GM reference

Reference. For the steps of a task, read the GM guide.

This reference describes every mode, panel, control, and game rule of the app. It assumes no knowledge of the code. Each section starts with what the area is for, then lists its controls in a table, then gives its rules and limits.

If a control named here does not show, check the mode switch and the role switch first. Most controls depend on these two settings.

Modes

The mode switch in the header sets the whole layout. Its options are Play, Build, and Library. Only a GM tab shows the mode switch.

While a fight is open, the combat screen replaces the Play layout and takes the full width. See Combat screen.

Roles

The role switch sits at the right end of the header. Its accessible name is Viewer, and its options are GM and Player. The first switch to Player in a browser shows the toast “Player view. Click GM to return.”, because the Player view hides the mode switch and the campaign controls. A tab that another tab forces out of the GM view does not show this toast.

A Player tab hides the mode switch, the Campaign, History, and Transfer buttons, the fog controls, the Time panel buttons, and the party-split switch. It also hides the Encounters card while no fight runs, so the card does not tell the players that an area is safe. A Player tab bound to a character opens on the Sheet tab, so the player sees the map and that character’s sheet side by side.

The role applies to one browser tab. Only one tab at a time can hold the GM view. While a GM tab is open, every other tab of the same origin opens as a Player tab and stays a Player tab.

The GM claim expires 15 seconds after the GM tab closes or crashes. The claim stops two tabs from editing the campaign at the same time by accident. It is not a security control. See Limits of the Player view.

Every save in the GM tab, including an autosave, reaches the other tabs. A Play-mode tab applies the change without a reload, so it keeps its scroll position, its open panel, and its map zoom and pan.

Player tab options

In a GM tab, the Party card has a link on each character row and a Spectator tab button. Each one opens a Player tab. See Party roster.

Bound and spectator tabs

A bound tab plays one character. An unbound Player tab is a spectator.

Recovery of a resource is a GM action. For this reason, a player can spend a slot but cannot restore one, and the HP steppers are GM-only.

A binding is exclusive, and it uses the same claim-and-expire rule as the GM view. The GM tab ignores bindings and can edit every character.

Limits of the Player view

The Player view is a display setting on the same browser data. It hides these items from the screen:

• the exact HP of a foe (the view shows a health band instead)
• the GM-only lines of the travelogue and the combat log: the total of an HP pool, the reason that an HP pool or an HP limit gives for each target, the save bonus of a creature, and the HP readout of a creature after you set its damage by hand. The Player view shows a version of each line without the number
• the notes on a tile
• the handouts and quests that you have not revealed
• the notes, the links, and the GM-only objectives of every quest
• a revealed handout that is for other characters, or for a tile where the party does not stand
• the fogged part of the map
• the Campaign, History, and Transfer buttons and the mode switch
• the Build-mode world tree. A Player tab does not build it, so the names of undiscovered maps are not in the page

The Player view does not protect any of these items. Every tab of the same browser reads the same saved campaign from the storage of that browser. A person at that browser can open the developer tools and read the whole save, including every item in the list above.

The app draws a partly revealed map in full and then covers it with fog, so the hidden art is also in the browser. The same person can remove ?role=player from the URL to leave the Player view.

The GM claim is a plain record in the same storage, and any tab of the same origin can overwrite it. The claim stops two tabs from editing the campaign at the same time by accident. It does not stop a determined player.

Put a Player tab only on hardware that you control. A second screen on the GM laptop is safe, and so is a laptop that you own and place on the table. If the campaign contains text that a player must not read, do not give that player the address on their own device.

Theme

The theme switch sets the light or dark color scheme for the whole UI. Its options are System (a monitor icon), Light (a sun), and Dark (a moon).

The app stores the choice per browser. A dark GM laptop and a light table display can run at the same time.

Campaign controls

The header buttons create, save, and move the whole campaign. They show in a GM tab only. On a phone-width window, the header buttons and the theme and role switches fold into the Menu button beside the title. A press on a button in the menu closes it, and so do Escape and a click outside the header.

A save from a stepped-back position discards the steps that were left to redo.

New, Load example, and Import each keep a copy of the campaign that they replace, as one undo step. The confirmation says that Undo in the header restores the current campaign. If browser storage has no room for the copy, the confirmation says instead that Undo may not restore it. To keep a copy in that case, export the campaign first.

Autosave

The app saves on its own only through autosave.

Storage

Everything lives in the storage of one browser, under one origin. There is no server and no account.

When local storage is full, a save drops the oldest undo steps to make room for the campaign, and a notice says so. If the save still fails with no undo steps left, an error notice shows once. Autosave then does not try again until you make another change.

The first stored image can make the browser ask whether the site can keep its data. The answer has no effect on the app. If a browser cannot open IndexedDB, as in some private windows, the images go into local storage and count toward its limit.

If the browser does not store an image, the save still stores the map and everything else. A notice says that the pictures were not stored, and the next save tries the image again.

Campaign size limits

The app loads at most 10,000 map areas and 2,000,000 tiles in all. A campaign that is over a limit loads shortened. The app leaves out the areas past the first 10,000, and the areas past the tile limit load with no tiles.

The example campaign

Load example replaces the campaign with a complete demo. The demo comes from one fixed seed, so every load gives the same maps and the same furnishings.

The party starts in Briarwick Vale, and only that region is revealed on the world map. Every land tile of the world map leads into its region. To travel to another region, the party walks off the edge of its region map where that region borders the next one. The party arrives at the matching spot of the next region.

The story is about King Ostrand, who has risen in his barrow. Castellan Irenne Vane of Thornhold secretly works to free him. Each side quest gives a clue about the Castellan or a tool for the fight in the barrow.

The Barrow of the Old King starts locked. Its lock needs an item named Warding Key. The hermit Odo gives the key, or the smith Sella recasts the counter-key from the crates of Dorn into one. When the party gets it, add an item of that name to the inventory of one character. You can also unlock the barrow at any time.

King Ostrand is the one legendary creature of the example. He takes two legendary actions each round and has one use of legendary resistance each day. His notes open with the wardstone rule and then say how his legendary row works in the fight.

Five quests start revealed: Rumors at the Waystation, Wolves on the Vale Road, and the personal quests of Mirelle, Wren, and Brannoc. When you complete a quest, the app offers to reveal the quests that it unlocks. For example, Rumors at the Waystation unlocks The Goblin Raids, The Hermit of Graypeak, and Dorn’s Sealed Cargo. The quests of Harbormaster Petra and the mire hag Grelka unlock from no quest, so reveal them when the party meets them. Every quest pays XP to each character. With the fights of the main line, the quests before the barrow bring each character to about 6,500 XP, the start of level 5. Wolves on the Vale Road also pays 25 gp each, and Dead Water pays 10 gp each.

The quest steps that would expose the Castellan stay hidden from the players until you reveal them. Her secret is only in GM notes. The party already knows four contacts: Dorn, Corvin, Lord Aldemar, and the Castellan.

Most hidden handouts sit on the tile where the party finds them. Each character starts with one personal letter, and only the player tab of that character shows it.

The party shows these character features:

• a feat and an ability score increase
• the Expertise of the Rogue
• the Arcane Trickster and Eldritch Knight subclasses
• a fighter who multiclasses into wizard

The undead and beasts have damage resistances and trained saves. The Castellan, one of her cultists, and King Ostrand cast spells. Snagtooth, Skalvyr, the Grave Wight, King Ostrand, the Bandit Captain, and the Thornhold guards attack more than once a turn with Multiattack.

Build mode

Build mode is where you author the world. The World tree rail is on the left, the map is in the center, and the Build rail is on the right.

A map with no tiles shows a card over the canvas. Paint tiles opens the Paint tab and puts focus on the palette. Generate map opens the Generate dialog. The card goes away after the first tile is painted.

In Play mode, a map with no tiles draws no grid and no coordinate labels. A plain card names the empty map. For the GM, its Open Build mode button switches to Build mode. A Player tab shows only the name.

Node kinds

The world is a tree of nodes. The top node is the world map. Regions and interiors sit beneath it.

Node settings

Add a child and Edit settings in the World tree open the same fields.

The environment tag is a description only. It has no effect on painting, generation, or rules.

A smaller width or height that removes tiles asks first. Cancel on that confirm opens the settings again with the values you typed. In the same way, Cancel on the confirm that replaces every tile after Generate map opens the Generate dialog again with the same choices and seed.

A locked node stops every move of the party or a character into it: a click on a tile that links to it, a walk across a border into it, and a teleport from the World panel. The GM view still zooms into a locked node where nobody moves. In a GM tab, a dialog names the key item and the character who carries it, for example “Locked. Requires the warding key; Aldric carries it.” The match is on the item name, without regard to case, across all characters. Click Unlock to open the lock and go on, or Unlock anyway when nobody carries the key. Unlocking sets the lock to Unlocked and writes a travelogue line. Click Stay out to keep the lock shut. On a walk of the whole party to a linked tile, the party then stops on the last tile before the link and spends the time of that walk. On a border crossing or a teleport, the party stays where it was. A Player tab shows the toast “The way into the Barrow is locked.” and nobody moves.

World tree

The World tree in the Build rail and the World panel in Play mode show the same node tree. Each tree scrolls in its own box. On a window wider than about 1090 px, Build mode fits the window and the page does not scroll. The World tree, each Build rail tab, and the palette swatches scroll in their own box, and only when their content is taller than the window. A wider window gives the Build rail more width, so the palette shows more swatches in a row.

A branch is closed when the tree first shows it. The exceptions are the top node and the rows above the current map. When the map in view changes, the tree opens the rows above it and scrolls to its row.

The tree takes one Tab stop. Inside it, Up and Down move between rows, and Home and End go to the first and last row. Right opens a closed row or moves into an open one, and Left closes an open row or moves to its parent row. Enter opens the map of the row. In Build mode, Shift+F10 or the Menu key opens the actions menu of the row.

Palette tools

The Palette card has four tool buttons and five sections of swatches. A click on a swatch picks it as the brush, and a drag paints it on every cell that the pointer crosses. The name of the picked swatch shows above the swatch sections, for example Brush: Grass (random variant). While Inspect, Region, Erase path, or Erase tile is the tool, the swatches fade. A click on a swatch still picks it as the brush.

A brush paints only while the Paint tab is open. On the Tile and Encounters tabs, a click on the map selects the cell, the same as Inspect. A chip at the right end of the map toolbar names the tool that a click uses, such as Painting: Grass, Painting: Briarwick region, or Inspect.

The Art size row (1x, 2x, 3x) sets how large the next painted tile draws. At 2x or 3x, one click stamps one tile whose image stretches across a 2x2 or 3x3 block. A scaled stamp places one block per click, and roads always paint at 1x.

The block is visual only. The covered cells keep their own terrain, roads across the block stay tile-sized, and fog reveals the block cell by cell.

A terrain type with several variants, such as grass or mountain, has one swatch in the Terrain section. That swatch mixes the variants, so a large area does not repeat one image. The position of a cell on the map sets its variant, so the same cell always gets the same variant from this swatch.

To paint one exact image, select Show variants. The swatches then show one swatch for each variant. If the active brush is a terrain swatch, the brush stays on the same terrain when you change the checkbox. The browser keeps the choice.

Roads overlay the terrain under them. If you repaint the terrain under a road, the road stays on top.

