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GM Controls
The GM tab's Controls is where a GM runs the game's moving parts. It has four tabs of its own:
- Panels: your own grids of sliders, switches, buttons, dropdowns and maps for setting values in play.
- Values: every value, and what it's set to.
- Rules: the campaign's rule book: what happens by itself, in the world, for characters and for kinds of item (see the rule book).
- Connections: a map of what changes what (see Connections).
For a simpler game, switch it all off for the campaign: Settings → Campaigns → the campaign's Rules → Rules, values and controls.
A value is a number the GM sets, which other things follow: players' drawn icons, shops (when they open, their prices), and the panels' readouts.
- Global values are one number for the whole campaign, the same for everyone: the weather, a doom clock, the market being open.
- Local values belong to one character, or one item. An item uses its own if it has one, else its character's. Use them for a blade's curse, a lantern's fuel, or one player's luck.
A value's name is a word: letters, digits and _, starting with a letter (storm, ship_x, doom).
The Values tab lists every value the app knows of, from panels, drawings and shops:
- Global values, each with a slider and a number;
- Local values: for each, every character (their own value), then the items that use it (each item's own).
A level without its own value says inherited. The × clears a value, so the level above applies again. Values change for everyone straight away.
The clock button beside a value starts it changing by itself: so much a second (negative to go down), until it reaches where it stops (or never). A tide rising, a fuse burning down, a storm building.
- While it changes, its row says how (+0.5 a second, to 10), with Stop: it keeps the value it has reached.
- It's sent once. Every device works the value out from the time, so icons following it move smoothly for everyone, and it stops by itself.
- Shops that follow a value use it as it is now. (A shop opening as a value crosses its line shows for players at the next update of the party.)
- Rules can start an item's or character's Local value changing too (see Item States and Rules).
- State limits (attunement slots) don't change over time.
A panel is a grid you fill with controls, arranged as suits you. Each control sets a value, or just runs its rules. While you drag a slider's handles, a polygon's handle or a board's pin, your own icons follow it at once; players' follow a few times a second, and again when you let go.
New panel makes one: give it a name, a Size and how many rows (the cells are always square):
- Phone: 8 cells across, drawn at a phone's width everywhere, your own card too, so you arrange it as players will see it. This is the size to show to players: only a Phone panel offers Show to players….
- Desktop: 24 cells across, as wide as your screen: your own controls.
Changing a panel's size (in its editor) keeps each control where it fits and moves the rest below. Rows: as many as it needs, up to 96. Panels follow the top bar's Play / Edit switch: in Edit mode you arrange them, in Play mode you use them.
- The grid is drawn as lines. Drag a box over free cells and the new control is that size (the box turns red over another control, or off the panel); or click a cell for one sized for its kind (a slider 4 × 2 cells, most controls 2 × 2, a board or polygon 6 × 6). On a phone, tap a cell; a swipe still scrolls.
- Add a control (above the grid) puts one in the first free place, from the keyboard too.
- Drag a control to move it, or drag its corner to resize it. With a control selected, the arrow keys move it and Shift+arrows resize it.
- The pencil (over each control's corner) edits a control, or removes it.
- A control dropped onto another turns red and goes back.
- Switch to Play (the top bar) to use the panel.
Preview (on its card, in either mode) shows it as players will see it, to try out: see Previewing a panel.
Every control has a label and a colour (its edge, a tint of its background, and its highlights). Its Kind is a dropdown, in three groups: Layout (Tabs), Display (Text, Picture) and Interactive (the rest). Each one that sets a value says which value, and for whom: Everyone (a Global value), a character (their Local value), one item, or whoever is chosen in a Players dropdown on the panel (see below).
