Marketplace content that has functional alternate fonts and formatting

Hi there. I've posted this question before, but lately I've been seeing more content that seems to have found a way around using Roll20's default fonts. I've been able to get the fonts different by copy pasting from an external document into Roll20. However, the font color is locked and doesn't switch when going between dark and light mode (meaning on one it will not be visible). The following examples seem to have found a way around that. Even when changing the following examples to a "normal" style, they retain their formatting. I'm wondering what wizardry people are doing that I'm missing out on. Examples are the Sly Flourish Fantastic Lairs that came with the holiday pro gift promotion thing, and the Deadlands test drive for Savage Worlds. I would very much like to replicate this sort of thing. There are no added scripts, stylus extensions, GM note hacks, etc. being used. Thanks!

Write the document in Word with all of the text styling that you want. Then copy sections of the document into separate handouts. It makes for messy HTML, but that is how you do it with the limitations put on the HTML editor in Roll20.

Also, you will get better answers on stuff like this on the marketplace creator Discord.

Cool, I'll give that a try! Thanks! I think I couldn't get access to the marketplace discord because I use google voice, and they require phone verification. Frustrating, but is what it is. But it's possible that's just for the general Roll20 discord server. I'll look into it.

If the format is really out there, it might be done programatically, by using an API script to write HTML to handouts. An excellent script for this is Stephen S's Markdown script. This allows you to set up CSS classes and have the handout interpret ordinary markdown and style it according to the classes you define. The thread I linked has a number of pre-built style sheets, but here are some examples:

keithcurtis said: If the format is really out there, it might be done programatically, by using an API script to write HTML to handouts. An excellent script for this is Stephen S's Markdown script. This allows you to set up CSS classes and have the handout interpret ordinary markdown and style it according to the classes you define. The thread I linked has a number of pre-built style sheets, but here are some examples: Is that script a "run once" script that updates handouts, or does it require a constant pro subscription?

It's a run-once. When the handout is saved, the script looks at the markdown in the GM Notes, creates an HTML interpretation, and replaces the regular Notes section with that HTML. This only happens at save time. If the script were to be later removed or deactivated, or if the GMNotes were to be erased, the html content would remain intact. You could even, with care, manually edit the content (html formatting is tricky). I think it's a better solution than pasting formatted MS Word text, which can have very messy html/css formatting. I don't know how the revised handout would react to modularization.  I suspect it would be fine, but  I have no way of testing if there might be any unforeseen complications.

Hmm. I remember you mentioning this script before, I didn't think about or wasn't aware you could have it do it's thing and then remove the script later to have it stay in place! That's nifty.

It's a similar approach as the Token Action Maker script. It automates a creation process, but isn't required to be active in order to use what you've created.

I tried the word copy paste thing, but it still gets the font color wrong when switching between dark and light mode. It is an old 2011 Mac version of word. Maybe I can get into the discord somehow and ask more questions.

I would strongly recommend against using Word. It just does not produce decent, bulletproof HTML. You can change the formatting in handouts to exceed the built in styles if you have a way of directly managing the html, such as through a script. Word is just never going to be dependable. This is true not just of Roll20, but the web in general. It's the wrong tool for the problem. Were you able to make any progress with Markdown?

Well, I'd prefer not to use Word either. Right now I'm trying to import the game rules for a system I'm working on. I already have pretty extensive formatting done in Indesign (precise spacing and indentation for bullet points and paragraphs, lots of bolded or italicized words, fancy headers, etc.) I can do some googling, but I'm wondering/hoping if you know of (or personally recommend) any tools or processes that can reliably convert an indesign document into markdown. I'd be okay if just the html was imported. The CSS from the styles would be a lot quicker and easier to type up, if that can't be imported. But redoing the markdown from scratch for the html (for the game rules at least) would be incredibly time consuming. If I'm starting from scratch, such as writing for a new adventure, I don't mind as much using markdown from the get go. But it would be nice to have a reliable workflow from Indesign > PDF > Roll20 fancy handout.