Tools card

Undo stroke reverts only the cells and fields that the edit changed. Fog that the party revealed and notes written after the edit stay. A tile link to a node that was deleted after the edit comes back as no link.

The stroke history is separate from the header Undo and Redo. It has no redo, and it ends when the page reloads.

If a map is too large for 64 pixels per tile, Export PNG uses a smaller size and names the size it used. If no size fits, the app refuses the export.

Tile inspector fields

The inspector heading shows the art of the selected tile and its name, for example “Forest”, or “Grass, Road (h)” for a tile with an overlay. Under the name, it names the cell, for example “Column 11, row 11”. Columns and rows count from 1, the same as the numbers along the map edges.

Tile menu

In a GM tab in Build mode, a right-click on a map cell selects the cell and opens the tile menu, if the pointer did not drag. Shift+F10 or the Menu key opens the same menu at the keyboard cursor.

Map generation

The Generate card fills the current node with a generated layout. The dialog shows a preview of the exact layout before it changes anything. The preview numbers the columns and rows when the tiles are large enough, and it outlines each block that Generate links to a sub-map, such as each region of the World archetype.

Links to the parent map

Every generated layout can reach its parent map.

If nothing on the parent map links to the node, generation places an entrance tile near the center of the parent and reports where. If a parent tile already links to the node, the tile stays where it is. Its marker changes to the marker of the new archetype, for example from a dungeon entrance to a cave entrance.

The art of a particular place, such as an inn, stays if the new archetype has the same point-of-interest type. A wilderness takes no marker, so its old marker becomes grass.

Names after regeneration

A region block on a world map has no marker, and the name of the region is its label on the world map. If a generated name follows the pattern of an archetype, the node takes the pattern of the new archetype with the same word.

For example, “The Ashford Hills” regenerated as a desert becomes “The Ashford Sands”. “The Crypt of Dunholt” regenerated as a cave becomes “Dunholt Caves”.

These names do not change: a name that you typed, a name of one word, the name of a building, and the name of a level in a stack. Undo restores the old name.

Parent tiles after regeneration

The parent tiles that link to a regenerated wilderness, highlands, frontier, desert, or wetlands take the ground of that climate. For example, a region block regenerated as highlands becomes mostly hills and mountains.

These parent tiles keep their art: water, coast tiles, points of interest, and tiles that link to another map. A river keeps its course, and a block that already reads as the new climate keeps its art. Each tile keeps its fog state and its notes.

A region regenerated as a town, an island, or a world keeps its ground and gets no marker, because the world generator places no settlements. Undo restores the old tiles.

Outdoor archetypes

The six outdoor archetypes differ in climate.

In each outdoor archetype, the north edge is colder than the south edge. Rivers run down from the hills to water or to the map edge. Landmarks such as ruins, mines, and camps stand on open ground.

An oasis stands only in the desert. A lighthouse stands only on a shoreline that faces open water, over the coast piece of its cell. A watchtower usually stands beside a road. The climate can also give jungle, savanna, taiga, glacier, badlands, snowy hills and peaks, volcanic peaks, and deep sea, each with its own tiles.

An outdoor map also gets settlements, with farmland around them.

Roads join the settlements and the keep. The roads leave the map at one edge, or at two edges on a huge or vast map. A road crosses a river on a bridge near a settlement and on a ford farther out.

Towns

A town has a core of streets and buildings around a central crossroads. The inn, the tavern, the blacksmith, the general store, and the temple stand nearest the crossroads, around a cobbled plaza. A well or a fountain stands near them, and a large town adds a market and a town hall.

A larger town then adds other shops and trades, houses near the center, and cottages near the edge. Farms and fields lie outside the core, with a windmill among the fields. Some towns have a graveyard.

Some towns have a river. The streets cross it on bridges, and a watermill stands on its bank.

About one large town in two gets a stone wall, with a gate on each street and a water gate where the river passes. A gate is open ground. The party never lands on the town wall when it enters the town, and a new link never goes on the wall.

Ports

The town map of a port has the sea along its north, east, or west edge, with a sandy shore. The party still enters by the street from the south edge. No street leaves into the sea, so a large port has three ways out.

A river in a port flows into the sea, and a small port has no river. A large port gets a wall as often as an inland town. The wall of a port is open on the sea side, and its two ends stop at the shore.

A port has one pier, or two on a large, huge, or vast map. Each pier starts at a timber quay on a straight part of the shore and runs straight out to a pier head. A street links each quay to the other streets, and the party can walk out to the pier head.

Interior archetypes

The four interior archetypes differ in layout.

A dungeon or a cave has rubble. The bottom level keeps a chest on the floor cell farthest from the way in.

The room behind the door of a house has a hearth and a table. The other rooms of a castle or a house are bedrooms, dining rooms, libraries, storerooms, or empty rooms, and a castle can also have chapels.

A town building takes its furnishings from what it is.

Obstacles, doors, and stairs

A pillar, a table, a bed, a bookshelf, a shelf, and a counter are obstacles. The party never lands on an obstacle or a wall when it enters a map, and a new link never goes on one.

The party enters an interior on the outer door nearest the side that it comes from. In an interior with no outer door, the party lands on the nearest floor.

A generated map never puts an obstacle beside a door or a staircase, or where it cuts off part of the floor. A generated staircase or trapdoor never sits directly inside a door. The party never has to cross a staircase or a trapdoor to reach the rest of the floor.

A trapdoor leads down like stairs down. A generated building links its trapdoor to its cellar. On a map that you paint, link the trapdoor to the level below, and that level returns through its stairs up.

Level stacks

Each level of a multi-level dungeon or cave becomes a child node.

• The first level has no stairs up, because its door is the way in.
• The stairs down of one level lead to the stairs up of the level below.
• The stairs down stand as far from the stairs up as the level allows.
• The bottom level has no stairs down.

If you generate a node that its parent reaches by a staircase, the node keeps the staircase back. A level below its parent gets stairs up where the first level has its door. A floor above its parent offers the upper floor alone.

The new levels below a regenerated level take the name of the top of the stack, for example “Ashford Barrow (level 3)”.

Worlds

A world is a continent in a sea, split into up to nine regions. Each region is a block of land tiles that all link to one region map. A small island is in no region.

A region map is a larger, more detailed copy of its block. Its coasts, ranges, forests, and rivers sit where the world map shows them, and small hills, lakes, and streams fill in between. The map takes the outline of its block where it meets a neighbor region, and the land of that neighbor stays blank. A coast keeps its sea out to the edge of the map. A larger block gets a larger map, from small (8 x 8) for a block of one tile to vast (48 x 48) for a block 25 tiles across. An edge exit arrow shows when the party is near the edge of the painted land, not only near the border of the grid.

A map that you generate again from the Generate dialog follows its block in the same way. This applies to each open-terrain archetype (wilderness, highlands, frontier, desert, wetlands, and island) under any parent map. A wilderness that links from a few tiles of a hand-painted map then draws the land of those tiles. A climate archetype first repaints the block (see Parent tiles after regeneration), and the new map follows the repainted block. A region regenerated as a desert then draws desert inside the coasts of its block. An island follows the block too, so an island on a block of inland tiles has no sea around it. A town and a world do not follow the block. The Size field starts on the size that fits the block, and the preview shows the map that follows it.

The terrain of a block sets the archetype of its region map.

A world has rivers but no roads or settlements, because each region gets those on its own map.

Sub-maps

The Sub-maps field shows for every region archetype. It sets which places on the new map get maps of their own.

The places are the regions of a world, the buildings of a town, and these sites of an outdoor map: settlements, the keep, the dungeon, cave entrances, mines, and ruins. A well, a fountain, a market, and a graveyard have no inside. All four cells of a town building link to its inside.

Each sub-map gets a generated name and its own seed. The seed comes from the seed of the map above it, so the preview is the same for every Sub-maps value. A dungeon or a cave sub-map gets one to three levels.

One generation creates at most 300 sub-maps. A place past that limit keeps its marker with no link, and the message after the generation counts those places. One undo removes the new map and every new sub-map.

Generation always makes these maps, whatever the Sub-maps value:

• the levels of a dungeon or a cave
• the upper floor and the dungeon of a castle
• the guest floor of an inn
• the cellar under a trapdoor

So a generated staircase or trapdoor always leads to a real map.

A world generated on the top map moves the party start next to the first town, inside the region that contains that town. The party then starts on land, on a tile with no marker and no link. A character split off on the world map rejoins the party there, and a character on any other map keeps its place. Undo puts the party and those characters back where they stood. If the new world has no town with open land beside it, the party does not move.

Generate a world on the Welcome card goes to the top map first, so it always replaces the world, even when a sub-region is in view. After it, a second card offers Create a character and Check the party start. Both switch to Play mode, and the first also opens the New character form. The card says whether the party moved to a start beside a town.

Link warnings

Build mode shows a warning below the tool tabs when the node in view has no way in or no way out. The World tree marks each node with a problem with a warning triangle. A closed branch shows a triangle and the number of nodes inside it that have a warning.

Neither problem strands a party. A node without an authored way out offers a plain “Return to (parent)” button.

Encounters tab

The Encounters tab of the Build rail stages creatures on the map in view. The Foes subtab lists foes, and the NPCs subtab lists friendly and neutral people.

The Bestiary lists the campaign templates under “This campaign” and the hostile templates of the library under “Library”, each sorted by name. The count adds up to 20 copies. The combat log and the setup dialog number copies that share a name, such as “Gray Wolf 2”. The location defaults to the selected cell of the map in view, or to the middle of the map when no cell is selected.

A defeated foe stays in the campaign until you remove it. Clear defeated counts the hostile creatures at 0 HP that stand on the map in view. It removes all of them, except a foe in the order of a running fight.

Clear defeated leaves foes on other maps and unplaced foes. It also takes the removed foes off any quest links, and one travelogue note counts them, for example “Cleared 4 defeated foes: Goblin x3, Wolf.” Undo brings them back.

Play mode

Play mode is where you run a session.

Play layout

On a window wider than about 1,090 pixels, Play mode fits the screen and the page does not scroll. The dock and the sidebar each scroll on their own, so the map, the party, the dice tray, and the open sheet stay in view together. A click on a row of the Party card selects that character and opens the Sheet tab. While Hide panels is on, the click selects the character and leaves the hidden sidebar on its tab.

Hide panels collapses the sidebar and gives the map the full width.

On a phone-width window, Play mode shows one area at a time. A bar at the bottom of the screen picks the area: Map shows the map with the Session tab under it, Party shows the Party card and the dice tray, and Sheet, Story, and Log show that sidebar tab. The bar takes the place of the sidebar tabs and the Hide panels button there. A click on a row of the Party card opens the Sheet view.

The World panel shows the node tree. A GM sees every node, and a player sees only the nodes that the party discovered. A discovered node has at least one revealed tile, or it is where the party stands.

A click on a row name in the World panel opens that map in a Player tab. In a GM tab, a click on the map where the party stands opens that map. A click on any other row asks what to do. View map opens the map and leaves the party where it is, as the breadcrumb does. Teleport party moves the party there.

Map controls

The map controls sit in a row over the map.

While a fog brush is picked up, a click paints fog instead of moving the party. A second click on the same brush button, or Escape, puts the brush down. A change of mode or of map also puts the brush down.

