Hello! Longtime roll20 user & subscriber here. I started with roll20 when I came back to DMing many years ago, looks like 8 or 9 years ago based on my game forum posts. To begin with I wanted the dice and "tabletop" functionality - showing a map, maybe moving tokens on the map, and rolling the dice. Since then I've learned a bit about what these VTTs can offer, and what I now want/need when I run a pathfinder Adventure Path (I'm about to start my 6th within a couple of months) are the following features: 1. Maps. I want to be able to import a map of a big base, dungeon, or piece of wilderness. An example of a map from the campaign book I'm currently preparing is a 70x50 squares large map, each square representing 5ft/the average size of a player character or monster. It has 20-30 rooms with doors and windows. It's a pretty average map for Pathfinder adventure paths, finding a temple in the jungle would often be the same size to fit both jungle and temple with several rooms or buildings in the same. Fog of war is a pretty decent function, but dynamic lighting and especially the more modern versions of dynamic lighting would really be the icing on the cake for this map as the players go to explore it. 2. Campaign library. I use other programs for my own extensive campaign notes. But in roll20 I can share images, make folders, share info files. One imporant function is keeping things from previous part of the campaign - for relevance (oh, the BBEG is actually the father of that guy we killed way back then?!) and for sentimentality (hey guys, remember that huge ass robot we fought at level 5 which we weren't even supposed to encounter until level 8?!). 3. Character sheets. My players appreciate being able to collect all of their character related info in one place, and especially within roll20 as it interacts well with the chat and they don't lose the stuff. The character sheets also have useful automation. 4. Dice rolling. I personally don't care for it, I roll IRL, but my players want the automated rolling from their sheets, and in general just open rolling so noone cheats or whatever. 5. Tokens. Custom image. Health and AC values, I often use one more value for something. And macros. I use an initiative button for every monster, and a button for hidden save rolls (very basic, just /w gm Fortitude [[1d20+5]] etc). Now, in almost every campaign I've played I've encountered severe lag. The only time I didn't was in a campaign that ended while it hadn't been around for long. The first time I experienced lag was when the players coming towards the climax of the very first adventure I DMed discovered a temple hidden beneath the water by a jungle island. The map was too big, I guess. After that, I've had whole campaign start lagging to a point where I could barely open them or do anything in them. That's been at about book 5-6 of an adventure path when the accumulated weight of character sheets grow too much. More recently, I've had lag related to dynamic lighting (even though I use it as I understand rather well, I guess a map can still be too big and complicated) and related perhaps to map size in general. I no longer store hundreds of characters in my campaigns, I actually rarely make characters for NPCs because apparently that creates lag. I prune a lot of stuff to keep the weight down. My players have 1-2 character sheets each, and some of them save a lot of spells or other things in the sheets. At the end of the day, even though I've adapted a lot to the performance issues on roll20, I still cannot reliably use dynamic lighting on the very exciting maps my players are going to explore. I actually shouldn't upload these maps at all, I get warnings way below the size of these standard large dungeon maps. And sometimes I get lag I can't relate to anything but simple map size (without dynamic lighting) and accumulated campaign weight. Even when I maintain the campaign to keep the weight low. So I've looked at the advice offered on this website, in the wiki etc. How do I maintain good performance. As it turns out, related to the different uses I have for this VTT: 1. My RPG maps don't fit the website very well , and the exciting functionality roll20 offers in the form of dynamic lighting etc will just risk creating lag. 2. I shouldn't really use roll20 for a campaign library. Saving too much stuff, keeping around the info for the characters the players have fought or that have died is just creating lag. 3. The character sheets are an issue because they weigh too much. My players shouldn't collect the data such as spells that is relevant for their character. 4. Well I guess the dice rolling works. 5. I can have tokens on the map, but I should really think twice before granting them vision and I can't have buttons on the tokens for rolling initiative or other simple rolls because making those macros are character sheet functions and character sheets weigh too much. So for my next campaign, I'm looking at the options of: a. Sticking with roll20, trying to keep my use of it even more simplified, not using the exciting functions I get emails about, telling my players to use it in a simple way and e.g. not collect spells. Still I'm at risk of getting lag due to map sizes, accumulated weight, or other unknown reason. b. Just doing very simple maps with very simple tokens in roll20 and handling the rest via discord and google drive. Why is it like this? Why am I offered functionalities which are traps and will make my campaign lag? Why can't the function I pay for offer me even functioning systems for using very basic pathfinder maps without warning me that I risk causing lag? I like this website a lot. But now that I again feel boxed in, unable to prepare the maps I want, I really doubt whether I can continue using this service for my next campaign. Does anyone have solutions or advice for me?