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Slider | Slide between two numbers, with a step. Taller than it's wide, it stands upright. Handles: One sets a value; Two sets a lower and an upper value on one track (a temperature range). |
| Switch | On or off: two numbers (1 and 0 unless you change them). |
| Button | Sets a value to an amount, or adds one (a negative takes away): "Doom +1". Or Nothing: just its rules: Ring the bell (see A control's rules). |
| Dropdown | A list of choices, each with a label and a number. Or, with Lists: Players, the party's players (see below). |
| Polygon | A shape with 3 to 8 corners, each setting its own value. Drag the handle anywhere inside: the nearer a corner, the more its value. At a corner it has it all, along an edge the two ends share it, and in the middle all share it evenly. |
| Board | A picture (a map, a dial) or a blank square with pins to drag. Each pin sets two values, from where it is across and down. Boards can have layers, pins can be pictures, and pins can be grouped (see below). |
| Picture | One of your [[drawings |
| Socket | Holds one item. Players put things in from their inventory and take them out, in a panel shown to them (see Sockets). |
| Text | Words, and the value it shows (a doom clock's count). Its words can show values too (see below). |
| Tabs | Splits the panel into tabs, with levels (see below). |
Buttons and tabs can show a drawing too (their picture button: your drawings come first).
Sliders and switches have More is towards (or On is towards): right or top, or left or bottom. Dropdown choices have a label and a value each; leave the value empty to use the label (if it's a number) or the choice's place.
Controls follow values, as a board's pins do. Rules don't need actions of their own to show, hide or lock a control: they set a value, and the control follows it.
- Shown when (a control, or a whole panel in its editor): a condition, as a rule's (global.door is 1). While it doesn't hold, the control is hidden in Play mode; in Edit mode it shows faded, with an eye, so you can still arrange it.
- Locked when: while it holds, the control can't be used (greyed, with a lock).
- Words with values: a label or a Text control's words can show a value in braces: The door is {door}, The storm is {global.storm}. A value with choices shows the choice's name.
Using a control (pressing a button, flipping a switch, letting go of a slider or polygon, picking from a dropdown, dropping a board's pin) can run rules: their When is A control is used. A rule can be for one control, or for every control on a panel; the control's own wins over the panel's. It can read control.value (its value as it's used: if control.value is over 5), and it runs on your device as the GM, so it can set Global values and open or close shops.
A control's editor lists its rules; + New rule for this control starts one. They're in the rule book (Controls → Rules, under Panels) too. Removing a control takes its rules with it; deleting a panel says how many go.
Pictures you can use. A Picture whose drawing has hotspots (see Drawn Icons) works on the panel: its hotspots set its values, and one with Run the rules runs the rules for that hotspot (A control is used, choosing the hotspot): pull a drawn lever, turn a dial.
A panel (in its editor) and a control (not a board or a Picture, which have pictures of their own) can have a Background: a Picture… (a picture file) or a Drawing… (one of your drawings: it moves with the values it reads).
- Fit: Fill it (it may be cropped), Fit it all in, or Stretch to its shape.
- Fade: none, a little or a lot: a veil over it, so the controls stay readable.
A panel's goes behind its grid, and its controls become see-through to show it. A button's face lets its own background show.
A dropdown whose Lists is Players: choose whose lists the party's players and sets no value of its own. Other controls on the panel can follow it:
- a Picture whose Local values of is Whoever is chosen in … shows that player's Local values;
- a slider, switch, button, dropdown, polygon or text whose For is Whoever is chosen in … shows and sets them. Its label says whose: Light · Bramble.
So one panel can run every player: choose Bramble, and the same sliders and switches are Bramble's. What's chosen is your device's, like the tabs chosen.
A board fills the space you give it. The corner expand button opens it full screen, to zoom (− and +, Fit, Ctrl+wheel, or pinch) and scroll. Pins still drag while zoomed, and the list below shows their values.
