Had to find something that would catch all of your attention.

I hope Denny and the other read this as well because I think there is a market for good quality (yet low file size) digital battle maps.

I just discovered a few weeks ago and fell in love with it. MapTool allows you to play your favourite tabletop RPG games with your friends online. This is great for me as my old gaming group is in the States and I'm now in the UK.

Its non-game specific so you can program/script/write it for any of your game systems easily. I am not very good at scripting but I'm learning fast, so if an eejit like me can figure it out I'm sure everyone else can.

It is comparable to the commercial versions that sell for $50.00+. Each person is given 100 custom macros buttons that they can program for specific dice rolls, chat features, etc. Each Toked on the map can be programed with Macros rolls as well! As an example I will show you.

I play with three other people in a GURPS Fantasy system. A single character can have several different attack types depending on combat techniques, weapon used, etc. One of the character tokens is pre-programed for Short Sword Thrust, Short Sword Swing, Three different levels of Fireball. With one click it will roll and say


Eldor Daeroth: Shortsword Swing
14 to Hit « 3d6 -> 9 »
Cut Damage « floor((1d6-mod)*1.5) -> floor((3 - 1) * 1.5) = 3

So the elf hit with his shortsword getting a nine (under 14) and inflicts 3 damage (after armor) and it showes the math it used to get the result. the term floor for those that dont know (I did not until a few days ago) means to round down.

Now the target still gets the option to defend but with a single click its been programed to Strike and damage. I even have the damage modifier applied after the subtracting the DR from the targets armor!

Now I've done the same thing with the fireball having to roll to cast it, roll to hit the target then the damage. It's really great!

Custom tables can be added in the table menu. Some of the guys on the RPTools Forums had GURPS tables already made up including Random Hit Locations, Critical Spell Failure tables, etc.

You can set field of vision of each token so each player can see a different distance on their screens.

Private messages and dice rolls can be sent. You can program for just about any system including HERO and Shadowrun.

They have great to show you how to use some of the features!





The only problem I had with it so far is memory problems when using really LARGE file size maps. But its something that should be fixed in the next release.

You can even drag and drop pictures from IE into map tool if you need tokens on the fly!

So if you into online gaming or if one of your members can't make a game because they moved or out of town for the day, or has to watch the kids, then check it out.

It would be cool if WWG started low file size battle maps for such applications and started to include them in thier adventures they already have.

Yeah I don't mind paying $50 for a good program. What I mind is my players having to pay $25+ to play as well.

If your playing d20, Hero or that Savage Worlds everyone here seems to like, then get their as well. It tracks initiative and the entire combat. Has a good selection of monsters as well. They are working on GURPS for the InitTool as well.

Looks pretty good. If anyone fancies running a game over something like this, let me know.

Arabin

I would be up for trying out too, especially seeing how Savage Worlds does with it