Maps rotated 45 degrees...

Hi, I prefer hand drawing or using ISO programs to draw my maps from back in the day. Currently I have just been importing maps that are premade or just creating 2d appearances but I wanted to give a more realistic approach. Using the following map (not drawn by me) as an example... <a href="http://s193.photobucket.com/user/tmpiper/media/OrthographicDungeon04_zps9008a628.jpg.html" rel="nofollow">http://s193.photobucket.com/user/tmpiper/media/OrthographicDungeon04_zps9008a628.jpg.html</a> I know I can just rotate the physical map 45 degrees but is there a way to rotate the in game grid 45 degrees instead so the map can be north to the top rather than possibly the top left?

Here are some other threads about this, that you might want to read through. Among these search results you can find a Suggestion thread asking for Isometric Grid, and you might want to comment or +1 vote for that suggestion. (Look for the one that's still open in the current Suggestions forum voting process.) <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/search?q=isometric" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/search?q=isometric</a> I believe that you'll be wanting a bit more than rotating 45 degrees. The isometric grid is rotated, but also smooshed (giving the appearance of perspective). It's explained better in some of the threads on the link. p.s. North South East West is not really usually considered the issue, because you can simply put a Compass Rose indicating which direction is North. Your compass rose could point top-right, and that would orient your grid to the directions. But there are other issues with isometric and the Roll20 square grid -- tokens movemements or distance measurements would seem to be double the expected amount when traveling up & down, IIRC.

Plexsoup has a few isometric tile sets on the marketplace: <a href="https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/search/isome" rel="nofollow">https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/search/isome</a>... Each of the sets also has instructions for map setup to make the isometric view work nicely: Tips for optimal experience: Turn off the Roll20 grid Make a new page Set the Page Size to 96x96 Set the Scale to 1 unit = 7 feet Set the background to a nice, dark color Go to the Map layer Start at the top left corner and lay tiles from back to front Right click on tiles and set To Front or To Back as required Try Horizontally-Flipping map tiles for more versatility Notes about isometric or side-view play: The ruler will only show proper distances along cardinal direction. ie: diagonals will show the wrong distance. Counting squares still works fine. Dynamic lighting requires special care around doors, because you want players to see the door. Character Facing is less obvious than in top-down play. Rotating side-view character tokens will make them lie down. Great for showing casualties! To change facing, right click a character and flip horizontal

thanks much for the responses. I am drawing one up right now to try to upload later this week for my team! We play on the 21st, afterwards ill see if I can post it here for anyones use (if I can figure out how to host it somewhere).

As Promised we ran this map Saturday that I drew! If anyone wants me to send this to them for use just ask. This is on isometric paper. What I ended up doing was setting the grid sizes to 2' and 0.5 respectively in the settings. (I did this so I had extra grid marks for moving toons around). I explained to my party that each square was 10' as seen and to ignore the ups and downs portions (as that is the 3d stuff). They were real happy with this. In retrospect, I wish I had not numbered the rooms (I could have done this on the GM layer). I also didn't (but set it up so I could) add a trap on the GM layer in room 4 in front of the path. It would be a 50' fall into the water below. Rooms that were the same room I labeled with a/b (IE 2b just shows that the shelf is 10' up (direct drop off) and 6b has that pillar in the center with the 10' wide path around it 30' up.

Having had run an Isometric campaign, I can say that it's very difficult to keep things looking nice. For one, there's a Z-order attached to upward north for tokens unless weird overlap issues crop up. I used Plex's set as well as several of my own design. I found that I was spending more time aligning, foward/backing graphics than I was running the actual game.

Yeah I only plan on doing an handful of ISO drawings as they take to much time to develop. We run twice a month so this was the end of the "first chapter" the dungeon (room 9) hallway collapses and they end up jumping in the waterfall or deep pool or whatever in the corner of that room. Then fight a boss fight there, then take the current (can carry someone even in plate) on further. Of course higher level players could have other spells that get them out of this situation. The group delayed following the first guy into room 3 from it, I had some Ice mephitis in there surprise him.