# Which Online Virtual Tabletop Do You Use?



## Retreater (Feb 3, 2020)

I'm looking for a virtual tabletop for a 5e game for players across a few different states. We would like to also have voice chat (though that can be done through a different service). People will likely be using a variety of devices, not just PCs. 

Feel free to explain in the thread your reasoning and to share your experiences. 

Thanks!


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## tommybahama (Feb 3, 2020)

We use Roll20 for map and background music and Discord for voice.   The dynamic lighting is overrated.  Roll20 will work on a tablet like the iPad and I think the Galaxy tab, but not on an iPhone or Android smartphone.  The character sheet is pretty good.  If you buy the digital books then their content is drag and drop onto the character sheet.


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## Jd Smith1 (Feb 3, 2020)

I use a VTT, but on a LAN network, at the table. We use MapTools, which is free, and excellent.


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## Ovinomancer (Feb 3, 2020)

Retreater said:


> I'm looking for a virtual tabletop for a 5e game for players across a few different states. We would like to also have voice chat (though that can be done through a different service). People will likely be using a variety of devices, not just PCs.
> 
> Feel free to explain in the thread your reasoning and to share your experiences.
> 
> Thanks!



Neither of the two VTTs you listed work off of a PC or Mac.  I'm not aware of a VTT that also works on tablets and phones.


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## Phenomen (Feb 4, 2020)

*Foundry VTT*. It has every feature of R20 and much more. Some pros:

One time purchase (only for GM). No subscription. Players connect through browser.
Unlimited resources for maps, tokens, music etc (since everything is hosted on GM's PC).
User-created compendiums.
Advanced dynamic lightning and walls (one-sided walls, terrain walls, doors and secret doors etc) and performance is miles ahead of R20.
Better ruler tools (AoE cones, squares etc).
Awesome automation and usability for D&D5 and WFRP4 systems.
Animated backgrounds, ambient sounds (play when token enter area), map notes, wildcard tokens, rollable tables with configurable weights and hundreds other QoL features.
Ability to import stuff from R20 and Beyond.
Open API, tons of mods and active community.
Cons:

Less systems (character sheets) at the moment.


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## Ovinomancer (Feb 4, 2020)

Phenomen said:


> *Foundry VTT*. It has every feature of R20 and much more. Some pros:
> 
> One time purchase (only for GM). No subscription. Players connect through browser.
> Unlimited resources for maps, tokens, music etc (since everything is hosted on GM's PC).
> ...



Cool.  Thanks, that's on my radar, now.  It's not released yet, though, so not immediately useful.


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## Phenomen (Feb 4, 2020)

Ovinomancer said:


> Cool.  Thanks, that's on my radar, now.  It's not released yet, though, so not immediately useful.



$5 on Patreon to get current version. Release is scheduled for March.


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## Ovinomancer (Feb 4, 2020)

Phenomen said:


> $5 on Patreon to get current version. Release is scheduled for March.



Current version being a closed beta.  It's cool, no doubt, but not released yet.  I've been too often burned by early release software to get excited to be a paying tester. YMMV.


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## HippyCraig (Feb 4, 2020)

D20pro.com. This works on windows Mac and Linux.   Active and pationate community as well


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## ninjayeti (Feb 4, 2020)

I've used both Fantasy Grounds and Roll20 for 150+ hours each.  Both work well - neither one is a bad choice, but I prefer FG for a couple of reasons:

1) I like the UI better in FG.  For example, navigating the character sheets are easier.  FG sheets are small with lots of tabs along the side so it is easy to click to exactly what you need.  Roll20 sheets are large and I am often scrolling around to find what I need; spells are on a separate tab but the tab button is on the page itself, so I  find myself scrolling to find the tab button for the spell page, then scrolling on the spell page to find what I need.   

2) FG has a lot more automation built in.  This gives it a bit more of a learning curve, but it is nice once you have a little experience.  For example, you could apply a "rage" effect to your barbarian with one click that automatically adds the bonus to damage rolls, applies resistance to incoming damage of the appropriate types, remembers the advantage to Str checks, and expires after 1 min. 

3) Roll20 is "freemium" but you will likely end up paying more in the long run for a subscription and the content with Roll20 than with FG.  

Whatever VTT you use I'd recommend discord for voice chat.


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## MNblockhead (Mar 2, 2020)

I'm looking at VTTs again. I'm mainly looking for something that will allow me to throw up a map and character token and clear fog as characters explore the map. I don't have time to prep maps for dynamic lighting so progressive reveal and dynamic lighting don't matter to me. 

Roll20 is at the top of my list as it is dead simple to add a map. But I find the reveal features clunky. After using RealmWorks for sharing maps, it is hard to live without paintbrush reveal, especially since I have a touch screen.  I can reveal parts of a map by simply smudging away parts of the mask layer with my finger.  This is a good send with circular rooms or natural caverns.  Using Roll20s polygon tool is slow and annoying to use in game an the results look terrible for rooms or caverns that are not made up of straight edges. 

I have not installed Fantasy Grounds yet. I like that I can use FG for in-person games and also like that it offers a freehand mask reveal. That may be what leads me to go with FG, even though I found it difficult to use, with a steep learning curve, when I first looked at it a few years ago. 

Astral is beautiful, but has no mask reveal at all, only dynamic lighting and setting up maps for dynamic lighting is very clunky and frustrating. 

I just joined the Foundry VTT Patreon and installed the software. It is wonky and doesn't work great with high-resolution displays. I had to change my display setting just to make it usable (important buttons would be off screen and not reachable). Also, I just could not figure out how to add a map and documentation is almost non-existent. I posted for help on the Patreon site but I'll probably cancel my Patreon. If just getting a map into it requires contacting the developer, I'm not very excited about bothering to learn any of its other features. 

Map tools has freehand mask reveal. Not as nice as paintbrush reveal but better than polygon reveal. But I find it to be fussy. I'll play around with it some more as it is open source and why pay for Fantasy Grounds if Map Tools will do?  Yes, map tools makes adjusting the grid to match that of the map image difficult if you use pre-gridded maps. Well, not difficult, really. Just not as quick and convenient as Roll20, FG, or Astral.


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## Eyes of Nine (Mar 15, 2020)

Sorry to necro this thread (well, it's only been 10 days; maybe I'm throwing a healing potion down its throat).

Wondering - what is the best option for Voice? I saw Discord mentioned a couple of times upthread; but wondering about Google Hangouts; or any other tools? What about webcams, do people usually see each other's webcams? 

I guess I should try some of these guys out. Looks like R20 or FG is the default. For someone who's never used any sort of VTT, what's the consensus best tool with good documentation or strong community?


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## Ovinomancer (Mar 15, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> Sorry to necro this thread (well, it's only been 10 days; maybe I'm throwing a healing potion down its throat).
> 
> Wondering - what is the best option for Voice? I saw Discord mentioned a couple of times upthread; but wondering about Google Hangouts; or any other tools? What about webcams, do people usually see each other's webcams?
> 
> I guess I should try some of these guys out. Looks like R20 or FG is the default. For someone who's never used any sort of VTT, what's the consensus best tool with good documentation or strong community?



Roll20 or FG.  Or one of the others.  There's no consensus.  Roll20 and FG are the clear leaders, and both have large user bases.  Depends on who you ask if those communities are helpful -- I've found Roll20's to be pretty good but I know posters here who say they've had bad experiences.  You can poke both communities via their official forums and see if you have a preference.  Roll20 has a free version, and it's pretty good, but if you're going to be running games and want automation and dynamic lighting and more storage space for all the pretty pictures you'll need to get a sub.  I haven't looked at FG lately, but I think they also have a sub version for a low cost, low risk look at what FG offers.  FG has more automation than Roll20, but has a higher learning curve because of it.  Both have good 'learn the program' videos out by fans.

Or you could go with one of the smaller VTTs.  I haven't looked lately, so I can't say much about them.  I'm pretty tied into the Roll20 economy now with map assets, and while I can export my purchases, it's a manual process that another VTT is gonna need to wow me to get me to switch -- or Roll20 needs to poop it's pants.


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## Eyes of Nine (Mar 15, 2020)

How exactly does Roll20 make money? They are really pushing their free trial; but I don't like to sign up for even a trial until I understand how much the real product will cost.


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## Ovinomancer (Mar 15, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> How exactly does Roll20 make money? They are really pushing their free trial; but I don't like to sign up for even a trial until I understand how much the real product will cost.



Subscription model for advanced features and larger storage cap.  Two paid tiers.  I pay $10/mo for a Pro sub and no one else in my group pays.

Alternatively, the have a market for game assets and published works which they take a percentage on.  You don't ever have to buy a thing, you can import, but their trick is that marketplace purchases don't count against your storage cap and they make it simple to buy and then immediately use.  

Can't say how anyone else does it -- as I said, I'm pretty deep into the Roll20 economy, so I'd need a good reason other than "maybe a little better" to switch.


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## cmad1977 (Mar 15, 2020)

Ovinomancer said:


> Subscription model for advanced features and larger storage cap. Two paid tiers. I pay $10/mo for a Pro sub and no one else in my group pays.
> 
> Alternatively, the have a market for game assets and published works which they take a percentage on. You don't ever have to buy a thing, you can import, but their trick is that marketplace purchases don't count against your storage cap and they make it simple to buy and then immediately use.
> 
> Can't say how anyone else does it -- as I said, I'm pretty deep into the Roll20 economy, so I'd need a good reason other than "maybe a little better" to switch.




I’m in the same boat. 
I pay 10/month and my players(6+) don’t pay a dime and it all seems to work out great.


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## heruca (Mar 15, 2020)

This list covers most of the VTTs out there, except perhaps a few of the newest offerings. I hope it helps.


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## MNblockhead (Mar 15, 2020)

@Eyes of Nine - since my last past I've put even more time into testing different VTTs, adding Fantasy Grounds and The Forge to those I've been testing.  I've downloaded d20Pro but haven't tested it yet. 

To keep it short, I don't know what your particular needs and preferences are but my conclusion is that there are good reasons Fantasy Grounds and Roll20 lead the pack. Unless you are technically oriented and like messing around with betas, I would avoid Astral and The Forge until they are more fully baked. 