When a map opens in Build mode, the view fits the whole map, even when its tiles then draw small. In Play mode the view fits the revealed tiles. If they are too large to show at a readable size, the view centers on the party instead, and Fit map to view shows them all at a smaller size. In a Player tab, it centers on the bound character. The view then follows the party until you pan or zoom.

A switch to Play mode opens the node where the party stands.

Party movement

A click on a tile, or Enter on the keyboard cursor, moves the party there. Only one kind of tab moves anyone.

A click on a tile that links to a sub-map enters the sub-map. The party lands at the edge that it came from, and the travelogue logs the entry. A first entry is logged as a discovery.

The move needs a walk from the tile of the party. The walk steps to the four sides of each tile.

• A wall or an obstacle stops the walk. So a town wall, the walls of an interior, and furniture such as a table block it.
• Deep water stops the walk, so the party goes around a lake.
• A gate or a door lets the walk through.
• An empty cell lets the walk through, so a gap in a painted map does not block a move.
• A player walk goes through revealed tiles only, so an empty cell stops it.
• The walk goes around a tile that links to a sub-map, such as a shop in a town. It goes through such a tile only when no other way exists.

The party takes the shortest walk, and the fog clears around every tile of the walk, not only around the tile where the party stops.

If no walk leads to the tile, a GM tab asks before it moves the party there anyway. So you can still put the party past a wall or on a boat in deep water. A player tab does not move the token, and it shows a message. Nobody can stand on a wall or an obstacle, so a click on one moves nobody and shows a message, even in a GM tab.

A GM click on a fogged tile that links to a sub-map asks first, and names the sub-map. So a click that aims past a building in the fog does not take the party inside by mistake.

A walk of the whole party moves the in-game clock on. The time depends on the map.

The minutes add up across walks, and the Time panel shows the next watch once 4 hours have passed. When a walk moves the clock into a new watch, a message and a Travelogue entry name the length of the walk and the new time, for example “The walk took 4 hours. Now Day 2, Midday.” A split character’s walk spends no time. A teleport, a way out of a map, and a forced move from another map spend no time either.

Before a walk that reaches Night, a GM tab asks first. The dialog names the length of the walk and offers three buttons:

Tick Don’t ask again tonight to skip the question for later walks into the same Night. The tab forgets the choice when you reload it. A forced move and a click on a fogged link tile add the warning to their own confirm. A walk that starts in Night does not ask, and neither does a player tab or a split character, because they spend no time.

The walk check applies only to a move inside the map in view. The ways out, a teleport from the World panel, and the Place on map button do not check for a walk.

A player tab ignores clicks on a fogged tile. A player cannot move a token into the fog or open the sub-map behind it.

Ways out of a map

Inside a sub-map, the edges and tiles that lead back to the parent map show return arrows. A click on an arrow travels.

An exit arrow that the mini-map would cover moves along its side of the map until it is clear.

In Play mode, the mini-map floats over the top-left corner of the map, and the map fits the canvas as if it were not there. Coordinate digits and region names under the mini-map hide. Collapse the mini-map to see them. In Build mode, the map fits clear of the mini-map, so a click or a paint stroke on a corner tile does not land on the mini-map. After you pan or zoom, tiles can pass under the mini-map in either mode, and a click there does nothing.

Party splitting

The Allow splitting the party checkbox in the Party card lets each character stand on its own tile. The switch is off by default, and it is GM-only.

Place on map opens a dialog with a map and a tile, or With the party. A placed character reveals fog around its tile.

When you clear the checkbox, a Regroup the party dialog asks where to gather everyone. The party then teleports to the position of the character that you pick. If you cancel, the party stays split.

Map markers and ranges

The sight of the party depends on the map and on the watch of the in-game clock. The detection range and the Nearby range stay the same at every hour.

A room in a building, an inn, or a castle is lit, so when the party steps into it, the whole room comes out of the fog with its walls and doors. A party that stands in a doorway sees into the rooms on both sides. A room of more than 100 floor tiles, such as a great hall, shows only within the sight of the party. The rooms of a dungeon, a cave, or a cellar stay dark.

In a GM tab in Play mode, the fog is part see-through. The terrain draws dimmed under the fog, and the grid, the region outlines, and the region names draw over it, so the GM reads the way ahead without a switch to Build mode. Point of interest outlines and exit badges on fogged tiles stay hidden. Creature markers show within the detection range, as they do under solid fog, and the badge of a hidden handout shows at any range. A Player tab, and a GM tab switched to the Player view, draw solid fog. In Play mode the mini-map draws solid fog, in a GM tab too.

Inside a building, a fogged tile beside explored floor, a door, or stairs draws a lighter fog. The lighter band shows where the explored part ends, for example past a door that the party has not opened.

When the party is on a sub-map, the tiles that link to it on each map above are revealed too. So the world map shows the region where the party stands.

When a tile that links to a sub-map first comes out of the fog, the Travelogue logs “Sighted” and the name of the sub-map. A discoverable site that the party has not found stays out of the log.

A hover on a tile in Play mode names the point of interest and the NPCs on it. The keyboard cursor does the same. The hover uses the detection range, so a tile out of range says nothing.

The mini-map

Inside a sub-region, a small picture of the map one level up sits in the top-left corner of the map. On the world map, the mini-map is hidden.

The dot scales the position of the party in the sub-region onto the outlined tiles. So a party at the east edge of a town shows at the east side of the block of that town. While the party is split, a Player tab follows its bound character.

In Play mode, a tile of the mini-map that the party has not seen draws as solid fog, also in a GM tab. In Build mode, every tile shows.

A click on the mini-map does nothing, so it never moves the party to a tile hidden under it.

Encounters panel

The Encounters panel in the Session tab has two tabs.

A friendly or neutral creature never shows in the Active encounter tab. It stays in the NPCs panel. Each row shows the name on one line, and the HP and the column and row on a second line. On a GM tab, the Amount field of a row sets how much the damage and heal buttons of that row apply.

The Nearby encounters tab shows one line for each group of foes that share a name, such as “Gray Wolf x4”. The line shows the HP of the group added up and the distance of the nearest one in tiles. The nearest group comes first. Every defeated foe goes into one “Defeated (2)” line at the end. On a GM tab, click a line to open the full rows of its foes, with the same controls as an Active encounter row. One line opens at a time. A Player tab shows each line as text, with the HP band instead of the bar.

A GM tab also shows these controls:

The difficulty hint

Above the Active encounter rows, the GM sees one line that rates the foes of that tab. For example: “Hard: 1200 XP against party thresholds easy 300, medium 600, hard 900, deadly 1600”.

The adjusted total is the sum of the XP of each foe, times a multiplier for the number of foes.

A party of one or two characters moves one step up this ladder, and a party of six or more moves one step down. The ladder ends at x0.5 and x5.

A dead character adds no budget and does not count toward the party size. The line hides when no living character remains, because there is no budget to rate against.

The line is a hint only. It blocks nothing, it awards no XP, and players never see it.

A foe with no challenge rating is worth nothing in the sum, but it still counts toward the number of foes. The missing worth makes the total too low, and the higher multiplier on the rated foes can make it too high.

Creature fields

The creature dialog defines a foe or an NPC. The same dialog opens from Build mode, from Play mode, and from the tile menu.

The fields sit under the headings Basics, Combat, Proficiencies, Spellcasting, and Placement. The ability scores and AC open the Combat section. The damage and condition defenses sit in a collapsed Damage and condition defenses group, after Proficiencies. A field that depends on another field stays disabled until that field has a value: On hit: DC and On hit: condition on a fail need On hit: save, Surprise Attack: die needs a dice count, Multiattack: attack with disadvantage needs a Multiattack of 2 or more, and Caster level needs a caster class.

A line under Row warns when the tile is outside the map, has no terrain, is deep water, or is a wall or an obstacle. The warning does not stop the save, so a sea creature can still go on a water tile. The Add from bestiary dialog shows the same warning.

The caster class list also offers “Fighter (Eldritch Knight)” and “Rogue (Arcane Trickster)”. For these two, a caster level below 3 saves as 3, because these subclasses cast from level 3.

The six ability scores plus AC are the only stats that a creature has.

The Build chip for AC reads “Base AC”. This is the AC without armor: 10 plus the DEX modifier by default, or higher for natural armor or a shield. The Play chip and the combat card show the AC with armor.

Worn armor replaces the 10 + DEX part with its own base AC and the part of the DEX modifier that its weight allows. See Armor class. For example, a DEX 16 creature in Plate has AC 18.

The Encounters and NPCs panels show each trained save and skill with its bonus, for example “Saves DEX +4 | Skills Stealth +6”. The app calculates each bonus from the ability score, the challenge rating, and any exhaustion, so there is no number to type.

An unrated creature takes its proficiency bonus from its level. With no level, the bonus is +2. A save that a spell calls for uses the same bonus, so the cast dialog asks only for the DC.

A defeated encounter shows as defeated in the lists. The app does not delete it.

Stat chips

In Play mode, a click on a stat chip of a creature applies a timed adjustment, for example +2 STR for 3 rounds. The chip then reads “STR 14->16 (3r)”.

The adjustment counts down as combat rounds pass, and combat math uses the adjusted value while it lasts. In Build mode, the same chips set base values.

Combat screen

The combat screen runs one fight at the full width of the page.

A click on a ribbon chip inspects that combatant without a change of turn.

The Damage and Heal box in the left column shows to the GM only. Its Target select picks the combatant that the box acts on, and the buttons name that combatant, as in Heal Mirelle. The target defaults to the card selected on the board, then to the inspected combatant, then to the combatant whose turn it is. A new selection on the board resets the target. A selection lasts for one turn, and Next turn clears it. A dying ally can be selected, so you can heal it on a foe’s turn. The Amount stays for the rest of the turn, so you can apply one area spell’s damage to several targets, and a new turn sets it back to 1.

Unless the party lost, End combat offers the XP of the defeated foes. The XP is split evenly among the living characters and rounded down, and the dialog states any XP that the split leaves over. A foe with no challenge rating is worth nothing. You can change the amount. The dialog opens before the fight ends, so Back to the fight keeps the fight, the XP, and every foe as they are. End and award ends the fight and gives the XP. A foe that falls while the dialog is open gets no fate, so a dead foe is never logged as fled.

Each hostile creature that still stands gets a select with three choices.

To make a captive a foe again, set its disposition back to hostile in the creature dialog. To keep a foe that fled in the story, pick Still hostile and move it to its new tile in the creature dialog.

A fight also ends when no creature of the fight is left on the tile of the party or on the eight tiles around it, and no hostile creature of the fight is left within the nearby range (8 tiles by default). A walk out of that range ends the fight, and so does the deletion of the last creature in it. The wider range lets a foe that joined from farther away keep the fight open.

Combat setup

Start combat opens the setup dialog. The Set up combat button of the Encounter! dialog opens it too. It lists the party, the live hostile creatures on the tile of the party and on the eight tiles around it, and any friendly or neutral creature on the tile of the party. Hostile creatures line up as foes, and friendly and neutral creatures line up with the party. Only a hostile creature starts an encounter. To fight a friendly or neutral creature, set its disposition to hostile first.

