it helps them immerse in the characters more especially when they are (for example) the first to enter a room and have to tell the others what they find, or when in a battle not all enemies are visible to some characters and that makes it more realistic, in their view.

I know that the second-obvious-solution is to create PCs for each NPC, and give those PCs to the players - but it's honestly a lot of work, and it's not a "once in a lifetime" thing since my Artificer can, and will, get different constructs under his control soon.

So, here's my question and feature suggestion: can we have the "party vision and movement" feature separated from NPC control? If a DM gives "control" of an NPC it stands to reason that they will allow the player to move said NPC, use the NPC abilities, move it around the place, and see with the NPC's eyes. I don't think there's more use cases for DM's wanting to give control of ONLY the NPC's abilities but not the movement.

[LordEntrails]

Vote for the item on the Wish List here; https://fgapp.idea.informer.com/proj/?ia=135757

[Lo Zeno]

I voted, but that wishlist item is slightly different from what I was thinking:
Separating party vision from movement (as the wishlist item says) means that when the option is on, players can't move each other's token, and the OP wants to separate the "we can see what the whole party sees" from "we can move each other's tokens"; my issue is separating NPC Control form that option: being able to control NPCs assigned to a player, including their movement and sight calculated by LOS, like you would a second PC assigned to the player, without having to suffer the unwanted side effects of party vision and movement.

Similar, but definitely not the same thing.

[LordEntrails]

Add a link there to your description, as the way things are described in the wish list are not always they way they get implemented.

Or if you feel they are distinctly different, then create a new item. Personally, I would add to the discussion of the existing item, otherwise the list gets fractured and it becomes hard for the devs to see which items are of most interest to the community.

[Moon Wizard]

The problem with separating party movement and vision is that vision is required for movement. If you can't see through the token, then everything is black and you can't move the token. It's a package deal.

Regards,
JPG

[Lo Zeno]

The problem with separating party movement and vision is that vision is required for movement. If you can't see through the token, then everything is black and you can't move the token. It's a package deal.

Regards,
JPG

I get that, that's why I suggest to separate NPC control from it, instead of separating movement and vision.
Ideally, it would work best if an NPC assigned to a Player worked exactly like any other PC assigned to that player.

To clarify:
If Player A has two characters, ThePaladin! and TheFighter!, when he clicks on either of them he can see what the clicked character see, move that character, use their actions (spells and/or attacks) and so on. Clicking on the second character gives the same options.

Player B, instead, has one character assigned to him, The Wizard!, and an NPC given to him by the DM, TheFamiliarPseudodragon!. When he clicks on his character, the player can see what the character sees, move it, use the characters actions and so on. But when he wants to use the NPC (the familiar), all he can do is click the actions - he can't move it, he can't see what the familiar can see.
Unless the DM enables "party vision and movement", which has the god awful side effect of letting everyone in the party see what everyone else sees, and move anyone's character token like they are their own.

So if you will, I could rephrase my suggestion this way:
Have FGU treat NPCs assigned to players just like any other PC, instead of the way they are handled now. Because really, there's no reason why it shouldn't be this way, from a player's perspective.

[Lo Zeno]

Add a link there to your description, as the way things are described in the wish list are not always they way they get implemented.

Or if you feel they are distinctly different, then create a new item. Personally, I would add to the discussion of the existing item, otherwise the list gets fractured and it becomes hard for the devs to see which items are of most interest to the community.

I think that this suggestion matches the issue better:
https://fgapp.idea.informer.com/proj/?ia=135411

so I voted there and added a link to this description here.

[DCrumb]

The problem with that is that the NPCs that you are describing, aren't really NPCs. They are class abilities that have "tokens" assigned to them. They really should be PCs in Fantasy Grounds. NPCs should be as presented by Fantasy Grounds, since regular NPCs (monsters and other people) will have their own motivations and ways of doing things which are in the GMs area of interpretation, rather than the players. Even followers or a cohort (for PF Leadership feat), will have their own brain, but be more tied to a PC.

[Lo Zeno]

The problem with that is that the NPCs that you are describing, aren't really NPCs. They are class abilities that have "tokens" assigned to them. They really should be PCs in Fantasy Grounds. NPCs should be as presented by Fantasy Grounds, since regular NPCs (monsters and other people) will have their own motivations and ways of doing things which are in the GMs area of interpretation, rather than the players. Even followers or a cohort (for PF Leadership feat), will have their own brain, but be more tied to a PC.

