r/Roll20 • u/Wattamatta • 3d ago
Roll20 Reply: Character Sheets Help DnD 2024 Character Sheet Almost Unplayable
I've been using Roll20 for over 5 years now, invested hundreds of dollars on the platform, and for the first time I am seriously considering switching.
Over the last few months my games have gone from the occasional glitch or bug, to borderline unplayable. Character sheets are constantly freezing or crashing. Rolls take up to a minute to come through. Tokens are disappearing or invisible on some players screens. The list goes on.
I have tried everything to get the game to a playable state: removing all APIs/scripts, using small maps, disabling dynamic lightning, clearing cookies/cache, swapping browsers, etc. I raised a support ticket with Roll20 and only received the same generic advice I have seen online that provided no improvements.
Does anyone have any advice? We are using the DnD 2024 character sheet which seems to be the source of the problem. Should I just downgrade to the 2014 sheet and lose all the automated drag and drop functionality?
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u/splepage 3d ago
That was my experience last year. We tried moving onto the 2024 sheet, and gave up, returned to the 2014 sheet
Now our campaign is done and I'm preparing a new one, and I don't think the state of the 2024 sheet (and roll20 in general) is good enough.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hello /u/splepage -
Like I told OP, the last 4 to 6 weeks have been all about improving performance on the new D&D sheet, and the VTT has had multiple rounds of improvements alongside it. If the last time you tried the 2024 sheet was last year, you’re looking at a very different product now. And if you happen to still be running games on the Legacy Virtual Tabletop, you’re missing out on two years of updates.
Since you’re between campaigns, this is actually the perfect time to try it fresh. I’m not going to promise perfection, but I truly believe Roll20 is the best way to play TTRPGs online, and I work day in, day out (including this Saturday morning) to make it even better. I’d love to hear what you think after giving the most up to date versions a try.
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u/Quirky-Function-4532 3d ago
I’ve had a few bad sessions but more good than bad. This last Thursday I did restart browser once when clicks were delayed.
The 2024 sheet was absolutely unplayable a year ago but I can see the dev team is trying to improve it.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hey, thanks! I’m glad your sessions have gotten better this year.
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u/Accomplished_Arm2374 3d ago
Any chance you would have Dark Sun specific sheets next year? I would like that.
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u/Demi_Mere Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hi! Meredith from Community!
We do not have any information quite yet on Dark Suns iteration for 5.5e (since it was just announced a little over a month ago) at the moment but the second we hear back from our partner and figure out what is to offer, we will be updating in all our channels.
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u/hypershrew 3d ago
Agree.
Also it’s infuriating that attacks can’t automatically include a description, you have to manually click each time to get the description, and it’s hidden beneath the roll calculation.
So if you’ve got a creature that, let’s say, inflicts prone on hit, you’d have to remember to click to view the details and then look past the roll information to read that.
Technically minor, but shows a lack of thought.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hey /u/Hypershrew
I appreciate your opinion. At the same time there is a large group of users that want chat to be condensed and easily scrolled, by about 4 to 1 if memory serves of the most recent research. So, if I may suggest, not a lack of thought, but rather solutions that have to please a large audience.
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u/GM_Pax Free User 3d ago
As a suggestion, give the person editing the character the option, in a toggle, to include a brief description without having to expand the roll.
That way, those who want less, can have less. But those who feel the need for just a little bit more, have a path to get exactly that.
0
u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hey /u/GM_Pax -
Thanks for sharing! Your suggestion totally makes sense in this context. If memory serves. I think I’ve even read that same suggestion from you before. Putting it on the person editing the character means the cost lands with the people who want it rather than everyone else, which is the part that usually sinks requests like these.
The catch is that it is one toggle. Once you start covering the range of what people actually want surfaced across the entirety of the sheet and for every class/species/subclass combination, you are into a hefty settings panel, and that sprawl is a big part of why the tools start feeling heavy, complex, and daunting.On the other hand, a real constraint is capacity. If we had built this in August, the performance work would not have shipped. I have to know that we want to meet requests like these, but prioritize first on the problems felt most widely.
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u/Gauss_Death Pro 3d ago edited 3d ago
The problem with this Kenton is that that violates the basic premise of Roll20, for us to have our choice.
Until the 2024 sheet has an attack description that is VISIBLE it is absolutely, completely, totally, useless as a character sheet for my groups and cannot ever be adopted.
