What Internet Software are people using to play T20?

[BetterThanLife]

Well GRIP is giving me headaches, but so far it is mostly usable. I was curious if anyone was running a T20 campaign via the Internet, using one of these products. GRIP, ScreenMonkey, Fantasy Grounds, Klooge, OpenRPG, or one that I missed, in my research?

It is a great concept. I am definitely enjoying running the campaign using GRIP, but I would prefer something that didn't have as many bugs or was better supported. Especially something that didn't require the game be suspended if someones connection drops so they can reconnect.

I am looking at different packages, but would prefer to find out what others are using and what works before investing any more money.

 

[BetterThanLife]

I'll start off with a quick review of ScreenMonkey, but if someone else has experience please let me know their thoughts.

nbos' ScreenMonkey is a brilliant concept. It is a webserver with the players simply needing a web browser to play.

The interface is clean, supports PNG, BMP, JPG, GIF graphics as both your map and your player's icons. No conversion required for any of that. No creating icons from graphic files. However you should probably limit icons to 32 pixel by 32 pixel. There is a scaleable grid, either square or hex that scales the grid by simply sliding it, though it is a bit clunky at smaller scales.

There is also a direct port from nbos' excellent Fantasy Mapper. So you can draw your maps in FM and port them, either the current screen view or the entire map directly to your ScreenMonkey screen.

Unlike other software of this type there is no provision for character sheets. So your characters have to know what dice to roll and what modifiers to add. You can automate your rolls by adding buttons to your screen, if you are using IE or Firefox as a player, to help automate your most common rolls and there is a memo function so you can stash up to 100 of your most common rolls, phrases, etc for easy access, but your character sheet is going to be primarily on paper at your desktop and you will need paper and pencil. (though rudimentary information, like hitpoints is available for each character in the software all you have is hitpoints, armor (not editable once set)a name and description. If you force your players to have the text file description in a certain format it will look like a character sheet and can work that way, but it is still lots of pen and paper note taking.

The other thing, I feel is missing is the ability to scale your map and/or icons. Your map, once loaded can not be scaled though you can pan around on it, you can't see all of a bigger map. Couple that with the fact that the character icons are always 32 pixel by 32 pixel, regardless of the scale of the map, and things can get a bit messy. Now you can scale your map so that your grid nicely lines up at 32 pixels accross especially if your map was set up in Fractal Mapper or even CC2, (though you have to do the math yourself with CC2) but you have to remember to save it that way and then probably just turn off the ScreenMonkey Grid. (It doesn't snap anyway and aside from putting lines on your screen has very little other utility.)

Players do get to move their own icons around, which can cause problems since there is no limits as to how they move them and there is no snap to function, but is a nice feature.

The Scripting language is well documented and since it is also a webserver you can also alter the appearance by altering the HTML code. (And HTML is also well documented.)

Even though it is a webserver, security is maintained because it requires a username and a password. The system works well with plug and play routers and opens and closes the port automatically and gets your IP address for your players without any fuss or muss. Though the email announce didn't work the few times I tried it, putting notice that the game is up on nbos's website works well and all a player needs to do is go to nbos's website, click on your game and log in.

The lack of a character sheet, epsecially an automated standard one, and the map scaling issues kept me from using it for my campaign.

Anyone else using it or attempt to use it for Traveller, especially T20?

 

[BetterThanLife]

Next a quick review of GRIP, at least my experience with it.

GRIP is a QLI product. (Almost enough reason to buy it, in and of itself.) Unfortunately GRIP was produced before T20 and there has been no work on GRIP since T20 was introduced. So while there should probably be all sorts of T20 stuff for GRIP there is none.

Further many of the features of the peripheral features of GRIP, (GRIPNET, the GRIPScheduler, the Library Data in the Traveller edition, etc.) don't work as RPGRealms has changed this website and the pages GRIP is looking for are no longer there. There are also a few bugs that bring things to a screeching halt.

The price is reasonable and the player required software is free. (A major plus for starting a campaign.)

Grip has a few fans answering support questions in the Yahoo GRIP Traveller list but QLI isn't supporting the software. This wouldn't be as bad if the documentation, particularily the documentation on CSML (The scripting language for Grip) was better documented.

The settings on your router have to be manually set. (And there is no documentation in the grip manual to tell you what ports need to be open that GRIP requires.) Likewise GRIP can't find your IP address automatically if you are using a router. (And the RPG Realms address that should allow you to find it is dead, but I couldn't get that to function using a different address anyway. (At least that is editable.)

