Token Discussions - what style do you prefer

I have started a post on Facebook to discuss a few different options for tokens. There are even a couple threads floating around here where you can make your own tokens, but I'm mostly looking to find what sort of tokens people would prefer to see in the store to buy as packs. With our license with D&D, there are a few different possible options we are exploring and discussing with WotC. For instance, there are a lot of images of monsters from several different editions and even a Monster Vault product where monster images were created in pog format for use at the table. In addition, there are actual minis from more than a dozen different sets that exist. For those, there are gallery pictures available for many of them. I also own a large collection of these minis in physical form and I played around with taking a top-down photo and then cutting away the background. The results are interesting but I'm not sure if they would meet the demands and standards for people for a paid product. On top of that, WotC owns all the images and likeness of their stuff, so they would have to approve. In some cases, they may not even own those if they outsourced the production. Lot's to discuss.

Either way, let me know what you think. The pit fiend is the work of our very own Carl Pinder who extruded it onto a 2D plane and rendered it in 3D. This wouldn't work for the current version of Fantasy Grounds but we want to look ahead as well.

I lean towards cropped pogs, personally - but I think that top-down "3d" figures could be cool, too. If FG does become a 3D environment, I like the idea of tokens that you'd actually see on a table.... and maybe some stuff you wouldn't be able to do on a table.

I use cropped round tokens akin to d&d pogs with a tri-stripe along the edges. A single white stripe denoting facing.

No option for round though.

The option to pan to top down view and switch to a 2d graphics mode would be nice. Not everyone has the time to prepare 3d environs.

I believe there was an android app called virtual tabletop that had a good illustration of this.

Here are some from the gallery images converted into 2.5D stand-ups. We might be able to do full 3D scans as well. I say that we might be able to do that "technically" but we haven't yet determined if we will be able to do that "contractually".

The last batch is from TabletopConnect, which is a style we are still working to support in the Unity version of FG.

Absolutely top down 3d images; POGS are horrible. And looking ahead POGS would be even more horrible in a 3D environment.

I like the first style - square profiles. I don't care for the top down perspective for PC's or NPC's. When FG goes 3D then obviously this discussion changes to 3d models.

I prefer the pogs or the square portraits. Sorry Z!

I made my own custom tokens that are taken from high quality internet art and made square. I have around 500 tokens in total and another 200 or so that I use for random NPCs and allow players to use as their own tokens. As a player, I'm okay with any of them, but the square token with sexy artwork is my favorite. If anyone is interested, I'll share my tokens.

While we can share methods used to create token packs, it is highly unlikely that we can actually share any of these token packs due to copyright unless we receive permission or a license to redistribute them from the original artists.

Personally I prefer the round or square, but since I am currently not actually GM'ing anything, I use whatever the the GM uses. 3D all the way if/when possible though - the renders look wicked.

I like square for PCs and round for NPCs. Not sure if I prefer top down or portrait though.

I will say I don't really like the 2.5D ones, since they are flat.

Did you see the link I posted the other day to Miguel Zavala on Shapeways (https://www.shapeways.com/designer/mz4250)? He's modeled all of the MM creatures in 3D and has released the stl (?) files to the public domain. You might want to talk to him about what you might be able to do to use his work. Don't think any of it is textured, but it's all 3D that could be used in the TTC model/approach.

Generally, I find that cropped images tend to look the best. I use the 'pogs' from the modules if I don't have an image, or a letter token if all else fails. I don't think I'd like the 3d view images as they would likely end up being too limited for what I am starting with. Plus.. the maps don't look that great when pulled out that way... the map element is only one facet of a game and often the one that's kinda behind everything else. If they are too complicated to set up.. they are too complicated to use. Things like lighting features are great.. but only if they are simple to use... 3d mapping seems like it would fall into this realm... Player tokens as images mix well in your 4th example (in the original post) with the cropped images.. although I'd prefer if they were all square to match their spaces. For HERO stuff.. I use HEX tokens.. cuz the squares are hexes... similar idea. Ideally, you want to be able to see the token as clearly as possible. The top down idea is interesting as a concept.. but usually doesn't end up being all that clear. The tokens with no backgrounds end up having 'clickability' issues a lot of the time and they don't really look right with the square player portrait images... which usually look pretty cool.

