Guide›Cartographer (maps)›Lights & walls

Lights & walls

This is the part of the Cartographer that turns a drawing into a playable map: rooms (with their wall around the perimeter and floor inside), the doors that open in the walls, the lights with their effects, and the global atmosphere (night, sun, shadows). The key point, worth keeping in mind from the start: the walls you draw here are the very same geometry the online Table uses for Vision (line of sight). You draw the walls once and the map becomes "playable with fog that opens up" when you bring it to the table. Everything runs in the browser and is free (the only thing that spends credits is Stamp Studio, which generates images with AI). The tools live in the vertical bar on the left of the canvas; each tool opens its own properties panel in the column beside it.

Creating a room

The Room is the building block of every space: a single stroke gives you the wall on the perimeter and the floor inside. Select the Room tool in the left bar: at the top of the panel five shape buttons appear (with the name showing on hover).

Choose the drawing shape among:

Rectangle — drag one corner diagonally to define the room.
Ellipse — drag to define an oval/circular room.
Polygon — first set Sides (from 3 to 20), then drag: you get a regular polygon (triangle, hexagon, etc.).
Trace line — click to lay the vertices one by one; double-click to close the shape. Use it for irregular floor plans made of straight segments.
Freehand — hold and draw the outline by hand; on release the shape closes itself.

Draw on the canvas. On release (or when the polygon closes) the room is born complete: wall around the edge and floor inside.

Add, subtract, merge

Below the shapes are the buttons that decide what the next drawing does:

Add — the normal mode: every shape you draw is a new room.
Subtract — with this active, the shape you draw cuts out (punches a hole in) an existing room. This is how you open an inner courtyard, a well, a recess in the plan.
Merge with existing shape — a checkbox: if active, the new shape you draw fuses with the room it touches instead of creating a separate one (handy for building "L" or "T" plans out of several rectangles).

Reshaping and moving the room

Nodes — select the Nodes tool and click the room's edge to reshape it: drag the dots (nodes) and the handles to curve the sides (Bézier curves). Click on the line = add a node; double-click a node = delete it; Alt + handle = sharp corner.
Select — with the Select tool you click a room to grab it, then drag to move it. Important: the objects sitting on top of the room move with it. Del deletes it.
Hand (inside the Room panel) — the dedicated "move/rotate" mode: drag the room to move it, and drag the handle above it to rotate it (holding Shift, or with snap on, it rotates in 15° steps). The attached objects are those of the first grab; press Enter (or Finalize) to consolidate the new layout.

Tip: with the right mouse button you can "quick-select" a room (or a tile, or a line) from any tool, without switching to Select.

The walls

The wall is simply the edge of the room (or of a shape/line) when the wall option is on. Select the room (with Select or Nodes): the wall edit block appears in the panel.

The Wall checkbox turns the edge on/off. If you turn it off, only the floor remains (an "open" room with no walls).
The wall texture is chosen in the options bar above the canvas, in the Wall group (recents + Library + favorites). It is a linear texture, meant to flow along the wall path.
Adjust the wall's look:

Corners — Rounded or Sharp: how the wall's corners behave.
Mirror texture — flips the texture onto the opposite side.
Width — the wall's thickness (from 8 to 300).
Texture scale — how big the texture pattern is (from 25% to 300%).
Scroll texture — shifts the texture's starting point along the wall (0–100%), useful to line up brick joints at corners.
Opacity, Fade edges and Edge fall-off — transparency and softening of the wall's edge.
Block light — a crucial checkbox: if active, this wall stops light and casts a shadow (lights that "respect walls" won't pass through). It is the switch that makes the wall a real obstacle, not just decoration.

The floor

Still in the same panel, below the wall:

The Floor checkbox turns the inner fill on/off.
The floor texture is chosen in the bar above the canvas, in the Floor group (it's a tileable texture, i.e. seamless when repeated).
Adjust Texture scale, Texture rotation and Opacity of the floor.

Opening doors and gaps

Doors (or gaps) are the points where the wall breaks: that's where characters pass and, at the table, where vision filters beyond the wall. With the Room tool active, press the Doors button (the door-shaped icon, next to Add/Subtract).

Click on the wall = open a 1-cell-wide door, already aligned to the grid.
Drag the central dot of the door to move it along the wall.
Drag the small squares on the sides to widen it (a larger gap).
Double-click the dot to remove it (the wall closes back up).

The mask from the room (for objects under the walls)

When you place objects (stamps) near walls, they may "spill over" beyond the wall. The room can generate a clipping mask that keeps objects inside its boundaries. Select the room with Select: in the options bar above the canvas the ◐ Mask button (Generate mask) appears. Pressing it creates a mask clipped to the room's interior; you then apply it to an object from its Clip (mask) dropdown, so the object stays visible only inside the room and disappears under the walls.