I'm using the terminology of the program (FGU), not the in-game meaning of the word.
In D&D, I agree, a familiar or an artificer's construct is more a class ability than an NPC. Sure. Same thing with followers, cohorts, animal companions... No objection there.
But, in FGU they are classified and called as "NPCs", so, in the in-program term, they are NPCs. No point in going over the philosophy of the game, all I'm saying is that when the DM drags a FGU-defined NPC onto the portrait of a character to give control of said FGU-defined NPC to a player, that player shouldn't just be able to click on the FGU-defined NPC's abilities, but should also be able to move its corresponding token on the map and be able to see the view of said token's LOS.
I only keep mentioning the Party Vision and Movement because it's the workaround that is always brought up for it, even though it's less than ideal and has unintended consequences.

I don't think I can be more specific than this.

[SilentRuin]

I am not handicapped by that problem in my polymorphism or assistant GM extensions - both will override that operation of dropping CT NPC link into player portrait to give full control of NPC to player (because I needed that for my own uses). I don't use party vision myself was one of the reasons I did that. 5E only of course.

[DCrumb]

In my PFRPG game, my wizard currently has a familiar owl. It was made as a PC and is controlled (and owned) by the wizard. There will always be those classes where this becomes rather excessive (PF has certain archetypes where the amount of controlled "creatures" are hordes), but for most classes, it is easier to have the familiars and animal companions as PCs since most of the time there is only one extra PC to control from the players perspective. From a tabletop perspective, each of these would have their own character sheet anyways, as they aren't always going to stay the same as the base creature.

[SilentRuin]

Life would have been much simpler if the rulesets did not go down the path of copying the hardcover book data descriptions of NPCs and simply do a translate into one common data format for PCs and NPCs - too late now of course - but would have made things so much simpler to just convert the NPC data into the DB in a common PC data format. Then all the issues with how tabs and main pages have to be specialized could be thrown out the door for one common format.

A lot less extension programming would be required to overcome the oddities caused by all that also.

[Lo Zeno]

In my PFRPG game, my wizard currently has a familiar owl. It was made as a PC and is controlled (and owned) by the wizard. There will always be those classes where this becomes rather excessive (PF has certain archetypes where the amount of controlled "creatures" are hordes), but for most classes, it is easier to have the familiars and animal companions as PCs since most of the time there is only one extra PC to control from the players perspective. From a tabletop perspective, each of these would have their own character sheet anyways, as they aren't always going to stay the same as the base creature.
You are just repeating ad nauseam the second workaround that I mentioned in my first post: "just create them as PCs".
I will refer you to that first post (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?68121-Separate-NPC-token-control-from-party-vision-and-movement&p=597063&viewfull=1#post597063) to understand why having several players with familiars, animal companions and constructs, and an artificer player who can keep swapping his constructs around, makes it less than ideal and excessively time consuming. I will just add that in D&D 5E familiars and animal companions DO stay the same as the base creatures, and do not advance in levels (so no, they would not "have their own character sheet anyways", the Monster Manual stat block is enough even on the tabletop), and I'll add that since I paid good money for the Monster Manual module I want to make use of its premade creatures, thank you very much.

[SilentRuin]

You are just repeating ad nauseam the second workaround that I mentioned in my first post: "just create them as PCs".
I will refer you to that first post (https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?68121-Separate-NPC-token-control-from-party-vision-and-movement&p=597063&viewfull=1#post597063) to understand why having several players with familiars, animal companions and constructs, and an artificer player who can keep swapping his constructs around, makes it less than ideal and excessively time consuming. I will just add that in D&D 5E familiars and animal companions DO stay the same as the base creatures, and do not advance in levels (so no, they would not "have their own character sheet anyways", the Monster Manual stat block is enough even on the tabletop), and I'll add that since I paid good money for the Monster Manual module I want to make use of its premade creatures, thank you very much.

Easy there. Just conversations of differing viewpoints in here - nobody is throwing insults at you just talking out ideas.

[Lo Zeno]

Easy there. Just conversations of differing viewpoints in here - nobody is throwing insults at you just talking out ideas.

