Roll visibility

[Moerill]

This thread is for continuing and merging conversations/ideas from issues https://github.com/Moerill/Mess/issues/73 and https://github.com/Moerill/Mess/issues/71. The question is here how to handle the visibility of rolls, while making it easy to understand, while not adding to many new settings.
I'll start with some reasoning for my attack card changes:
I did like the idea of using the chat log as a log (for everyone) for what was happening, who was attacking who, etc. But i did not want to show every attack or damage throw to my players (and possibly reveal the monsters stats by doing so. This also replicates when in real play a gm rolls behind a screen and just states the result). This resulted in the eye icons for toggling the result visibility.
For this change to be useful and as i intended i added the option to force attack cards to always be public, while other rolls do adhere to the default fvtt roll behaviour.
This is where we are currently.

There was already some discussion going on in the linked threads above and i made a proposal which i, initially liked. But the goal of consistency, as mentioned by Bob, is an honourable one which i'd like to try and achieve.
Question is: how?

Idea:

• Scrub idea 1) from https://github.com/Moerill/Mess/issues/71#issuecomment-653932002
• Add a "visibility toggle" to the chat controls for the GM only. This toggles whether or not roll results should be shown automatically or not.
• Keep attack cards special in the sense that they're always public (as long as the setting was chosen)
• Make other rolls follow the FVTT roll mode selector

[bsleys]

This is more for my own sake to see if I understand the various concerns/proposals.

1. The idea was for a way to make attack to hits and damage totals to show immediately to players when rolled without the need to click the eye icon. The proposal was to add a visibility toggle to chat controls for GM's only and use it to control the default state of the reveal. The attack card is always displayed to all IE it's special and doesn't follow the foundry roll mode selector but does use the new "visibility toggle" to control the default state of the reveal of roll results.

2. To hide/show npc names on attack cards. The proposal was to use the token's setting for displaying it's name to control its visibility on the attack card.

3. The saving throw button on spell chat cards use the default foundry saving throw system. Proposal hook into the MESS saving throw system instead.

4. Saving throws and ability checks show the results to the players along with the formula to calc them thus revealing NPC stats. Proposal is the make them work similar to attack cards and only show results to players.

5. Since NPC ability checks/saves etc might need to be hidden from players have the display of the card follow the foundry roll mode selector.

IF, and I know it's a big if, I'm understanding this all properly and I was clean in my summary above.

I think I like the end result above however with a few minor clarifications.

On save's and ability checks I'd have the also follow the new "visibility button" similar to attack cards.

Now we have multiple states of the two display modes FVTT mode and MESS visibility.

FVTT mode	MESS visibility	Save/ability card player result
not public	hidden	nothing displayed (1)
not public	reveal	nothing displayed (FVTT mode overrides) (1)
public	hidden	card displays stating the GM rolled some dice (2)
public	reveal	card displays showing roll total only

1. if the GM hits the reveal button on the chat card the card is then displayed to the players along with the roll total
2. when the GM hits the reveal button on the chat card the text is replaced with the roll total.

Hope I've at least partially understood it all and when I've typed out make any sense at all. LOL

[dyoung418]

I'd like to add one other element to the above list that @bsleys summarizes.

6. On the card, next to the title of the roll (e.g. "Scimitar", or "Unarmed Strike"), also include a notation to indicate if the roll was made at advantage or disadvantage. The normal roll system does this (see blue arrow below for the strength saving throw), but the MESS cards do not show this unless I click into the roll result to inspect it. As GM, I'd like an easier, visual confirmation of how the roll was done (see red arrow) rather than needing to click into the result to confirm.

[bsleys]

That might not work till after the To Hit is rolled. You can change the adv/dis button at the bottom of the chat window after the card is displayed but prior to making the actual roll. I suggest adding it to the To Hit text right above the button so it becomes

To Hit (Advantage) 28

After the button is pressed to make the roll.

[MSAbaddon]

I'm not sure if I understand the whole topic, but I'll try to give my opinion ;-)

The attack card system for attack roll abilites as it is now is simply great - it's in fact exactly how I want visibility of rolls to be (showing advantage/disadvantage would be great though).

A suggestion for saving throw abilites: Have a look at the module 'Let Me Roll That For You'. Instead of posting a card which contains a button with the spell dc you could instead send a popup to all targeted players/creatures for the specific roll. The results of the roll could be posted in the chat the same way your attack cards are presented - showing details for NPCs only if the GM decides to show them.

I hope you understand the idea - my english is not that perfect :-)