"Photoshop" like layers and folders

Hi folks, This is a thread asking for opinions on the idea of having layers and folders (which would allow one to group layers arbitrarily) in the Map&Background, Objects&Tokens, GM Info Overlay and Dynamic Lighting layers? My dream would be to have a button that says "Add Floor". This button creates a new folder. It contains: Map&Background Objects&Tokens GM Info Overlay Dynamic Lighting The Map&Background and Objects&Tokens layers are actually folders with a default empty layer in them. However there is a "+" button which would allow one to add more layers to these two folders. So one could have terrain, walls, secret doors etc on different layers. Each one would have a "VISIBLE" toggle button. Maybe an eye? anyway, it would allow the GM to turn off or on any layer for surprises. GM's love surprises. Should the GM want to make a town with houses, they can make the interiors on one Floor, and put the roofs on another Floor. Then one might turn off the roof of a given building as the players enter it. Dungeons could be as deep as the GM likes, and each full dungeon is on a single map tab. I feel the floors, folder and layers should be draggable, so one can arbitrarily grab a handle in the hierarchy of layers and change their order. Each layer has a tag. All tokens can be associated with this tag. This means that a token can be assigned to a given layer, and appear only there. PCs can be made to "teleport" from the bottom of the stairs on the 3rd floor to the top of the stairs on the 4th floor, just by changing that tag assignment. From that point on, that token's player can only see the 4th floor. If other players are on other floors, they can only see the floors their Token(s) are on. In the event that a player has more than one token (Leadership Feat), the visibility is defined by the turn order. This would require tracking all the NPCs, but I've found this helps the game flow more correctly (less errors) this way. A Floor's GM notes and Dynamic Lighting would apply across that floor probably, so I'm not sure there's a need for folders and layers in those two cases. That's all I have for now. Tuck

Just a note: every extra layer will increase the amount of video memory required and will also slow down the rendering of the images.

ok. Can the unwanted layers be not drawn? Actually, if all the layer's images could be downloaded, but hidden... In fact, allowing only one set of Map, Objects/Tokens, GM and Lighting to appear at a time (hard limit... turning on one turns off the active one) might solve that.

Im not a Dev, I was just relating a bit of the technical difficulties involved. When the Devs think about adding things like this they have to take performance into consideration. Roll20 is supposed to be easy for systems to run. I used to run it on an 8 yr old system without too much problem.

Tuck, trust me when I say you are not the first or the last to request this in some form. Speaking as someone who has written code, this is harder then many think. Photoshop is a massive program, unrunnable on many computers that roll20 works easily on, and more of that is layers then most think.

ok. I'll let it go. Thanks for replying though. I appreciate that.

TUCK. See my Screen sharing suggestion. We're talking about the same thing although I believe that screen sharing would shift the processing to the client. Anyone whose programmed for browsers knows its a pain in the ass to add this functionality, and Im wondering if shifting to a client side app that is then streamed into the roll20 interface isn't the solution. roll20 might be deep in their projected goals and iterations (or whatever they call it) so they cant change direction, but a client side app teamed with now almost ubiquitous streaming services like twitchtv and riotstream might be totally Do-able. Hit me up ad we'll see if we know people who can build it if roll20's not into it. Duh, Ill resend into PM.

I'm no code guru. Just a GM with a freaking huge map. I'm about to upgrade to Mentor status so I can get teleporting macros, which would be a functional workaround. If layers could be done, I'll help in any way I can. I can provide original maps that might be a good test-bed, and a game in which to test if you like. Other than that I'm not sure what help I could be.