General

1. Who can help me Dev test my new board
2. What is the Actions column
3. What does it mean to Import/Export a Board
4. What does it mean to Restore a Board
5. What is the difference between Single Layer and Dual Layers
6. What is Player Border
7. What is Player Background
8. What is Border Display
9. What does the Public Beta flag do
10. How do I update a Live board
11. Why don't my edits take
12. I'm not able to save changes to my scenario; the designer just freezes.
13. I can't upload my Board Images (Mac)
14. I can't upload my Cards (Mac)
15. I can't see the player colors once I've added some territories.
16. I'm Dev testing my board and when a player clicks on a territory it doesn't "select."
17. Why is my the Nth player in my game not getting assigned seat N
18. I'm Dev testing my new board and the factories don't seem to be working at first, but then they start working.

Board Design Tool

1. What does Single, Chain, and Tether mean when adding Borders
2. What does By Border and By Territory mean when deleting Borders and Modifiers
3. How do Border Modifiers for SimulGear boards work

Setup and Scenarios

1. How are the number of Neutrals calculated
2. What are Starting Cards and Starting Bonus
3. What are Scenarios

Did you Save? It's that button in the upper right that for some reason is easy to overlook. 'Apply' is not enough. Don't feel bad - we've all been there.

If you did save and your edits still didn't take, it might be that you are attempting to edit a scenario in which you have not unlocked the appropriate settings. In the example below, if you tried to edit the borders on the Standard scenario, those changes would not apply even if you save because the “Borders” features for that scenario are locked. In the Total SimulGear scenario, the “Borders” features are unlocked, and so you can edit those. Just click on a lock icon to toggle between locked and unlocked.

This is a known issue that happens when you are have territories that are factory Members on your “main” board that you have deleted in your scenario. One workaround is to “Lock” the first four locks of the problem scenario, and then “Unlock” them, which may make you have to re-enter other territories.

On the main designer page “right-click” on the arrow at the far right for the appropriate board.

It might be your browser - Try Chrome.

Fill areas need to be one solid color. Close is not good enough. Even if you are only using Single Layer mode, read this section of a tutorial to better understand how fill images work.

The territory's 'color' (and thus its ownership) may be bleeding from another territory. Take a real close look at the problem territory's (fill map) borders at the pixel level.

The only way to ensure this is to have a different scenario for each # of players. Forum discussion here.

This is a known issue/feature that occurs if the starting bonuses for the first round have been modified. Forum discussion here.

Check out the Development Testers and Review Team thread for a list of players that are willing to help at any point along the Board Design process. Also, check out the Board Designer's Chat forum to ask additional questions or find more information on Board Design!

Right clicking on the Arrow in the Actions column of your My Boards page will open a Menu in which you can Copy or Export boards in a Live or Retired state, or Copy, Delete, Export, Import, Rename, or Restore a board in a Dev state.

Importing and Exporting of a board is a way in which you can store all the information of a board offline. Exporting will generate an XML document that contains all information about the board. Importing an XML document can quickly create a board or can be used to restore a board to previous settings. The XML document can also be modified offline and once imported the board will contain the new modified settings.

WarGear will save the board information at multiple Save Points which can later be Restored via this action. WARNING: All existing board data will be overwritten after choosing the Save Point to Restore back to.

Single Layer and Dual Layer settings are available for Fill Mode board designs. Single Layer boards have one Board Image in which both board graphics and player color filled territories are defined. Information in the Getting Started and the Anti-Aliasing Help pages will be helpful in developing Single Layer boards, with an example of Dual Layers Help page will be helpful in developing Dual Layer boards, with an example of New World Gear.

The Player Border is the thin black outline border visible in the Flash Player of a game. The player border is merely for graphics.

The Player Background is the backdrop of the Flash Player in a game. The backdrop will be seen for transparent areas of the board and will be seen on the Cards and Info tabs. The transparent setting will display the black/grey stripes when in non-Work mode and a solid grey backdrop when in Work mode. The opaque setting will enable a selection of a Player Background Color setting.

Border Displays can be set to Arrows or Circles for both Attack and Fortify Borders. This setting will be honored in the Flash Player of a game. A setting of Arrows will set borders to display as Arrows pointing from the selected territory to any territory that can be Attacked or Fortified. While a setting of Circles will circle/highlight territories that can be Attacked or Fortified. One drawback of the Circles setting for Attacks is that it is not possible to hover over a border and display the tooltip with the border type and dice information. The highlighted color of the circle will still honor border modifiers though.

Depending on the number of territories to be Attacked/Fortified from each territory and/or the board's Fortify Rule the board may benefit from one setting over another.