Based on my experiences as both a player and DM, when recommending VTTs, I generally recommend one of the three, based on your needs, with some follow-up thoughts about VoIP/Video Conferencing:

1. Roll20

Probably the easiest to get started with. If you play major systems, especially 5e, you can can buy adventures and rulesets all configured and ready to play, which is a HUGE time saver and helps with the learning curve. It also has an excellent system for DMs to advertise games and players to find them. It has voice built in, but many groups use a third-party tool like Discord or Hangouts for voice. 

If you are mostly looking to run games online, Roll20 is by far the easiest VTT to get up and running with.

2. Fantasy Grounds

If you have more patience with learn curves and don't mind a bit more effort, Fantasy Grounds offers a powerful set of tools with an amazing community. You can buy all the 5e stuff and material from other publishers and other systems all prepped and ready to play. 

Also, it is a great solution if you want to use a VTT for in-person play. E.g., if you have a digital battlemap (i.e. horizontal TV or other display). Almost all DMs I see using a VTT for in-person games are using Fantasy Grounds.  

But if you primarily plan to use it for online games, the big downside is that all your players must download and install the software. Also, it is more work to configure it and your PC firewall rules to serve games. 

3. Map Tools

This is the best free options. It has many features of the commercial tools, but you have to do all the work yourself in configuring rules, etc. Also, like Fantasy Grounds you're players will need to install it and you'll need to be comfortable configuring it as a DM to serve games. 

A NOTE ABOUT VOIP/WEB-METTINGS

I've not had issues with Roll20s voice features, but I don't have a lot of experience with it because nearly every DM running games in Roll20 whose games I've joined uses Discord. 

Personally, I'm not a fan of Discord. I find the interface ugly and confusing and I've had a lot of issues with voice quality using discord. 

For games I run, I use Google Meet. I've found it to be the most solid web-meeting platform no matter what region of the world I'm in (having used it in the United States, East Asia, India, and the Middle East). Few companies have the data-center footprint and resources of Google.  Same thing with Hangouts, which is basically the free version of Meet. One advantage of Hangouts is that it has dice-rolling built into its chat. 

Microsoft Teams and Skype are also excellent but I only have that through work, so I don't use for gaming.


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## Ovinomancer (Mar 15, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> @Eyes of Nine - since my last past I've put even more time into testing different VTTs, adding Fantasy Grounds and The Forge to those I've been testing.  I've downloaded d20Pro but haven't tested it yet.
> 
> To keep it short, I don't know what your particular needs and preferences are but my conclusion is that there are good reasons Fantasy Grounds and Roll20 lead the pack. Unless you are technically oriented and like messing around with betas, I would avoid Astral and The Forge until they are more fully baked.
> 
> ...



We use Teamspeak, but that because some friends are huge into the CoD and Battlefield games and don't mind a weekly use of their guild TS server.


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## Shiroiken (Mar 15, 2020)

Both Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds have advantages and disadvantages. 

Fantasy Grounds appears to be the overall better system, with really cool features... but you can't play for free. Everyone has to have a certain level of access, or the DM has to have a the mega level, which allows players to join for free in their game. I got a chance to check out a trial version, and another issue is that the tabletop normally took longer to load between maps because of how many features it has (my laptop is quite old).

Roll20's biggest feature is that you can play for free, but the downside is that if you want the better access (giving a few cooler features), you have to pay a monthly fee, rather than having the option of a one time payment that FG has. When playing for free, you have to wait about 20-30 seconds to open the initial game (as it runs an add for the paid version), but moving between pages doesn't have a delay. None of the cooler features from the paid version are necessary to play the game, and the free version works great. I've been using it for about 7 years now with no regret.

As for voice, we use Skype normally. We tried Discord, but for some reason several of us had issues with connection quality. We never tried the in-game voice option for Roll20, because one of our group said that it tended to lag the game.


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## Reynard (Mar 16, 2020)

I use Fantasy Grounds and I like it, but it's expensive. Even if you go with a subscription instead of straight purchase, you still have to opt for the most expensive version to host friends for free, and then you have either A LOT of work to do or have to spend a pretty penny to have access to all the material. That said, the automation is really nice and there's lots of support, both official and 3rd party.


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## Tallifer (Mar 16, 2020)

We use roll20 for images. We used to use Twiddla, but it now has a time limit for any free session. Now we are all learning how to use roll20 more and more like a virtual tabletop, but most of us don't even use macros.
For sound, we have found that Google Hangouts works for a greater proportion of our players. Roll20 sound seems not to work so well, and discord also seems to cut out portions of sound.


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## Eyes of Nine (Mar 16, 2020)

Tallifer said:


> We use roll20 for images. We used to use Twiddla, but it now has a time limit for any free session. Now we are all learning how to use roll20 more and more like a virtual tabletop, but most of us don't even use macros.
> For sound, we have found that Google Hangouts works for a greater proportion of our players. Roll20 sound seems not to work so well, and discord also seems to cut out portions of sound.




which platform is best if I have homebrewed stuff?


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## Matchstick (Mar 16, 2020)

I will always take straight up paying over any kind of subscription service.  Doesn't take much inattention and all of a sudden you realize you've way overpaid for what you've gotten.


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## UngainlyTitan (Mar 16, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> which platform is best if I have homebrewed stuff?



Not much of a difference really between Roll20 and FG for homebrew. I would prefer FG because of the map pin hyperlinks but that is my preference.


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## MNblockhead (Mar 16, 2020)

What VTTs have you guys found to be best for larger maps? I was playing around with Roll20 some more last night and I uploaded a JPEG of a level from Rappan Athuk. I decreased the file size to under 1 MB but after using the align-to-grid feature, the map went outside the workspace.  I probably have to do some more research and tutorials because if this is due to a grid size limitation I can't see hardly any but the most limited battlemaps being useful in Roll20.  

I'm going to test the same thing in Fantasy Ground and MapTools, I like that Roll20 is online and I don't have to mess around with having two instances of a program open and connected by localhost to display a map to my players. 

At this point, I couldn't care less about macros, character sheets, text descriptions, pins or other bells and whistles. I'm looking for something that I can:

1. Quickly load a map with fog of war
2. Quickly align the VTT grid to the map-image grid
3. Throw some tokens on the map and be able to move them around.


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## Tallifer (Mar 16, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> which platform is best if I have homebrewed stuff?



I have found roll20 very adaptable: one of our group always runs a new and different system which he always hacks and mixes from other systems: roll20 works well for him. You do not need to use any roll20 character sheets: I do not even use them for 4E or 5E. We just use Google docs to share and look at and edit our customized character sheets.


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## Tallifer (Mar 16, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> What VTTs have you guys found to be best for larger maps? I was playing around with Roll20 some more last night and I uploaded a JPEG of a level from Rappan Athuk.




You can use the tab for pages at the top of the roll20 map and edit the size of the page to accommodate the map. It can be as huge as you want. (The roll20 wiki explains it better.)


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## Zaukrie (Mar 16, 2020)

I used FG for awhile. the learning curve is real, but it definitely automates a ton. If you have the money, I'd do it again.


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## MNblockhead (Mar 17, 2020)

Tallifer said:


> You can use the tab for pages at the top of the roll20 map and edit the size of the page to accommodate the map. It can be as huge as you want. (The roll20 wiki explains it better.)




Thank you. I finally figured it out a while after that post. I've also got dynamic lighting and advanced fog of war figured out. 

I'm thinking of getting the $50/year subscription which gives me enough storage to upload all my Rappan Athuk maps. I do really like the the dynamic lighting used in conjunction with advance fog of war, but am finding that it gets very unresponsive with large maps. 

I'm going to try prep some of the same maps in Fantasy Grounds and Map Tools to see if I have a better experience running software on my computer and just doing a screen share.  The problem with that is that I would have to move all the player tokens during the game. 

I'd be happy to spend the money, but my problem is that I'm worried about buyer's remorse. If I go all into Roll20 and then if FGG focuses on putting its content into Fantasy Grounds, it would feel like a waste. 

As much as I love FGG and their Lost Worlds setting and related adventures, I would have had an easier time going with official WotC material or even Kobold Press's Midgard setting, both of which have good support in a number of VTTs. But I jumped into Lost Lands when I was still running in-person games. 

I'm going to spend the weekend running simulations in a variety of tools this weekend to first see which solutions provides the best performance given my sub-part Internet connection. I'm going to hold off on buying any 5e rule-sets and bestiaries until I have a better idea on which system will better support the third-party content I want to use.


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## jaerdaph (Mar 22, 2020)

Does d20Pro have Fate dice?


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## MNblockhead (Mar 23, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> Does d20Pro have Fate dice?




I don't know what fate dice are. I can say that d20pro is designed specifically for d20 system games. It is not trying to be all things for all games. That's another reason I'm still seriously considering Fantasy Grounds, which seems like it can better support more, and very different, game systems.


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## Ovinomancer (Mar 23, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> Does d20Pro have Fate dice?



Roll20 does, yes. 





__





						Dice Reference - Roll20 Wiki
					






					wiki.roll20.net


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## kenada (Mar 23, 2020)

We started using roll20 recently. It’s okay (just okay). One of the other members of my group ran Call of Cthluhu, and I’ll be moving my Pathfinder 2e campaign to it starting this Saturday.



MNblockhead said:


> I'm thinking of getting the $50/year subscription which gives me enough storage to upload all my Rappan Athuk maps. I do really like the the dynamic lighting used in conjunction with advance fog of war, but am finding that it gets very unresponsive with large maps.



That’s a concern I have as I work to put my stuff into roll20 for my game. However, there’s a rewrite in the works, so maybe it’ll get better soon.


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## jaerdaph (Mar 23, 2020)

Thanks, guys! 
I already use Roll20 for Fate but I was curious if d20Pro might have Fate dice. Based on the name I'm not surprised it doesn't have Fate dice but it still looks like a solid VTT choice both for usability and affordability.


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## LordEntrails (Mar 23, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> I have not installed Fantasy Grounds yet. I like that I can use FG for in-person games and also like that it offers a freehand mask reveal. That may be what leads me to go with FG, even though I found it difficult to use, with a steep learning curve, when I first looked at it a few years ago.



Check out www.fantasygroundscollege.net. They are probably new since you last tried FG. They offer all sorts of free classes to get people up to speed and even into advanced topics in FG. Another aspect of the great FG community.



Eyes of Nine said:


> Wondering - what is the best option for Voice? I saw Discord mentioned a couple of times upthread; but wondering about Google Hangouts; or any other tools? What about webcams, do people usually see each other's webcams?



