Token Bar Extends Beyond Token

When a Token Bar is taken to a negative number, the bar extends to the left beyond the token itself. On a busy map with many tokens in close proximity it can become confusing if bars extend beyond the token and overlap onto other tokens.

Fair enough. :) Personally, I don't see the burning need to have negative values displayed in bars since it looks 'busy' and confusing on the map to me. However, I can see where others may see this as a feature rather than a bug. :) I'm computer illiterate so take this with a grain of salt, but, perhaps, a mouse-over or hover -display feature on the token if an at-a-glance tool is needed?

I might suggest having the Token Bar change color, say to Red for negative numbers, would that be possible.

Another idea as to how to display a negative value is have the bar be empty at zero, but turn red at any negative number. Once a creature is dead, the X status is used, so the red bar would just be confirmation and wouldn't overlap with other tokens' bars. That way, if the bar is red, but there's no X status, the creature is still alive, just not dead yet (Pathfinder and DnD type rules, dunno if that helps for other games or not). I find I have to make sure my dead tokens are at zero, because the field can get somewhat cluttered sometimes with overlapping bars.

Bars extending to the left doesn't seem useful to me. However, I'm only familiar with Pathfinder and DnD. For all I know, there's 40 other games people play on Roll20 that DOES use the left-extending bar. We could take a poll. haha.

It does allow players to see overkill amounts, in D&D/PF etc players don't die at 0 so seeing a negative expression could be useful for this.

You could disable the bar. Then when you click the token you'd see the negative value. Or use one of the other 2 non-health bars to represent negative.

Or use one of the other 2 non-health bars to represent negative. Yes, but that would mean one less bar for other things, and sometimes (depending on your game) 3 is hardly enough.

I use the negative bar in Pathfinder. If people do not want a busy board full or bars then the bars should be set to Edit only and not See. That way only the GM and the controlling player will see the bars. - Gauss

The issue isn't about a board full of bars. It's about bars overlapping each other and becoming confusing because people can't tell whose bar belongs to who. The bars allow the players the ability to see how "hurt" their allies are. At a RL table, people essentially have to ask "what's your health at now?" A cleric on a battlefield would be able to visibly see that the fighter is in need of a healing. A health bar is that visibility. As such, I think it's important to allow them to be viewable. So, when they're overlapping and causing needless confusion, I feel a small fix is in order. I play solely Pathfinder and 3.5e. I understand that things don't die at zero. As I stated above, the x would represent the death. If the green (health) bar goes below zero, it could turn red instead of going negative (to the left). If the bar is red and there's no x status, then the creature is in the negative, but still alive. This allows for those games that utilize negative amounts to still be able to function and cleans up the board, because you would no longer have bars overlapping each other.

I play solely Pathfinder and 3.5e. I understand that things don't die at zero. As I stated above, the x would represent the death. If the green (health) bar goes below zero, it could turn red instead of going negative (to the left). If the bar is red and there's no x status, then the creature is in the negative, but still alive. This allows for those games that utilize negative amounts to still be able to function and cleans up the board, because you would no longer have bars overlapping each other. +1! Great suggestion.

Good point Clinton. I was just stating a workaround not that it should remain that way. One problem with turning red, there is already a red bar. That bar would need to be shaded another color. - Gauss

How about when a Bar reaches 0, it turns into a black bar with a white "0" on it. If it goes lower than 0 then the "0" becomes the negative number.

Riley D. said, Is there anyone out there who's actually using the fact that the bars extend to the left beyond the token when you put in negative values to their advantage? For what is worth, under the GURPS rules, for instance the Health - Hit Point value can go very well from an initial value of 13 to, for instance, -37 without automatically killing a character. So sometimes we have large bars extended at the left (I don't use bars always.) This is an ogre after suffering about 80 points of damage (initial Hit Points 20, right now -60 after a critical sword hit in the face/eye and a bit of additional bad attitude against him). At that point he's already dead, but if I remember correctly he was not at -43, and the bar was also pretty large back then:

Wow. Case and point there. haha. That is a tremendous negative bar!

Lol it was a quick test fight with a player. She launched a random attack while running toward that ogre, achieving a single damage point to the face. Such large negative bar is the result of that single damage point that at the same time was also a critical hit (turning the "face" location into the "eye", multiplying damage), along with a subsequent round of pushing the point of the sword inside the same wound :-S I guess she wanted to be sure the enemy was truly defeated . . .

I just did a little test and noticed that the "see" check box does nothing. If you are the GM or are allowed to edit the bar then it is automatically visible. I just had an idea regarding this problem (I run GURPS, so I do run into this problem often). How about letting us set an upper and lower end to the bar with a vertical line on the bar indicating where 0 is. Maybe also have the bar turn a darker shade of the normal color when it drops below 0.

Found this as I've been having trouble with the negative bars as well- it's also not obvious at a glance that the value is negative. Can I suggest that in addition to changing the colour to red when in negative values, the bar should start filling from the right? Larger negative values (if it drops below -maximum again) could be a darker shade of red, again filling from the right (and overlapping the lighter shade successively).

As a GM I use the various bars. The green bar I use to represent hitpoints, the red negative hitpoints, and the blue is nonlethal damage. - Gauss

@Gauss that would only work if I handled all of the HP bars myself. I've already got players unhappy about losing all the automation we had with Maptools. If I tell them they have to keep 2 HP bars straight they'll lynch me. :P

I've asked this before, why can't the health bar just turn say red as soon as it goes negative and start full. This will work with most major systems like 3.5, 4E, and Pathfinder just fine because you aren't dealing with massive amounts of negative damage. If you could incorporate accessing an ability variable like Constitution the red bar would then count down to DEAD or return to green when Healing was applied.

Count me in the group that has gotten confused by a negative bar over another token. Red doesn't work as noted above - there are already red bars separate from the green. And you have to have some way to indicate each one going negative - if you have the green bar turn red, what color should the blue bar become? You could use primary colors and opposites, changing the red bar to yellow and then use green/red, blue/orange, and yellow/purple. Alternatively, maybe just a black and white checked outline or something.

How about, keep the bar going to the left when representing negative hit-points AND turn it red? :) This: