u/UnclePlants

Try it: https://lodestarvtt.com

This started as a passion project for my own table and kind of grew, so I figuredI'd share it in case it's useful to anyone else. It's called Lodestar, a battlemaptool that runs in your browser for playing in person: run it on your laptop and push the map to a second screen or a TV on the table.

Up front, so nobody feels sold to: it's completely free. No account, no sign-up, no ads, no paid tier, nothing to buy, and no catch. It runs offline once it loads and your maps stay on your own machine. It's open source too. I'm not selling anything, I just built the thing I wanted for my own games and want to share it.

Easiest way to see it: click the Demo button on the homepage. It drops you straight into a real map (a great Tearooms map by Fantasy Atlas, used with his permission) with music and sound already loaded, so you can try the whole thing in one click with zero setup.

What it does:

- Maps and fog of war you reveal as the party explores (paint, shapes, or named rooms)

- Tokens with images, drag to move, live distance readout while you drag

- Initiative tracker that links a token to each combatant and rings whoever's turn it is

- Music and SFX: two looping layers (music + ambiance) and a soundboard, mirrored to the player screen

- GM notes (rich text), droppable images, and a PDF viewer for sheets and stat blocks

- Area of effect templates, map rotation, distance measuring, and an in-app shortcuts and manual

It's still a work in progress and I'm building it around feedback, so I'd genuinely love to hear what feels clunky or what's missing for your table. Not trying to sell you on anything, just hoping it's useful and wanting to make it better.

Try it: https://lodestarvtt.com

Source: https://github.com/UnclePlants/Lodestar

10 days ago I shared Lodestar, a FREE browser battlemap tool for running games from your laptop to a second screen/TV. No account, no install, works offline once it loads, and your maps stay on your machine.

I just pushed v1.2, and a big chunk of it came straight from suggestions in the last thread. Thank you for those. Here's what's new:

• Music & sound: a dockable player with two looping layers (music + ambiance) playing at once, plus an SFX soundboard. Save mixes as scenes and click between them. It plays on the player display too.
• Initiative tracker: turn order, HP, and a corner overlay you can share with players. You can link a combatant to its token: click it to find/ping it on the map, the current turn gets a ring on the battlefield, and linked tokens show a GM-only HP bar.
• Sticky notes: GM-only notes with fonts, sizes, andbold/italic/underline, that scale with the grid and resize from the corner.
• PDF windows: pop open character sheets, stat blocks, or rules asfloating DM-only windows. Stays on your screen, never shown to players.
• Better images: drop an image, then resize from the corners, rotatewith a handle, and toggle whether players see it.
• And more: area-of-effect templates, map/player rotation, a reworked fog of war,measurement tools, an in-app shortcuts cheatsheet, and a built-in manual.

Everything's still local-first and free. Try it here: https://lodestarvtt.com

( source + the full changelog: https://github.com/UnclePlants/Lodestar )

I'd genuinely love feedback on what's clunky, what's missing, what would make it useful for your table. Several features in this update started as one-line comments last time, so keep them coming.

And of course, thanks the people that suggested points of improvement on my last post!

PS: I keep track of all the suggestions and name of the authors of these suggestions to eventually make a proper shoutout.

Cast your map to a second screen, control fog of war, tokens, floors, AOE indicators from your own browser, and your players never see your DM panel. That's the core of it.

It's called Lodestar. You open it at https://lodestarvtt.com, load a map image, and drag the player window to your TV. Everything else is easy:

• Fog of war (polygon, brush, or drag-draw shapes)
• Live AoE spell templates that mirror to the player screen in real time
• Initiative tracker with HP bars
• Multi-floor support with linked staircases
• Tokens, GM-only notes, distance measuring, pings
• Save/load full setups locally — nothing ever touches a server
• and more!

No account. No subscription. Runs offline. Lodestar is FREE and will stay that way forever. MIT licensed and open source: https://github.com/UnclePlants/Lodestar

Happy to answer questions or take feedback.

The demo map in the screenshot is "255 Worship of the Atropus" by Elven Tower Adventures, used under a CC BY 4.0 license. They have a big collection of free maps if you want to check them out.

Cast your map to a second screen, control fog of war, tokens, floors, AOE indicators from your own browser, and your players never see your DM panel. That's the core of it.

It's called Lodestar. You open it at lodestarvtt.com, load a map image, and drag the player window to your TV. Everything else is easy:

• Fog of war (polygon, brush, or drag-draw shapes)
• Live AoE spell templates that mirror to the player screen in real time
• Initiative tracker with HP bars
• Multi-floor support with linked staircases
• Tokens, GM-only notes, distance measuring, pings
• Save/load full setups locally — nothing ever touches a server
• and more!

No account. No subscription. Runs offline. Lodestar is FREE and will stay that way forever. MIT licensed and open source: github.com/UnclePlants/Lodestar

Happy to answer questions or take feedback.

The demo map in the screenshot is "255 Worship of the Atropus" by Elven Tower Adventures, used under a CC BY 4.0 license. They have a big collection of free maps if you want to check them out.

Hey everyone. I run my games in person with a TV laid flat as the player screen, and I wanted a simple way to show maps with fog of war without setting up a whole VTT or paying a monthly subscription. I couldn't find anything that did just that without a lot of extra stuff, so I made one. It's called Lodestar.

It runs entirely in your browser. No install, no account, nothing to download if you don't want to. You open it, load a map, click "Open player display," and drag that window over to your second screen. You control everything from your own DM panel, and your players only see what you choose to reveal.

Here's what it does so far:

• Fog of war with polygon areas, a paint and erase brush, and click to reveal. You see a light tint over the hidden parts, and your players just see black.
• Named areas, so you can label rooms on your side only. The "Chapel" and "Library" tags in the screenshot are visible to you but not your players.
• Multi-floor dungeons, where each floor has its own map, fog, and tokens, connected by stair markers that only you can see.
• Tokens you can drop, drag, label, color, and snap to the grid.
• A grid, a measure tool, and ping with alt-click.
• A splash screen, blackout, and undo/redo.
• A local map library with JSON export and import, and everything stays on your own machine.

It's completely free and open source, so you can use it, fork it, or tear it apart however you like.

• Try it here (no download): https://uncleplants.github.io/Lodestar/
• Source code: https://github.com/UnclePlants/Lodestar

One thing worth knowing: when you save a map, it's stored locally in your own browser, not on a server somewhere. Nothing gets uploaded, so your maps stay on your machine. The catch is that the saved library is tied to the browser and device you saved it on, so it won't follow you to another computer or survive clearing your browser data. If you make maps you want to keep, use the Export button to save your whole library to a file. That file is your real backup, and you can import it on any device.

Alternatively, you can download a local version from the GitHub page (Code, then Download ZIP) and just open index.html on your own computer. It works exactly the same offline, and it's handy if you'd rather not rely on the browser version or want it available without internet at the table.

The demo map in the screenshot is "Chapel of the Bountiful Harvest" by Elven Tower Adventures, used under a CC BY 4.0 license. They have a big collection of free maps if you want to check them out (https://www.patreon.com/cw/elventower).

It's still early days, so I'd really appreciate any feedback, ideas, or bug reports. What would make something like this actually useful at your table?