Under Add nearby foes, the dialog lists the other live hostile creatures within the nearby range, nearest first, with the distance in tiles. Tick Join on a row to bring that foe into the fight. When two or more foes stand on one tile, an Add the whole group box above them ticks every Join box of that tile at once. A joined foe rolls initiative with the others. The Stealth contest covers only the rows above the list. During a fight, the Nearby encounters tab has an Add to fight button on each hostile row that is not in the fight. Open the line of the foe to reach its row. It rolls initiative for the foe, logs the roll, and puts the foe into the order.

Combatants that share a name get a number after it, such as “Goblin Scout 1” and “Goblin Scout 2”. The numbers follow the order of the creature list. The rows of the Encounters panel, the combat status line in the sidebar, the combat screen, and the attack and spell dialogs use the same numbers. The Active tab and the setup dialog number the foes of the fight that Start combat would begin, or of the fight that runs, so a foe shows the same label in the panel, the dialog, and the fight. A foe that is the only one of its name in the fight shows no number. The Nearby tab counts on after the fight, so a second wolf nearby reads “Wolf 2” beside a lone “Wolf” in the Active tab. A defeated foe keeps its place in the count of a running fight. The log and the stored name keep the plain name.

For the initiative rules, see Initiative.

Surprise

The GM decides who is surprised. The Stealth contest ticks the boxes for you, or you tick Surprised on each row by hand before you press Start combat. The log records a line such as “Goblin Scout is surprised.”

A surprised combatant wears a Surprised chip and keeps its place in the initiative order. Until its first turn ends, its Reaction pip is spent. On that first turn, the Action and Bonus action pips are spent too, so every button that needs them refuses. The app does not track movement, so the GM keeps the surprised combatant in place. At the end of that turn the chip ends and the reaction comes back, and its next turn is a normal one. To overrule a spent pip, press it to mark it free.

Stealth contest

The contest is optional. With Who sneaks at No one, the dialog shows no Stealth controls. Pick the side that sneaks, and each row of that side shows a Stealth total. Each row of the other side shows its passive Perception (PP). Pick Both sides when each side tries to sneak up on the other. Then every row shows a Stealth total and its PP.

Roll Stealth rolls d20 plus the Stealth bonus for each sneaker. A character uses its sheet bonus, and a creature uses its stat block. The chips of the roller slant the roll. For a character, armor with stealth disadvantage and armor that the character is not proficient with also give disadvantage. You can type a total in any sneaker row instead of rolling. A row with no total takes no part.

The app compares each watcher’s passive Perception with every sneaker total. A watcher notices the threat when its passive Perception is higher than at least one total. A total equal to the passive Perception stays hidden. A watcher that notices no sneaker is surprised. Each change to a total runs the contest again. It ticks Surprised on each watcher that notices no one, and it clears the box on each watcher that notices. The boxes of the sneaking side do not change. The outcome line under the picker names every total and each surprised combatant.

With Both sides, the app runs one contest for each side. The foes’ passive Perception is compared with the party’s totals, and the party’s passive Perception with the foes’ totals. A sneaker still watches the other side, because surprise is decided for each creature, so a sneaker can be surprised too. Each side has its own outcome line.

You can change any Surprised box after the contest. When you press Start combat, the travelogue records each outcome line, such as “The party sneaks (Stealth Ayla 16, Bren 11). Goblin 1 and Goblin 2 are surprised.”

Parley

Parley in the setup dialog records that the party settled the encounter without a fight. It closes the dialog, starts no fight, and writes a note to the travelogue that names the foes. The foes stay on their tiles, but they stand down and become neutral, so the Encounter! dialog does not open again when the party next moves next to them. Undo makes them hostile again. If the truce breaks later, change the disposition of each foe back to hostile in the creature dialog.

Attack dialog

A weapon button in the action bar opens the attack dialog.

Action, bonus action, and reaction

The Actions heading on the combat screen shows three pips: Action, Bonus action, and Reaction. A free pip has a filled dot. A spent pip has an empty ring, and its label is struck through. A combatant with Extra Attack also shows how many swings are left. A button that needs a spent cost has a muted label and a dashed edge, and its tooltip names the cost, as in “Action spent”.

The whole turn comes back when the turn of that combatant starts again. The reaction comes back at the same time, not at the top of the round. A combatant that the turn order steps past, because it is down or cannot act, keeps what it spent.

The pips never block a button. Instead, the dialog refuses a swing or a cast that the turn cannot pay for. The dialog then offers an Ignore action cost box that goes ahead anyway. Use the box for a rule that the app does not model.

Each pip is also a button. Press a free pip to mark that cost used, for example when a bonus action goes to something the app does not track. Press a used pip to mark it free again, for example after a spend by mistake. The combat log records each press.

The Standard actions group under the spells has one button for each standard action. A button spends the action and writes a log line, such as “Ser Aldric takes the Dash action.” The app does not move tokens or track hidden creatures, so the GM resolves the rest. Dodge also puts a Dodging chip on the combatant until the start of its next turn, and attack rolls against a Dodging creature roll at disadvantage. The Dodging creature rolls its Dexterity saves at advantage, both for a spell save in the cast dialog and for a save from the character sheet. A Rogue of 2nd level or higher also gets a Cunning Action (bonus action) group with Dash, Disengage, and Hide, which spend the bonus action instead. A button whose cost the turn already spent shows a toast and does nothing, so press the pip first to free the cost.

A Fighter also gets a Fighter group with a button for each class pool that the character has (see Class feature pools). The button title shows the uses left. Second Wind spends the bonus action and one use, and the fighter regains 1d10 plus the fighter level in HP. The log line shows the roll, such as “Ser Aldric uses Second Wind and regains 9 HP (d10 5 + 4).” Action Surge costs no part of the turn. Press it at any point in the turn for one more full action. After the action is spent, the Action pip becomes free again. Before the action, a “+1 action (Action Surge)” pip shows next to the Action pip, and the first action spends that pip instead, so the Action pip stays free for the second. An Attack action with the new action gets its Extra Attack swings again. The app allows one surge per turn, as 5e does, even for a fighter with two uses. A button with no use left, or a second surge in one turn, shows a toast and spends nothing.

A Cleric of 2nd level or higher gets a Channel Divinity group. Each button opens a dialog first, and a cancel keeps the use and the action.

• Turn Undead lists every undead in the fight, all ticked. Untick the ones that are out of range (30 feet) or cannot see or hear the cleric. Each ticked undead rolls a Wisdom save against the spell save DC of the cleric. An undead with the Turn Resistance box in its creature form rolls the save with advantage. On a failure, it gets a Turned chip for 1 minute. Damage ends the chip, and a Turned creature takes no reactions. It keeps its turns, and the GM moves it away or has it take the Dodge action. From cleric level 5, Destroy Undead destroys an undead of a low enough CR instead (CR 1/2 at level 5, 1 at 8, 2 at 11, 3 at 14, 4 at 17). An unrated undead is only turned.
• Preserve Life (Life Domain) shares out 5 times the cleric level in HP among the allies in the fight. The dialog has one amount per ally below half its max HP, and each amount stops at half the max HP. Undead and constructs get no row. A share-out over a limit shows a toast and spends nothing.

A casting time longer than a turn, such as a ten-minute ritual, is refused in a fight in the same way, and it offers the same box.

Two-weapon fighting

A character with two light melee weapons equipped gets an Off-hand (bonus action) group in the action bar. An example is a dagger and a shortsword. The group shows after the character takes its Attack action, and only while the bonus action is unspent.

The group offers both weapons, and you pick the one that the second hand swings. The off-hand swing rolls to hit like any other attack.

Its damage gets no ability bonus, which is the 5e rule. A negative ability modifier still applies. A character with the Two-Weapon Fighting style adds the ability modifier (see Fighting styles). The combat log marks the swing “off-hand”.

Reactions and opportunity attacks

A reaction happens between the turns of its owner, so its controls are on the board card, not in the action bar. A card shows a Reaction row when all of these conditions are true:

• The card is not the current turn.
• You can act for that combatant.
• The combatant can still act.
• Its reaction is unspent.

The row has one button per melee weapon, as in Opportunity attack: Rapier. It also has one button per spell that casts as a reaction, as in Cast Shield.

Apart from a hit on a Shield caster or an attack on a creature with Redirect Attack (see below), the app does not watch for a trigger. It tracks no distance between tokens, so it cannot see a creature leave the reach of another. You call the trigger at the table and press the button.

An opportunity attack rolls like a normal swing and keeps its ability bonus on damage. It spends the reaction, and the log marks it “opportunity attack”.

Its defender starts as the combatant that takes the turn, because that is who the reaction interrupts. A card that you pick on the board overrides that. A reaction spell opens the usual cast dialog and spends the reaction instead of the action.

Legendary actions

A creature with Legendary actions per round set in the creature dialog takes that many legendary actions each round. Its board card shows a row named Legendary action (N left) when all of these conditions are true:

• The card is not the current turn.
• You can act for the creature.
• The creature can still act.
• It has a legendary action left.

The row has one button per weapon of the creature. A button opens the attack dialog, titled “Legendary action: attack with”, and the swing costs one legendary action instead of the Attack action. It offers no Multiattack box, because a legendary attack is one swing. The log marks each swing with its number, as in “legendary action 2 of 3”. The creature gets every legendary action back when its own turn starts.

The 5e rule allows a legendary action only at the end of the turn of another creature. The app does not enforce that timing, so take the action when the turn ends and before you click Next turn. A legendary action that is not an attack, such as a move, has no button, so describe it at the table.

Legendary resistance

A creature with Legendary resistance per day set can turn a failed saving throw into a success. When such a creature fails the save of a save spell, or its save against Turn Undead, a dialog asks “Use legendary resistance? N left today”. Click Succeed instead to spend one use, or Let it fail to keep the failure. A success takes half damage from a spell that halves on a save and no damage from any other, and no condition lands. The log records each use and the uses left.

The uses come back when the party takes a long rest. The app does not ask about the save that a weapon hit forces, such as the poison of a giant spider. Handle that one by hand.

Shield against a hit

When an attack roll hits a combatant whose reaction spell raises its AC, such as Shield, a Reaction dialog opens before the damage. The dialog names the roll and the AC, and the AC that the spell really adds. A floor such as Barkskin can take up part of the bonus, so Shield on a combatant at AC 16 from Barkskin over a base of 12 adds only +1. The dialog opens only when the higher AC would turn the hit into a miss, so it never opens on a natural 20, which hits whatever the AC.

Press Cast Shield to cast the spell at the lowest slot that the combatant can spend. The cast spends the reaction, and the attack then rolls against the new AC. The log line of the attack names the spell beside the AC. Press Take the hit to let the attack land as rolled. Against Magic Missile, the spell blocks every dart. A combatant that already has Shield takes no Magic Missile darts, and no dialog opens.

The dialog opens only in a tab that can act for the defender: the GM tab, or the Player tab bound to that character. When a player attacks a foe that knows Shield, the attack does not pause. Cast the foe’s Shield from its reaction control, and undo the damage by hand.

Resisting a hit

When a weapon hit, a spell attack hit, or a save spell deals a damage type that a combatant’s reaction spell can resist, a Reaction dialog opens after the damage roll and before the damage lands. The spell is a buff that casts as a reaction, and its chip resists the type through Resists or Caster picks one of. The dialog names the damage before resistance, and for a save spell it names the save result too, such as “Mage fails the save against Burning Hands and takes 12 damage.” Press Cast to cast it with that type picked, so the damage of that type is halved. Press Take the damage to let the damage land as rolled. The dialog follows the same tab rule as Shield.