Discord. Or Teamspeak if you or a friend are willing to run a server.


Eyes of Nine said:


> How exactly does Roll20 make money? They are really pushing their free trial; but I don't like to sign up for even a trial until I understand how much the real product will cost.



As other have said, they sell lots of content and try to get people to pay for upgraded features. And of course, it always reminds me of the saying; "When something is free, it's because _you _are the product."


MNblockhead said:


> What VTTs have you guys found to be best for larger maps?



I always struggle to load custom maps in Roll20. Getting them to fit and getting the grid on them is always a struggle for me even after I followed several tutorials. Never had that challenge with FG except for when grid size is not a whole number of pixels you end up with drift. MapTools should be easy, but never explored it.


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## The_Dagda (Apr 4, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> I'm looking at VTTs again. I'm mainly looking for something that will allow me to throw up a map and character token and clear fog as characters explore the map. I don't have time to prep maps for dynamic lighting so progressive reveal and dynamic lighting don't matter to me.
> 
> Roll20 is at the top of my list as it is dead simple to add a map. But I find the reveal features clunky. After using RealmWorks for sharing maps, it is hard to live without paintbrush reveal, especially since I have a touch screen.  I can reveal parts of a map by simply smudging away parts of the mask layer with my finger. ...
> 
> ...




Had the same experience and impression with Astral and you piqued interest in Realmworks.  Thanks for the post.

Sorry your Foundry experience wasn’t great.  My group is moving there from Roll20 chiefly BECAUSE of the high definition performance.  Roll20 can’t handle highrez maps and it’s performance crawls with complex dynamic lighting and light sources (I feel you re: the polygon shapes).  I’ve been running ultraHD animated maps (can’t do that on R20 or FG) from Dynamic Dungeons and 100+ shaded light sources and dynamic lighting hasn’t complained with 4 characters.

Hope the version 1.0 is dropped soon and the documentation gets a boost.  Encourage you to check again when it does.


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## MNblockhead (Apr 20, 2020)

Currently I've settled on running Map Tools and sharing the player map via Google Meet.  I have the 100+ maps from my Rappan Athuk campaign, and tokens for all MM maps easily available and searchable from Map Tools.  I just go to my Rappan Athuk maps folder, search for the battlemap image I want, right click on it and select new map. It opens with Fog of War. Sizing the grid is a little finicky but not hard and is pretty quick. Then I just drop the party tokens on it. 

It offers rectangle, diamond, polygon, and freehand reveal. I can easily drop monster tokens on for encounters. 

It is easy and reliable. No freezing. No crashing.  I reveal the map as the party explores, moving their tokens around and throwing monster tokens on the map during combat encounters.

The downside is that running a Map Tools server that my players can access to control their own tokens is too much of a hassle to bother with. Also, it would be too much work to create the macros and data enter monster stats to have any of the automations that make Roll20, d20pro, and Fantasy Grounds nice. 

I'm still paying $9/month for Fantasy Ground Unity Ultimate (Early Access), because it is what I would most like to work. I've just found it to be unusable in practice. 

It consistently and repeatedly freezes when I simply try to repeat what I do in Map Tools in FGU.  I thought I was starting "simple".  But everything is less convenient and less stable than Map Tools for what I'm trying to do. 

I have all my maps and tokens for my characters in the campaign folder. I pull up a map by going to the images widget, which simply takes longer to navigate and search than Map Tools. Then I have to open the Maps widget. Create a new map and then add the battlemap image to the background layer.  Seems like an unnecessary number of steps (why not just right click on an image and select "create new map"?), but is not that difficult and can be done quickly once you know what you need to do. 

Sizing the grid in FGU is the simplest of any VTT I've used. 

Adding tokens is pretty strait forward. 

Panning around the map is one thing I don't like for FGU. In other VTTs, you can hold the right click on the mouse and drag the map around. In FGU you can to click on an special icon on the map and drag it to move around the map. Not a big deal, just not as fluid and simple as Map Tools. 

Opening another instance and connecting via LAN for sharing on a second screen for in-person play or via Google Meet, etc., is about the same process as Map Tools but it takes a lot longer, uses more system resources, and software inevitably hangs and freezes, making it unusable for play. 

I'm going to do more testing with FGU using two computers and connected using the cloud server. Maybe if I'm only running one instance it will run better. Ultimately, of course, I want to get to the point where my players can run FGU on their computer and control their own tokens. But I'm not going to bother them with that until I know I accomplish simple tasks as displaying and manually revealing maps. 

Also, it is important to note that with VTTs that are installed on your local computer and connect to the company cloud servers, like FGU, d20pro, and Foundry on The Forge servers, they don't work in many countries. I started my testing when I was working abroad in the mideast and it is unlikely I'd be able to host games using most of these tools as I can't access their cloud servers.   That was one big thing in favor of Roll20 and if I were not running such a map-heavy campaign, I would consider Roll20, even if it is not a great tool for in-person games. 

In terms of its feature set, FGU is the holy grail for me, except that it has proven unstable to the point of being unusable and hosting doesn't work when I'm working overseas. I'll do more testing over this month as I just paid for another month, but it is looking like I'll just cancel my Ultimate subscription and use Table Tools for the time being and check it out again when it comes out of its "early release" stage.


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## MNblockhead (Apr 20, 2020)

The_Dagda said:


> Had the same experience and impression with Astral and you piqued interest in Realmworks.  Thanks for the post.
> 
> Sorry your Foundry experience wasn’t great.  My group is moving there from Roll20 chiefly BECAUSE of the high definition performance.  Roll20 can’t handle highrez maps and it’s performance crawls with complex dynamic lighting and light sources (I feel you re: the polygon shapes).  I’ve been running ultraHD animated maps (can’t do that on R20 or FG) from Dynamic Dungeons and 100+ shaded light sources and dynamic lighting hasn’t complained with 4 characters.
> 
> Hope the version 1.0 is dropped soon and the documentation gets a boost.  Encourage you to check again when it does.




My problem with Foundry is that it took too much time just to get it to start. To just install it and create my first campaign and load my first map took a couple hours of testing, looking for documentation, posting to the Patreon page, and finally getting a solution from the Discord channel that required manually applying a patch. I work in info systems, so I'm used to wrangling with software, but this just felt like work. I want to play D&D not learn 2nd-level IT support solutions. 

Also, Foundry doesn't have licensed WotC content, so I would have to do all the data entry if I want stats, initiative tracking, combat macros, etc. I'm finding Map Tools offers everything I need in terms of displaying maps and tokens. It offers dynamic lighting etc. and has great FOW reveal tools.  So I'm not sure what Foundry is adding to my experience, even if it wasn't so half-baked and undocumented. 

Foundry also doesn't do anything to make it easier to host games. At least FGU and d20pro offer cloud servers as part of the subscription, so long as you are not in country blocked from accessing them.  Map Tools and Foundry are just too difficult to host games on over the Internet. Especially if you travel and do not always have control over routers etc. 

Once Foundry gets to the point of general release, I'll take another look.


----------



## CleverNickName (Apr 20, 2020)

I voted Roll20, but I don't want that to sound like an endorsement.

We played two games of D&D this weekend on Roll20, and it was a bear.  It was slow and laggy, with unreliable audio/video and glitchy lighting.  We would be using a different platform if a superior option were available, but alas.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Apr 20, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> Currently I've settled on running Map Tools




Is this the Map Tools you mean? MapTool

Or this one?





						MapTools - Tools and information for using UTM, MGRS and latitude longitude coordinates
					

MapTools - Tools and instructions for GPS users to work with UTM, MGRS, USNG and lat/lon coordinate systems.




					maptools.com
				




Assuming the first, but intrigued if it is the 2nd.


----------



## MNblockhead (Apr 20, 2020)

Map Tool. Sorry. My world building has progressed to the point of using GIS tools in my games.  Though, funnily enough I do have QGIS installed on my work laptop. It would be interesting to play around with how to use it in my world building. If I was doing a modern or SciFi game, I could totally see using QGIS for marking up maps. 

It would be most impressive if you are doing a modern game like Delta Green or futuristic game like Shadow Run. There are lots of free satellite images, you can match these with various overlays and shape files to show and reveal things and you can mark up the maps.  If you want a large region, continent, or the whole world to be your area of exploration, using QGIS would be an awesome way to display that and reveal information about locations as you explore. 

If you are homebrewing your own worlds, it would be a lot of work, but if using the real world and pulling from open source images and data, it is just the learning curve to learn the software, but after that it would be quick to load maps, shape files, and data and to mark things up. 

The image files, howver, are huge. Like I just opened one set and the main B&W sattlelite image is half a gigabyte. The overlay file is 161 MB.  You'd need a good amount of space on your hard drive and you'd only be sharing via screenshare. 

I'll probably never do this, because I only have time for my D&D campaign and I'm looking to decrease my prep time. But I can imagine some cool things one could do with a QGIS or some other GIS software. QGIS is open source. If interested, you can download for free here: Discover QGIS

Good sources of free GIS file sets can be found here:



			Free GIS Datasets - Categorised List
		

(large, well-categorized list of sites offering free GIS data)









						10 Free GIS Data Sources: Best Global Raster and Vector Datasets - GIS Geography
					

Turbo-charge your search for free GIS data with this list of 10 free, downloadable global GIS datasets from highly reputable sources - vector and raster.




					gisgeography.com
				



GIS Geography's list of the 10 best sources of free GIS data


----------



## Hawkwind (May 15, 2020)

Just found this online , its google slide for running Indexcard rpg complete with a dice roller.its is easy to hack it for most other games 








						GSVTT v1.2
					

20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 GSVTT v1.2 Google Slides VTT Map by Fantastic Maps (Cropped) Character tokens from ICRPG CORE This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Initiative tracker Reorder Character Sheet slides to...




					docs.google.com


----------



## el-remmen (May 15, 2020)

I use ZOOM.

I have a paid acct, a two camera set-up (one on the battle mat and one on me with the big classroom sized dry erase board I have in my game room behind me), we use the chat feature for sharing names of people and places and other important details (or secret convos), I use the share screen function when I need to share a map or image, and I let my players roll their own dice because if I did not trust them to not cheat I wouldn't be playing D&D with them in person or remotely.

