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How do I add character tokens to a map?

July 20 (13 years ago)
I'm sure there's a simple solution to this but I couldn't find it last night in our first game.

I made characters for every player and got their avatar assigned to it but when it came time to place them on the map, I couldn't from the characters page. For most of the characters I could go to search and find them, but other characters I couldn't. In both cases I had to turn on permissions and everything again.

Is there no way to just drag a character from the character tab onto the map? Or is there some other easy way to add characters to the play area?
Not now, but linking characters to tokens have been asked from the devs, I think.
July 20 (13 years ago)
Wow, really? Not trying to sound harsh but you'd think allowing players to have and place a character would be one of the earlier things they would implement.
Not really, Characters are the place where you can record things about the characters (obviously) show a portrait or give access to handouts.
Tokens are pieces needed to play on the map, they are placed by the GM who gives then ownership to the players. They can handle their tokens then.
It would probably be useful to link both, but Roll20 works quite smoothly even without it.
July 22 (13 years ago)
So you're telling me it's not a major pain to manually look for players tokens to place on a map, set all their permissions and what-not, and have the players sit there board while you do that? Do you like copying and pasting tokens one by one from one map to the other?

It would be so much simpler if the GM or player could just drag their character onto the map and already have their permissions set.
As I said, it would be easier.
But having to make a selection/copy/paste is not that much of a drag, for me (YMMV). You don't have to do it one by one, you can copy and paste a group of tokens at once.
And you only have to set the permissions once, when deploying them for the first time. After that, they shall retain them.
I prepare all the tokens I'll need on a separate repository "map" before the game. So I only have to make one copy/paste each time I change map.
July 29 (13 years ago)
Copying to and from a blank map is a really good idea... thanks :)
July 30 (13 years ago)
Eric D.
KS Backer
I use a "welcome screen" page for dealing with player tokens. That is also where I leave the Players flag when we're not playing so that players can't mess with things when I'm not there watching. When we move to a new page I just mass select their tokens from my welcome page, hit copy, switch to the next page we're playing on and hit paste.
That's also what I do.
I intend to try it with an evocative illustration on the blank map. I'll let the players wait on it with the illustration to look at and some music while I prepare or check the next map.
I also try remember to delete older versions of the characters tokens, to avoid confusion.
July 30 (13 years ago)
Chris Clouser
KS Backer
So you're telling me it's not a major pain to manually look for players tokens to place on a map, set all their permissions and what-not, and have the players sit there board while you do that? Do you like copying and pasting tokens one by one from one map to the other?

It would be so much simpler if the GM or player could just drag their character onto the map and already have their permissions set.


Oh, no, it's a major pain. Actually, the action you describe is how I assumed Roll20 worked when I first tried it; I was troubled when it didn't work. However, since Roll20's only persistent...uh...thing...is the campaign as a whole, the welcome screen / storage bin approach is the way it has to be.