A spell that damages several combatants, such as Burning Hands, opens one dialog for each combatant that can react, in target order. When the spell attack also offers Shield, the Shield dialog comes first. A combatant that casts Shield has no reaction left, so it gets no second dialog. If the fight ends while a dialog is open, your answer still counts and the damage still lands.

Redirect Attack

A creature with Redirect Attack, such as a goblin boss, can use its reaction when an attack targets it. It swaps places with an ally, and the ally becomes the target. A goblin boss can pick only another goblin within 5 feet, and its notes say so. The app tracks no positions, so before the attack roll a Redirect Attack dialog lists every ally of the creature in the fight that is not down. Pick an ally that qualifies and press Swap places. Press Keep target or Escape to keep the creature as the target, with its reaction unspent.

The dialog opens for a weapon attack and for an attack spell, such as Fire Bolt, but not for a save spell. It opens only while the creature has its reaction and can act, and only in the GM tab. When a player attacks the creature from a Player tab, the attack does not pause. A redirect spends the reaction, and the log names the swap. The attack roll then uses the AC of the ally, and the damage, the resistances, and any save that the attack forces apply to the ally. When Multiattack is ticked, only the first swing can redirect, because the redirect spends the reaction.

Cover and Sneak Attack

You decide both of these in the attack dialog. The app tracks no distance between tokens and no line of sight, so it cannot see a wall, a barrel, or where the rogue stands.

Half cover adds 2 to the AC of the target for that swing, and three-quarters cover adds 5. The log prints both numbers, such as vs AC 12 (10 half cover +2).

Total cover is not offered, because a target in total cover cannot be attacked. Cover in 5e also adds its bonus to Dexterity saving throws, and the cast dialog does not apply that. Add it to the save bonus that you type for a foe, or pick a roll mode for a character.

The Sneak Attack box shows when the attacker has the feature and has not used it this turn. The label states the dice, such as Sneak Attack (+2d6). The level in the class that granted the feature sets the count.

The Sneak Attack dice are d6, they take the damage type of the weapon, and a critical hit doubles them. The damage line of the log names them.

The 5e condition for the dice is advantage on the attack, or an ally next to the target. The app checks neither, so the box is where you state that the condition was met.

The app tracks the once-per-turn limit. After the dice land, the box is gone for the rest of the turn, and it comes back on the next turn of any combatant. So a rogue that spent the dice on its own swing can spend them again on an opportunity attack, which is the 5e reading of once per turn. A miss leaves the box, because Sneak Attack applies only on a hit.

Pack Tactics, on-hit saves, Surprise Attack, and Multiattack

A creature with Pack Tactics has advantage when an ally of the creature stands within 5 feet of the target. The app tracks no positions, so tick the Pack Tactics box when the condition is met. The attack line of the log names Pack Tactics advantage.

A creature weapon can force a save on each hit, such as the DC 11 Strength save of a wolf bite. After the damage lands, the target rolls the save with its own bonus and chips. The log names the total, the DC, and the result. A target that fails gains the condition, and a target that the hit dropped to 0 HP rolls nothing. A creature immune to the condition keeps its chips, and the log says so.

A creature with Surprise Attack adds its dice to a hit in round 1 when the target is still surprised, which lasts until the end of the first turn of the target. The app applies the dice without a box. They take the damage type of the weapon, a critical hit doubles them, and the damage line of the log names them.

A creature can have one attack of its Multiattack that rolls with disadvantage, such as the second scimitar attack of a goblin boss. The app counts the swings of the Attack action and adds the disadvantage to that swing, and the attack line of the log names Multiattack disadvantage. An advantage chip cancels it, and a roll mode that you pick in the dialog replaces it.

Damage riders on hits

Some spell chips add damage dice to hits, and the app rolls them with the hit. Divine Favor adds 1d4 radiant to each weapon hit of the paladin who holds it. Hunter’s Mark goes on a foe, and each weapon hit of the ranger who cast it adds 1d6 of the weapon’s damage type. The mark does nothing for the hits of anyone else. A critical hit doubles the rider dice, and the damage line of the log names each rider, as in , Hunter's Mark +2d6.

When the marked creature drops to 0 HP, cast Hunter’s Mark again on a later turn and pick Repeat (no slot). The repeat costs a bonus action and no slot, and it marks the new target under the same concentration. The app does not check that the old target is at 0 HP, so you check it. The advantage on Wisdom checks to find the target, and the longer duration of a 3rd-level or higher slot, stay with you.

Combat rules

The app follows the 5e rules for the rolls in this section.

Attack rolls

• The roll is 1d20, plus the ability modifier of the weapon, plus the proficiency bonus of the attacker, against the AC of the defender.
• A character adds the proficiency bonus only when its proficiency lists cover the weapon, by category or by name. Otherwise, the roll takes the ability modifier alone, and the log says “not proficient”.
• A creature is always proficient with its own weapon, like a 5e stat block.
• STR modifies a melee weapon, and DEX modifies a ranged weapon. A finesse weapon uses the higher of the two.
• A shot at long range takes disadvantage, which combines with the condition chips. A Roll value other than Auto still overrides it.
• A thrown melee weapon, such as a dagger, lists Melee first and the two throw distances after it. The throws count as ranged attacks. So a prone defender is harder to hit with a throw and easier to hit with a melee swing.
• Armor that the character is not trained for gives disadvantage on every attack roll.
• A natural 20 hits whatever the AC is, and every damage die rolls twice.
• A natural 1 always misses.
• On a hit, the damage dice roll with the ability modifier added. Proficiency never adds to damage.

Damage and damage defenses

The app applies the damage to the defender. An encounter or an NPC loses HP at once, and the log records a defeat. A character or a creature loses bonus HP first, then real HP. The combatant card shows bonus HP beside the HP bar.

A weapon or spell hit checks the damage defenses of the defender first.

Each damage type in the hit changes separately. For a spell with half damage on a successful save, the save halves first, and the defenses apply after that.

A character resists the damage types of its race, such as fire for a tiefling. A creature takes its three lists from the creature dialog. A chip can add resistances too. Stoneskin resists bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from a nonmagical weapon, and a spell gets through it. Protection from Energy resists the one type that the caster picks at the cast. A weapon counts as magical when the Magical weapon box in its item form is ticked, and the pact weapon of a Pact of the Blade warlock counts as magical too. A creature takes the flag from the library weapon that arms it. The log names each defense that changed the damage, with the amount taken.

The Damage button on the combat screen and on the panels deals the typed amount with no damage type. No defense applies to it.

Death saves

A party character at 0 HP is dying, not dead. It gets a death-save tracker on the combat screen and on its sheet, and the Unconscious chip.

• The save is 1d20 against DC 10, with no ability modifier and no proficiency. A Bless chip still adds its die.
• Three successes stabilize the character. It stays at 0 HP and unconscious, and it rolls no more saves. The Stabilize button does the same thing without a roll.
• Three failures kill the character. The app says so and changes nothing else, so you decide what happens next.
• A natural 20 wakes the character at 1 HP. A natural 1 counts as two failures.
• Any damage at 0 HP is an automatic failure, with no roll. A critical hit counts as two failures. Damage on a stable character starts the saves again.
• If the damage left over past 0 HP is at least the HP maximum, the character dies at once. A 12 HP character hit for 24 dies, and so does a character at 0 HP hit for 12. Bonus HP absorbs the hit first.
• The hit that drops the character to 0 HP costs no failure.
• Any healing above 0 HP clears the tracker of a dying or stable character. Healing from the combat screen, from the HP stepper of the sheet, from a spell, and from a rest all count.
• A dead character regains no HP. A heal or a rest has no effect on it, and the combat log says so.
• Only a spell that raises the dead brings a dead character back. Revivify and Raise Dead are the built-in ones. Each clears the tracker and heals the character to 1 HP. Neither has an effect on a character that is not dead, a dying one included. In a custom spell, the Raises the dead box of a heal gives the same rule.
• Spare the Dying stabilizes a dying character, the same as the Stabilize control. It has no effect on a character that is not dying, or on a creature. In a custom spell, the Stabilizes the dying box of a heal gives the same rule.
• A healing spell has no effect on a creature at 0 HP, because a creature rolls no death saves. Revivify and Raise Dead bring a creature at 0 HP back to 1 HP. The heal control of the combat screen still heals a creature at 0 HP, so you can bring back an NPC that was only knocked out.
• The roll is a button, not an automatic step, so nobody rolls for the player when the turn advances.
• In a fight, a dying character keeps its place in the turn order. When its turn starts, the log and a toast say “Mirelle is dying. Roll a death save.” The Roll death save button shows only on that turn, and it goes away after the roll, so the character rolls once per turn. A stable or dead character loses its turns.
• The GM sees Stabilize on any turn, because an ally stabilizes a friend on the ally’s own turn.
• A dying character has no action bar, because it cannot act.

An encounter and an NPC have no death saves. Both are defeated at 0 HP.

Initiative

Initiative uses the DEX modifier, which is floor((DEX - 10) / 2). The default initiative value is 10 plus the modifier. On a tie, the combatant with the higher DEX modifier goes first, and then the name decides.

Initiative is a Dexterity check, and it rolls as one.

• A condition chip that affects ability checks affects initiative. So a poisoned or frightened combatant rolls two d20s and keeps the lower one.
• Armor that the character is not trained for does the same.
• Exhaustion takes 2 off the total for each level.

The log line says what happened to each roll, for example: Initiative rolled: Ser Aldric 17, Mirelle 6 (at disadvantage (dropped 15), Poisoned disadvantage). Every value stays editable until you press Start combat.

A creature that a spell summons into a running fight rolls a plain d20 plus its DEX modifier, with no condition or armor effect. You can edit the value afterward.

Armor class

A Barbarian keeps its unarmored defense while it carries a shield. A Monk loses it, but the shield still adds its bonus. Both lose the formula when they put on body armor.

Body armor has two more 5e traits.

Both traits come with the armor presets. Armor already in a saved campaign has neither trait until you pick its preset again or set the fields by hand.

Armor proficiency

A character that wears armor its proficiency lists do not cover takes these penalties. A shield counts as its own entry in the armor list.

• Every STR and DEX save or check from the sheet rolls at disadvantage. The log says “not proficient” and names the armor.
• Every weapon attack rolls at disadvantage, because every attack uses STR or DEX.
• The character cannot cast a spell. The refusal names the armor and spends nothing. The cast dialog offers an Ignore armor box, which casts anyway.
• A spell that forces a STR or DEX save makes the wearer roll that save at disadvantage.

These penalties combine with the condition chips, so an advantage chip cancels them. The AC of the armor still applies. A creature has no proficiency lists and never takes these penalties.

Conditions

Eleven condition names have rules. The app applies them to every roll that they affect: a weapon attack, a spell attack, a spell save, and a save or a check rolled from the character sheet.

A chip that you type matches a row when it spells one of the names above. Case does not matter. Any other chip has no rule.

Charmed, Deafened, and Grappled have no rule. They need a relationship between two combatants, or movement, and the app has neither. Decide their effects at the table.

Timed conditions count down at the start of each round and end on their own.