I came up with this system after my first in-person game had to go remote b/c of covid, but then I started a second remote-only game with friends from around the country.


----------



## AaronOfBarbaria (May 16, 2020)

I recently switched from astral tabletop, which is what I switched to after a couple years of using Roll20 begrudgingly, to FoundryVTT.

It's technically still in a pre-release state, but it is easily the best virtual table-top experience I've ever had. I can do as much with it as I did with MapTool way back when that was what I used, but it has an interface that meshes well with my brain and my players only need their preferred web browser to connect in.


----------



## Ulfgeir (May 16, 2020)

My group uses AstralTableTop, and then Discord for voice.


----------



## Zaukrie (May 17, 2020)

AaronOfBarbaria said:


> I recently switched from astral tabletop, which is what I switched to after a couple years of using Roll20 begrudgingly, to FoundryVTT.
> 
> It's technically still in a pre-release state, but it is easily the best virtual table-top experience I've ever had. I can do as much with it as I did with MapTool way back when that was what I used, but it has an interface that meshes well with my brain and my players only need their preferred web browser to connect in.



Tell me more. I really want to see it in action, not a tutorial....


----------



## Zaukrie (May 17, 2020)

Ulfgeir said:


> My group uses AstralTableTop, and then Discord for voice.



What do you like about astral?


----------



## AaronOfBarbaria (May 17, 2020)

Zaukrie said:


> Tell me more. I really want to see it in action, not a tutorial....



There is a video on youtube in which someone runs through the setup of the warhammer ruleset, and is very informative of what the VTT can do.

Let's see if I can link it: vid


----------



## Ulfgeir (May 17, 2020)

Zaukrie said:


> What do you like about astral?




It is relatively easy to get started (at least for a player), and they do have support for a number of different games.


----------



## R_J_K75 (May 17, 2020)

CleverNickName said:


> I voted Roll20, but I don't want that to sound like an endorsement.
> 
> We played two games of D&D this weekend on Roll20, and it was a bear.  It was slow and laggy, with unreliable audio/video and glitchy lighting.  We would be using a different platform if a superior option were available, but alas.




We too use Roll20.  You have just explained my experiences with it.  My feelings are that the program works but Im considering switching to FG.  With Roll20, the voice/video option lags at times, or players get kicked off, and performing simple actions takes a long time.  I bought a month $5 subscription to try FoW and Dynamic lighting but that just slowed everything down to the point that I had to turn those features off.  I thought that my laptop might have some effect on this as it takes awhile to respond opening webpages and when I right click for menus but Ive cleaned my cache and defragged which doesnt help much so I may have to find what program is hogging ram in the background.  This would make some sense until I remembered that I have AutoCAD 2018 installed and it works fine.  So this leads me to believe that the performance issues are web based, I am using Chrome not sure if everyone else is.  Ive chalked it up to Roll20 systems being taxed as well as internet providers bandwidth being maxed out with everyone pandemic streaming, gaming among other things at the hours we play which is probably peak times for all of the aforementioned.  We play on Wednesdays at 630PM to 900 PM.  Can anyone confirm or refute my suspicions?  Thanks.


----------



## Nebulous (May 17, 2020)

R_J_K75 said:


> We too use Roll20.  You have just explained my experiences with it.  My feelings are that the program works but Im considering switching to FG.  With Roll20, the voice/video option lags at times, or players get kicked off, and performing simple actions takes a long time.  I bought a month $5 subscription to try FoW and Dynamic lighting but that just slowed everything down to the point that I had to turn those features off.  I thought that my laptop might have some effect on this as it takes awhile to respond opening webpages and when I right click for menus but Ive cleaned my cache and defragged which doesnt help much so I may have to find what program is hogging ram in the background.  This would make some sense until I remembered that I have AutoCAD 2018 installed and it works fine.  So this leads me to believe that the performance issues are web based, I am using Chrome not sure if everyone else is.  Ive chalked it up to Roll20 systems being taxed as well as internet providers bandwidth being maxed out with everyone pandemic streaming, gaming among other things at the hours we play which is probably peak times for all of the aforementioned.  We play on Wednesdays at 630PM to 900 PM.  Can anyone confirm or refute my suspicions?  Thanks.



We use Roll20 also.  It generally works well, even with the dynamic lighting.  Some days/times are slower than others.  It can also be the size of the map and how many objects it is rendering.  Roll20 is coming out with an updated lighting system in the next couple months, I hope they're changing enough under the hood to speed things up.  Their servers undoubtedly are very, very overloaded, and I'm sure they're working on that too.

EDIT - I would use Discord for audio, it's much better than what is packaged with roll20.  And probably don't use video at all, it eats up too much bandwidth otherwise needed for the lighting.

EDIT - I have FG and Fantasy Grounds Unity too, but I personally have a harder time using it than Roll20.  The systems are so different.  FGU has dynamic lighting too, and I think it will be on par with Roll20 whenever they officially release it.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (May 17, 2020)

We use Roll20 for tabletop visualization,  but Discord for Audio (or Zoom or while I still worked there, GotoMeeting).


----------



## R_J_K75 (May 17, 2020)

Nebulous said:


> We use Roll20 also.  It generally works well, even with the dynamic lighting.  Some days/times are slower than others.  It can also be the size of the map and how many objects it is rendering.  Roll20 is coming out with an updated lighting system in the next couple months, I hope they're changing enough under the hood to speed things up.  Their servers undoubtedly are very, very overloaded, and I'm sure they're working on that too.
> 
> EDIT - I would use Discord for audio, it's much better than what is packaged with roll20.  And probably don't use video at all, it eats up too much bandwidth otherwise needed for the lighting.
> 
> EDIT - I have FG and Fantasy Grounds Unity too, but I personally have a harder time using it than Roll20.  The systems are so different.  FGU has dynamic lighting too, and I think it will be on par with Roll20 whenever they officially release it.




Thanks for the response, definitely helped to make up my mind on a few things.  I am probably going to switch to discord, FG isn't worth the trouble of switching to for my needs, and seems we're not the only group experiencing performance issues.

We already have Skype installed and were using that before we started using Roll20 which the audio seemed better in that than Skype.  Is Discord better for virtual gaming as opposed to others such as Skype, Hangouts, or Meet or is it just preference?


----------



## Nebulous (May 17, 2020)

R_J_K75 said:


> We already have Skype installed and were using that before we started using Roll20 which the audio seemed better in that than Skype.  Is Discord better for virtual gaming as opposed to others such as Skype, Hangouts, or Meet or is it just preference?




I don't really know, Discord is the only one i've used with any regularity.  Someone else can probably advise though.

On another note, The Foundry officially releases May 22nd, next week, and that's a new contender in the VTT field.  It looks good.  It's $50, but you might want a monthly subscription to a server called Forge if you don't want to deal with setting up your own host.






						Home | Foundry Virtual Tabletop
					

The official website and community for Foundry Virtual Tabletop.




					foundryvtt.com
				




I'm definitely going to get this.  It supports 10 systems out of the gate, and the lighting effects look really fantastic.


----------



## R_J_K75 (May 17, 2020)

Nebulous said:


> I don't really know, Discord is the only one i've used with any regularity.  Someone else can probably advise though.
> 
> On another note, The Foundry officially releases May 22nd, next week, and that's a new contender in the VTT field.  It looks good.  It's $50, but you might want a monthly subscription to a server called Forge if you don't want to deal with setting up your own host.
> 
> ...




Thanks I'll look into it.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (May 17, 2020)

R_J_K75 said:


> Thanks for the response, definitely helped to make up my mind on a few things.  I am probably going to switch to discord, FG isn't worth the trouble of switching to for my needs, and seems we're not the only group experiencing performance issues.
> 
> We already have Skype installed and were using that before we started using Roll20 which the audio seemed better in that than Skype.  Is Discord better for virtual gaming as opposed to others such as Skype, Hangouts, or Meet or is it just preference?




Discord has pretty good audio, but you're better served downloading the app to your device as opposed to trying to use it via web browser. Especially if you are using headphones, and especially especially if you are using bluetooth headphones. [edited to add: I say this because when I used my bluetooth headphones and the discord browser interface, when I would mute/unmute, it would switch between my headphones and the onboard Mac microphone. It was weird, and I probably could have troubleshot it more - although Discord itself said it could be resolved by just downloading the Discord app to my Mac. Which is what I did, and now it works great.]


----------



## Nebulous (May 17, 2020)

We have one guy, his audio frequently drops him out from Discord, I don't know why.  Like he's kicked out and has to log back on a bunch.


----------



## Ulfgeir (May 17, 2020)

R_J_K75 said:


> We already have Skype installed and were using that before we started using Roll20 which the audio seemed better in that than Skype.  Is Discord better for virtual gaming as opposed to others such as Skype, Hangouts, or Meet or is it just preference?




Skype used to be good before Microsoft bought them. Then they got steadily worse (and Skype for Business is their old product Lync, which really isn't any good. Teams is better for that). Haven't tried Hangouts or Meet for audio. Discord usually has rather good audio, but you can get problems. But they are intermittent. My group is 8 players (though 1 refuses to join though computer, so he hasn't been playing for a while). And sometimes the audi can be really bad for one person, or drop completely. Happened to me today, so I had to join up through the phone instead. Luckily that was just as we were wrapping up.  Zoom has relatively good audio as well, but might not be the best product securitywise.


----------



## R_J_K75 (May 18, 2020)

Ulfgeir said:


> Skype used to be good before Microsoft bought them.




I had notice when we used it once or twice recently that it seemed like it was worse than it had been years ago, but had no idea Microsoft bought it.  I was wondering if the video/audio programs were relatively the same across the board and just a matter of preference but it seems that most are using Discord.  



Ulfgeir said:


> Discord usually has rather good audio, but you can get problems. But they are intermittent. My group is 8 players (though 1 refuses to join though computer, so he hasn't been playing for a while). And sometimes the audi can be really bad for one person, or drop completely.




I expect some problems no matter what were using.  Think I'll have us all reboot our machines halfway through the session when we take a short break and maybe this will help with players getting dropped.  We are adding a player this week so Im hoping this doesnt multiply any performance issues.


----------



## Nytmare (May 19, 2020)

I'm probably a special case, but I'm running a game of Torchbearer split between Slack, a Google Sites site, and a shared Google spreadsheet.  