In a board's Edit board…: a picture or a blank square, its layers, then its pins, a row each. Add pin (or ✎ on one) opens the pin's own sheet:
- a label and colour, and its layer;
- Look: a Dot, or a Picture (one of your drawings, a new one, or a built-in icon) at a Size. Sits on its spot: which point of the picture is on the spot (the 3×3 grid: centred, or the bottom middle for the foot of a flag or a figure), and a Nudge in pixels. Show the exact spot adds a small dot where its values put it;
- its Values: the value it sets across and down (leave one empty to slide along a line), and what the edges are worth (0 to 100, say; a range can run backwards);
- who it sets them for, or A group (below).
Layers. + Pins adds a layer of pins, + Picture a picture over the background: an image, or one of your drawings (it moves with the Global values it reads: a fog that lifts, a rising tide). They're listed top first, with the arrows to reorder. Each says how it starts: shown or hidden (the eye), locked or not (the lock). In play, expand the board and press Layers to show, hide, lock and unlock them on your device. A locked layer's pins can't be dragged (they show a small lock), so the enemies stay put while you move the party.
Groups. Add group makes a pin that stands for several: the party, to start with, a member for each player. Each member sets the group's values for their own player (or item), with its own colour and, if you like, its own picture. The group shows how many are with it, and dragging it moves them all. Tap it for its members: Split off one, and it shows as a pin of its own, moved alone, with a dotted line back to the group; Rejoin brings it back to where the group is, as does dropping it on the group. Who's split off is saved with the board.
An example: a player's compass icon has a needle whose rotation is bound to deg(atan2(global_ship_x - 50, 50 - global_ship_y)). Drag the ship on the sea chart and every compass turns towards it.
A big panel can be split up with a Tabs control, placed, moved and resized like any other. It has Levels (1 to 4): each level is a row of tabs, showing the tabs under the one chosen in the row before (Weather › Wind; Sea › Chart › North). Each tab has a name and, if you like, an icon; the editor shows them as a tree, to add a tab under one, reorder or remove.
- Style: As its shape (rows if it's wider than tall, columns if taller), Horizontal (rows) or Vertical (columns).
- Turn the labels in columns: the labels read upwards on the panel's left side, downwards on its right, the first level outermost. Choosing Vertical ticks it; untick it for upright labels.
Every control has Shows on: a tab at any level (it shows while that tab is chosen, or any tab under it), or always: a doom clock that's always there. Controls under different tabs can use the same cells, and a Tabs control can itself show on another's tab. Arranging works on the tabs showing; the tabs still work while arranging.
Removing a tab moves its controls to the tab above it; removing a Tabs control shows its controls on every tab. Panels made with the old page and section tabs become Tabs controls by themselves.
Panels belong to the campaign, on the GM's device (and in its backups), ready for the next session.
A panel's editor has How players see it: whether players see each control's labels, its values (a slider's number, a Text control's value), notes and hints (the lock badge, a socket's hints, who put something in, the note under a shown panel), borders, its colour edge and tint, and the card behind it; rounded or square corners; the text size; the font (the app's, serif, plain, typewriter, or handwritten, which depends on the device's fonts); and for the panel itself the gaps between controls, the space around it, and its name on players' screens.
Each control's editor has the same choices for itself, each As the panel unless you set its own: one big readout, the rest plain.
Players see the panel this way, and so does its preview. Your own card shows everything, so you can work with it; the eye on its card switches it to As players see it and back (in Play mode).
Style (CSS), in the panel's editor, is your own CSS for how players see it. It only reaches that panel: & is the panel itself, .cp-cell each control ([data-label="Ring the bell"] picks one by its label, .cp-type-slider a kind), and .cp-label, .cp-out and .cp-readout (values), .cp-btn, .cp-switch, .cp-socket and .cp-grid its parts. Anything that could reach outside the panel is taken out, and the editor says what: @import, @font-face, links to other places, fixed or sticky positioning.
Preview on a panel's card shows it as players would see it: hidden controls aren't there, locked ones are greyed out, and it has its look. On a wide screen it docks beside the card, so you can arrange the panel (in Edit mode) and watch the preview follow.
