Blacked Out Map Solution - Bug or Feature?

Hi, Disclosure: I am still learning how to use Roll20 effectively.   Yesterday, I was running a game and I tried to move the players to a new map.  This failed in that the map appeared completely black to the players.  Searches of help, forums and Google suggested that it might be a problem with the player bookmark or settings for Fog of War.  In my case, I was using the bookmark correctly and Fog of War was off.   I was out of ideas and searches.  My players were waiting patiently.  Finally, I discovered a checkbox on the advanced tab of the edit token feature called "Has Sight".  It was unchecked by default.  Checking the box seemed to work!  I did a more controlled test today and confirmed that the box should be checked for players to see the map where the player bookmark resides (Fall of Plaguestone module). Since seeing maps is most often the desired result, should that checkbox be checked by default rather than unchecked?  Or is the unchecked box part of some important feature that I just don't understand?  Thanks, Dan 

That checkbox only comes into play when using Dynamic Lighting which you have access to in your games due to being a plus level subscriber. Without the other checkboxes enabled for the DL feature the 'has sight' box has no effect.

Hi Ziechael, Thanks for the reply. Yes and that module does use the dynamic lighting features.  It's a great feature.  It does seem though that the default value should be checked.  Perhaps if the other DL features are enabled, check Has Sight as well.  Of course, now that I know about it I will be just fine. Dan

Also, if "has sight" were the default, an awful lot of characters who don't need it (NPCs, primarily) would be calculating their lines of sight, bogging down performance. When you create a default token, a good practice is to set their default sight settings before saving.

I believe earlier modules did have sight checked for all tokens which led to the performance issues Keith mentions. If a module has pre-made characters though I agree it would be sensible if those had sight checked by default for sure!

Hi Keith, Great point.  Off by default improves performance and people can just learn to check it as needed. It's interesting how we have different perspectives as users or developers.  As a user I thought checked made more sense, but you point out there are invisible goings on that impact performance and I instantly see it differently now.  I was thinking like a user...and now I am back. :) Thanks, Dan

Ziechael, That is a great observation about pre-generated characters for the module.  That module does have pre-generated characters (that we aren't using).  Do they have "Has Sight" checked?  Yes, they do!  Whoever put together the Roll20 version of the module knew what they were doing. If someone created their own adventure with DL features they would certainly figure out "Has Sight".  Thanks, Dan