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My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

doodlegrid.com

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Re: My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

#11
post #2

It's early days and looking for feedback :-)

Pretty slick, any options for more token icons? Only 4 appear

you mean like a larger pallet? it lets you search for more (three character minimum search string) but remembering more than four, atleast in the 'find a token' popup, seems pretty important

otherwise the search is nice, though not having anything under 'goblin' is pretty unfortunate

Re: My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

#12
post #2

It's early days and looking for feedback :-)

It took me a little while to figure out that the "Select" tool only selects tokens, not walls. Renaming it to "select tokens" or grouping with the token buttons would help. It's not clear to me what the "radius" of a token is for. At least D&D 5e is played in a non-euclidean space where the diagonal of a 5ft square is the same length as the edges, so a "circle" looks the same as a square. A D&D monster that can attac…

In Pathfinder 2e, for a different example, melee reach works on those non-Euclidean rules, while every other range/area measurement does the "every second diagonal square counts double" rule. So for that, you actually need both versions of radius measurement.

Re: My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

#18
I love it. Just a little enhanced and I would use it regularly.

My primary problem with it seems like you can't move a wall after its placed. Deleting and redrawing instead isn't the biggest deal breaker if it's basically a seamless operation.

As a stopgap I would recommend adding keyboard shortcuts for your tools. If I could 1,2,3,4 to activate those buttons or even Q, W, E, R it would I'd probably have used this for a few hours tonight, haha.

Great work, I think this is a waypoint on the path to a really useful tool, thank you for sharing it.

Re: My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

#19
post #2

It's early days and looking for feedback :-)

It took me a little while to figure out that the "Select" tool only selects tokens, not walls. Renaming it to "select tokens" or grouping with the token buttons would help. It's not clear to me what the "radius" of a token is for. At least D&D 5e is played in a non-euclidean space where the diagonal of a 5ft square is the same length as the edges, so a "circle" looks the same as a square. A D&D monster that can attac…

This is not generally true. Mechanics in 5e with a radius affect a sphere of that size, and for grids normally the rule is that grid spaces are affected if their center is within the radius. So TFA's token radius is probably meant for ongoing effects centered on the player - light cast by a torch, the range of a paladin aura, etc.

The funky diagonals you're describing are an optional variant rule that's often used to simplify movement, but I've never seen a group that measures spell effects with that rule.

Re: My mate is making a tool for DnD players to quickly visualise scenarios

#20
The ability to draw and connect straight lines is much more fluid than any system design or general drawing tool I've used, very smooth. It would be great to have a free drawing tool on top of this.

The drag function is quite janky insofar as you need to drag then release on an object, then click again to place. It should probably be either click once or hold down lmb.

Being able to import your own images if probably the most essential feature you could add.

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