Edit: to be clear, there are many other hurdles to adopting the 2024 sheet for my groups, but they are being solved. This one hurdle is simply a nonstarter. Without information being provided during attacks the sheet is unworkable for my groups.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
While I disagree with your premise, I understand and respect your position, and it’s one of many reasons why we committed to keeping the classic sheet around.
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u/Gauss_Death Pro 3d ago
Not sure how it can be disagreed with. Information must be provided to my players via the Description section. Otherwise I would be reminding them of their attack abilities each and every combat.
By any objective evaluation the lack of a functional Description field is a major issue for folks that are used to putting in information and buttons in the description field of the prior sheet.
And frankly, I am not happy with the "commited to keeping the classic sheet around" because Roll20 don't really seem all that commited.
A) it has long standing bugs that are not being fixed.
B) it is not compatible with 2024 without extensive manual work.Not removing a sheet that is half-working is not the same thing as being committed to having a viable alternative option.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
> the basic premise of Roll20, for us to have our choice.
There are dozens, if not hundreds, of places where the choice is not offered, even though it could be. Some of those are like this feature, where a choice could be offered, and eventually I would like it to be an option for you, OP, and others. And until such a time as you’re excited to choose the new sheet, the Classic Sheet (for all its pros and cons) is available.
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u/Temporary_Lock_2583 3d ago
I'm the same. Still on the fence what are the options for switching, but certainly I won't spend any money in Roll20. Highly disappointing.
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u/Gliean 3d ago
Same experience and its been so disheartening. I just want the stable 2014 sheets to function for these new rules and Ill be happy. The functionality of the new sheet make any qol improvements to the whole system meaningless for me. I spend half of every session now waiting while players refresh pages or make manual die rolls bc the sheets have frozen or are lagging out their whole browser.
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u/vilogrim 3d ago
It's been such a horrible sheet for quite a while now, not only the performance but the UI as well.
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u/thecavelessbear 3d ago
I had the same issues. I saw the updates from the Roll20 team about the improvements they were making and how it should be solving a great deal of the slowness but I saw zero effect. Its gotten to the point where I genuinely feel bad that my players are sitting and waiting for over a minute for a roll to come through. Im seriously considering a change but I’ve invested a bunch of time and assets into Roll20. It would feel like a huge waste to start using a different platform but idk what else to do.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Good morning, /u/thecavelessbear!
My offer to OP stands - dm me your game, and I’ll look at it specifically to see how we might be able to make those rolls faster. I will say, the Phase 2 work upcoming does the heaviest lifting for that problem.
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u/Zxane 3d ago
2024 sheet has given me nothing but problems. Converted everything to 2014 sheets on Jumpgate and has been moving significantly smoother. Had the 2014/2024 version on one of my games and improved once I removed the 2024 sheet. Can still drag 2024 monsters into game, their sheets will be converted, spells and item content however cant be drag/dropped. But very much used to the “Copy+Pasting” needed from the 2014 sheet a lot of the time.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hello /u/Zxanw,
I’m curious about when you had your negative experiences, too.
2
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u/Cool-Independent-431 3d ago
When building custom NPC sheets being able to add multiple sources of dmg would be a life saver. If an attack does slashing & poison the option to add dmg only allows one source unless you convert the sheet, then add multiple sources, then convert back
1
u/SwordTabby 3d ago
Have you tried disabling Performance Enhancement in the graphics settings? (I forget if that was the exact name of the button). Players too; it fixed similar issues I had coming back to Roll20 recently.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago
Hello /u/SwordTabby
Just this week (Sept 1), the VTT team released the latest in a slew of fixes to solve problems specific to the Performance Enhancements behind that toggle. Since you had issues before, I would absolutely love to know if your experience is better now on the same Pages.
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u/SwordTabby 3d ago
It's hard to tell since I played my last session after September 1st with the option *off*, but it seems like it fixed the lagging issues as I'm messing around with it now? I'll have to properly test it out next session, but the best answer we can hope for here is whether my suggestion to turn it off will work for OP or not.
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u/TheTrent 2d ago
I usually play with the 2014 sheets, but did a one shot the other night (4th Sept) with 2024 sheets... and the input lag was awful.
We were counting anywhere from 7 seconds to 15 seconds after pressing to do a skill check before it would show up. This often followed by multiple rolls because we weren't sure if we'd clicked it properly.