When you are waiting for players to connect, the system needs to be in listen mode. In Listen mode chat is available but virtually nothing else is. This isn't a bad thing as everyone shows up to play at the start of the session, after all everyone is going to want to catch up, etc. However once the game is in progress a late arrival can't get in without you pausing the game and going back to listen mode. The more important drawback to this is if a player's internet connection goes down, you have to pause the game while you wait for them to reconnect. Aside from the bugs this is probably my biggest dislike of the system.


So much for the bad news. Now for the good news.

The map is scaleable, both by the referee and the players. (So everyone can look at the map at a scale that works best for them.)

The Icons scale and will show status of the character they represent, though exactly how it determines status is not documented and I can't seem to figure it out.

The Map drawing features, while a bit clunky work well enough and if you have the Traveller Package you have all sorts of standard Traveller furnishings and things like doors.

To get around the clunkiness, and to import your wide array of deckplans that you have on your home computer by now, you can use a BMP, GIF or JPG as your base for your map. The Grid on your map has to start at the top left corner and you have to do a counterintuitive method of scaling the grid but once you figure that out importing graphics and maps is no big deal.

However the icons do snap to grid, whether the grid is on or off, and they snap to a square grid even if you have it set to a hex grid. This is not a bad idea, for standard Traveller Square Grid deckplans, it is fine, but looks funny with other grids. Just make sure that the grid in your map matches the grid in GRIP and you are in good shape. There is no facility for the players to move icons, not neccessarily a bad thing, but if you want it, it doesn't exist.

The system allows file transfers, pretyped narations, pretyped NPC statements, preloaded maps and encounters, (though it doesn't keep your NPC positions for the encounters on the map.) and is generally well thought out. There is a facility for file transfers, so you can send pics, etc. though if you choose a file that is too big it will crash your system and bring the game down.

Probably the best part of the system is the Character Sheet interface. It, once you get past the how do I do this, allows you to create a fully automated character sheet for whatever game you wish to play. There are a few character sheets for various games included in the system and quite a few more on the web. (Though there isn't a fully functional T20 sheet, the one I created from scratch is close.

) If the character sheet creation was better documented this could be completed in an afternoon. (It isn't better documented and 3 weeks later (4 weeks after I started creating this T20 sheet, I am still looking for a bug that crashes the player when they push a button.)Character sheets can even produce dorpdown menus in the chat window for your most common things you do on your character sheet. Though that feature isn't available in the Character sheet creation software package, it has to be loaded from the player interface software.

Entities (NPCS that can combat interact with players) require their own specialized sheets definitely much simpler than full blown character sheets but the ability to simply use a character sheet for an NPC would be a nice touch. Giving NPCs the same type of drop menu from chat that players have would be a very nice touch. (Flipping tabs to various NPCs during combat is defiitely annoying.) But easily enough accomplished if you do it right. And you can always group several NPCs under a single entity to simplify your tab flipping.

There is lots of power in GRIP, I wish I knew more.

I also wish we could get a bug fix and a flush of the scheduler, and those webpages that GRIP is looking for, fixed.

 

[Berg]

Excellent review

You raised a few points (questions) which I will address....

The Icons scale and will show status of the character they represent, though exactly how it determines status is not documented and I can't seem to figure it out.

When you create the Icons you can make a bar that shows the health of the character. The first icon has a full green(?) bar, then reduce it a bit for each succesive icon til the 5th one is all red. This is the method I chose, as well as some of the other icon makers. The standard icon set has the character icon either slowly turn to B/W, or the "green dot" gets smaller and smaller.

However the icons do snap to grid, whether the grid is on or off, and they snap to a square grid even if you have it set to a hex grid.

The square map bits snap to square, but the character icons do snap to the hex grid. This does make for annoying mapping, but I've been working on a "mayday" tile set that has a work around so you can place planets etc. on a hex grid that are in the middle of the hexs. I'll post it soon on the GRiPList

There is no facility for the players to move icons, not neccessarily a bad thing, but if you want it, it doesn't exist.

On the contrary... At the top of iGM, under "Gripmap", there is a feature that says "unlock map for >", that expands to include all the players that are attached. So you can let the player whose turn it is move his/her icon. It only shows up when you are in play mode with players attached. Just remember to "lock" it after or you can have a rambo on your hands

Let me know how it works out

Tom

 

[BetterThanLife]

Originally posted by Berg:
Excellent review

You raised a few points (questions) which I will address....

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> The Icons scale and will show status of the character they represent, though exactly how it determines status is not documented and I can't seem to figure it out.