I agree that would be nice. I'd jump on it. Unfortunately, I do not believe such a tool currently exists. Even internally, the current work flow is to export plain text, and manually format the entry in the compendium or game. (There are exceptions for structured data, but for regular content, it's manual). There are just too many special cases and extra code in Indesign, PDFs, Word and other apps that produce formatting. The Markdown script is the best I have seen. That being said, the last time I looked (several years ago) there were some plugins for InDesign to export to markdown, but none were free, so I did not explore any further. Lastly, you can import a PDF directly into Roll20. It's pretty limited, but it does work.

Cool cool, thanks for the feedback. That's good to know. I'm doing some experimenting now and will report back if I discover an effective way to do it.

Another option you have is to experiment with a local installation of CKEditor or TinyMCE. It still won't get you the level of detail you have above, but it gives more than the installation of SummerNote on Roll20.

Hey Brian, I've used Tiny MCE before (I want to say as a Wordpress plugin?) Are you suggesting composing in another site using one of those text compositing engines, and then pasting in Roll20? How would that handle formatting on <H1>, <H2>, etc.? Is the styling-line or does it pull from the site?

I've played with it a bit within an html file on my computer. You can run it as a creator of fairly clean HTML with the advantage of switching to the code view. Essentially, its like what we use here, but it does it better and more cleanly. I have also used&nbsp; <a href="https://html5-editor.net/" rel="nofollow">https://html5-editor.net/</a> &nbsp;when all I have need of is cleaning up a section of html that Summernote turned into a dog's dinner. Any solutions that did more exotic styling would need to pack the styling into the elements to be picked up in handouts unless Roll20 ever makes style sheets available.

Yeah, the current text editor's best feature is that it is better than the original text editor. There were some things you could do with that editor that you can't with this, but boy, was it buggy. I still maintain (though it requires a Pro account) that Stephen's Markdown script is currently the most powerful option for custom handout formatting.

I did some googling into those things. Looks like some useful HTML editors? Also, I could not find any info on whatever SummerNote is on Roll20. I'm also a bit lost on a workflow you're suggesting. I have the completed files (with lots of formatting) in Indesign. If I want to get them into Roll20, I can either past in the raw text, clear the formatting, and redo said formatting inside Roll20's editor. Are you suggesting there's a faster way to do that using CKEditor or TinyMCE? Or are you saying, for future stuff or when starting from scratch, that's a faster way to do some text editing which also produces some markup code, that I can then use in combination with the Markdown script? Either way, thanks for pointing out some useful software tools.

Daniel S. said: I did some googling into those things. Looks like some useful HTML editors? Also, I could not find any info on whatever SummerNote is on Roll20. I'm also a bit lost on a workflow you're suggesting. I have the completed files (with lots of formatting) in Indesign. If I want to get them into Roll20, I can either past in the raw text, clear the formatting, and redo said formatting inside Roll20's editor. Are you suggesting there's a faster way to do that using CKEditor or TinyMCE? Or are you saying, for future stuff or when starting from scratch, that's a faster way to do some text editing which also produces some markup code, that I can then use in combination with the Markdown script? Either way, thanks for pointing out some useful software tools. <a href="https://summernote.org/" rel="nofollow">https://summernote.org/</a> &nbsp;Like CKEditor and TinyMCE, it is an HTML editor you can embed in web pages. I feel it is too buggy though, and it is locked down so you cannot access the HTML (without right clicking and selecting "Inspect"). I don't think there are good ways to directly pull formatting directly from a PDF and turn it into HTML. For that to work with Roll20 as the target you need at least the following: Reading layout from Indesign and substituting appropriate HTML elements. A contiguous layout. Too often it seems that a PDF's elements are out of order, especially when floating elements come into play. A consistent style injected into the style attributes of each element rather than a high-level style sheet. All the HTML editors can do #3, but you have to start over from scratch, cutting and pasting plain text, or you often get garbage elements that are difficult to remove. The PDF export to markdown would be great, but may be more expensive.