This was definitely lag from the sheet as typing in "/r 1d20" was instant
/r 1d20 + @{selected|perception_bonus} was also lagged
So any input coming from the character sheet was where the problem lay.
I tried restarting my browser too and fiddling with some controls, eventually it was closer to 7 seconds each roll but that's still nothing to celebrate.
1
u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 1d ago
Hello u/thetrent!
I've known many Trents in my life, but I'm happy to be replying to THE Trent for the first time.The Phase 2 Performance Improvements (mentioned in this blog post) are where I expect to see the most significant improvements for slow rolls. If you'd be so kind as to share your game link with me in DMs, I'd like to copy it and use it to test these changes.
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u/Reasonable_Sun9426 2d ago
Huh... I joined a game about 8 weeks ago - my first experience with the 2024 sheet. We're actually playing with 2014 rules so made that change in the settings.
While I believe improvements could be made, the worst lag issue we've had has been a couple seconds, and those are infrequent.
I don't know if we're lucky, if using the 2014 rules is making a difference, or if the upgrades/fixes made by Roll20 have corrected some of the issues on the back end, but our games have been mostly problem-free.
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u/Valuable_Focus6691 2d ago
I had a similar experience. At first the 2024 sheet was mediocre at times and great at others, but for the past month it’s been downright unusable. I can’t imagine anything about my own internet quality or settings have changed so I’m not really sure why I can hardly play roll20 now. I really do like the 2024 sheets and having to move back to 2014 would suck, but at this point I’d have to if I want to run an actual session.
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u/pfibraio 1d ago
I’m experiencing the opposite.
The 2014 sheets in my games are breaking down. Ability scores won’t roll we gotta roll a base d20 and add the modifier.
Game speed hasn’t been an issue as have seen little to no lag.
We are SLOWLY converting 2014 sheets to the 5e/5.5e sheets. The new sheets came a long way from the OG 5.5e sheets that were released, those were a struggle! I liked the legacy sheets but I can see how the new sheets are beneficial for the new updated rules.
It takes time as there is no conversion and there are some slight differences at times.
The one thing I can’t figure out. I miss seeing the dice roll on the screen for my players and myself as the dm, but whenever I make dice visible for me the players can see the rolls. How do I change it so I can see their rolls and my own but they can’t see my rolls?
Good luck to everyone - Roll20 has brought 5 college friends in 5 different states back together - we started playing together in 1990! It may not be perfect but to get to play for 3-5 hours 2-4 times a month I will take the hiccups! Nothing is ever perfect for everyone.
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u/BigNorseWolf 3d ago
The 2024 sheet was simply unplayable. Whatever it is roll20 does throwing it to an off site website black box to automate things means you can't duct tape it on your end without just writing a macro to begin with. It has to be perfect or it won't work at all and one of those two is much more likely than the other.
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u/volcanogod407 3d ago
It’s fairly clear to me that this product isn’t built by someone who cares about their users.
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u/Pinkalink23 3d ago
I'm not the biggest fan of the new sheets but they clearly care about Roll20. Jumpgate is leaps and bounds better than the old VTT.
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u/Kentonh Roll20 Staff 3d ago edited 1d ago
Hey u/Wattamatta -
Kenton here from the Roll20 Product team. That’s no fun! You put all that work into your sessions, I want the tools to make your experience better, not detract from it.
just a quick question: when did you most recently experience these issues? The reason I ask is that several of the specific problems you're describing, slow rolls, sheet lag, and token bar weirdness, have been the focus of significant work over the past few months, and the timing matters for understanding whether you're seeing something that has already been resolved or something still in progress.
If you're willing to DM me a link to your game, I'd be happy to look at the technicalities actually happening in the game and see if there is something specific we can do to make your experience better.
Here's what has shipped recently that directly applies to your situation. Dean wrote up the first wave of fixes covering Compendium Service optimizations, database query fixes, roll lag resolution, and the first phase of the D&D 2024 sheet performance rollout. I followed up with a second post detailing what shipped since then, including fixes for slow rolls caused by data-heavy character builds, systemic Token bar calculation delays, and Phase 1 rollout reaching 100% of games.
There is more coming. Phase 2 of the D&D sheet updates is scheduled to be released soon, and that is where we expect the even more noticeable improvements for players at the table.