When you create the Icons you can make a bar that shows the health of the character. The first icon has a full green(?) bar, then reduce it a bit for each succesive icon til the 5th one is all red. This is the method I chose, as well as some of the other icon makers. The standard icon set has the character icon either slowly turn to B/W, or the "green dot" gets smaller and smaller.</font>[/QUOTE]Actually that part of it I got. You create 5 Icons for each icon. With varying degrees of health. (For example Icon 1 is fully healthy and Icon 5 is All red, and/or no color.) I just can't figure out how Grip decides when to change between the icons.

On the contrary... At the top of iGM, under "Gripmap", there is a feature that says "unlock map for >", that expands to include all the players that are attached. So you can let the player whose turn it is move his/her icon. It only shows up when you are in play mode with players attached. Just remember to "lock" it after or you can have a rambo on your hands

Let me know how it works out

Tom

Kewl, Learn something new everyday. Thanks Tom. It shows that I am still learning.

 

[cq081]

Originally posted by Bhoins:
though exactly how [GRiP] determines [icon] status is not documented and I can't seem to figure it out.

iPC compares the number of hit points you have have when healthy to how many you have now, then displays the appropriate icon from the selected set. In order to have hit points to compare, one or more fields in the character sheet needs to be set to item type "Hit Point" and both base and current values need to be set.

In Classic Traveller this is done with STR, DEX and END each of which has its current value set equal to its base value when setting up the character. When damage is taken, you reduce current values by clicking on the Hits tab in the status bar and selecting which stat you plan to reduce.

In games where hit points are calculated by an esoteric formula <g>, you'll need an appropriately labeled field set to type "Hit Point" and filled in from your formula. Damage is taken in the same way: by clicking on the Hits tab on your status bar and typing this round's damage into the handy popup box.

If clicking on the Hits tab turns up an empty box, go back and make sure that your hit points/stats field(s) have "Visible in iPC" ticked.

For our fantasy players there is a Points tab sitting next to Hits and looking for one or more fields set to type "Power Points" which, like Hits, has both base and current values. While you can track your remaining mana points this way, they don't effect the look of your character icon.

Posted by Tom:
"unlock map for..", that expands to include all the players that are attached. So you can let the player whose turn it is move his/her icon.

Note that you can unlock map movement for only one character at a time, so pay attention to your init order <smile>.

 

[BetterThanLife]

And it apparently does it, when you have two sets of hit points by adding them and then subtracting the damage and dividing it by the whole number. Which in T20 means you could be dead with 4 green bars. (Provided you aren't wearing lots of armor.) I figured that out this evening during my T20 campaign.

And power points, I use that, for amoung other things, current ammunition levels in your weapons.

Magic, is just technology that isn't understood yet. That Gauss Rifle is, in D&D, is a Staff of Fireballs and a Staff of Automatic Missile Fire all in one Artifact.

 

[BetterThanLife]

Well apparently I am the only one attempting to run a T20 campaign in real time using Internet.

Further Research for those interesting in doing this.

Klooge,
Klooge is a fairly adaptive system with most of the action occuring on the map screen. (Which IMHO is a good thing, having to flip back and forth between map and chat (Both Grip and ScreenMonkey) or to have either a small map and a larger chat area, or viceversa, (ScreenMonkey) is annoying as the GM. Chatting happens right on the map. The Map functions are great and most of the D20 ruleset is in one of the default definition files. (changing it to a T20 definition file appears fairly straightforward but we shall see about that.)

The Map features are incredible. Setting the scale of your imported map, measuring range, measuring moves is all neat intuitive tools. Characters can tell the Referee where they want to go and the referee move them, (same as Grip, for the most part), move themselves, (same as ScreenMonkey) or make a move and let the referee approve, reject, or allow part of the move depending on the settings.

It includes a Java Script to import PCGen character sheets to the Klooge Character sheet. (Should be a fairly straight forward rewrite to get it to import a T20 Sheet from PCGen.)

DOes not require the game to be suspended to allow player connections.

Has a follow feature. So once the party is set up in order they can move as one. (Very cool for a Mercenary unit movement, they can move out in a wedge formation as a unit.)
Klooge has a great support base both from fans and the publisher.

The Demo campaign is neat, though D&D 3.0 and shows you many of the basic features.

It is a bit pricier than GRIP and ScreenMonkey but it appears to take the best features of GRIP and ScreenMonkey and throws in a few more for good measure. The reason it is pricer is that the players have to have a copy of the game to play (which is free) but someone has to purchase a license for them to play. THe nice thing about this is the Referee can purchase the licenses and then maintain control of the licenses that he/she purchases. Or the Players can purchase their own. It doesn't matter if the players purchase their own licenses or the Referee does. You need a license to play and one to run the game.