The only "table top" aspects of the game are die rolls, simulated by a /command in slack, and an "each side chooses and plays three face down cards and you flip them up pairs" game that we handle on the spreadsheet.  Aside from that, the Slack is where we talk, the Site is where I have character creation and world info, and the spreadsheet is where we have character sheets, the card game, and XP voting.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (May 19, 2020)

Nytmare said:


> I'm probably a special case, but I'm running a game of Torchbearer split between Slack, a Google Sites site, and a shared Google spreadsheet.
> 
> The only "table top" aspects of the game are die rolls, simulated by a /command in slack, and an "each side chooses and plays three face down cards and you flip them up pairs" game that we handle on the spreadsheet.  Aside from that, the Slack is where we talk, the Site is where I have character creation and world info, and the spreadsheet is where we have character sheets, the card game, and XP voting.



I always like to hear about folks' asynchronous games (fka Play by Post / PBP). I was in a memorable Slack/Sheets Freebooters game that unfortunately faded as one player sort of just ghosted away. I'd play again with people I know.


----------



## Nytmare (May 19, 2020)

This one actually isn't PBP, it's real time, attempting to focus more on descriptive writing than "typing in a funny voice."

The out of game chat is asynchronous, but actual play time is about 3-4 hours real time.  It's actually a lot closer to a MUD or old school text adventure than anything.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (May 19, 2020)

Nytmare said:


> This one actually isn't PBP, it's real time, attempting to focus more on descriptive writing than "typing in a funny voice."
> 
> The out of game chat is asynchronous, but actual play time is about 3-4 hours real time.  It's actually a lot closer to a MUD or old school text adventure than anything.



Huh. Well that's an interesting way to do it. Sounds fun!


----------



## Eis (May 20, 2020)

we use roll20 and its working pretty well for us, like others we are using discord or google hangouts for voice instead of the roll20 audio

for those of you using roll20 (and the other vtt's I believe) along with dndbeyond I highly recommend beyond20 which is a free browser extension that allows you to use your dndbeyond character sheet for rolls, spells, what have you and display it right in the roll20 chat log

as an example we are playing Tomb of Horrors and our DM has just about every 5e book in dndbeyond but not in roll20, this allowed me to use all of the dndbeyond resources and play in roll20 without having to actually import a sheet


----------



## Steel_Wind (Jun 28, 2020)

I would note that for those using Roll20, FG2 or D20Pro to play 5e?  The VTT you should be using is now Foundry VTT.

I could explain its features, but I'll leave that to the video below. There is a proviso in all of this for Foundry VTT. Currently, the support for 5e is *robust.* You will be_ very pleased_. There are TONS of tutorials and a LOT of 3rd party support on Patreon for it already, both directly and indirectly.

*The Problem*: the support for games other than 5e is only in community development. Pathfinder 1 and Pathfinder 2 are coming along - but they just aren't there yet. Maybe by the fall they will be, but not yet.  To be fair, this "problem" is really more a consequence that the software has only been available for about 2 months and something as complicated as PF1 and PF2 take time to develop. I imagine they will get here with both, but they aren't there _*yet.*_

For PF1 I would still recommend D20Pro as the King of that PF1 VTT Castle. For Pathfinder 2? Roll20 remains the preferred platform - so far. I expect with D20Pro ver 4 that will change.

It would be nice to have all of Foundry's features (which are already in D20Pro for the most part, and D20Pro still has a lot that Foundry doesn't) and its nice UI and *awesome character sheets* for use with Pathfinder. But it's just not there yet. _*Yet.*_

But for 5e? Oh yes - it's* oh so there*. It integrates nicely with D&DBeyond, too. And you _*really should be using it. *_Compared to Roll20, FG2, FGU, Astral and even D20PRo? _*Well, there really is no comparison.*_


----------



## Phenomen (Jun 28, 2020)

@*Steel_Wind *actually PF2 support in Foundry is miles ahead of any other VTT. It has a beautiful sheet and the whole SRD for free


----------



## Steel_Wind (Jun 28, 2020)

Actually, _*it *_*isn't. *

The char sheet is beautiful, sure. Does it have support for all the archetypes, feats, and spells in the game? Let alone every combat option?

No. It doesn't. We don't have to guess about this. Go to reddit or discord and just ASK. I have. Try to run a game with it. I have.

Not even close. SRD compendium is there, sure. The entries are also broken right now given the problem it has with links in those SRD passages. And access to the SRD is not exactly the test.

It's coming along, sure. But no, it's not there yet.


----------



## Phenomen (Jun 28, 2020)

Steel_Wind said:


> Does it have support for all the archetypes, feats, and spells in the game?



What you want is not SRD and cannot be added legally.
Also, I'm pretty sure all corebook spells and feats are there, only some parts of Lost Omens and non-SRD (e.g graphics) stuff is missing.


----------



## Steel_Wind (Jun 28, 2020)

Phenomen said:


> What you want is not SRD and cannot be added legally.
> Also I'm pretty sure all corebook spells and feats are there, only Lost Omens and other non-SRD stuff is missing.




You are confusing WotC's approach to game content with Paizo's. Paizo protects their content under the heading "product identity" in the backmatter. There are no archetypes, feats and spells, that receive that designation under the OGL. NONE. ZERO.

*Product Identity (World Guide): *
The following items are hereby identified as Product Identity, as defined in the Open
Game License version 1.0a, Section 1(e), and are not Open Game Content: All trademarks, registered
trademarks, proper nouns (characters, deities, locations, etc., as well as all adjectives, names,
titles, and descriptive terms derived from proper nouns), artworks, characters, dialogue, locations,
organizations, plots, storylines, and trade dress. (Elements that have previously been designated as
Open Game Content, or are exclusively derived from previous Open Game Content, or that are in the
public domain are not included in this declaration.)

There are no archetypes,feats or spells referenced above. The Product Identity doesn't change from the above in the Character Guide or Gods and Magic.

That's why all of it is in the SRD on the Archives of Nethys. Again, we do not have to guess. Just go look:

Lost Omens World Guide : World Guide - Sources - Archives of Nethys: Pathfinder 2nd Edition Database
Lost Omens Character Guide: Character Guide - Sources - Archives of Nethys: Pathfinder 2nd Edition Database
Lost Omens Gods and Magic: Gods & Magic - Sources - Archives of Nethys: Pathfinder 2nd Edition Database

I'm a lawyer. I have been for 25 years. _*You are just making stuff up here*_. Please stop.


----------



## Phenomen (Jun 28, 2020)

So which spell or feat is missing? Your answer is totally irrelevant. As I said everything in the core is already available and even more. I've just checked and all equipment, Bestiary 1/2, Gods & Magic, archetypes, race features, deities, GMG, Adventure Path, and even Pathfinder Society content is there. So your "knowledge" is very outdated. Not to mention it's available for free and you don't have to pay $200 for books as you would have on Roll20.









Steel_Wind said:


> I'm a lawyer.



Weird flex.


----------



## AaronOfBarbaria (Jun 28, 2020)

Steel_Wind said:


> Try to run a game with it. I have.



I've been running PF2 with Foundry VTT since it went up for pre-purchase... and uh... it's as "there" as I've ever seen a VTT be for a game already, and constantly getting better.


----------



## Jd Smith1 (Jun 28, 2020)

Steel_Wind said:


> I'm a lawyer. I have been for 25 years.


----------



## Emirikol (Jun 28, 2020)

Just bought Foundry for the Warhammer Roleplay platform the fans made, but Cubicle7 just went to war with VTTs. 
Turns out they are going to require license for their stuff and accidentally revealed they are in secret negotiations with Roll20..and thats why they called other VTT 'shady.' Cant have fan made stuff anymore.

Hopefully they work it out soon.


----------



## Myrdin Potter (Jun 29, 2020)

Emirikol said:


> Just bought Foundry for the Warhammer Roleplay platform the fans made, but Cubicle7 just went to war with VTTs.
> Turns out they are going to require license for their stuff and accidentally revealed they are in secret negotiations with Roll20..and thats why they called other VTT 'shady.' Cant have fan made stuff anymore.
> 
> Hopefully they work it out soon.



You cannot copyright game mechanics. There are plenty of fan made rulesets (FG) and character sheets (Roll20) for lots of games.

Licenses allow the actual game material that is not in OGL form to be used.


----------



## doctorbadwolf (Jul 18, 2020)

My wife wants to check out Foundry, and I just wanted to check into their behavior and culture before giving them money. 

Anyone know of any important (to anyone) criticisms of Foundry of the folks who own and operate it?


----------



## Retreater (Jul 18, 2020)

Well shucks. I was just looking at Foundry and it doesn't seem to be compatible with Chromebooks (which my fiancée, best friend, and I have) - looks like it requires Mac or Windows installation (same as Fantasy Grounds). Oh well, it looks like we're stuck with the inadequate Roll20 for Pathfinder 2e for now.


----------



## MNblockhead (Jul 18, 2020)

I have not heard anything untoward about Foundry. Generally, when looking at a potential software purchase I google it and the company and read reviews from the more reputable sites I find, plus check out discussions on relevant forums and Reddit. That usually gives me notice of any potential issues with the software and whether it seems to fit my needs enough to give it a trial run. If something awful comes up about the company, they may sway me against going with that product depending on the nature of the allegations and whether it seems to be company culture issue or just one individual. But I don't really go out of my way to check social media, like Twitter or Facebook where those kinds of allegations are going to get the most traction.  So I could be missing something. But, so far, I've heard nothing bad.  They are a new and small company, however. So probably more risk than, say Fantasy Grounds.  But you are not talking about a lot of money. Low risk.


----------



## Zaukrie (Jul 21, 2020)

doctorbadwolf said:


> My wife wants to check out Foundry, and I just wanted to check into their behavior and culture before giving them money.
> 
> Anyone know of any important (to anyone) criticisms of Foundry of the folks who own and operate it?




It's one person. Should be easy to see if you have issues......but on discord, seems good.


----------



## Nebulous (Jul 21, 2020)

I too have thought about using Foundry, but it would require me to convince five other players to get on board too, and they like their Roll20.  I might just get it to play around and compare.


----------



## Matchstick (Jul 21, 2020)

__





						Gen Con | Gen Con Indy 2023
					

The Best Four Days in Gaming




					www.gencon.com
				




They're doing a panel at GenCon, maybe that might help to watch before buying.  The Discord is also a good place, in my limited experience.  I haven't heard or seen anything bad about culture etc.