Some spell chips end at a turn boundary instead of a round count, such as the Blinded of Sunbeam, which ends at the start of the caster’s next turn. Such a chip shows “next turn”. Some chips deal damage at the end of each turn of their holder, such as the chip of Acid Arrow. Point at a chip to read what it does and when it ends. A dying character still takes this damage, and each hit costs it a failed death save. When the fight ends, the damage that such a chip still owes lands at once. Outside a fight the app deals no later-turn damage, so apply it by hand.

A chip that deals damage on later turns, or that the holder retries a save against, stays apart from a chip of the same name from another caster or spell. A combatant can therefore show two Acid Arrow chips, and each one deals its own damage. Point at such a chip to read which caster and spell wrote it. The remove button of a chip removes only that chip, so the other cast keeps its chip. For other chips, a combatant keeps one chip of each name. A longer chip from another cast stays, and of two casts of one spell with different strength, such as Aid at 2nd and at 3rd level, the stronger one stays.

A combatant that loses its turn keeps its place in the initiative order. Next turn steps past it without a message. A save that fails at once never reaches the dice, and the log names the chip that failed it.

A spell such as Hold Person lets its target repeat the save at the end of each of its turns. A target that loses its turn still has that turn end, so Next turn rolls the save as it steps past the target. A success ends the condition, but the target still loses the turn that it was held for.

NPCs have condition chips too. The chips sit on the row of the NPC in the NPCs panel of the Story tab, and on its card in the fight. The NPC list of the Build rail is for authoring and shows no chips.

Advantage and disadvantage

Advantage and disadvantage from any number of sources combine by the 5e rule. If both are present, the roll is normal. Otherwise, the one kind that is present applies.

Chips on both sides of an attack count. The log names every chip that affected the roll, including the ones that cancelled.

A roll that no chip affects uses the d20 mode of the dice tray. A roll that a chip affects does not change the d20 mode. The mode changes only when you click it.

Exhaustion

Exhaustion is a level from 0 to 6, not a chip, and the app stores it as its own number.

The log names the level and the number that it took off. A spell save DC is not a d20 test, so exhaustion does not lower it.

The saving throw of a creature against a spell is a number that you type into the cast dialog. The app does not apply exhaustion to it, so subtract the penalty as you type it.

A row of six numbered pips sets the level, and the pips up to the current level are filled. The row is on the character sheet under the chips, and on each creature row in the Encounters and NPCs panels. The top line of the character sheet also names the level, beside AC and speed.

Only a GM can click the pips, because the sixth pip kills. A player on a bound tab sees the row but cannot change it.

The sixth level kills.

• A character gets three failed death saves and goes unconscious. The log says that the character died of exhaustion. The HP number stays where it was, because exhaustion kills without damage.
• A creature goes to 0 HP and drops out of the fight, the same as a killing blow.
• A heal that brings a character or a creature back also takes the level from 6 down to 5.

Spellcasting

Spells come from the Spells tab of the library. A character learns and prepares them in the Spellbook tab, and casts them from the action bar in a fight or from the sheet outside one.

Spellbook tab

The Spellbook tab of the character detail card lists every spell that the class of the character can learn, grouped by spell level. It also lists any spell that the character knows from another source. Each spell is a card with its name and one line with the school, the casting time, and the range. The cards fill one column in the sidebar and several in the full sheet.

A multiclass caster picks the class that a new spell records under. The list offers the caster classes whose spell list has the spell. If no class has it, the list offers every caster class. A spectator sees the details but no actions.

Cast dialog

If you press Cast with no target or recipient ticked, the dialog stays open and shows “Pick at least one target.” No slot is spent. A utility spell or a summons needs no target.

The spell attack bonus is the proficiency bonus plus the spell ability modifier, minus any exhaustion penalty.

The app follows the bonus action spell rule on the caster’s own turn. After a spell cast with the bonus action, the caster can cast only a cantrip with a casting time of one action for the rest of the turn. A spell of 1st level or higher, a reaction spell, and a spell cast with the second action of Action Surge are all blocked. After a spell of 1st level or higher cast with the action, a bonus action spell is blocked. An action cantrip blocks nothing. The rule does not apply on another combatant’s turn, so Shield stays open after a bonus action spell. A repeat of a spell that an earlier turn paid for is not a new cast, and the rule skips it. Giving back the bonus action on the action bar also clears the spell that it paid for.

A hit of Ray of Sickness also rolls the CON save of the target. The target list shows that save bonus beside the AC. A hit of Vampiric Touch gives the caster hit points equal to half the damage the target took, after its resistances, and the log records the amount.

Sleep and Color Spray roll a pool of hit points in place of a save, and Power Word Kill compares the current HP of the target with its limit of

1. The dialog lists the targets by name only, because none of them rolls a save. The app reads the HP of each target when you click Cast, not when the dialog opens. See Hit-point rules.

A spell can have creature-type rules, which the spell form in the Library sets under No effect on, Only affects, No effect if immune to, Save at disadvantage, and Maximum damage. The app applies them to each target by its creature type. Hold Person and Charm Person affect only humanoids, and a creature with no type still counts, so you decide for it. Sleep passes over undead and creatures immune to Charmed, and the log names the reason. The healing spells have no effect on undead or constructs. Blight skips undead and constructs, and a plant saves at disadvantage and takes the maximum damage. Sunburst and Sunbeam give undead and oozes disadvantage on the save. See Creature types.

A Chill Touch hit stops the target from regaining hit points until the start of the next turn of the caster, and a heal on it logs that it has no effect. An undead target also attacks the caster at disadvantage until the end of the next turn of the caster. The spell form sets this second chip under Extra chip on some creature types, which shows once A hit imposes a condition is ticked. The group names the creature types, the chip name, the turn that ends it, and its mods, which include Stops healing and Attacks the caster at disadvantage. The extra chip has no save.

A buff with a range of Self, such as Shield, offers only the caster as its target. The chip of Shield, Shield of Faith, Mage Armor, or Barkskin changes the AC that the sheet, the combatant cards, and every later attack read. On a creature, Mage Armor replaces the authored AC when 13 plus DEX is higher, and a creature has no shield field, so a shield that is part of the authored AC does not add to the Mage Armor AC. See Armor class.

Aid raises the HP maximum and current HP of its targets while its chip lasts. False Life and Heroism grant temporary hit points, and the log records each grant. Heroism grants them at the start of each turn of its target, and it ends and blocks Frightened. The temporary hit points of a spell end with its chip. See Hit points and immunity.

Faerie Fire gives advantage on attack rolls against each creature that fails its save, and Blur gives disadvantage on attack rolls against the caster. Protection from Evil and Good gives disadvantage only to an attacker whose creature type is on its list, so a creature with no type set gets no disadvantage. Greater Invisibility leaves an Invisible chip. A hit of Guiding Bolt leaves a chip that gives advantage on the next attack roll against the target, and a failed save against Vicious Mockery leaves a chip that gives disadvantage on the next attack roll of the target. Each of these two chips ends on that roll, hit or miss, and the log notes it. A weapon attack and a spell attack both read all of these chips, and the log line of a weapon attack names each chip that slanted it.

Haste gives its target +2 AC, advantage on DEX saves, and one more weapon swing on each of its turns. The combat card counts the extra swing in the swings left. When Haste ends by any path, including a chip that you remove by hand, the target gets a Lethargic chip, and the log notes it. Next turn steps past a lethargic combatant on its next turn, and the chip ends at the end of that turn. The target keeps its concentration and its reactions. See Speed of action.

A spell that the caster still keeps open from an earlier turn, such as Spiritual Weapon, casts as a repeat. The dialog is titled Repeat and has no slot picker and no ritual box. A repeat spends no slot and skips the component and armor checks, because the first cast passed them. It still costs the action or bonus action that the spell names.

The app refuses a cast for these reasons, in this order, and spends nothing on a refusal:

1. A material component is missing. A component with a cost, or one that the spell destroys, must be the item itself. Any other component is covered by a component pouch or a focus.
2. The caster wears armor that it is not trained for.
3. The turn cannot pay the action cost, or the casting time is longer than one turn.

Only a character has an inventory, so a creature is never asked for a component. A cast that consumes its component removes the item from the inventory.

Concentration

A caster, character or creature, keeps at most one concentration spell. A new concentration spell ends the old one.

When a concentration spell ends, the conditions that it put on other creatures end, and the creatures that it summoned leave.

Summons

A summoning spell puts creatures from a library template on the tile of the party, at full health. The built-in example is Conjure Animals, which brings eight Wolf creatures, sixteen with a 5th-level slot, twenty-four with a 7th-level slot, and thirty-two with a 9th-level slot. If the library has no template with the name that the spell gives, the cast dialog refuses the spell.

The side that a summon fights on is the disposition of its template. A hostile template fights the party. To summon an ally, write a friendly template in the library.

If a fight is running, the summons join the initiative order. See Initiative. The end of the spell removes the creatures that it brought.

Characters

Party roster

The Party card lists the characters. The selected character sets what the character detail card shows.

Open player tab is an ordinary link, so a middle-click or the “Open in new tab” menu of the browser also works on it. Spectator tab is a button. It always opens a new browser tab, and it has no link menu.

Character summary card

The Sheet tab of the sidebar shows a summary card of the selected character. It has what a GM reads during play:

• the name, the race, the HP bar, and the Damage and Heal controls
• the level line with AC, initiative, speed, passive Perception, the proficiency bonus, and XP
• the spell slot lines
• the level-up banner
• Checks and saves, a grid with a button for each plain ability check and each saving throw. A click rolls it through the dice tray. A solid dot marks a proficient save
• the counters of limited resources, such as Second Wind
• the Conditions block, with exhaustion
• the 18 skills, one line each with the bonus. A click rolls the skill

Open full sheet at the top of the card opens everything else. A Player tab bound to a character shows the same card and the same button.

Full sheet

Open full sheet at the top of the summary card opens the sheet the width of the page, in the way the combat screen takes the page. The party row menu (the three-dot button) has Open full sheet too, and the C key opens and closes it in Play mode. With an empty party, the button hides and the C key does nothing. The map, the party dock, and the sidebar hide while it is open. The bar along the top has Back to the map and one tab per party member. Left and Right move between the tabs, and Home and End go to the first and last. Back to the map or Escape closes it and puts focus back on the control that opened it. In a text field, such as the inventory search, Escape clears the field and leaves the sheet open. A switch to Build mode or a fight shows that mode, and the full sheet comes back on the return to Play. At phone width the view bar at the bottom of the screen hides while the full sheet is open.

The full sheet has four tabs.

Sheet contents

The top of the sheet shows the name, the race, and a tall HP bar the width of the card, with the current and maximum HP above it. Under the bar, the GM gets a Damage button, an amount field, and a Heal button. The amount field sets how many HP each click moves. It starts at 1. The level line gives AC, initiative (Init), speed, passive Perception (PP), the proficiency bonus (Prof), and XP. Init includes the exhaustion penalty, as the initiative roll of a fight does.

A caster gets one line per spell level, such as “1st”, then the pips, then the free count, such as “3 of 4”. A filled pip is a free slot. A spent pip is a hollow ring, dimmed and struck through. A click on a pip spends or restores a slot. Each line names its count for a screen reader and in its tooltip, such as “Level 1 slots: 3 of 4 free”.

