[Roll20 Screenshot] Getting Ready to Cross Mirkwood

[Heilemann]

We're playing through To Journey's End and the Eagles' Eyrie, and on sunday I'll take the company from the Marshdwellers' sunken city through Mirkwood, into an encounter with a scouting band of orcs. I'm currently prepping the setup, and figuring out how to best make use of Roll20 alongside The One Ring. Here's the Voidstate's battle mat, prepped and ready to go. I don't count on having more than one encounter next session, but in such a case, I'd probably duplicate the battle mat and set up another one with the other tokens ready to go as well, saves a lot of time at the virtual table.

[Glorelendil]

Take note, Hermes Serpent: orcs with names.

[Heilemann]

Yeah, I figured it was better than Orc Soldier 1, Orc Soldier 2 etc. I put that number into one of the circles that pops up when I click them, so I can easily look them up in my spreadsheet if I need to. But with their endurance and hate also in the circles, I should be good to go.

I made their endurance bars viewable by the company as an experiment. It can be hard to keep track of nine different orcs, and knowing who's who and remember what shape they're in at any given point in the battle; this way they'll get some idea.

[Hermes Serpent]

Take note, Hermes Serpent: orcs with names.

I'll take a look and see if all the bad things that are creeping up on you can have individual names, but I draw the line at naming all the bats (how many variations on Squeak can you have).

The big Orc that you are chasing does have a name but you don't know what it is yet as no-one questioned the now-dead orcs earlier in the adventure.

[Elmoth]

Nice, really nice

I see Endurace, but not Hate/Hope. Where is it in the images?

[Woodclaw]

I'll take a look and see if all the bad things that are creeping up on you can have individual names, but I draw the line at naming all the bats (how many variations on Squeak can you have).

I assume that most bats speak through ultrasonics, so their name won't intelligible anyway :p

[Mim]

For whatever it's worth, I usually name Orcs. While I don't expect the heroes to leap out of their seats to chat with them , it's fun & adds (IMHO) a certain finesse when Uglúk snaps at Grishnákh. Most players seem to enjoy it.

In addition, I name many other LM characters & creatures, including Trolls & Secret Shadows, though as you point out, I also draw the line at Great Bats.

[Heilemann]

Nice, really nice

I see Endurace, but not Hate/Hope. Where is it in the images?

It's in the popup circles. Most of them have just one, so there's no need to keep too much track of it.

[Mordagnir]

I started posting a box labeled "Fellowship Pool" with chits - bearing only a Gandalf rune -- equal to the Fellowship Pool. That way, everyone at the virtual table could see at a glance how many points were in the Fellowship Pool.

I used a similar system for any cooperative and/or prolonged action: chits -- with Gandalf or Sauron runes -- would be added along a line to show successes or failures. The players wouldn't know Tolerance, but I think it helped with building tension and assisted everyone with visualizing how well the company was doing at something.

[Mordagnir]

This is a recreation of a scene in which the heroes had to save a trapped Loremaster character on the floor of a flooding subterranean chamber. Every "round," the water marker moved closer to the top. The heroes had to do a variety of things to free their companion, represented by successes and tracked with the Gandalf runes. The background images were the ones I used for the scene; particularly observant readers may note these are "dressed up" screenshots from LOTRO.

I've also included the Fellowship Pool display I referenced in my previous message.

(Edited to fix image display.)