Setting a board to Public Beta (click the Green Bug icon) will allow the board to accessible from the Beta view of the Boards tab and other players can then begin games on your board without you being in the game. You can access these games from the MyBoards > Games List page and you have the ability to comment and control the Dev game. Note: The board should be in a playable state prior to setting the board to Public Beta. Also, the Public Beta flag will automatically revert to non-Beta after 30 days.

If you need to make a change to a board that is in a Live state then follow these steps. First, you will Copy the board to a new version (this will copy the base board and any related Scenarios), this new version will now be seen in your Dev boards section of the board designer tab, at this time the pre-existing version will continue to be in the Live state. You will then be able to make changes to the board/Scenarios in the Dev state and Save the changes. Finally, simply Promote the version in the Dev state and the system will promote the new version to Live and Retire the pre-existing version. You will not need to have the board re-Reviewed, so ensure the new version is complete and well tested (especially if promoting new Scenarios).

Note: All existing Rankings and Ratings will copy to the new version of the board.
Note: Only games started after the new version is promoted to Live will see the changes. If you need a change to a Live board (for example a change that is affecting current gameplay) then please contact Yertle or tom to have the existing Live version updated.

When “Single” is selected you will click on both territories to set a border. Example: Click Terr A, Click Terr B to get border A-B. Click Terr B, Click Terr C to get border B-C.

When “Chain” is selected you will be able to click on a string of territories to create borders between each of them. Example: Click Terr A, Click Terr B, Click Terr C to get borders A-B and B-C.

When “Tether” is selected you will click one territory that is the base and then click other territories that you would like to border to that territory. Example: Click Terr A, Click Terr B, Click Terr C to get borders A-B and A-C.

Depending on the types of borders and the layout of the board one of these may work better/quicker than the others.

When “By Border” is selected you will click on the black line of the border or the red/green arrow of the modifier to complete a delete action.

When “By Territory” is selected you will click on the territories in which the border/modifier exists to complete a delete action.

Depending on the number of borders present one of these may work better/quicker than the other.

Creating border modifiers for a SimulGear board is done in the same way as creating border modifiers for a Turn Based game, access the Modifiers section on the Design tab. SimulGear border modifiers are set in increments of 5 and reflect a difference in percent (%) of the associated odds of killing a unit. The other difference for SimulGear modifiers though is that the thought process of what border modifiers mean is a bit more complex.

Consider the following example:
Default Odds set to Attack 50% and Defend 60%
A modifier of Attack 5% means new Attack odds are 55% (more likely to kill a defending troop when attacking in that modifier direction).
A modifier of Defend 20% means new Defend odds are 80% (more likely to kill an attacking troop when defending from that modifier direction).
A modifier of Attack -5% means new Attack odds are 45% (less likely to kill a defending troop when attacking in that modifier direction).
A modifier of Defend -20% means new Defend odds are 40% (less likely to kill an attacking troop when defending from that modifier direction).

If Neutral Count is set to Low, Medium, or High and territories are distributed randomly then Neutrals are awarded territories in a similar manner as players. In addition to territories distributed to Neutral, a Neutral Count enabled setting will also help ensure players are given the same number of randomly distributed territories. So if the number of territories to be randomly distributed is not divisible by the number of players in a game, then Neutrals will fill in the gap. The number of Neutral territories distributed is dependent upon the Low, Medium, or High setting and plugged into the following calculation:
Low: Set Number Neutral Players = 1
Medium: Set Number Neutral Players = 2
High: Set Number Neutral Players = 3

¹⁾ Round Up = Number of Territories Per Player
Total Number of Territories - Number of Setup Defined Territories - (Number of Territories Per Player * Number of Players) = Number of Neutral Territories

Starting Cards and Starting Bonus located on the Colors tab are ways to set card and troop allocation for each player on their first turn. Whether Starting Cards and Starting Bonus is locked to the Seat Color the Seat Number is determined by the Rule Lock player colors to specified seat number. Starting Cards and Starting Bonus only affect turn one, all subsequent turns will be played out as normal.

Starting Cards can be set to A, B, C, and/or W in which the player receives the cards allocated. For example, if set to A, A, B, then on turn one the player will receive cards A, A, and B. Note, these cards are distributed outside of the virtual card deck and therefore do not reduce the number of that card in the starting deck.

Starting Bonus can be set to either Default or 0-100. Default indicates the player will be given the number of troops relative to the per territory and/or continent bonus on turn one. A value of 0-100 will override the per territory and/or continent bonus and simply give that player that specified number of troops on turn one.

Scenarios are a way for Board Designers to modify rules, setup, images, etc. and have each Scenario Live. Normally Scenarios will have the same theme as the board and differ in minor ways, such as Abandon rules or Initial Setup. All Scenarios of a board tie to the same base board and therefore all Rankings and Ratings of a board are kept as one and not on a per Scenario basis. For more information see the Scenarios Help page.