What RW features have become your unexpected favorites?

[wurzel]

Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

For me, I'm very happy with current Player View functionality and don't have any desire to share things on the fly with my player's devices. But different DMs and players have different play styles and needs/wants.

That is exactly the way I see it as well.

There are lots of other things that really need to be implemented and are IMHO way more important (for me, data export/import/realm copy etc.).

[Farling]

I've found that preparing one or two adventure paths before ever using RW at the table has meant that I have to go back and change some of the structure of the information in RW to make it more useful :-(

The reveal history function (as shown in the latest video) is actually surprisingly useful for players. One of my players uses it to remind himself what has happened so that his journal entry (on Obsidian Portal currently) contains more information for the other players who haven't yet discovered the wonder of RW.

[adzling]

Odd, for me this is THE single most important aspect of Realmworks.
Not being able to share content in real-time that I have spent countless hours entering into realmworks is rather crippling.....

I mean shouldn't we be able to print or share with players the content we spent countless hours entering into the dang software?!?

Originally Posted by wurzel

That is exactly the way I see it as well.

There are lots of other things that really need to be implemented and are IMHO way more important (for me, data export/import/realm copy etc.).

[AEIOU]

Export and print have always been my top two items. As a GM, they are absolutely indispensable. They are way more important than calendars or player journals as those we can and have worked around; but these two items we're dead in the water with absolutely no options.

RW is an ominous blackhole -- everything goes in and nothing comes out.

[MNBlockHead]

Originally Posted by adzling

Odd, for me this is THE single most important aspect of Realmworks.
Not being able to share content in real-time that I have spent countless hours entering into realmworks is rather crippling.....

I mean shouldn't we be able to print or share with players the content we spent countless hours entering into the dang software?!?

I see printing as distinct from instantaneous reveal outside of the player view. Yes, printing is needed. That, like so much else, it tied to development of the Content Market.

As for needing to have revealed content available for display on player devices as you reveal it, without needing both GM and players to manually sync, that is something that for some users is much more important than others.

RW was designed, for better or worse, to have live sharing done with the player view, which means connecting another monitor to your computer. The Player Version of RW is meant to be used to view revealed content between sessions or to look up information from past sessions at the table.

I don't mean to argue over whether that is good design choice or not and am not trying to discount your needs and preferences. I'm just explaining, how for my use use, I've found the player view as currently implemented meets my needs and is much more useful than I anticipated when I purchased the software.

Actually, I find it interesting that I seem to be on the other extreme. I just watched the most recent spotlight series. One feature I don't make good use of is session tracking. I always forget to start my session and end up just entering the dates and session notes retroactively. The Spotlight series showed how if you use session tracking you can later filter the review history to show what was revealed during that session. That looks very useful, but the problem is that I just don't see myself revealing topics and snippets during play. I find that distracting an unenjoyable. I apply all my reveals between sessions, which also gives me time to tidy up content and give some additional information.

So, even if I could share content during game without the current manual sync process, it wouldn't be much use to me as I don't reveal anything during play. I know that my process is not the workflow for which the reveal functionality was designed, but it may help explain why I feel less urgency for more instantaneous content sharing.

[ShadowChemosh]

Originally Posted by MNBlockHead

but the problem is that I just don't see myself revealing topics and snippets during play. I find that distracting an unenjoyable.

I have found this be really helpful to do during the game. As I set each "scene/encounter" up in RW I pre-reveal the snippets that I know the PC's need to know right away. I add "DM" notes often to these sections if I need "rules" for DC's or skills in addition.

During the game as the Scene happens I reveal the whole topic and those "snippets" now show as bright green. This brings my attention to those sections to help remind me to "give" this information to the players. DM's have allot to remember and keep track off. Anything that highlights what I should be telling players is great in my book.

I still have other "snippets" that are not yet revealed because they are based on what the PCs do in the "scene/encounter". As the information or treasure is given to the PCs I then reveal those snippets as well. This is great for two reasons. 1) Players using RW can later see what they learned via the history or via searches. 2) This acts as a reminder to myself of what "exactly" did the PCs get out of the encounter/scene.

You just have to get use to talking to the players and quickly interacting with RW. But at most its a simple "button" press to reveal something and usually not very distracting (the first few games maybe but you will get better/faster). Just do it quickly and for myself I always keep the laptop angled to my "side". I don't want a barrier between me and the players so its not setup "directly" in front of me. The mouse is simply located where my hand naturally rests and just click the button and quickly return to looking at the players. This prevents the players from thinking I am not paying attention to them but instead that I as a DM have many things to track and they got 90% of my attention.

[adzling]

In regards to what MNblockhead wrote I would respond, what about text?
You can reveal image snippets to players but there is no way to show the players text snippets on your secondary display.

This is, plainly, nuts.

Most content entered is textual, so why should you not be able to share it via the player view (or even better via the Player Edition in a live manner)?

Although Realmworks is a central part of our gaming sessions now AEIOU is correct imho, Realmworks is a content blackhole.

The developers really should work on printing and live player previews via web or player edition. It would make our use of Realmworks 100% more beneficial.

100% is a lot, that's like double ;-)

[ShadowChemosh]

Originally Posted by adzling

In regards to what MNblockhead wrote I would respond, what about text?
You can reveal image snippets to players but there is no way to show the players text snippets on your secondary display.

This is, plainly, nuts.

Most content entered is textual, so why should you not be able to share it via the player view (or even better via the Player Edition in a live manner)?

What are talking about? I display text all the time to my players. Especially if its a thing like a "note handout". They even have a really nice preset snippet type so I can have these as like 18+ font so easy to read.

[adzling]

urm, how do you display a single snippet in playerview?

I don't see any interface element that permits this (perhaps it's hidden somewhere?).

I only see the ability to display a whole topic, which is not very helpful when that topic contains many other snippets.

[ShadowChemosh]

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