Dynamic Light to Allow for Map Exploration

Hi there, Brand new and just played through my first game session a a player. I was very impressed overall. HOWEVER, the dynamic lighting was really annoying in areas with lot of corners and small objects, casting crazy shadows like a disco light even though my character would still have known what he had seen just a moment earlier. Also, it was tough to remember shapes and location of previous rooms, although in real life my character would have had a good idea on those things as well. Finally, it was really hard to tell when things were walls versus other object likes buildings, rocks, or tall fountains. This would have been much easier to understand if my character could have still "seen" the previous wall of the building as he just went around it, for example. What I'm getting at is that there really needs to be an option where the DM as allow a fog-of-war reveal of the map in conjunction with dynamic lighting. This would cause WAY less confusion on that part of the characters and give much better perspective on the current situation. It would also give players a sense of achievement in having actually mapped and thoroughly explored the given area. Otherwise, the characters are often just as lost at the end of an area as they were first entering it. Anyhow, that's my 2-cents as a long term player and DM. Does such an option exist? Do you plan on implementing such an option in the future? Overall, my experience so far has been great. Thanks for creating such a wonderful system! -Chris

The GM can select if they want Dynamic Lighting (on/off), Line Of Sight (enforce/disable), and Fog of War (on / off / Reveal certain areas / Hide certain areas). More info about it is here, <a href="https://wiki.roll20.net/Dynamic_Lighting" rel="nofollow">https://wiki.roll20.net/Dynamic_Lighting</a> I think the effect you are asking about, that you would prefer, to be able to see your back-tracks on the completed sections of the map continually while just having dynamic light of the new areas ahead, I believe that is possible with the right combination of settings, namely having Dynamic light on your tokens and the GM revealing areas from the Fog Of War, and Line of Sight disabled. That might also be that situation where some people have advised the GM can drop hidden "light" tokens like breadcrumbs to keep your past-hallways glowing. p.s. Welcome to playing on Roll20

Thanks for the reply. That seems like it may be an OK work-around, although I would think a lot of people would like a simple feature to see where they have been before. In this way, there would be the bright areas of the map (where they can see at current with line of sight), and dim areas of the map (where they have already explored). This would be the best of all things, since having a complete reveal of previous areas means the DM could not covertly repopulate those with other creatures that may have moved in or be following the party. I don't know enough out the system yet to comment further. Thanks again for taking the question. -Chris

Christopher , the current way to mark 'already explored areas' is to drop "dim light" token (tokens where the dim light radius is set to 0). Also, if you want to repopulate those areas you can use the GM layer for that purpose.

Start up a campaign where you're the GM, Christopher, and you can explore how those features work (such as the GM Layer that can be used to repopulate, as well as the Fog of War system where the GM has ability to Hide or Reveal, and finally the GM's ability to "drop dim light tokens". It is free to start new campaigns & the campaign is not advertised unless you choose to list it. So you can do it experimentally.

Hi Gauss and Gold, Thank you so much for your feedback on this. It still seems to me like just a common sense feature that should be standard, as this way the players get to see the map as it is explored. It's something that all long-term roleplayers are used to experiencing. That said, I know I am too new here to have any "complaining rights" yet! :) Thanks again for your ideas and I will try those out. -Chris

The standard, or default, on this site is actually Players can see the entire map, nothing is hidden. (No Fog, No Dynamic, No Line Of Sight). It is actually your GM who selects settings to add or stack among those 3 types of limitations on players' field of vision. Fog Of War is an option to all GM's, while Dynamic/Line Of Sight are options for paying subscriber GM's.

+1 i'm sure there are a number of work arounds and such, but as a suggestion or idea, i also agree that some improvements to the fog of war system for map exploration would be good. I would love for my players to be able to explore a map and not have to wait for, "Hold on a sec, let me reveal that" 4 times a turn (assuming 4 players that are determined to split up, and i'm not even talking about having to juggle two or more different pages because the really split up). Ideally, the fog of war would be revealed as the character's light source (or a new token setting for reveal aura so that it can still function for non-subscribers) reveals it and if the character's light source (or reveal aura) revealed it, it remains visible after the light source is no longer there but only reveals the map layer and doesn't show token or such. (yes i'm know i can accomplish similar using dim lights and the GM layer, but if i was doing a PvP event then that won't work.)

I guess I would sum this up as follows: Characters should not be constantly "forgetting" where they have been and what they have seen. By default, it would make a lot more sense and use if previously seen areas automatically changed to fog of war, so that characters could still see the explored map but only as dim areas. This is not a gripe; I love dynamic lighting. Take this just as a suggestion for future improvement. As a new player I often get lost and can't even remember if structures on maps are buildings or just walls (or something else), since my character loses perspective every time he rounds a corner or structure. Having previously seen areas automatically remain persistent but dim would but SUPER nice.

I'd just like to chime in to say if this was an option it's also something I'd like to be able to turn OFF. I played a few sessions of a zombie apocalypse game and my players were only able to fumble around by torchlight. In perhaps the most dramatic scene one player fled into the darkness without a flash light, using only his memory to guide him as zombies closed in all around. If he'd been able to see all those previously revealed areas the whole scene would never have played out with such tension. I left the players to construct maps and remember their routes, just like the would have to in real life. Not knocking the idea, but just keen that it doesn't take away an interesting option that currently exists :)