The lights

With the Light tool you bring the scene to life. Click on the map to add a light; drag it to move it; Del to delete it. When you select one, the panel says "You are editing the selected light" and every change applies instantly.

Basic properties (they apply to all types):

Color — the light's color.
Radius — how far the light reaches (from 1 cell up to 20 cells).
Intensity — the strength (from 0% to 200%).
Falloff — how soft the fade toward the edge is (0–100%).

Light types

A row of buttons picks the light's shape:

Point — a 360° light, radiating in every direction (torches, lanterns, braziers).
Spot — a directional cone: Direction (0–359°) and Spread (the cone's width, from 10° to 350°) appear. Ideal for beams, floodlights, ceiling lamps.
Strip — a linear light with Direction and Length (from 1 to 20 cells). Plus: One side only (emits from one edge only) and, if active, Flip side (chooses which). Perfect for windows, arrow-slits, signs.
Line — a light that follows a path you draw. Before creating it, choose how to trace it:
Points — click to add a point; click-and-drag to pull the curve handles; Enter or double-click confirms, Esc cancels.
Brush — draw the path freehand and on release it becomes a light.
The Line also has One side only / Flip side. Once created, drag the marker to move it.

Relationship with the walls

Every light can respect walls: when the This light respects walls option is active, the light does not pass through walls that have Block light and it casts Shadows from walls. The overall strength with which walls stop light is set in the Atmosphere (see below, "Shadows from walls"). This is the mechanism that lets lights "see" the same geometry the table's Vision uses.

Flicker (animated lights)

Check Flicker to make the light "live". Choose a preset:

Torch — warm, irregular flame flicker.
Candle — a smaller, more nervous flicker.
Pulse — a slow breathing of intensity.
Lightning — sudden flashes (storm, electric magic).
RGB — a cycle of colors.
＋ (Custom) — build your own effect.

For every preset you adjust:

Amount — how pronounced the effect is (0–100%).
Speed — how fast it is (0–100%).

For Torch and Pulse you can also turn on Animate color and pick a 2nd tint: the light oscillates between its Color and this second tint.

With Custom you get full control:

Effect colors — a color ramp (the first stop is the light's Color); add up to 6 tints with ＋, or remove them with the ✕.
Motion — how the ramp flows: Flame (irregular noise), Breath (soft pulsing), Flash (strobe/steps), Cycle (continuous scroll).

Note: for the flicker to actually move on the canvas, the Animations switch (▶, in the editor footer) must be on.

The global atmosphere

The Atmosphere tool (sun icon) governs the map's global settings: they apply to the whole scene, not to a single light. They are the map's "weather" and "time of day".

Night

Night tint — how dark the scene is at rest (0–100%): at 0 it's broad daylight; raising it brings the darkness that lights then "carve out".
Night color — the hue of that darkness (midnight blue, sepia, etc.), visible when Night tint is above 0.

Sun

Check Sun (directional shadows) for a directional light that orients the static shadows of the whole map:

Sun direction — where the light comes from (0–359°): it sets the direction of the shadows.
Sun elevation — how high it is (10–80°): the lower it is, the longer the shadows.
Sunlight — a uniform warm tint over the sheet (0% = the sun casts only shadows, without brightening).
Sun color — the hue of that sunlight (visible when Sunlight is above 0).

Global shadows of objects, walls and rooms

The Object/wall/room shadows checkbox turns on shadows for all elements at once; then each element can override from its own panel (by ticking "Custom shadow"). You adjust:

Shadow intensity — how dark it is (5–100%).
Shadow blur — how soft the edge is (0–40).
Shadow distance — how detached it is from the element (0–300%).
Elongation (lights) — how much the shadow stretches (0–200%).
Shadow direction — the direction (0–360°).

Shadows from walls and blending

Shadows from walls — the global strength (0–100%) with which walls that have "Block light" cast shadow from the lights that respect them.
Blend — how the lights' halos mix with each other and with the scene (Normal, Additive, Screen, etc.).

The link with the Table's Vision

This is the reason it's worth drawing the walls well. The walls you trace in the Cartographer are the same geometry the online Table uses for Vision (line of sight): when you save the map and open it at the table, the engine uses those walls (the ones with Block light active) to decide what characters see and what stays hidden, and uses the doors/gaps as the points where sight (and the fog) filters beyond the wall. In practice: you draw the rooms and walls once in the Cartographer, and the map automatically becomes playable with fog that opens up as the characters move. That's why it pays to close the perimeters properly, keep "Block light" on the real walls, and open doors where the characters actually pass.

When you're done, give the map a Map name at the top and press Save: the map lands on your account and is ready for the online Table.

🗺️ Lights & walls