As much as I like to use Top-down view of 3D minis, I end up using pogs for the ease of use. If 3D minis become as easy to use as the pogs I would switch to that in a heart beat.

I commented on Facebook - square or round portrait style pogs.

I prefer the pog-type as they are easy for the players to grab and manipulate on the map. Not only that, but the pog-border guarantees that there will be enough contrast to keep a token from being "lost" on the battle map.

That being said, it's also very very easy to make good pog tokens. The ONLY way I would consider paying for tokens would be if the pack of tokens is sincerely amazingly high quality for the price. Honestly, I can't imagine that it would be worth anyone's time to try to sell minis to me for FG.

Now... if you were to do a custom book of Monsters; unique creatures with unique art fitting a solid flavor/theme AND those monster stat blocks came with quality tokens... Then you could get some money out of me. No doubt.

I use full body side view tokens with the background set to alpha. I don't play with facing, so this works fine, and I can tip the figures over to indicate prone or incapacitated combatants.

I don't care much for top down tokens because I don't find staring at hats and hair very interesting and most of the time they seem to have their arms in strange positions.

I like the dinky letter ones, because a lot of the time I like being able to instantly tell what would otherwise be identical monsters apart.

By 'Cropped Profiles' you don't actually mean profiles.. right? You mean 'Cropped Images' .. ie. pictures of the monster from the front or side .. ie. not 'top down'.

And.. umm.. what is a 'pog' exactly? I can see the difference in the Token Modules, does it mean.. 'with a background' or something? Obviously it stands for something.. I just don't know what. :)

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Originally Posted by Zacchaeus

Absolutely top down 3d images; POGS are horrible. And looking ahead POGS would be even more horrible in a 3D environment.

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Word.

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Originally Posted by Blackfoot

By 'Cropped Profiles' you don't actually mean profiles.. right? You mean 'Cropped Images' .. ie. pictures of the monster from the front or side .. ie. not 'top down'.

And.. umm.. what is a 'pog' exactly? I can see the difference in the Token Modules, does it mean.. 'with a background' or something? Obviously it stands for something.. I just don't know what. :)

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You're either at least ten years older or five years younger than me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk_caps_(game)

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Originally Posted by Black Hammer

You're either at least ten years older or five years younger than me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk_caps_(game)

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'Older' seems the more likely. Thanks for the reference ID.

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Originally Posted by Blackfoot

'Older' seems the more likely. Thanks for the reference ID.

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Seemed the easiest way. Just telling you that POG stands for "Passionfruit, Orange, and Guava" seemed amusing but unhelpful.

I am partial to the pogs, in fact, I use that system for my games @ conventions, especially GenCon.

i like the mini's in the first post. The 2.5D standups look pretty good as well.

Cough *3d rendered top-down* cough, lol. I got sold on them from back in the Dundjinni days.

I use and like pogs myself, as this makes creating tokens that fit very easy if making homebrew monsters from artwork, as I am unable to model and render a 3d image to make a topdown view.
I am partial to 3d top down though, as it fits the look of maps and whatnot quite well.

When I DMed at conventions, I was partial to Starburst fruit chews. You could write on them and I had a diehard rule that you ate what you killed. Almost put a kid in diabetic shock at a battle interactive one time. He had a wand of fireballs and his position was being swarmed by a zombie horde.

True story!

More on why I favor pogs:

1) It is easy to create professional-looking pogs with existing tools like tokentool, while top-down 3d renders are beyond the capabilities of most. So you can make what you need.
2) They are more uniform and clean looking.
3) They are easier to handle when there are large numbers of them.

I like pogs. I like top down tokens on Pogs for monsters and I quite like the square portrait style token for PCs.

Someone should upload a shot of each style so I can play along!

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Originally Posted by ausmara

Someone should upload a shot of each style so I can play along!

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See the first post :)

For some reason I thought they were all the same token in different environments, that's what I get for browsing on mobile.

Personally, I prefer top-down tokens, similar to real miniatures. Despite being a little “childish” sometimes, I really like the art of Davin Night, because I think it have a good balance between hand draw and computer rendering.

I bought some of his tokens on Steam Store, and I am using them in my game sessions. I really like the tokens that came with Fantasy Grounds too, and I would like to have more of them – I think they are even better than the ones made by DN.

I just don’t like the ones that looks like 90’s video game characters – too much CGI, too few artwork… lol