Getting Started

This walks you from an empty vault to running a fight, in about fifteen minutes. It assumes you have never written YAML or markdown — you won't have to type any here. Every step ends with something you can see.

If you already used the plugin before 7.0.0, read Migrating from 5.x to 7.0.0 first: your first sync offers to move your old compendium files, and taking that offer is what keeps your existing links working.

1. Install the plugin

You need Obsidian 1.13.0 or newer. Obsidian updates itself, so you almost certainly have it — Settings → General → Current version if you want to be sure.

1. Open Settings → Community plugins.
2. If Obsidian says Restricted mode is on, click Turn on community plugins.
3. Click Browse, search for Draw Steel Elements, and click Install.
4. Click Enable.

That's it — there is nothing to configure yet.

2. Learn the one keyboard shortcut that matters

Everything the plugin draws — statblocks, trackers, hero sheets — only appears in Obsidian's Reading view. In Editing view you see the text you wrote instead.

Ctrl + E (Cmd + E on a Mac) switches between them. You will use it constantly.

Here is the same note in both. Editing view — the text:

Reading view — what that text draws:

If you ever see a block of grey text where you expected a card, you are in Editing view. Press Ctrl/Cmd + E.

3. Download the compendium

The plugin can keep a copy of the official Draw Steel Compendium inside your vault — every monster, kit, ability and rule — so you can drop any of it into your notes.

1. Open Settings → Draw Steel Elements → Compendium.
2. Click Sync.

It downloads into a folder called DS Compendium. Your own notes are never touched: the plugin only ever updates files it installed itself.

If you used the plugin before 7.0.0, this first sync stops and offers to move your old compendium files to their new locations first. Say yes. Obsidian rewrites the links in your notes as it moves them, so everything you wrote keeps working — and it makes a backup of anything you edited before it starts. The full story, including what the dialog shows you before anything happens, is in Migrating from 5.x to 7.0.0.

4. Make your first element

Open any note, make sure you are in Editing view (Ctrl/Cmd + E), and type:

/ds

A list of everything the plugin can draw appears. Keep typing to narrow it — /dsstat for a statblock, /dsroll for a dice roller. Pick one with the arrow keys and Enter.

The plugin writes a complete, working example into your note. Switch to Reading view (Ctrl/Cmd + E) and there it is:

Now go back to Editing view and change something — a name, a number. Return to Reading view. That is the whole authoring loop: edit the text, look at the card.

Everything is a "code block". The lines with `` around them are how Obsidian marks off a chunk of special text. The plugin reads what is inside and draws something in its place. You never have to write those lines yourself —/ds` does it for you.

5. Drop a monster into a note

You don't have to type a monster out. With the compendium synced:

1. Put your cursor where you want the monster, in Editing view.
2. Open the command palette — Ctrl/Cmd + P.
3. Type Insert Draw Steel and pick Insert Draw Steel: compendium reference.

1. Search for the creature you want and press Enter.

The plugin writes three short lines into your note. In Reading view they become the whole statblock — the one you saw in step 2.

Nothing was copied into your note but a code. That is deliberate: the card always shows the currently synced version of that monster, so when the compendium is updated, your notes are too. If you would rather have your own copy to change, that is the Customize a monster guide.

6. Run a fight

The initiative tracker runs an encounter: turn order, Stamina, conditions, Malice.

1. In Editing view, type /ds and pick Initiative tracker. You get a worked example with two heroes and a group of enemies.
2. Switch to Reading view.

Now play with it — it is all clickable:

• Click the circle next to a name to mark that someone has taken their turn.
• Click a Stamina number to open the damage/healing editor.
• Click the + in a conditions row to apply a condition.
• Malice has its own panel, with arrows to spend and gain, and a log.
• "Advance round" clears the turn markers and moves to the next round.

Everything you click is written back into the note, so closing Obsidian and coming back later picks up exactly where you left off.

To replace the example heroes with your party, go back to Editing view and edit the names and numbers — they read exactly as they look. The full field list is in Initiative Tracker.

Where to go next

• Run an encounter — build the fight from compendium monsters, with a difficulty budget, then hand it to the tracker.
• Track your hero — a whole character in one block.
• Customize a monster — the homebrew loop.
• Style your statblocks — make cards look the way you like.
• Settings — a tour of every page.
• All elements — the full catalog.

Something not rendering? It is nearly always Reading view (Ctrl/Cmd + E) or an un-synced compendium (Settings → Draw Steel Elements → Compendium → Sync).