Battery System

Battery System (🔋)

The Battery System adds a full battery lifecycle to smartphones. Batteries drain over in-game time and must be recharged through charging stations, charging zones, or charge items. This feature is completely optional — it is disabled by default and can be toggled on or off at any time in the GM settings.

This page covers the GM configuration. For the player-facing experience (dead screen, charging UX, boot animations), see the Battery & Power page in the User Guide.

How to Access Battery Settings:

Method 1 (Main Settings):
1. Go to the main Foundry VTT Configure Settings menu (⚙️).
2. Navigate to the Module Settings tab.
3. Find "Smartphone Widget" in the list and open "Smartphone GM Settings."
4. Switch to the Battery tab.
Method 2 (In-App Shortcut):
1. As the GM, open your Smartphone Widget (📱).
2. Navigate to the Settings app (⚙️).
3. In the "GM Only" section, tap on "GM Settings."
4. Switch to the Battery tab.

Battery Settings Overview

Enable Battery System

The master toggle. When checked, the battery system becomes active for your world. When unchecked, all phones have unlimited power and the battery icon is hidden from the status bar. Changing this setting requires a page reload.

Battery Mode

Controls which phones are affected by battery drain:

Mode	Description
All Phones	Every phone in the world drains battery. Simple and universal.
Selected Phones Only	Only phones you explicitly select will have battery drain. All other phones have unlimited power.

When "Selected Phones Only" is chosen, a Phone List appears below the mode selector. This list is separated into PC and NPC tabs with a search bar and Select All / Deselect All controls. Check the phones you want the battery system to apply to.

Tip: Use "Selected Phones Only" mode to apply battery only to player characters, preventing unnecessary battery management on dozens of NPC phones that rarely get used.

Drain Rate (% per in-game hour)

How fast batteries drain. The default is 4% per hour, meaning a full battery lasts about 25 in-game hours. You can set this from 0 (no drain) to 50. The drain is calculated whenever in-game time advances — if your time source module jumps forward 6 hours, the battery will drain accordingly.

Low Battery Warning Threshold (%)

The battery percentage at which players receive a toast warning notification. The default is 20%. The system also has built-in thresholds at 20%, 10%, and 5% that trigger sequential warnings as the battery drops.

Charge Items

Charge Items let you register specific Foundry VTT items as portable chargers. When a player drags a registered item onto the phone widget, the phone charges.