And I haven't insulted anyone myself, but if my tone sounds annoyed is because I started my feature suggestion by literally listing all the current workarounds, including this one, and having someone argue more than once in favour of that same workaround makes it look like they didn't bother reading that post in the first place.

[SilentRuin]

And I haven't insulted anyone myself, but if my tone sounds annoyed is because I started my feature suggestion by literally listing all the current workarounds, including this one, and having someone argue more than once in favour of that same workaround makes it look like they didn't bother reading that post in the first place.

Well the game is what it is and those suggestions you've gotten is all there is to handle player controlled NPCs at the moment. To recap:

1) Share NPC by dropping combat tracker entry onto player portrait. But this requires party movement to let players have decent amount of control.
2) Make the NPC into a PC and simply have the player play more than one PC at a time.

Other than that your only option is writing an extension yourself or using one already out there that gives players that kind of control of NPC's - but extensions = RISK and can cost if you can't find a free one. Gist is - right now - today - option 1 and 2 I gave you (and you already mentioned) are the only options you have if you plan to have players do what you asked. And only option 2 will give you full control.

So your initial post states what there is now. Things on the list typically take forever, so your stuck with what you already know to do.

[Bonkon]

Good Day All :)
How about this as an addendum to the "Make a PC" option. Instead of making multiple PC's just make one with all the abilities as separate power groups and the player only gets to use abilities from the power group they have as the active creature? I believe this would work well for your Artificer (as I believe they always have the same basic stats?). As far as other summoned creatures I do not know. :)

[Lo Zeno]

Good Day All :)
How about this as an addendum to the "Make a PC" option. Instead of making multiple PC's just make one with all the abilities as separate power groups and the player only gets to use abilities from the power group they have as the active creature? I believe this would work well for your Artificer (as I believe they always have the same basic stats?). As far as other summoned creatures I do not know. :)

I don't think I fully understand your proposed solution, so please bear with me: the Artificer can have, right now, two active constructs at a time (in my example, a homunculus servant and a steel defender), plus another construct he can activate if he deactivates one of his active infusions - which means that he still needs two or three extra tokens on the map on top of his character, each time.
If I understand you correctly, you're suggesting to create one PC that would have, in its Actions tab, three groups of abilities (with each group representing one of the possible constructs), of which the Artificer would use only the groups (constructs) that are active for that battle. Am I correct? But wouldn't that make combat a real mess to handle then? Only two of his constructs have the same base stats, the third one (the homunculus servant) has different stats, so saving throws and abilities don't always match; plus, by having only one PC that represents them, how would you handle the HPs of each creature in combat (remember that the Artificer can take more than one with him into battle)? Moreover, how would you handle their separate positions and movements, if you only have one PC that represents them?

[Bonkon]

I don't think I fully understand your proposed solution, so please bear with me: the Artificer can have, right now, two active constructs at a time (in my example, a homunculus servant and a steel defender), plus another construct he can activate if he deactivates one of his active infusions - which means that he still needs two or three extra tokens on the map on top of his character, each time.
If I understand you correctly, you're suggesting to create one PC that would have, in its Actions tab, three groups of abilities (with each group representing one of the possible constructs), of which the Artificer would use only the groups (constructs) that are active for that battle. Am I correct? But wouldn't that make combat a real mess to handle then? Only two of his constructs have the same base stats, the third one (the homunculus servant) has different stats, so saving throws and abilities don't always match; plus, by having only one PC that represents them, how would you handle the HPs of each creature in combat (remember that the Artificer can take more than one with him into battle)? Moreover, how would you handle their separate positions and movements, if you only have one PC that represents them?

Good Day Lo Zeno :)
The Artificer in my game uses Eldritch Cannons (Not sure about how the Steel Defender works) in this instance they all have the same stats for saves, hps, AC, etc.. Only the abilities differ.
So using one PC for the three different types would cover any variety he decides to summon (They only last one hour unless he uses a spell slot to summon again).
I forgot the Homunculus has a drastically different set of stats so that would not work. So the player would still end up with 3 total PC's under their control but, in my case, really has 5 options.
Sorry was just throwing out an idea. :)

EDIT: Sorry, just reread your above reply and missed the "plus another construct he can activate if he deactivates one of his active infusions" Reading too quick and not digesting what you said! :)