While a character has a level to assign, an ability score improvement, or a class feature choice left, a banner at the top of the sheet says so, such as “Ready to level up: 1 level to assign.” The GM’s Level up button opens the full sheet. For a pending level, it then opens Assign a level. For an improvement or a feature choice, it moves focus to the +2 ability or Choose button of the Progression block. A Player tab shows the banner with no button. The party row of the character shows a Level up mark at the same time.

The Character tab of the full sheet adds these items to the summary:

• the ability scores with their modifiers, which replace the quick-roll grid
• the six saving throws, with the bonus of each
• Add pool and the edit buttons of custom resource pools
• the Progression block, with the hit-dice pool
• the Features section, with one card for each class feature, race trait, and feat. A class feature with a claimed choice has a Change button for the GM. Cancel in its dialog keeps the current choice
• the castable spells

A dot in front of each save or skill shows how trained the character is.

A key under passive Perception shows the solid and the ringed dot.

Passive Perception is 10 plus the Perception bonus. Compare it against a hidden thing when nobody says they are looking.

A click on a save or a skill rolls it with a d20 and the whole bonus. The roll goes through the dice tray, but the tray stays closed, and the dice and the modifier that you set up in the tray stay as they were. The log shows the parts of the number: the ability modifier, the proficiency or expertise, and any condition chip that adds to the roll.

Guidance and Resistance add to one roll only. The first check or save that they change removes their chip. In the Library, the spell form marks this kind of spell with One roll only.

The DC is the DC field of the dice tray. Type a DC there once, and each save or skill that you roll from the sheet reports success or failure against it, in the toast and in the log, as in “against DC 13 from the dice tray”. The field keeps what you typed until you clear it. An attack or a death save compares against its own target and leaves the field alone. With the field blank, nothing judges the roll, so compare the total against the DC that you have in mind. The d20 mode of the dice tray applies, and the log names the die that it dropped.

The Conditions block shows the chips and the held spell with its Drop control. While the character is at 0 HP, it also shows the death-save tracker with its Roll and Stabilize controls. The tracker shows the same pips and words as the combat screen.

Expertise doubles the proficiency bonus for a skill. The Expertise features of the Rogue and the Bard grant it. When such a feature unlocks, a prompt offers the proficient skills.

The picks show in the class features list with a Change button. An unclaimed grant waits in the Progression block as a pending feature choice with a Choose button. The Set expertise button is a manual grant with no maximum, for a subclass or homebrew feature that the class catalog does not model. The button shows to the GM for any character with at least one skill proficiency, and it offers only the proficient skills. The line “No expertise chosen” shows only for a character with a class feature or a feat that grants expertise.

Creation and progression

Creation picks a class, a race, and a background, and offers the skill choices of the class. From these three choices, the sheet assembles the proficiencies: saving throws, skills, weapons, armor, tools, and languages. Every list stays editable afterward.

The class sets the hit die, and the class with its subclass sets the caster type. Max HP comes from the hit die plus the CON modifier per level.

Spell slots follow the 5e table. A multiclass character combines its casting classes on the combined-caster-level table.

A character with no class still works. Its HP then follows a flat growth curve, and it gains no proficiencies.

The total XP of a character follows the SRD table.

The sheet header shows the total against the start of the next level. A character made at a higher level starts at the XP where that level begins.

Enough XP does not level a character with a class on its own. Each earned level waits as a pending level. The GM assigns it to a class, either the current class or a new one.

The proficiency bonus follows the assigned class levels. So a pending level does not raise the bonus until the GM assigns it.

An assignment does these things:

• It grows HP by the hit die of that class.
• It adds a hit die.
• It advances the spell slots. A new spell level arrives full, and a slot already spent stays spent.
• On an ability score improvement level, it leaves a pending choice: +2 across one or two abilities, up to 20, or a feat by name.

Both choices can be undone from the same block. The feat list shows a built-in feat that the character does not qualify for as disabled, and it names the prerequisite. An example is Grappler for a STR 8 Wizard. The prerequisite of a feat that you wrote in the library is display text only, so you enforce it.

A class feature with choices, such as the Expertise of the Rogue, prompts when its level is assigned. A choice with only one possible pick applies with no prompt. A cancel keeps the grant pending, and the Choose button in the Progression block offers it again.

The hit-dice pool can be spent. The Spend button in the Progression block spends one die outside a rest, and it asks first, so a click in the middle of a fight does not heal by mistake.

Fighting styles

The Fighting Style feature of the Fighter (level 1), the Paladin (level 2), and the Ranger (level 2) waits in the Progression block as a pending feature choice. Click Choose and pick one style. The class features list shows the pick with a Change button. A character with the feature from two classes takes a different style each time.

The attack log line names Archery, and the hit line names Dueling and Great Weapon Fighting.

Disciple of Life

A Life Domain cleric adds 2 + the spell slot level to each target of a healing spell of 1st level or higher, such as Cure Wounds or Healing Word. An upcast uses the higher slot. The heal line in the log ends in “, Disciple of Life +N”. A spell that rolls no healing dice (Lesser Restoration), a revive, and a stabilize get no bonus. The class features list on the sheet shows the feature from cleric level 1.

Class feature pools

The app gives each character a resource pool for every class feature that has a count of uses. The class levels and the ability scores set the size of each pool, so you do not type it in. A new level adds its uses unspent, and a class that the character no longer has takes its pool away.

Custom pools

The GM can add a pool for any count of uses that the class list does not give, such as the charges of a wand. Click Add pool below the resource list of the sheet, and set the name, the number of uses, and Refills on. A Long rest pool refills on a long rest, a Short rest pool refills on either rest, and a No rest pool refills only when the GM restores it with the plus button. Each row shows its rest in brackets. The pencil button edits a custom pool, and the bin button removes it. A class feature pool has no edit button, because the class levels set its size and its rest.

Subclasses

A class can take a subclass from its subclass level.

The Progression block shows a Choose button for each class at that level, and a Change button after the pick. The assignment of the subclass level also asks for the pick. Only the GM can set a subclass.

The list offers the SRD subclass of each class. The Fighter also offers the Eldritch Knight, and the Rogue also offers the Arcane Trickster.

The Eldritch Knight and the Arcane Trickster cast spells. Each one learns from the wizard list with INT, as a known caster with no rituals. The slots follow the third-caster table below, and a spell can be no higher than the top slot level.

In a multiclass, each of these subclasses adds a third of its class level to the combined caster level. A class with no slots yet at its own level does not join the combined table. So a Fighter 4 (Eldritch Knight) / Paladin 1 keeps the Eldritch Knight slots.

A change away from a casting subclass removes its slots, and it removes the spells that the character learned under that class. A later change back gives full slots. While a class has a subclass on its subclass level, that level cannot move to a new class.

The Spells block of the character sheet warns when a spell list breaks a subclass rule. The warning does not block the list, so a GM can allow it.

• The spell schools of each subclass. The Eldritch Knight uses abjuration and evocation, and the Arcane Trickster uses enchantment and illusion. The spells learned at class levels 3, 8, 14, and 20 can come from any school.
• The number of leveled spells that each subclass knows: 3 at class level 3, 4 at level 4, and 13 at level 20. Only the spells learned under the subclass count, so the wizard spells of a Fighter (Eldritch Knight) / Wizard do not.
• Mage Hand as one of the Arcane Trickster cantrips.

Eldritch invocations

A warlock picks its eldritch invocations and its pact boon when it gains a warlock level in the Progression block. Only the GM can pick either one. The level-up asks for the pact boon at warlock level 3, and for the new invocations at each level that raises the count. It then offers one optional swap of a known invocation for another that qualifies. A pick that the GM cancels stays pending, and the Warlock choices pending row asks for it again, with no swap. The Invocations row shows how many invocations the warlock has and how many its level allows. The GM edit buttons set the boon and the invocations freely, with no swap limit, and list only the invocations that the warlock qualifies for. An invocation qualifies when the warlock level is high enough, the warlock knows the cantrip that it names, and the warlock has the pact boon that it names. The Pact boon row appears from warlock level 3. The Invocation rules list under the rows shows what each picked invocation does.

The spells that the invocations cast list on the character sheet and in combat. A spell that the spellbook does not have goes in its own Invocations group on the sheet. A once-per-rest spell in that group shows struck through while it is spent, and its tooltip says “spent” or “available”. A cast through an invocation uses the warlock save DC and attack bonus, and the log names the invocation, as in “Wren casts Mage Armor (Armor of Shadows).”

A Pact of the Blade warlock marks its pact weapon in the Inventory tab. Each weapon or bow row has a sword button, labeled Make (weapon) the pact weapon, that marks it, and the same button clears the mark. The marked row shows a Pact weapon badge. One weapon at a time is the pact weapon, and the mark goes away when the weapon leaves the inventory. Thirsting Blade and Lifedrinker read the mark.

The app does not enforce these invocation rules, so you enforce them:

• The creature types of Chains of Carceri, and its limit of one cast on each creature per long rest.
• The push of Repelling Blast. The board does not move a token by feet, so you move the token.
• The ritual casting of a warlock with Book of Ancient Secrets. The app offers the ritual box for a ritual in the Book of Shadows only, but a ritual that the warlock also knows as a warlock spell casts with a slot.
• How the Pact of the Blade summons the pact weapon, and the familiar of the Pact of the Chain with the invocations that use it. The pact weapon does not count as magical against resistance to nonmagical damage.

Pact of the Tome

A warlock with the Pact of the Tome keeps a Book of Shadows. The level-up that picks the boon asks for three cantrips from the list of any class, and the Book of Shadows cantrips row in the Progression block changes them. The book cantrips join the spellbook as warlock spells, so they use CHA and the warlock save DC. They do not count against the cantrip limit, so the Spellbook tab reads, for example, “Cantrips 5/5” for two class cantrips and three book cantrips.

A change of the pact boon away from the Pact of the Tome removes the Book of Shadows. Its cantrips leave the spellbook, and a cantrip that the warlock knew from a class before the book stays. To keep a book cantrip, forget it in the Spellbook tab and learn it again as a class cantrip before you change the boon.

The Book of Ancient Secrets invocation adds rituals to the book. The pick asks for two 1st-level rituals from the list of any class. To copy more rituals later, click Add ritual on the Book rituals row. The list offers rituals up to half the warlock level, rounded up. A ritual in the book lists with the other spells on the sheet, and it casts only as a ritual, with no slot and ten minutes more. The GM decides when the warlock finds a ritual to copy, and the app does not charge the gold or the time of the copy. A warlock who loses the invocation loses the rituals too, so the invocation picked again asks for two new rituals.

Mystic Arcanum

At warlock levels 11, 13, 15, and 17, the level-up asks for one warlock spell of 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th level. The list offers the warlock spells of that level in the library. A level left at None stays pending, and the Warlock choices pending row asks for it again. The Mystic Arcanum row in the Progression block lists the picks, and its GM edit button changes them.

An arcanum spell casts once per long rest at its own level with no spell slot. It lists in a Mystic Arcanum group on the character sheet, and with the other spells in combat. While it is spent, its chip shows struck through, and a cast refuses until a long rest. If the spellbook also has the spell, the app first asks How to cast: the arcanum with no slot, or a spell slot. The log names the feature, as in “Wren casts Circle of Death (Mystic Arcanum).”