----------



## CleverNickName (Jul 21, 2020)

Roll20 has been serving us pretty well since the pandemic struck.  It's laggy at times (especially at peak hour useage), but it's still much better than it was even a few weeks ago.

I wish they would hurry up and get those feats working already.


----------



## DarrenShard (Oct 10, 2020)

This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?


----------



## DarrenShard (Oct 10, 2020)

oops post went twice


----------



## Myrdin Potter (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?




For me it is Fantasy Grounds with the excellent 5e ruleset. The automation takes care of all the bookkeeping details and I just DM the game.


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## R_J_K75 (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?




I've used Fantasy Grounds and Roll20, the latter seemed more user friendly but still took a bit to learn.  One thing I realized was that not only the DM but the players have to take some time to learn it too.  We tried to use the built on video/audio in Roll20, Skype and Discord but we seemed to have lag and latency issues.  In the end it seemed we were spending more time figuring out the program than playing so we quit using it.  We only used it when the pandemic started and it was out of necessity so your experience may differ.  Overall, I liked the features just took too much time to prep and even after that sometimes we couldn't get stuff to work.


----------



## billd91 (Oct 11, 2020)

R_J_K75 said:


> I've used Fantasy Grounds and Roll20, the latter seemed more user friendly but still took a bit to learn.  One thing I realized was that not only the DM but the players have to take some time to learn it too.  We tried to use the built on video/audio in Roll20, Skype and Discord but we seemed to have lag and latency issues.  In the end it seemed we were spending more time figuring out the program than playing so we quit using it.  We only used it when the pandemic started and it was out of necessity so your experience may differ.  Overall, I liked the features just took too much time to prep and even after that sometimes we couldn't get stuff to work.




We’re using Roll20 and, you’re right, there’s a learning curve for players too. We haven’t gotten to players computerizing their whole character sheet or using macros or the die roller. But they did pretty much pick up moving around and checking ranges after one session and that’s pretty much all I need them to do.


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## Wasteland Knight (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?



We use Roll20 for basic maps and Discord for voice plus Dice Maiden on Discord for rolling.  That’s it. Nothing is integrated into Roll20, just tokens for relative locations. 

We purposefully kept it barebones so we could have a shirt learning curve and so far it’s worked great. 

I ran a Session 0 with very easy encounters and a simple adventure to let everyone come up to speed with VTT.


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## Jd Smith1 (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?




MapTools has, IMO, the best system for prep time.


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## Myrdin Potter (Oct 11, 2020)

Foundry looks nice, but FGU has a pretty robust feature set, including dynamic lighting. The mapping is good and getting better as well.

What is also has is DLC. I can get all the WoTC books and modules and tons of 3PP material as well. All there and loaded up so I don’t have to enter it.

In Foundry, I have to source the maps and the text myself, load all the monsters. Tons of work.

Right now it sort of is bridged by owning the content in DND Beyond, but I am working for the extension to be determined to be violating fair use and shut down.


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## aramis erak (Oct 11, 2020)

I'm using gTove. It's free, it's got nice dice, and it stores the assets on my google drive.


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## DarrenShard (Oct 11, 2020)

billd91 said:


> We’re using Roll20 and, you’re right, there’s a learning curve for players too. We haven’t gotten to players computerizing their whole character sheet or using macros or the die roller. But they did pretty much pick up moving around and checking ranges after one session and that’s pretty much all I need them to do.



If you wan to shorten your learning curve for players then you should try out our VTT, Shard Tabletop.  We usually find that players can get in create a character sheet and be playing in order 10 minutes.


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## DarrenShard (Oct 11, 2020)

Jd Smith1 said:


> MapTools has, IMO, the best system for prep time.



For building maps or whole adventures?  How do you find it for actually playing?  Do your players figure it out as well?


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## Jd Smith1 (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> For building maps or whole adventures?  How do you find it for actually playing?  Do your players figure it out as well?




Any jpeg or png can serve as a map (it needs to be at least close to 1 mb for good zooming); a couple mouse clicks puts it up as a map, and you can adjust it with a couple clicks so that your pogs fit. There are literally thousands of free ones on the Net, and I mean actually free, not pirated. 

Token Tool can make pogs out of any jpg or png with a couple clicks. 

So adventure creating: last weekend I had a idea for an encounter for my game, an d I decided to insert it into my campaign.

First thing I did was to pick a map. That was the longest portion of the process, as I have about 15,000 maps stored. But I chose on in about ten minutes (I have them sorted and labels into useful categories.

I opened maptool, double-clicked on the map, chose weather to have hexes, squares, or none (I always pick none.  

Opened the NPC folder for that campaign, double-clicked for one NPC, then pulled down a toolbar and clicked on 'adjust grid' Using the pog as reference, I adjusted the scale of the map so it was suitable for the pog. I could have adjusted the pogs to the map, but that means setting each pog.

I then pulled out five more NPC pogs. I made some adjusts, and cut & pasted three of the pogs to create multiples of each. The pogs were positioned on the map (I later moved them around a couple times until things were how I wanted them, but that is because I was trying for a specific series of events).

Then I went to my objects folder and double-clicked on several items  wanted for the map, which I them adjusted and positioned in the Object Layer, so that players moving their pogs would not affect the item placement. 

Then I moved the PC and NPC pogs for the party onto the map, made them visible to players. I then saved the campaign.

It took about twenty minutes, most of which was spent on choosing which map to use, and how the NPCs should be deployed (creative decision, IOW).

At the table, I opened MapTools (takes a minute or so to open). Chose Open Campaign and selected the appropriate file. Dropped a toolbar, chose 'Import Preference', and then chose the preferences file I wanted. (Preferences are states which can be displayed on pogs. For example, I use a blue circle for kneeling, red for prone, and so forth. There's no limit to the number you can create, but you have to load the file every time you open a campaign, which adds three mouse clicks).

Then I chose Start Server, which creates a LAN server.

When the time came, I told my players to log on. They started MapTools, found my server, and logged on. 

And off we went, into three hours of in-character negotiation, argument, bitter combat, and post-combat mop-up.

Here is a screenshot of the entire map. As you can see, it isn't very complex, but this was a meeting engagement that was later interrupted by the arrival of two, more hostile, groups (already ready and waiting on the map, invisible to the PCs).





Here is a closer view. I use round pogs for known enemy, hex pogs for NPCS, and square pogs for PCs. At the start of the scenario the players could not see any of the enemy pogs.


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## ruedas (Oct 11, 2020)

I tried Roll20 and found it to be very clunky, Fantasy Grounds works better and has a really helpful community behind it. I would say try both and see what you prefer


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## DarrenShard (Oct 11, 2020)

Jd Smith1 said:


> Any jpeg or png can serve as a map (it needs to be at least close to 1 mb for good zooming); a couple mouse clicks puts it up as a map, and you can adjust it with a couple clicks so that your pogs fit. There are literally thousands of free ones on the Net, and I mean actually free, not pirated.
> 
> Token Tool can make pogs out of any jpg or png with a couple clicks.
> 
> ...



I guess that I'm asking a slightly different question.  From a tactical battle map, MapTool is a very competent solution, with a bunch of other good options that vary mostly on your preferences.  (Finding maps on the web is especially valuable which is why we built in searching the web for maps into our solution Shard Tabletop)

Running a session is more than just about the battle map though.  There are lots other parts of the game that can interfere with having an amazing play experience.  Managing all of the current state of characters and monsters, including: turn order, HP, and conditions.  Communicating information between players and the GM, like: what does that spell do, what does that class ability really say, what happens when that condition is active.  Organizing the adventure, including: story line, session notes, and adventure history. Dealing with the unexpected, like: characters going somewhere unexpected, or dealing with monsters quicker than expected.

Virtual tools should hopefully help with the whole play experience to make let you spend more time having fun playing the game and less time fussing with tools and rummaging through books and notes.

There is also a question around how the tool impacts the overall interaction.  In person do people interact less working behind a laptop?  Working remotely does the tool encourage an interactive session?  As an example, in person rolling dice together is pretty great, working remote not so well.  A good digital dice solution can help recreate some of that excitement of seeing each other's rolls.

What tools and best practices do people find works best?


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## dbm (Oct 11, 2020)

We moved to playing via Fantasy Ground Unity when lockdown started in the UK. Just for info, you no longer need to bother with port forwarding on your router - it just works. 

It’s really good, and supports more than just D&D. I play in a 5e campaign, and run a Savage Worlds campaign. The automation is really good on both once you understand them. Fireballing a large group of enemies is excellent, and the power implementation of Savage Worlds abilities is also cool. You do need to learn how the automation works to get the best out of it, but there is lots of online help and the community are friendly in my experience.

You can get an Ultimate license for less than $10 per month, and if the GM has one of these then the players don’t need a licence. I reckon it’s cheaper than the cost of hosting the game in my house, which I usually do for our F2F sessions.


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## Jd Smith1 (Oct 11, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> I guess that I'm asking a slightly different question.  From a tactical battle map, MapTool is a very competent solution, with a bunch of other good options that vary mostly on your preferences.  (Finding maps on the web is especially valuable which is why we built in searching the web for maps into our solution Shard Tabletop)
> 
> Running a session is more than just about the battle map though.  There are lots other parts of the game that can interfere with having an amazing play experience.  Managing all of the current state of characters and monsters, including: turn order, HP, and conditions.  Communicating information between players and the GM, like: what does that spell do, what does that class ability really say, what happens when that condition is active.  Organizing the adventure, including: story line, session notes, and adventure history. Dealing with the unexpected, like: characters going somewhere unexpected, or dealing with monsters quicker than expected.
> 
> ...




MapTools. It is extremely user-friendly. As to finding maps, Pinterest and DeviantArt have thousands.


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## CleverNickName (Oct 12, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?



Depends on what tools you need, and what resources you are using. 

I like Roll20 because it's free and web-based, so you don't have to troubleshoot multiple software installations and IP connections for multiple people, every time you want to play.  It has several compendiums that you can purchase for different adventure paths, campaign settings, and rulebooks.  (The downside being, of course, that you have to purchase that content--and the price is roughly the same as the price of buying the hardcopy.)  Still, it's nice to be able to drag-and-drop in monsters, maps, magic items, etc., and have everything already linked and rigged for lighting. 

