Question - 3/4 perspective map tiles

Hello! I'm wanting to develop some assets for the marketplace. In browsing through what's available, I've seen that almost all of the maps are top down(though, I found a few isometric views). Is there any reason why a 3/4 view wouldn't be used or popular? For reference, something that looks a bit like this(League of Legends): <a href="http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/194xf3h9lzh7cjpg/o" rel="nofollow">http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/194xf3h9lzh7cjpg/o</a>... Thanks!

I can't remember who it was, (I want to say Gabriel P. Plexsoup) But he made a really nice isomeric set. Caves sewers and some type of sand dungeon. The issue with these is the set up time is higher and they don't play nice with grid measurements. But they sure do look pretty...

Perspective maps are certainly welcome and sought by some. Though some of the popular games played on here are reliant on top-down maps for consistent distances and square grids, many other games don't mind a different art style and perspective. Search the Roll20 Forum for pre-existing threads talking about Isometric grids, telling some of the pitfalls and ways to implement isometric perspective in Roll20. Note that Roll20 does not have a built-in isometric grid function, and the measurement tool will be inaccurate in some directions on a perspective style map, but the Roll20 grid can be turned off or set in a certain way to help simulate. The illustration example you showed isn't surely isometric but this topic would be related.

Not I that was plexsoup , who does those (and I agree wholeheartedly that they are really nice). In addition to Jake's points I'll add they have to be PNG as their edges aren't rectangular (which makes them a bit more load intensive), they are more work intensive to set up and align as an artist, and a number of players who adhere to the more old school systems are simply more used to the classical feel of top down perspective. That said it doesn't mean there isn't a demand and producing for an under served market helps make sure that everyone can find the style of art they want for their Roll20 games.

Hello! I did read the threads about the isometric tiles and the problems with the grid. What I'm talking about making wouldn't be isometric, but more like a tilted view, so instead of top down, you could see the sides of objects, walls, etc, but it could still line up with a square grid. Think old video games, like Legend of Zelda for a really simplified version of this. Anyways, maybe I'll give it a try. Thanks for the feedback!

I tried creating some a few months back, and found that they were more problematic and time-intensive in creation than top down, by an unreasonable amount, so I scrapped the idea.

Rachel Q. said: What I'm talking about making wouldn't be isometric, but more like a tilted view, so instead of top down, you could see the sides of objects, walls, etc, but it could still line up with a square grid. Think old video games, like Legend of Zelda for a really simplified version of this. There are numerous other perspective drawing techniques besides isometric, but what you described is the exact purpose of isometric and other oblique projections (lines up with a grid, has 90 degree right angels, lines that are parallel in the object depicted are parallel in the art). The example art you posted in the 1st post isn't actually one of those types though. That is a curved perspective with a horizon, parallels are not depicted in parallel.

Yeah, the first image isn't a strict 3/4 view, but it's close enough to what I had in mind to use as an example of look/feel for how the objects on the map are rendered, such as the trees, rocks, etc. An isometric view does line up with a grid, if the grid is flipped 45 degrees. I think the viewpoint I'm talking about is either called 2.5d or 3/4 view and lines up with a grid where the lines are running vertically and horizontally, instead of on diagonals.

I am lacking vision. Is this what you are talking about?

Yep. Though, style wise, I would paint my objects to look more realistic.

I would like that. I would really like a whole pre-built village or even wilderness on a very large Roll20 map or tile. Of course I can make the map large myself in roll20 if you make a set of the individual buildings, trees, objects, but i think it would be neat if you can include some pre-built oversize maps too, like a whole Zelda size (outdoors) map, with lots of doors leading to interior areas that could be loaded on another map/page.

I looked into this a while back from another direction..... Room by room perspective... it had an added plus of making Dynamic Lighting simple... "Box Style Dynamic Lighting." Sample: Good thing about this set up you never need to move or redraw the red lines. This is perfect when you just need a map right now with a few room. Just add, shuffle, and spin the tiles... maybe add a few internal lines in yellow. There is also an API for it <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1213067/slug%7D#" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/1213067/slug%7D#</a>... which manveti helped me with. Not actually what you are looking for, but this also solves the problem of mutilpe player perspective on the same map with basically the same view... and makes lighting really easy. You can change them up really quick as well. And its kind of fun to mix things up and give the players something different to think about... Add some depth to the dungeon.

Hey everyone! Thanks for all the feedback. I'm going to attempt it! Gold, I was going to do something exactly like that. I even thought about packaging it two different ways: 1 with a large prebuilt map and then broken down into square tiles with the individual buildings, etc. The second pack, I thought about providing all of the assets as pngs so they aren't baked into the background image....I noticed somewhere else that people were requesting images of paths, walls, plants on a transparency, so they can use whatever background they want. I know the guidelines for assets discourage that, but there still seems to be a demand for it. Steve, those are really cool. The ability to rotate the tiles is nice!

Hey, just thought I'd throw a wip up here...it's slow going, but some progress is being made.

I love the style, but I'm hesitant about the alignment to grid. Any chance you could do a mock up with the grid youre planning?

Some interesting things happened when I loaded the images into the grid. Looks like I'll need to be tweaking this a bit...

While the art looks really good, Rachel, I think that image looks closer to something for a side-view than to something isometric.

Thanks...yeah, drawing that particular perspective seems to be a bit more challenging than I anticipated.

Very fun style, Rachel! I'm looking forward to seeing more of this set!

Thanks, Russ! I'm just not sure whether I should continue developing this particular set with this particular angle. I can't figure out whether the angle is so problematic that it wouldn't be useful...

The art is beautiful, and there are plenty of campaigns interested in a lower angle like that. (Frankly, considering the hoops you need to jump though to get the grid playing nice for an isometric game, I suspect more GMs would be interested in the lower angle than a fully isometric one.)

Thanks for the feedback, Brian!