A toybox to show you all those toys (paper figures, paper terrain, Maptool tokens and maps, illustrations,...) I make for my roleplaying and wargames sessions... Et aussi, peut-être quelques nouvelles en français, selon les circonstances...
Lots of people are using Artificial Intelligence to enhance their Tabletop Roleplaying experience ! But they tend to limit its use to illustrations.
Combining assets made by Artificial Intelligence programs with Virtual Tabletop Applications can make a tremendous boost to games. And not online, but mostly in face to face sessions !
Rules do not matter, it works for every atmosphere by choosing an appropriate style. Have a look at all the exemples in the video !
When playing online, I generally use Runehammer VTT, Owlbear Rodeo VTT, or similar simples VTTs, using paper and pens for any information that I want to keep on hand. Some players seem to prefer to have their character sheet on the screen, so, I generally make some fillable character sheets that they can use alongside the program, in another tab.
I had backed the test drive rules of Dragonbane and they really look to be right up my alley in style and complexity. When the final edition was released, I was a little disappointed by the differences from the test drive rules and let it down for a moment. I have gone back tot the rules and found that I could live with those changes (except maybe the rest rules, which have a quite classical problem, but that's a discussion for another day and easily solved anyway).
So, I decided to remake the charsheets I made for the test drive rules, but this time adapted for the final edition. The user guidances are, of course the same as those for the test drive, but they are repeated here for ease of use.
Finally, I have only the official character sheet in english. I have translated it in french myself for the french version, but I could have to remake it later if the french edition translates some things differently.
Here is how the result looks like. Read further to find the files for your own use.
To fill that image field with an image of your choice (more or less square images are going to work best), open the odt file:
Check that you are not in design mode (Form Menu > Design Mode):
And that's it. If you open the pdf form in a tab alongside your VTT page, you have a charsheet as accessible as those imbedded in other online VTTs.
If you want to take the Dragonbane style appearance a little bit further, you can make the illustration of the character in the same style as the rest of the character sheet.
To do that, you'll have to open a PSD file containing the frame with GIMP or Photoshop and export the portrait from there. I'll show how to do it with GIMP, because I assume that if you pay a monthly fee for Photoshop, you already know how to use it (and the steps are the same anyway).
Step 1: Open the PSD DoD-Portrait file with GIMP:
This blog post was made for the test rules released during the Kickstarter Dragon bane campaign. The character sheet of the finale release is different. This post is then obsolete and is replaced by a newer one taking into account the new modified character sheet.
You'll find it here:
https://toybox-sw.blogspot.com/2024/04/dragonbane-fillable-character-sheets.html
When playing online, I generally use Owlbear Rodeo VTT, Runehammer VTT or similar simples VTTs, using paper and pens for any information that I want to keep on hand. Some players seem to prefer to have their character sheet on the screen, so, I generally make some fillable character sheets that they can use alongside the program, in another tab.
I have recently backed the test drive rules of Dragonbane and they really look to be right up my alley in style and complexity (except maybe the rest rules, which are quite classical, but that's a discussion for another day and easily solved anyway).
So, I decided to make some charsheets, but contrary to my usual black background, I used graphic elements from the official character sheet, because I found them so gorgeous.
Here is how the result looks like. Read further to find the files for your own use (files provided with the authorisation from Free League, of course).
There are three ways to use those files:
To fill that image field with an image of your choice (more or less square images are going to work best), open the odt file:
- odt file of the charsheet in Libre Office -
Check that you are not in design mode (Form Menu > Design Mode):
In the PDF option window that opens itself, verify that the button "Create PDF Form" is checked.
And that's it. If you open the pdf form in a tab alongside your VTT page, you have a charsheet as accessible as those imbedded in other online VTTs.
If you want to take the Dragonbane style appearance a little bit further, you can make the illustration of the character in the same style as the rest of the character sheet.
To do that, you'll have to open a PSD file containing the frame with GIMP or Photoshop and export the portrait from there. I'll show how to do it with GIMP, because I assume that if you pay a monthly fee for Photoshop, you already know how to use it (and the steps are the same anyway).
Step 1: Open the PSD DoD-Portrait file with GIMP:
There is, of course, no obligation to use digital character sheets whilst playing online.
A simple sheet of paper on your desk can easily do the trick. It is certainly enough for my notes and for tracking PCs, NPCs, scenario info... but some players prefer to have their character's info on the screen, alongside the VTT display. So, why not?
Some of the most used online VTTs provide sheets that you can use within the program, more or less customizable, more or less limited and more or less available, depending on the VTT and the game played.
There are two BIG problems with those embedded sheets. The first one is that you have to fill lots of stuff on those sheets, because peoples designing them never think there is enough information on them.
The second one is that if you play one of the games for which no charsheets are provided, you are out of luck. You'll have to setup one yourself in a programming language that is generally not intuitive, and with almost no control on the look and usability of the sheet.
It can be quite frustrating, but, you don't have to use those.
There is a far easier way to have online charsheets and in a very simple way: using simple PDF forms that you can generally find online for your favorite game, or that you can produce yourself by making a form in Open Office or Libre Office (in odt format) and export as a PDF form.
Making PDF forms is really easy: you make an image of the form you want to design. Set it as background in Open Office or Libre Office. And then place the fields you want onto it (bullets, check boxes, text, images...). Let's have a look at the result.
Here is the exemple of the charsheet I have made for Lamentations of the Flame Princess. As you can see, the page setup is in landscape format to be in the same orientation as a screen.
And there is a space for an illustration of the character, which means that there is an image field in the odt form (obviously).
To fill it, open the odt file (sample files are found at the end of this post to let you try it). Note that if you make charsheets where there is no illustrations to place, you can directly use the PDF in your browser without going through the odt first, but it is less funny...).
- odt file of the charsheet in Libre Office -
Check that you are not in design mode.
Double click on the illustration field and choose an illustration, ideally more or less square (to avoid black areas padding the image, but it will work with any proportions of image).
Export as pdf form (check that form is active).
And that's it. If you open the pdf form in a tab alongside your VTT page (on Owlbear Rodeo, preferably, it is the best one available -and free- at the moment), you have a charsheet as accessible as those imbedded in other online VTTs, but much more flexible, easier to produce, and adapted to YOUR game and tastes. And if you need special sheets to add for certain class of characters (sheets with lists of spells, for exemple...), you can always make one that the player can open in another tab.
Indeed, any information that a player may want to have available can be turned into a pdf, fillable or not, that can be opened in a different tab. The difference here, with the sheets offered by VTTs like Roll20 or Foundry, or .... is that here you only have what you want, in the way you want, and each player can have his own setting without having to use a predefined one.
CAVEAT: When you have finished using the form in your browser, don't forget to save it WITH the changes. If you just close it, they will be lost. It is probably a good idea to save regularly your progresses (yes, we all know that and still...).
If you don't want to go through Open Office or Libre Office to export PDF forms customized with an illustration of the character, you can just do it once and place the logo or the cover of the game as an illustration. And then use directly copies of the same pdf for every player.
But, above all, remember: it is not because something can be turned into a digital format that it must be, and papers and pencils are still the most versatile way to record information. But, of course, YMMV....
If you want to experiment a little, here are the LotFP sheets (english and french) in odt, and the samples in pdf that you can open directly and fill in your browser.