Roll20 also has a high learning curve, but once you and your players get the hang of it, you can throw a game together with a moment's notice.  I imagine this is going to be true for anything...including D&D.

We tried FantasyGrounds first, but we weren't able to get it to work for all of our players.  Everyone was using a different device and OS -- some were using Mac, some were using Chromebooks, some were using touchpads, others were using their work computers and didn't have permission to install the software -- it required a level of technical mastery that was beyond some of our players.   So I guess it also has a learning curve...or a learning curve of a different sort.  (I understand that FantasyGrounds takes a bit of effort to set up and get running, but once you do, it runs effortlessly.  I can't vouch for that, because we never got it to run.)


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## MNblockhead (Oct 12, 2020)

DarrenShard said:


> This thread has lots of discussion around the features and capabilities of different VTTs.  What provides the best play experience so that you can spend more time playing games and less time focusing on the tool?



The right attitude.

I'm not trying to be cure here--well, maybe a bit--but it is true. 

I have spend a lot of time and more money than I should have diving into various VTTs over this past year.  The one gold truth that I learned is that whatever tool you use, you don't have to use its every feature. Almost any tool can be easier to use if start with just the basics.

Also, there is "prep time" and there is "learning curve" for how to use the tool. Some tools can drastically reduce prep time, but have a very high learning curve. For example, I found a lot of people using Roll20 for on-the-fly games, but I found I had to invest quite a bit of time in learning the tool before I could start throwing together a game on the fly or improvising through a sandbox session in Roll20. 

Another consideration is there the best way to save prep time is to pay for someone to do all the prep for you. If you are running official WotC adventures or if the third-party system and adventure material is available to purchase for the VTT you use, well, that certainly take away a lot of the prep time. 

Because I am not running material that I can just buy ready to play in a VTT, I wanted something I could run my games in without hundred of hours of data entry and graphic design. 

Here is my journey through a forest of VTT offering and how I got to where I am today. Maybe useful for you.

After a few years of running my own home-brew campaign, work was getting to be too demanding and I decided to purchase adventures and campaign settings. I used RealmWorks to manage my campaigns and to share maps. When I no longer had time for all the data entry, I just used the books, but put all the maps in Realm Works. Then I had to work over seas. I would display the players view of the maps in RealmWorks, shared using Google Meet. Everything else run pen and paper.  

But I was spending too much time just loading maps. Also, I couldn't load a map on the fly quickly enough to run my sandboxy adventures and I didn't have time to enter all my maps into RealmWorks. 

Then Lone Wolf Development stopped developing RealmWorks. 

At the same time I was running my games I would play one-offs using the Roll20 find a game feature. So I played a lot of games using Roll20, usually with Discord. So I got an account and tried running games in Roll20. But the space limits, the time to prep maps, just wasn't as fluid as I wanted. I probably didn't give Roll20 enough of a chance. I am grateful to Roll20 for giving me a platform where I could find games when away from my gaming group in countries with poor and censured internet. But I just never like to DM in it. It seemed like too much work and I never got to the point where I was comfortable running a game in it for my players. I ended up cancelling my account after a few months. 

So I went to MapTool.  Networking issues, due to the security controls of my employer's internet (which I used in the employer provided housing while working abroad) made it a impractical to actually host as a normal VTT.  Instead, I would run two instances of Map Tool.  A DMs instance and player instance. I shared the player instance using Google Meet.  This worked very well. With Map Tool I can quickly filter from hundreds of maps, open one up with Fog of War, then filter through thousands of tokens and quickly add them to  map. The 5e frameset provides some quality of life features for 5e DMs, but for the most part, I was just sharing maps, revealing areas by painting away the "fog" and throwing tokens on the map.  The main issue was that the players were not able to control their own tokens, which is not as satisfying. Also, all map reveal was done manually. So, little to no prep time, but more work for the DM in play. That said, Map Tool does support full VTT functionality with many lighting and reveal features that are more advanced than some of the commercial tools.   The main issue for me was that I didn't have the time or interest in trying to come up with a way to figure out the networking given my situation. 

At the same time I was running games in MapTool, I tested Fantasy Grounds.  I participated in some virtual convention games that used Fantasy Ground Classic. The only way I could get it to work when abroad was to us my Google Fi 3G connection on my phone with a VPN running on my phone, then join my phone's hotspot from my computer. It was just barely acceptable as a player, but I wouldn't be able to run games this way. But I though I could use it like MapTool and run locally, with a GM and a player's instance and share the player instance. With FG you can use online and for local play.  FG Unity had just been released so I did the $10/month subscription to test it out.  While I liked that I could have hundreds of maps and thousands of tokens and fairly quickly find them, it took a bit more time to get things ready on the fly. But my main issue with FGU is that it kept hanging. I tried to use it to run games but ended up having to give up on it and go back to Map Tool.   I liked the idea of the automations but I would have to rebuy D&D content I already bought in book form and on D&D Beyond.   I also found the interface had a high learning curve. There are great learning resources for FGU and great support, but I didn't have the time to spend many hours at FG College (and acutal site/service they offer) just to run my D&D Games. Map Tool was doing the job. 

I tested d20pro. Really liked it. Like Map Tool and Fantasy Grounds, it is locally installed so easy to reference large libraries of maps and tokens.  It offered a much easier interface than FGC or FGU and is targeted to d20 games. But it didn't have the fog of war reveal tools I need for my low-prep games. 

I looked at Astral VTT, but it is online only, so there are storage issues. But the real killer is that it only supported lighting, line-of-site prepped maps, or just sharing the entire battlemap. It didn't have the manual fog of war application and reveal I was looking for. 

The tool that ended up convincing me to move from Map Tool was Foundry. It offered everything I wanted with the caveat that I had to install some community modules to get it that way. In particular, Simple Fog, so that I can easily apply and reveal fog of war manually. Also, unlike FG, Map Tool, and d20pro, my players do not have to install any software. They just interact with the map using their browser.  Because of my work travel situation and the areas I have to work, I'm hosting my license of Foundry on virtual machine online. But if I were only running games from my ample home connection, I could easily just run the game from my laptop. Loading maps and assets are a bit more involved than Map Tool or Fantasy Grounds, but all the other features and advantages are good trade off for the extra couple minutes it would take me to set up a battlemap.  In particular with with third-party modules I can import my DnD Beyond purchased content and I can apply a variety of automations that make running the game easier. And expanding it with modules, I find is much easier and more smooth than customizing Map Tool. 

Another tool I am Kickstarting is "Role."  If you have basic needs.  You just want a web meeting tool with gamer features.  I.e., voice, video, text, an easy to reference character sheet that gets out of your way when you are not using it, and a basic battlemap that you can drop tokens on, as well as a dice rolling app, then this could be the tool for you. Unfortunately, you'll need to wait until it is released. Currently there is just an early access release for backers.  For more info, see: Role: A New Kind of Platform For The RPG Community


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## Lackofname (Oct 12, 2020)

I used Maptools back in the day, but eventually found it too much work. Now I'm getting back into things and need to learn Roll20 by the first session next Sunday.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 12, 2020)

I think I've fallen in love with owlbear.rodeo. It's a free but very barebones browser-based VTT. There is no audio or video component -  you will need Google Meet, Zoom, or Discord for that. I recommend Discord because of all the dice and RPG bots available. There are also no tools for character sheets. What you get: maps, tokens, fog of war, drawing tools, barebones dice tray, and a laser pointer. All tokens, maps, and other images live on your computer so there are no limits on file size or storage space. There's hardly any learning curve compared to other VTTs. It also works beautifully on desktops, tablets, and phones (but there is no app - you need to use a web browser on all devices).

That said, it is very barebones. There are no user accounts - everything works on a custom URL that you can password protect at creation, but you can't change that password later, so anyone with the link and password will always be able to get in. It "remembers" what map and token images you "uploaded" from your computer with a cookie (they don't use third party cookies though), so if you clear your cookie cache, you will have to add everything again since it pulls the images from your computer. There are no defined roles like GM or Player, but the original URL creator has some rights other users don't (like hidden tokens etc.). The creator is the only one with access to the tokens and maps they upload, but other users can load their own tokens and maps too (which the original creator won't be able to see unless the user shares them). You are also only considered the original owner on the device where you originally created the URL.

All things considered, the pros outweigh the cons if you are looking for something lightweight and easy that pairs nicely with your other online gaming tools like Discord. The developers are committed to keeping it simple and not trying to replicate other VTTs like Roll20.






						Owlbear Rodeo
					

Tabletop map sharing ʕﾉ•ᴥ•ʔﾉ┬─┬ヽʕ•ᴥ•ヽʔ




					www.owlbear.rodeo


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## jaerdaph (Oct 12, 2020)

I also just received my early access account info for the recently Kickstarted Role VTT. Will report back when I've had a chance to play with that. Role: A New Kind of Platform For The RPG Community


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## John Desmarais (Oct 12, 2020)

Need an option to give multiple responses.  For games that benefit from a map and minis, I use Roll20 (its easy and does the job).  For games that don't necessary benefit from maps and minis, I just use Zoom or Google Hangouts occasionally sharing my screen when I have things I need to the players to be able to see.


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## John Desmarais (Oct 12, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> I think I've fallen in love with owlbear.rodeo. It's a free but very barebones browser-based VTT. There is no audio or video component -  you will need Google Meet, Zoom, or Discord for that. I recommend Discord because of all the dice and RPG bots available. There are also no tools for character sheets. What you get: maps, tokens, fog of war, drawing tools, barebones dice tray, and a laser pointer. All tokens, maps, and other images live on your computer so there are no limits on file size or storage space. There's hardly any learning curve compared to other VTTs. It also works beautifully on desktops, tablets, and phones (but there is no app - you need to use a web browser on all devices).
> 
> That said, it is very barebones. There are no user accounts - everything works on a custom URL that you can password protect at creation, but you can't change that password later, so anyone with the link and password will always be able to get in. It "remembers" what map and token images you "uploaded" from your computer with a cookie (they don't use third party cookies though), so if you clear your cookie cache, you will have to add everything again since it pulls the images from your computer. There are no defined roles like GM or Player, but the original URL creator has some rights other users don't (like hidden tokens etc.). The creator is the only one with access to the tokens and maps they upload, but other users can load their own tokens and maps too (which the original creator won't be able to see unless the user shares them). You are also only considered the original owner on the device where you originally created the URL.
> 
> ...



