Maps and Lag

The general rule of thumb is try to keep map size under 3mb and less than 300x300 squares.

It doesn't really matter if you're using tiles or a single image. Also, it's a good idea to close any maps you are not actively using at the time.

all of this has a lot of factors, Your machine, your connection to the web (both to and from), each of the players machines and their connection to the we (both to and from)..

so, smaller is always going to be better

if you'd like, upload your map here and I'll take a look at it. might be able to offer better suggestions.

 

You should be able to squeeze that down to 3mb or less, pretty easy.. the map area on that is pretty small. If image quality is your issue, increase the DPI at a smaller resolution. just my 2 coppers, but for the size (area) of that map 10 mb is way over the top end.. I was expecting to see a single sleeve of a super dungeon

Tho here's the thing, that could easy be broken up into smaller pieces.

here's an example with 80% compression, scaled to 25px per square rather than 50.. so it comes in at 233kb rather than the 2.52mb of the original. as you can see, we didn't loose very much quality at all, but gained a massive usability bonus. Also, I did that super fast, just as an example.. had I taken more time and done it more cleanly, it would be almost unnoticeable that it was different.



here's the original cut from your image



Just looking at the original whole image in the other post you did, I can see natural image areas that could easily be made to break that map up into 4 sections or so, if really had to do so (required the high res)..

 

You can also reduce the file size of the image with no loss of quality, and no noticeable difference to the players by using a solid color for the areas the players will not be able to see - understating the JPG image model, less colors and more solid areas will decrease the file size. This image is 3.4MB, with no drop of dpi. Should result in a significant improvement in play-ability. I'm sure you can do even better, as this was a 30 second fix.

 

I was referring to JPG compression .. I usually use somewhere between 80-90% original image. Image file size on disk is the relevant issue here.

 

Just to provide a complete answer.. here it is...

As @Krilion_GD stated "Image file size on disk is the relevant issue here."... This is true for the speed at which the image is transferred to the players, therefore will have a smoother transition between maps and such. And the overall original post and topic.

The uncompressed image size is basically how much RAM will be used on the GM's computer and on each of the player's computers respectfully. As technology grows and it becomes less and less expensive to own more advanced computers this might be an old topic. Though, if you have a huge map and it's uncompressed image file is 900MB, you may have players who only see "a black map" as some may not have enough RAM allocated to Java/D20PRO to support the map image and all the token images all at once.

 

there seems to be some new lag beast with 3.7 and the new networking method.