Safety
New Templates
Thank you to Kienna Shaw and Lauren Bryant-Monk, curators of the TTRPG Safety Toolkit, for putting together the official Role Safety Templates. All accounts will automatically come with three templates to help organize and think about safety when playing on Role. The following templates are now available for everyone:
More info about Safety on Role coming soon! If you have any feedback as you use these templates please send them our way to support@playrole.com.
Ping
We encourage everyone to set proper safety boundaries ahead of a session so all players feel comfortable. In the event something comes up, we've added the ability for you to anonymously ping the entire table in real-time. When you ping the table, a notification appears on everyone's screen, as well as a message in chat. We hope this will help play groups to pause, review their safety tools of choice, and check in to make sure everyone is okay with the session.
To ping the table, open the chat and click red button with an exclamation point next to the send button.
Managing Players
Table Hosts can now manage and remove players from a table. A new menu item item located in the Settings dropdown can be found if you are the creator of the table. Removing a player from the table will do the following:
- Immediately boot the player from the table if they are currently connected to it.
- Remove the table from the player's list of joined tables.
- Remove any sheets that player added to the table.
- Remove any assets, including maps and tokens, that the player added to the table.
- Hide any messages and dice log entries the player had sent to the table.
NOTE: This does not ban the player from the table. If you want them to re-join you can simply invite them again. If you want to ensure the player cannot re-join your table, we recommend you add or change the password to the table.
Custom Modifiers and Dice Tray Updates
You can now manually add a reference or buff to your Dice Roll without needing to select something from a sheet! When you open the Dice Tray, you will see two new options: "+ Add Ref" and "+ Add Buff". Clicking one of these will open a modal where you can adjust the modifier. This modal will also list references or buffs you have selected from your sheets. If you already have a ref or buff added to your roll, you can now click them to open the same modal to adjust your modifiers as you see fit.
With this change we've also updated how the Dice Tray works:
- Moved the Cards button next to the dice, and added Roll button that will toggle open the Dice Tray.
- Opening the Dice Tray no longer requires dice to be already selected, and closing the tray no longer automatically clears your roll.
- There is an explicit "Clear" button for when you are done with your currently selected dice and modifiers.
Misc Improvements and Fixes
- Added the ability to remove a password from your table. To remove a password click "Remove Password" from within Settings > Table Info.
- Added the ability to minimize another player's roll. When a player's roll shows up, there is now a double arrow button that will minimize it so it doesn't take up as much space.
- Fixed immediately removing a player's sheets and assets if they permanently leave a table.
- Fixed re-sending your roll to other players if you toggle Private Roll off.
Fixed a bug with shuffling cards where the state of the deck was not saved. This caused drawn cards to stay drawn on page refresh instead of actually being shuffled back into the deck.
Text Chat is now available at all Tables on Role! Chat with your party, private message individual players, and view a log of all public dice rolls. You'll see a new Chat Button at the bottom right of your Table just above the Assets bar. Clicking that will open the "Everything" chat where you can see a public chat with all players at the table plus any dice rolls. Use the "Show Chat" dropdown to view only messages from people, the dice log, or to start a private message with someone. Here is the list of chat options you have available today:
- Everything: A public chat for everyone at the table plus all public dice rolls.
- Everyone: The same public chat from Everything minus the dice rolls.
- Dice Log: All public dice rolls by anyone at the table. Private dice rolls are never logged.
- Private Message: You'll see a list of every person at the table that you can select to start a private conversation.
All text chat histories will remain available so long as the table is active. This means you can leave, come back later, and pick up right where you left off. We also keep track of your last read message so you always know if there is something to catch up on when you return.
Misc Improvements and Fixes
- Toggling off a private roll will resend any current dice information to other players at the table.
- Fixed a crash that occurred when deleting a table and heading back to the dashboard.
- Fixed a crash when viewing a sheet that another player removes from the table.
You can now share sheets with everyone at the table! To share a sheet, open the sheet's options menu by clicking the gear icon located at the top right of the sheet and selecting "Share with Table". This gives all players at the table the ability to view the sheet and edit it. Any player at a table can share a sheet. Shared sheets still belong to the person who shared it and will still live in that person's account. Please note that a sheet that is marked as private and shared, will be viewable and editable by everyone at the table. Meaning that sharing a sheet ignores its privacy. This change now gives sheets three possible statuses at a table:
- Public: The sheet is viewable by everyone at the table and editable only by the owner. This is the default for any sheet added or created at a table.
- Private: The sheet is viewable and editable only by the owner.
- Shared: The sheet is viewable and editable by everyone at the table (even if it is marked as Private).
NOTE: If two players edit a sheet at the same time, the person whose changes are submitted to the server first will override the other person's edits. To help with this, shared sheets will have inputs highlighted when someone is editing it so you can be aware of any incoming changes. We've intentionally made the player making the edits anonymous so that this feature can support group safety tools such as Lines & Veils.
With this feature we have updated the UX around viewing/selecting sheets at the table. We have added an explicit dropdown located above the sheet panel. This dropdown will list all players that are part of the table plus a new option labeled "Table". Selecting this will show sheets that are shared.
Previously, you could select a player's sheets by clicking on the name in the header of any sheet. We have removed that functionality and have added showing the status of the sheet next to the player's name.
Misc Improvements and Fixes
- You can now set a sheet as your Primary Sheet at a table. Primary Sheets load first and will be listed as your default sheet at the table. You can set this by opening the sheet's option menu and clicking "Set as Primary".
