Monster Mash
Just in time for your Halloween games, we are rolling out a software update with a ton of monster related features with a few other minor enhancements thrown in for good measure.
Multiple tokens for monsters and characters
Both monsters and characters will be delighted with the new found ability to have multiple tokens and multiple artworks attached. How to posts on how to add extra tokens and how to use a random selection of the tokens have been added in the learning section. Learn more: Monster & Character Tokens, Different Monster Tokens
More flexibility to track and change select stats for standard monsters
Once a monster has been added to an encounter, you will have several new options on Creatures tab to change its size, add temp hit points, adjust hit point maximums, and track ability usage. You can now also adjust armor class (AC) and hit points from this view. You can also select art just for this encounter. Learn more: Monster Action View
Friendly
Monsters and non-player characters can now be set as friendly to the characters. This change adjusts both experience point awards and encounter difficulty calculations. Setting a monster to friendly can be done at encounter planning or on the fly based on a player actions. Learn more: Friendly Monsters
Initiative made easy
Any creature added to the tracker now automatically rolls an initiative score. Further, the tracker itself is automatically sorted in initiative order. The only non-automated rolls are the player characters.
Dead monsters no longer drop to a separate section of the tracker, but instead remain in place with their initiative order number (no more renumbering every time a monster dies) and a dead icon in the tracker. They are automatically skipped when you advance the turn order.
Additionally, campaign settings now has an option to all monsters of the same type to share an initiative scores (default RAW) or if you prefer a bit more chaos, to have every monster have a unique score.
Balancing Planned Encounters
When you are building an encounter, you can now enter the number of characters and character level for which you are designing it. Based on those settings and the monsters added a difficulty level ranging from easy to deadly will automatically be calculated for you. Learn more: Encounter Difficulty
Planned encounter from the Witch of the Wilderlands from Nord Games.
Enhancements to book performance
As we’ve added features like automatic die roll highlighting, we had noticed a decline in the performance of larger books or more specifically large chapters with numerous sections and art. This release includes some enhancements that should dramatically improve both reading and editing these larger chapters.
As always, we hope you enjoy these changes. We are always open to feedback on how to make Shard an even better experience for your table.
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