Inventory and equipment

The Equipment tab shows nine slot cards around a plate with the character’s name and AC: Helmet, Armor, Gloves, Greaves, Main hand, Off hand, Ranged, Ring 1, and Ring 2. A card shows the item’s name and one short stat line, such as “AC 17, heavy” or “1d8 slashing”. Click a card to open its picker. The picker lists Empty and every item that the slot accepts, each with its full details, and Equip puts the chosen item in the slot. 5e armor has no Helmet, Gloves, or Greaves slot, so those three are a house rule. The item form marks their types with “(house rule)”, and a note under the AC row says so too.

One item fills as many slots as its quantity. So a single ring goes on one hand, and a pair of daggers can fill both hands. A two-handed weapon in the main hand empties the off hand. The Off hand card reads “Both hands on” the weapon, and it stays closed until the weapon comes out of the main hand.

The Inventory tab has a search box over names and descriptions, a type filter, and one collapsible heading per item type. Under each heading, every item is a tile with its name, one short stat line, a badge such as “x41” for a stack, and an “Equipped” mark for an item in a slot. Click a tile to show the item in the detail pane, which has its full effects, its description, and the edit, give, count, use, and discard controls. On a wide screen the pane sits beside the tiles, and on a narrow one it sits under them.

Only the GM adds an item. A player uses, gives away, and discards what the character carries.

A consumable with heal dice heals when a character uses it. Use one opens a dialog that asks who drinks it. The character who carries it is first, and any other party character can take it, so a character can pour a potion into a downed ally. The tray rolls the heal with no target, and a heal above 0 HP ends the dying state. A dead character cannot take a potion, and the potion stays on the stack. In a fight, on the turn of the character who carries it, a potion costs the action. The app does not check that the two characters stand on the same tile.

The heal dice belong to the item, so a renamed potion still heals. To make a custom healing item, such as a Troll Draught that heals 3d6, add a consumable and set Heals when drunk. A consumable with no heal dice is a plain consumable, and Use one only takes it off the stack. A potion from an older save that has no heal dice gets them on load when its name matches one of the potions above.

An edit keeps the item equipped, because it is the same item. A type change that its slot cannot accept takes the item off. When the last of a stack is removed, the item comes off.

Time, story, and dice

Time and rests

The Time panel shows the in-game day and watch, for example “Day 3, Dusk”. A day has six watches: Dawn, Morning, Midday, Afternoon, Dusk, and Night. Only a GM tab shows the buttons. A walk of the party also moves the clock on, by the time that Party movement lists for each map.

When time passes, every condition, timed stat change, and concentration with a round count loses that many rounds. One that runs out ends. So Bless cast between fights is gone after a rest, while an effect that lasts 8 hours still has 4 hours left after one watch.

A rest that lifts a dying character above 0 HP clears the death-save tracker. A character that is already dead keeps its exhaustion level.

Quests

A row of buttons at the top of the Story tab names the Quests, NPCs, and Handouts cards with the number of entries in each. The Quests count includes the quests in a folded group. A click on one opens that card and scrolls to it. Each card also has a chevron button in its top-right corner that folds the card to its title, and the browser remembers which cards you folded.

The Quests panel in the Story tab lists active and completed quests.

A folded quest is one line: the status mark, the title, the count of objectives done (such as “1 of 4”), the chevron, and the eye. A click on the title or the chevron opens the quest. The open details list the objectives, each with a checkbox that marks it done, and several objectives can be done at once. Each objective also has controls to hide it from players or reveal it, to move it up or down, and to remove it. A click on a link chip shows the linked place on the map.

When you mark a GM-only objective of a revealed quest done, a dialog asks whether to reveal the objective to players. When you mark the last open objective done, a dialog offers to complete the quest. Completing a quest shows a toast and writes a travelogue line. The line of a quest that players cannot see is GM-only. Reopening a quest writes no line.

The Unlocks field of the quest dialog lists the other quests that this quest leads to. When you complete a quest that unlocks hidden quests, the dialog lists each of them under Also reveal, ticked. Clear a box to keep that quest hidden. Each revealed quest gets its own travelogue line. This dialog also comes up when you click the status mark of such a quest. The Player view never shows the Unlocks list. A deleted quest leaves every Unlocks list.

The reward fields of the quest dialog are Reward gold (gp), Reward XP, and Pay. Pay is either “To each living character” or “As a total, split evenly”. A total splits among the living characters and rounds down. When you complete a quest with a reward, the dialog shows the three fields with the reward filled in, and you can change them first. The gold goes into the Gold stack of each character, or into the first item whose name starts with “Gold”. A character with neither gets a new “Gold (gp)” item. A dead character gets no share. The travelogue line reads, for example, “The party receives 50 gp and 300 XP each.” Set both amounts to 0 to remove the reward.

On a window wider than about 1,090 pixels, the Quests panel grows with its list, and the Story tab scrolls around it. On a narrower window, the panel scrolls once its list is taller than most of the window. A click on a control keeps the scroll position, and a revealed or hidden quest keeps its place in the order.

The Player view lists only revealed quests. It shows the objectives that are not hidden, and it hides the notes and the links.

NPCs

The NPCs panel in the Story tab lists the friendly and neutral creatures near the party. Each row shows a disposition badge, the location, and the chips.

In a GM tab, the Here and All switch above the list picks its scope. Here lists the NPCs near the party, as in the table. All lists every friendly and neutral creature in the campaign, on any map, so you can look up an NPC without moving the party. A Player tab has no switch. The party meets a placed NPC when it lands on the tile of that NPC. The meeting writes one travelogue line. If you move the NPC, it counts as not met until the party lands on its new tile. A move onto the party tile keeps the NPC met, whether it comes from Move to the party in the edit dialog or from the buttons below.

In a GM tab, each row of the NPCs panel has two more controls. The Travels with party toggle makes the NPC a companion, and it shows a check mark while it is on. A companion moves to the party tile each time the party moves, into and out of child maps too. A companion at 0 HP stays behind. Turning the toggle on also brings the NPC to the party, and turning it off leaves the NPC where it stands. Each change writes a GM-only travelogue line. The arrow button, “Bring to the party”, moves the NPC to the party tile once.

Long notes show two lines, and More shows the rest. The condition chips and the exhaustion pips of an NPC row show only while the NPC is in the running fight, or while it still has a condition or a level of exhaustion.

An NPC stands on any map at a column and a row, or it stays unplaced. An unplaced NPC appears everywhere. Columns and rows count from 1, the same as the numbers along the map edges.

The notes of an NPC are GM-only. The Player view lists the NPC with its role and disposition, without its notes.

Handouts

A handout is read-aloud text or lore, with an optional picture.

A handout starts hidden. The eye toggle reveals it to players or hides it again. A badge beside the title reads Shown or Hidden. A shown handout lists its text under the title. In a GM tab, a long text shows three lines, and More shows the rest. A Player tab shows the whole text.

When the party, or a character on their own tile, steps onto a tile with a hidden handout, the GM tab shows a message such as “The party stands on ‘Dorn’s Manifest’.” with a Reveal button. The message comes after any encounter dialog. Each handout gives this message once per session. A parchment note on the tile marks each hidden handout on the map, and only the GM sees it.

The GM sees every handout of the node where the party stands. A line under each row names the tile of the handout and the characters who see it.

A Player tab lists a handout under the current spot only when all of these conditions are true:

• The GM revealed it.
• It is campaign-wide, or bound to the node of the party, or bound to the tile where the party stands.
• It has no chosen characters, or the tab plays one of them. A spectator tab never lists a handout that has chosen characters.

A Player tab also lists every other revealed handout for its character in a Revealed earlier group below the handouts of the current spot. The group comes from the campaign, so a Player tab that opens late, or opens on a new device, lists the same handouts as a tab that was open all along. A handout leaves the group when the GM hides or deletes it. An erase stroke, a smaller node size, or a regeneration of the node can remove the tile of a handout. The handout then binds to the whole node. An undo of the erase or the regeneration binds it to its tile again.

Travelogue

The Travelogue in the Log tab records events automatically, newest first. Each entry shows the in-game day and watch when it happened, such as “Day 1, Dusk”. A line from a fight adds the round, such as “Day 1, Dusk, round 2”. Hover the time to see the local time of the entry. An entry saved without an in-game time shows the local time instead. The combat log shows only the round, such as “Round 2”.

Clear log deletes every entry after a confirmation.

Dice tray

The Dice Tray collapses to a d20 icon with the label Roll dice. The full tray builds a roll from steppers, and it does not read typed dice expressions.

The tray shows the latest result at its top. The total is large, and the dice faces and the modifier sit beside it in small type, as in “d20 (5) + 3”. A roll with a target ends with a line such as “vs 15: fail”. Every roll also goes into the Travelogue under the name of the roller. The name is “The GM” for a GM tab, the character name for a bound tab, and “A player” for a spectator tab.

An attack or a death save from the app opens the tray and shows its roll there. The dice counts and the modifier keep what you set, so your next Roll is your own roll and not a repeat of the attack. An attack judges against the AC of its target for that roll only, and the DC field keeps the value that you typed. A save or a skill from the character sheet rolls in the tray without opening it. A roll that names its own mode uses that mode for one roll only, and it leaves the d20 mode as it was.

The library

Library mode curates the templates that the preset pickers offer. It has four tabs.

A custom entry overrides a default with the same name. For equipment, the name and the type must both match. An edit that changes the disposition of a creature moves the entry to the other subtab.

The Spells tab has Class, Level, and School filters beside the name filter, and the Creatures tab has a Challenge rating filter on both subtabs. Each filter offers only the values that the entries of the subtab in view have, and a filter with no values hides.

The equipment form shows its Preset picker only for a new entry. An edit of an existing entry hides it, because a pick would overwrite the stats of the entry.

Customizations live outside the campaign. New and Load example replace the campaign and never change the library. A campaign export bundles the customizations, and a campaign import offers to restore them. See Campaign controls.

The Library file card sits at the top of Library mode, above the tabs.

At startup, if the browser has no customizations, the app loads library/campaign-library.json from the project directory. The merged lists apply at once everywhere that the app reads the presets.

Keyboard control

Press ? anywhere for the shortcut reference.

Save, Undo, Redo, and the mode keys work in a GM tab only. The map keys work after you click the map or move focus to it.

The map is a focusable widget with a visible focus ring. A screen-reader live region names the current node, its size, the party position, and the number of points of interest. The region updates as these values change.

A list after the map names the points of interest, and a screen reader reads it on demand. In Play mode, the list names only the points of interest that the tooltip names: revealed, discovered if discoverable, and within detection range. It reads the notes in a GM tab only.

A second live region names the cursor cell after each arrow key. It gives the column and row, the art, the point of interest, and whether the cell is explored.

The ways out of a sub-region are real buttons. Tab past the map, and they show over it, each with its way out. For example: “Return to Barrow of the Old King, through the stairs up at column 11, row 7”.

The turn ribbon and the board of the combat screen are one tab stop each. Arrow keys move between chips and between cards, and Enter or Space picks a target. A live region announces each turn. When one side is down, it says “The fight is over.” once and stops reading turns. Each action pip is a toggle button named for its cost, such as “Bonus action spent”, and a screen reader reads whether it is pressed.

Mouse and touch control

The map grid shows X and Y labels along the top and left edges. When the grid edge scrolls out of view, the labels stay at the edges of the viewport at partial opacity.