Combat Encounter Director Overview
Combat Encounter Director is a Roll20 Mod designed to give Game Masters rapid control over every stage of an encounter.
From adjusting difficulty for unexpected party sizes to introducing reinforcements mid-battle, the mod provides a collection of tools that help encounters remain balanced, flexible, and engaging without disrupting the flow of the game.
Whether you are running a one-shot for two players, a convention table with a dozen participants, or a long-running campaign with complex boss encounters, Combat Encounter Director allows you to adapt the battlefield in seconds.
Key Features
Dynamic Party Scaling
Scale encounters to suit the number of players at the table.
Built-in presets support everything from solo adventures to massive convention-style groups, automatically adjusting hit points, armour class, and damage expectations.
Custom scaling values are also available for Game Masters who prefer fine-grained control.
Boss and Minion Presets
Transform ordinary creatures into memorable encounters.
Apply presets such as:
- Minion
- Elite
- Boss
- Legendary
Each preset adjusts creature statistics to reflect the intended role within the encounter.
Reinforcements and Duplication
Need additional enemies to raise the stakes?
Combat Encounter Director can duplicate selected tokens, automatically positioning and enumerating them to simplify large-scale battles and wave-based encounters.
Battlefield Control
Move tokens between layers with a single command.
Game Masters can quickly:
- Hide creatures on the GM layer.
- Reveal ambushes.
- Shift scenery to the map layer.
- Restore normal battlefield visibility.
Position Recovery
Save and restore token positions at any point during combat.
This feature is particularly useful when testing encounter layouts, resolving accidental token movement, or rewinding scenes after an error.
Encounter Templates
Store the state of an encounter and restore it later.
Templates preserve information such as:
- Token positions
- Layer assignments
- Health values
- Armour Class values
This makes it easy to prepare reusable encounters or reset failed encounters during testing.
Reset and Recovery Tools
Every tracked modification retains its original values.
Game Masters can safely experiment with scaling and adjustments knowing that tokens can be restored individually, across a page, or throughout the entire campaign.
Status Reporting
Generate a detailed encounter report directly into a Roll20 journal.
Reports provide visibility into modified tokens and highlight important changes, creating a central reference point for encounter management.
Internationalisation
Combat Encounter Director includes support for more than twenty languages.
Menus, journals, chat output, and interface elements can all be displayed in the preferred language of the Game Master, helping make the mod accessible to a wider international audience.
Why Use It?
No encounter survives contact with the players exactly as planned.
Parties may be smaller than expected, reinforcements may be required, bosses may need strengthening, or accidental token movements may need reversing.
Combat Encounter Director provides a safety net alongside a collection of powerful encounter-management tools, allowing Game Masters to adapt confidently without breaking immersion or slowing down the game.
It transforms encounter preparation from a static process into a flexible toolkit capable of responding to whatever the players decide to do.
Development Notes
Combat Encounter Director has been developed using modern JavaScript practices and a modular design philosophy focused on reliability and maintainability.
The project includes:
- Comprehensive manual testing procedures.
- Extensive validation and error handling.
- Persistent configuration management.
- Automated localisation workflows.
- Journal-driven user interfaces designed for rapid in-game use.
The mod continues to evolve based on practical Roll20 campaign experience and feedback from the wider community.
Compatibility
Combat Encounter Director is designed for Roll20 API games and is fully compatible with Jumpgate.
The script has been developed to coexist safely alongside other API scripts, making it suitable for heavily customised Roll20 environments where reliability and recoverability are essential.
Useful links
Useful links will be added here when the packaged release is published.