It's a practice run: what you do works as it would for players. Values change, words update, controls show, hide and lock, and the controls' rules run (their messages start Practice:). Nothing is sent or saved: Start again, or closing it, puts everything back. Item rules and world rules wait until you close it, since they'd change real inventories and shops, and a rule that opens a shop just says it would. While a preview is open, panel cards say practice run, since they show its values too.
A socket's starting item is there to take, and Test item… puts in any item from the catalog, so you can try a socket's rules without touching anyone's inventory.
In a party, Show to players… on a Phone panel's card chooses who sees it. It opens for them as a shared screen, and they use it as you would in Play mode: hidden controls aren't there, locked ones are greyed out, pins drag and pictures can be touched.
What they press, flip or drop comes to your device, which sets the values and runs the controls' rules, as if you'd done it. Their screen moves at once. A player's use can only set what that control sets.
While it's shown, the card says who to, with End, and lists the last few things players did. Changing the panel changes theirs; deleting it ends it.
A Socket holds one item: the golden idol on its altar, a key in a lock, a gem in a statue's eye.
- In a panel shown to them, a player drops an item onto a socket from their inventory or their At hand drawer (or taps it there for Put it in…), or presses Put something in…. It leaves their inventory and sits in the socket (you put it in, or put in by … for the others). Each item's history says where it went.
- What a socket holds is a tile, as in an inventory: tap it for its details, with Take it (for a player: back into their inventory) or, on your card, Give it back for what a player put in. Press and hold it for those as a menu. On a wide screen a player can also drag it out onto their inventory to take it (the inventory is outlined while they drag).
- Starts holding (in its editor) puts an item from the catalog in it each time the panel is shown: the idol, waiting to be taken.
- Putting something in or taking it out is A control is used, so its rules can ask it holds something or it's empty, the item is … (an item, or any of a kind), and the item weighs … (see Item States and Rules). Swap the idol for a bag of sand that weighs too little, and the trap springs.
- Ending the showing gives back what players put in.
Connections is a map of what changes what, centred on one thing at a time: a value, a panel or a control, an item, a character or a shop.
- Changed by (left): what sets it off or sets it: a control, an item's action, a rule, you by hand.
- This (middle): the thing chosen, with its value now.
- Changes (right): what it shows, hides, locks, moves, opens or sets.
Each wire says why, in a word or two: a rule (amber), something following the value (blue: Shown when, Locked when, a control's words, a drawing, a shop), set directly by a control or a pin (grey), or by hand (grey, dashed).
- Tap a box to centre the map on it. Came from shows the way you came; Back goes back, Everything to the list.
- Tap a wire's words for what it is: a rule in blocks (When, Do, Applies to), with Edit rule, or a control's link with Edit control, and buttons to go to either end.
On a wide screen, the list beside the map has everything that's connected, by kind (values, panels and their controls, characters and their items, shops), with two numbers: what changes it · what it changes. Find… searches it. On a phone, the list comes first; choose one and the map stacks top to bottom.
The cog: on a GM's device, connected items have a small cog beside their name (in inventories, item details and the Players tab). It opens the map centred on that item. Players never see it.
In the icon editor's Variables tab, + Global value and + Local value add a variable named global_… or local_… (rename it, keeping the start). Its slider sets the default and the range. Bind layers to it like any other variable: the cursed blade below has a ring whose opacity follows its curse. See Drawn Icons.
Drawings made before Global and Local values used gm_ names (gm_curse). They still work: the item's own value, else its character's, else the Global. They're tagged gm_ in the Values tab.
Outside a party, with the GM role (see Running the Game), values are the campaign's starting values: they go to the party when you load the campaign into it, and your own icons show them meanwhile. A value changing over time carries on from where it is. In a party, the host keeps them, and every device sees changes as they happen. Only GMs see the Controls tab.
Who sets what: the GM sets any value. A player's device sets the Local values of its own characters and their items, through their items' rules and the game system's panels. Global values, the GM's state overrides and state limits (attunement slots) are the GM's only. Everyone in the party needs this version of the app on the host for that.