First-Person View Mode for 2024

[Blackwolfe]

I think it only shows for the GM and not for the players (or the otherway?)

I'm only seeing it on player side

[LordEntrails]

I think I remember Moon saying they are looking to change that.

[Zacchaeus]

The NPC's have two tokens, one for top down and one for 3d. I do not see that for the PCs. Am I missing it? Is it shown in one of the video? (which?) Is this not a feature yet?

Clicking on the player token or portrait area brings up the Pictures and Tokens window. If you aren't seeing this then it may be an extension which is causing the issue. You don't mention the ruleset you are using so it may be that. This works for both DM and players by the way.

[Blackwolfe]

I'm generally 'meh' about this feature, it doesn't seem necessary, but I guess folks that are excited about it can use it.

There's a feeling of "they keep breaking our game" at our table. Can't blame My players for feeling that way.
We use FGU live in person with a table mounted flat screen and real minis, no one in our group wants this new feature.
I'm just hoping to get to a place where everything works without missing images and error messages, with the mods I've paid for. *L*
Smiteworks, Please do not abandon 2D.

[HywelPhillips]

There's a feeling of "they keep breaking our game" at our table.

There's some truth in that, but in my experience Smiteworks' bug fixing is absolutely exemplary. They fixed as many bugs as were found in the beta phase when only a small number of highly-motivated people tested the product, and are fixing multiple bugs post-release on a daily basis whilst communicating with the community on an hour-by-hour basis.

Serious suggestion: if you run FGU live in person with a table mounted installation, don't install major new versions of FGU for a couple of weeks. Just hold off hitting "check for updates". Regard your set-up as a production environment - as I have the computers and software for my business set up. I do not install every new thing Apple or Adobe come up with because I need my production machines to just work when I sit down at my desk in the morning. I update judiciously, when I have to, and when I have time to deal with any bug fixing and fallout, not routinely.

Every time SW launch a new version with major new features, it takes a couple of weeks to find and fix the major bugs. This is REMARKABLY QUICK by software dev standards, but it's still imposing pain on you that you can simply omit by holding off running check for updates until the new release has bedded in. That's especially true if the new version doesn't offer any features that are compelling for your use-case.

The situation is worse with Roll20 (they control the code and updates, not you - you can't freeze your game in a production state even if you want to. The bright side is that Roll20 development is so slow it hardly affects us) and Foundry (you control the code and updates, but the number of breaking changes in every release is far worse than FGU and the time taken for the release environment to become stable after a new version is such that some packages don't ever catch up before the next big bundle of breaking changes are released).

I feel for the community ruleset devs with all the breaking changes, for sure, but for those of us who just want a smooth weekly game, holding off running check for updates for a couple of weeks will result in a MUCH smoother experience. Or even just do what I do when forced to use Foundry - get everything into a working state, freeze that installation for production for the duration of the campaign, and don't touch it until your needs change and you move on to the next campaign or have to install the next module in the series to continue the campaign.

Cheers, Hywel

[HywelPhillips]

P.S. for comparison, I (and many other professional photographers) have a rule on Apple updates that we don't ever install a new major version of MacOS until the next major version is about to be released. That usually gives you the most stable platform you are going to get for the next year. If you install the latest shiny OS on release day, you WILL suffer all the bugs all at once. If you wait to the relatively stable xx.5 release your production environment is a lot less likely to break every few minutes.

Cheers, Hywel

[rocketvaultgames]

There's some truth in that, but in my experience Smiteworks' bug fixing is absolutely exemplary. They fixed as many bugs as were found in the beta phase when only a small number of highly-motivated people tested the product, and are fixing multiple bugs post-release on a daily basis whilst communicating with the community on an hour-by-hour basis.

Serious suggestion: if you run FGU live in person with a table mounted installation, don't install major new versions of FGU for a couple of weeks. Just hold off hitting "check for updates". Regard your set-up as a production environment - as I have the computers and software for my business set up. I do not install every new thing Apple or Adobe come up with because I need my production machines to just work when I sit down at my desk in the morning. I update judiciously, when I have to, and when I have time to deal with any bug fixing and fallout, not routinely.

Every time SW launch a new version with major new features, it takes a couple of weeks to find and fix the major bugs. This is REMARKABLY QUICK by software dev standards, but it's still imposing pain on you that you can simply omit by holding off running check for updates until the new release has bedded in. That's especially true if the new version doesn't offer any features that are compelling for your use-case.

The situation is worse with Roll20 (they control the code and updates, not you - you can't freeze your game in a production state even if you want to. The bright side is that Roll20 development is so slow it hardly affects us) and Foundry (you control the code and updates, but the number of breaking changes in every release is far worse than FGU and the time taken for the release environment to become stable after a new version is such that some packages don't ever catch up before the next big bundle of breaking changes are released).

I feel for the community ruleset devs with all the breaking changes, for sure, but for those of us who just want a smooth weekly game, holding off running check for updates for a couple of weeks will result in a MUCH smoother experience. Or even just do what I do when forced to use Foundry - get everything into a working state, freeze that installation for production for the duration of the campaign, and don't touch it until your needs change and you move on to the next campaign or have to install the next module in the series to continue the campaign.

Cheers, Hywel

I very much appreciate this post.

I definitely feel like "they keep breaking our game", but at the same time, they are extremely responsive to issues and committed to making the product better in the long term.

It is refreshing to hear that the grass isn't greener with other VTTs!

Now if only it wasn't so tempting to click that update button, especially when it's red...

[Blackwolfe]

There's some truth in that, but don't install major new versions of FGU for a couple of weeks,Cheers, Hywel

This is good advice and a process I already employ. I have a machine I run each update on, that is NOT the machine we play from, this lets Me demo changes for the players and see what I have to fix before updating our "live" game machine.
The problem with waiting "a couple of weeks" is FGU updates are very frequent, waiting for something new to update you can run right into the next new improvement that breaks your saved game.
I read the forum posts for what has been done, trying to avoid issues, and even then, there are often surprises.
As a customer I want the improvements, but it's a mystery, what's going to be broken in the next batch?

I keep back ups. Several dated back ups, and use them when needed.

[micael]

Hi,

for me its absolute important, that FU 3D view will support other 3D map views for example from Dungeon alchemist mapping software or Campaign cartographer- because there are already 100s of maps around in webp format, that could be used and have a good 3D quality?

In addition its a absolute must, that players and GMs are able to toggle for themself the mapview from 2D to 3d, because depending on position and plans of the combat member its better to use the one or the other - it makes no sense that the GM have to toggle around a lot for every player.
Most probably if you have a lot of combat members it will be hard to don´t loose the overview as GM.

Thanks
Micael

[superteddy57]

We aren't ready for 3D assets quite yet, but everything you asked for is available in Fantasy Grounds at this time.