- If you select "Viewing Sheets" for a player with no sheets at the table, we now tell you they have no sheets instead of having the UI do nothing.
- Fixed being able to fully backspace out a modifier value and then typing. Previously, it would automatically become zero, making inserting negative numbers annoying.
- Fixed updating a modifier setting the correct new value for other players at the table.
- Fixed selecting a modifier sometimes causing numbers in the Dice Roller to output a string such as "0-4" or some other non-number combo.
- Fixed removing a sheet from other tables if it has been given to another player.
- Fixed a crash sometimes caused when trying to start your camera or microphone and then leaving the page.
- Fixed usernames wrapping oddly on the Dashboard.
Live Play Connection Fixes
In our last big video and audio push, we made it so that entering a Table would automatically connect you to in-progress Live Play sessions. However, after living with it for a bit it was not quite as smooth of an experience as we had hoped. We saw that there was more "missed" connections than we would like. For example you might enter a table and be able to hear people but not see them, even if they had their cameras turned on.
With this update we've updated the flow to be a little closer to what it was previously (but still keep the optimized video and audio settings). Now when you enter a table, in the top navigation bar you see a button that says "Start Live Table" or "Join Live Table", depending on whether or not there is a Live Play session currently in-progress. If there is, you will also see how many current players are connected. Once you start or join a live play session, the button will disappear and you will be able to turn on your camera and microphone if you so choose.
Thank you to everyone who has been using Role and helping us refine our video / audio technologies & user experience!
Misc Fixes
- Fixed an issue that could cause the "Close" or "Minimize" buttons to not be clickable when viewing a Map or Image.
- Fixed an annoying bug with Notes that were fairly long. When typing text in a long Note, the scroll box would often jump to the top of the note and you would need to scroll back down to where you were typing. This was particularly affecting Google Chrome players. With this update, that bug should no longer be present!
Give a Sheet to Another Player
There is now now an option to "Give Sheet to Player" listed in the Sheet Menu accessed by the gear icon on the top right of your sheet when viewing it at a table. When selected you can choose another person at the table to transfer your sheet to. When you do this, the sheet is removed from you account and moved over to the other player's account. They will have now have full access and ownership of the sheet!
Change Your Display Name
We've given player names at the table a design update. Sheet avatars and player names now appear together on a person's thumbnail. Clicking on a sheet avatar will still open that sheet. Clicking on your own name will open a menu that allows you to update your display name. This will change your name at the table only. Now you can update your display name to match your character's, show your pronouns, and showcase other important information! This will have no affect on your account name which will remain unchanged.
Fixes
- Fixed an issue where you would see the same user rolling dice listed multiple times.
Coming Next
- Ability to manually add Buffs and References to your rolls.
- Shared sheets allowing multiple people to edit the same sheet.
- Text Chat!
- Updates the positioning of other player's dice rolls to not overlap with your dice tray.
- Fixed seeing other player's dice rolls after they leave the table or refresh the page.
- Fixed the dynamic grid layout when more than four people are at a table.
- Fixed a crash that sometimes occurred when entering a table if your player colors didn't load.
Who's excited?? We're excited! Welcome to our first big release of 2021. We've focused our initial efforts this year on tidying up the video experience, as well as refining critical parts of the dice interface. We hope you enjoy!
The New Dice Tray
Our goal is to always do our best to keep people front and center when you play on Role. To that end we wanted to find a way to display the Dice Tray without it needing to be a pop-up over people's faces. With this update the Dice Bar is now persistent at the top of your table. When selecting dice from the bar, or selecting a modifier from your sheet, the Dice Tray will now slide down into view. The video thumbnails of people at the table will rearrange themselves so that everyone stays visible allowing you to see them and your roll at the same time!
Video & Audio Improvements
- We've moved the camera and audio buttons to the top navigation bar and we've updated their designs to make it more obvious when you have a device turned on or off.
- If you enter a table that has a video call already in progress you will automatically be connected to it. Your camera and mic will default to off, but you will be to see and hear anyone that is already streaming.
- We've updated/fixed how and when we ask for device permissions. This should help resolve people running into the "Device not found" error.
- The grid of video thumbnails has better dynamic sizing so that we always display video streams as large as possible.
- We've tweaked some video and audio settings to improve overall quality and minimize the chances of videos freezing.
Misc Improvements and Fixes
- Added a loading indicator when initially opening the Role app.
- Changed "Table Menu" to "Settings" to clarify its intent.
- Moved our changelog into it's own page located at playrole.com/changelog.
- Added more info about us to our about page and moved it to our root domain at playrole.com/about.
- Fixed Fate dice not properly adding up for the people viewing your roll.
Coming Next
- Ability to manually add Buffs and References to your rolls.
- Ability to change your Display Name at a Table.
- Ability to give a sheet to another player.
- Shared sheets allowing multiple people to edit the same sheet.
- Text Chat!
- You can view Saved Templates! In your Template Library you'll see a new "View" button under Saved Templates. Template Share links will automatically open in preview mode.
- We've updated the Role color palette. This includes updates to our grey color values to help with color constrast within our Dark UI.
- Various styles were tweaked within Sheets and Templates to create better visual hierarchy and readability.
- Styling has been added to text formatted with Markdown including: links, images, tables, lists, quotes, and code.
- Markdown links now open in a new tab.
- Updated logic in how Sheet Duplication works.
- Fixed being able to click on the video/audio buttons if you have the Sheet panel collapsed.
- Fixed a bug with creating tables.