Maps and teleportation traps

[krush11]

Sorry if this has been asked before. Tried searching but didn't find anything specific to what I'm asking, so...

In some of the older modules, their dungeons had teleportation traps, i.e. 2 rooms (or corridors) in the map that look identical and the party would port from one to the other without noticing (until later when their maps would be off) as they moved into the room, etc. Now doing old school gaming where a player is drawing the map from the DM's descriptions, that works fine. But I'm trying to figure out how that could be done with the online maps? It would be obvious if I had to move everyone's token to a different room on the map (I don't know how I could do that without them noticing)? Or is that possible?

Any suggestions on how to do this in FG?


Thanks!

[esmdev]

Sadly that sort of thing is nearly impossible in computerized RPGs. The problem is that the players will still be able to see where they are relative to the sides if the map, so even if you could seamlessly move their tokens without them seeing you cannot change where their screen is seeing to match without them seeing the repositioning and such.

[LordEntrails]

Two ways I've done this;

So the first way I have handled this with Undermountain is to not reveal a complete map to the Players. Instead I describe the hallways, then I give them a battlemap for the individual room or set of rooms. They are responsible for either mapping, remember, or guessing the way they came and how to get out etc. This is pretty old school, and has benefits and problems. The easiest way to modify this is except with teleport traps and one-way doors, wheneever the party want to leave you tell them which way they go. And if they went through a trap you can tell them when/where they get lost and that things don't match what it should be.

The second way I've done this is to use a complete player map for the level, with masking and revealing only the parts they have been too. And then out of character let them know that their characters do not know where they are when they teleport (or even if they have teleported). This relies upon the players being able to not meta-game. And it takes something away from the play experience.

[krush11]

Yeah, I suspected there wasn't an easy way to do that in these online maps. A pity since those types of tricks were always fun to DM for players.

Not revealing the entire map and using combination of old school descriptions with specific battle maps of rooms might work. I'll have to play around with that and see how it goes. I get that we could just do it and hope the players would roleplay their characters accordingly, but that would be a hard ask from my players. Can always try though. Thanks for the suggestions.

[Griogre]

Like LordEntrails when I ran Dungeon Under the Mountain and Undermountain I had the players make their own maps. I used drawings and wall tokens they could drop. It worked out pretty well. You might want to use a large blank map grid instead.

He's a look at a their map in a combat:

[Hurske]

Hmm, I got an idea how I would do it. Would need two copies of the maps, have the teleport room in the same location with both maps, then "accidently" crash fantasy grounds.

Tell them whoops, while you reconfigure the tokens. I'm sure there might be better ways, but that came off the top of my head lol.

[Chalmes95]

Another option is you an put 2 maps on the same screen. You can prep them and go to the unlock section unshare the map. Move the old map they were on to the side and move the other one under them. Hide the other one with a mask and boom bobs your uncle they e been switched to a different map without moving tokes to a whole new map name. You can even overlap the map so they move their tokens onto it then move the other map out. Just food for thought on trying.

[Fear Grounds]

If this is something that affects the entire party then here is a option for you to consider...

Open the main map, we'll call it map 1. The destination map (map 2), needs to be made into a token. Overlay the map 2 token on top of map 1, lock it's position, and make it invisible.

When running the actual sessions, I always lock and synchronize the view of the active map. This helps keep characters from wandering off where they don't need to be, yet. So my players are used to their maps shifting slightly during play, to reveal relevant areas.

When the trap is triggered, you can change the map 2 token to visible. If the two areas are at least similar in design, players are not likely to even notice the switch. ��

At any point after the switch, like say a bathroom or snack break, un-share map 1 and share map 2 with tokens set back to their same positions. If you end up having problems with token stacking, because of the large map 2 token, then this also gives you a reason to un-share and reshare the maps.

Sadly this will not work for things like castle Ravenloft, in the Curse of Strahd, where characters are obviously in different areas. For these, I would recommend checking out the portals extension.