Alright! Session 1 of my first #pathfinder 1.0 module is over. I've got some immediate reactions from using @AstralVTT .

Overall review is about a 5/10, and I'll explain why in this thread. But with the additional statement of, I am -keeping- my account. (1/?)

The interface of the general space is beautifully easy for me to understand; on top of that, it has a default color of black which is always a bonus. I know that's an easy fix for most of us who know how to use Darkreader ext., but still; easy on the eyes! Very pretty UI. (2/?)

I really enjoy the scheduling functions, and how straightforward it all is. It allows you to set reminders, make plans, and as a player OR a gm, ping ahead of time if you can't make it. This will be good for folks who use it w/o an external communication platform, (3/?)

and/or just for keeping things organized. There's a section for 'followers' of your campaign, and other neat little functions I have yet to fully explore. It's got a -lot- of promise as a platform, and the how-to-use tutorials are pretty good about teaching you the basics. (4/?)

Given, I have ADHD, and learning new stuff is NOT easy when I'm not married to the idea of it. And since the website is still pretty much in beta, there are a lot of clunky things about the editing system that rub me the wrong way. (5/?)

The layer system when editing maps is kind of confusing, and unintuitive so far. You also have to go in and do everything one at a time, instead of being able to do groupings or -any- other method that might be easier. It feels the way ppl say it feels to animate with SFM. (6/?)

Example: I was in a little bit of a pinch today & needed to add enemy tokens onto the map in a rush. Instead of letting me just plop the token images into the map and use them right away, it bound them to the map layer, and I couldn't figure out how to make it not do that. (7/?)

What I resorted to was drawing dots onto the map, planning to erase them and redraw them when the enemies moved. But I couldn't figure out how to erase, or edit/undo the dots away. So I had to draw OVER them with a shade close to the map color, ending up like this: (8/?)

I know I could go watch another tutorial video, or sit around and try to figure out what I wasn't figuring out, but as a person just freshly picking this up, I'm burnt out from trying every 'this would make sense' method & failing each. It wasn't a disaster, but UGH. (9/?)

The map editing is my main complaint so far. It needs a LOT of work done, but I know that this website is just in beta right now, so I'm more than happy to wait and try again. It's not very straightforward, and things I expected to be simple wound up being confusing. (10/?)

The character sheet editor is also very clunky, and you have to plug -every single little thing in-. No, I mean it. EVERYTHING. My players had their stats all punched in, all their bonuses, and clicking their sheet just would not populate correctly into the chat. (11/?)

I figured out that this might have been because you have to add all of the rolls or... other parts of the number soup into the sheet, and it only does a few simple things for you on its own. It's -very- frustrating to figure out. (12/?)

Even just looking at the char. sheet builder from the get-go, my executive dysfunction basically did this, and I really, really had to force myself to sit down and slave over it for a few hours in an attempt to get it to work, and it STILL had problems: (13/?)

Example; plugging in weapon damage rolls... or stats... you have to do it all twice, manually, and the website on a non-recent computer just... CRAWLS with how slow it is. It's agony. The gray square on the right is the scroll wheel. Each skill, stat, etc. has two inputs. (14/?)

Maybe there's an easier way to do this. Maybe I'm using the website wrong, or accidentally doing it 'the hard way', but this is me giving it a shot raw with no help, like most ppl are going to when they make an acct.. (15/?)

One can argue, "Artie, u have ADHD; no matter what it's gonna be harder for u to understand or pick up on your own w/o help", but that's the point. LOTS of TTRPG players are neurodivergent, or idk, not wanting to waste their time on this kind of thing?? (16/?)

So, I'm sounding really harsh to a project that is VERY new, but I'm making this thread BECAUSE I want Astral to get better. I see -so much good potential- in it. & it has a LOT of cool map features its developing! When it's polished up, it'll be really good! ...probably. (17/?)

The dynamic lighting feature is super cool. And the fact that you can plot out doors and hide certain areas and make them intractable... in theory, is cool! I, for the life of me, could not figure it out myself, but... maybe someday I'll get it? (18/?)

All in all, I really want to thank the folks at Astral for taking on this HUGE project they're doing. You have a lot of really cool stuff in progress, and I'm definitely gonna keep my eye on updates and test it out as more improves, but... oof. I was not ready for that. (19/?)

W/O folks beta testing like this, it's never gonna get better, though. So pls go and give Astral a try as more updates come out. They really have a cool thing in the works, it's just rough around the edges RN.

So, 5/10. Will try again later? (20/20)