I'd never seen owlbear.rodeo before.  That's kind of cool (although the lack of hex maps is an issue for me).


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## Nytmare (Oct 12, 2020)

John Desmarais said:


> I'd never seen owlbear.rodeo before.  That's kind of cool (although the lack of hex maps is an issue for me).



There's nothing stopping you from importing a hexed map.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 12, 2020)

In owlbear rodeo, you could add a hex map and turn off (square only) grid snapping. Another nice feature of the grid snap feature: it's sort of a hybrid where it will snap tokens to the grid but you can still place tokens a little off the snapping points.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 13, 2020)

Owlbear Rodeo tokens are really cool. When you import any image as a token, it can be designated as one of three types: Character (eg PCs, NPCs, monsters), Prop (eg furniture, treasure chests, barrels), and Vehicle/Mounts (eg horses, carts, rowboats). Any type of token can be locked but this is especially useful for prop tokens you don't want to be moved around accidentally. Any type of token you add can also be made invisible to others.
The tokens are smart too - props are always on the bottom "layer", vehicles/mounts next, and then characters on top. If you move characters onto a vehicle/mount and then move that rowboat, for example, the characters go along for the ride. There isn't a hierarchy though within each type of token - the last character token moved will always be on top of another character token in the same space, so no need ever for send to front/back etc.

Maps are smart too. They remember what tokens you placed on them between sessions. Square grids are extremely easy to set up if you know the columns and rows dimensions in squares. If the image file name contains the dimensions (eg 20 x 30), it will automatically set it up at those square dimensions (but you can still do it manually).

Oh, and hex maps are on the list of features to be added soon.


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## MNblockhead (Oct 13, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> I also just received my early access account info for the recently Kickstarted Role VTT. Will report back when I've had a chance to play with that. Role: A New Kind of Platform For The RPG Community



Very interested in your comparison of Owlbear Rodeo to Role.  Role seems a bit like Owlbear Rodeo with the web meeting functionality integrated with the basic TTRPG features.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 20, 2020)

@MNblockhead Finally started to play around with Role a bit. It's still Kickstarter backers only beta testing (although you as GM can invite in non-backer friends as players), so not a lot of the features I'm interested in are ready to go yet (custom character sheet creation in particular). So far, the audio and video is very smooth and easy to set up in the program. 

Initially Role was supposed to be a "theater of the mind" but now you can import maps and tokens. Very easy to set up and configure maps and grids, both square and hex, and tokens are easy to import and scale, but it's nowhere near the options available in Owlbear.Rodeo yet (save for hex maps) and certainly not Roll20 yet either (all with regards to tokens and maps). 

The dice options are more robust than Owlbear as you can add bonuses/penalties from character sheets, but again not at Roll20 levels. No Fate/Fudge dice yet though. 

Custom character sheets aren't available yet but there are a few premade templates for D&D, Lancer, Mothership, and some other games. Sheets and maps and tokens (and other assets like images and PDFs) can be shared between your games (called Tables), and deleting something from a table doesn't delete it from your account and will still be available on your dashboard library (where you can delete things permanently). Nothing is automatically imported into a table (game) when you create it so you have to populate it with assets from your computer or dashboard library - this is so you can have multiple tables and not be overwhelmed in a new one with everything from elsewhere already inside. I like this a lot.

I don't think I can evaluate it yet until more of the upcoming announced features are added, but I am very impressed with the work the developers are doing and the frequent updates. The high quality audio and video are pretty sweet right now though.


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## Lackofname (Oct 20, 2020)

Oops, I just realized I posted in this thread already.


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## MNblockhead (Oct 21, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> @MNblockhead Finally started to play around with Role a bit. It's still Kickstarter backers only beta testing (although you as GM can invite in non-backer friends as players), so not a lot of the features I'm interested in are ready to go yet (custom character sheet creation in particular). So far, the audio and video is very smooth and easy to set up in the program.
> 
> Initially Role was supposed to be a "theater of the mind" but now you can import maps and tokens. Very easy to set up and configure maps and grids, both square and hex, and tokens are easy to import and scale, but it's nowhere near the options available in Owlbear.Rodeo yet (save for hex maps) and certainly not Roll20 yet either (all with regards to tokens and maps).
> 
> ...




I concur with your comments on Role. I don't like, however, that you need to count the number of squares or hexes on the horizontal and vertical lines. That makes it impractical to pull up a map spontaneously in play.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 21, 2020)

MNblockhead said:


> I concur with your comments on Role. I don't like, however, that you need to count the number of squares or hexes on the horizontal and vertical lines. That makes it impractical to pull up a map spontaneously in play.



Yeah, I can see that. Most of the VTT maps in my collection are 12x12, 20x30, or 30x30, so it's not really an issue for me because I can usually tell. I also like to "optimize" the maps and add elements in GIMP so I'm trying to get into the habit of adding the dimensions to the file name so they go right into Owlbear.Rodeo.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 21, 2020)

Also, Owlbear Rodeo released v1.6.0 a couple of days ago and it adds some nice new features, notably the ability to group maps and tokens in groups (folders) as well as select multiple maps and tokens. Plus the maximum map zoom-in has been substantially increased. I was able to get one of my tokens on one map to about the size of a tea cup saucer!


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## Scott Christian (Oct 22, 2020)

I swear I posted inside this thread? Is there a similar thread?
We use Roll20. But I don't find it that great. There are a lot of things it could improve upon.
I am backing Roll. I think it is very user friendly so far. They have to add some things (and they are working on it), but from what I've seen it is really good. 








						Role: A New Kind of Platform For The RPG Community
					

Discover new games from passionate creators, meet new friends, and adventure together. Anyone can play, everyone is welcome.




					www.kickstarter.com


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## Thomas Shey (Oct 23, 2020)

Maptool user here.  No question its got a serious learning curve if you want macro functionality, but I just need map-and-token manipulation tool, and don't have to pay for it or be dependent on someone else's server.


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## jaerdaph (Oct 24, 2020)

Scott Christian said:


> I swear I posted inside this thread? Is there a similar thread?
> We use Roll20. But I don't find it that great. There are a lot of things it could improve upon.
> I am backing Roll. I think it is very user friendly so far. They have to add some things (and they are working on it), but from what I've seen it is really good.
> 
> ...



I'm really glad I backed Role too. A couple of days ago they announced they are going to be concentrating now on rolling out the Creator Suite that will allow users to build their own character sheets from drag and drop parts eliminating the need to understand complex macros, APIs etc. I can't wait to see that in action!


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## TheSword (Oct 24, 2020)

I’ve just bought Foundry VTT in preparation for WFRP as the current Roll20 just doesn’t support it well enough.

Ive been impressed with the features so far.


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## CleverNickName (Oct 25, 2020)

Was it just us?  Or was Roll20 acting very strangely last night?

We have been playing a 5E Eberron game on Roll20 ever since the pandemic struck, and it's been going fairly smoothly for the most part.  Sure, there would be the occasional dropped connection or stuck video feed, but nothing that couldn't be fixed in a few seconds by reconnecting or refreshing the browser. But last night?  Last night was _dumb._ 

The dynamic lighting kept messing up: one player would lose sight through their own game token and start seeing through a different player's token.

The audio and video kept messing up:  different people would only be able to see and hear one or two other players, and reconnecting wouldn't fix the issue...instead, it just shuffled the players. (You can see Bob and Sue, but not Carl and Eric?  Reconnect, and now you can see Bob and Carl, but not Eric or Sue.  Reconnect, and now you can only see Sue.  Reconnect, and you can see everyone _except_ Sue.  Sue reconnects, and she can see you just fine but can't see Eric, and can only hear Carl.  Etc.)

The maps kept messing up:  first, the map wouldn't load until you moved your token...and then the map would disappear if you moved your token again.  The compendium kept messing up: you'd try to look up a spell or a monster, and it would freeze the game for several seconds and never display the results...until half an hour later, when it would flood your screen with every failed search result all at once.

We tried everything we could think of.  We tried reconnecting, we tried closing and restarting, we tried clearing our browser caches, we tried dis/enabling our VPN, we tried using Edge, Chrome, and Explorer, we tried restarting our routers.  We eventually switched our audio and video to Discord and only using Roll20 for the battle mat and dice roller...but with only half of us able to see the map or roll dice at any given moment, it was still just a frustrating mess.  We ended up quitting the gaming session early, right in the middle of an encounter, because we couldn't get the technology to cooperate.

I love Roll20 as a virtual tabletop...but last night was unacceptable.  The Roll20 Server Status website says there were no issues...nothing but green checkmarks on all servers for last night and the past several days...but we beg to differ.   Was anyone else having issues?


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## Scott Christian (Oct 25, 2020)

jaerdaph said:


> I'm really glad I backed Role too. A couple of days ago they announced they are going to be concentrating now on rolling out the Creator Suite that will allow users to build their own character sheets from drag and drop parts eliminating the need to understand complex macros, APIs etc. I can't wait to see that in action!



I am geeked about the Creator Suite. We'll see how it holds up. 

I am even more interested to see what they do with cards, since one of the games I play runs on cards. We'll see and fingers crossed.

But for now, they have shown that they seem to know what they are doing.


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## Scott Christian (Oct 25, 2020)

CleverNickName said:


> The audio and video kept messing up: different people would only be able to see and hear one or two other players, and reconnecting wouldn't fix the issue...instead, it just shuffled the players. (You can see Bob and Sue, but not Carl and Eric? Reconnect, and now you can see Bob and Carl, but not Eric or Sue. Reconnect, and now you can only see Sue. Reconnect, and you can see everyone _except_ Sue. Sue reconnects, and she can see you just fine but can't see Eric, and can only hear Carl. Etc.)



I am curious... Your table does audio/video through roll20?

We use Discord specifically because of the lag. Other than that Roll20 works well for some games. But we found the video/sound always lagging compared to having a separate browser open to Discord.


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## CleverNickName (Oct 25, 2020)

Scott Christian said:


> I am curious... Your table does audio/video through roll20?
> 
> We use Discord specifically because of the lag. Other than that Roll20 works well for some games. But we found the video/sound always lagging compared to having a separate browser open to Discord.



We usually use Roll20 for audio/video, without issue...it's normally very stable and smooth for us, since all six of us are on fiber internet (~800 Mbps or higher).  Last night we switched to Discord just to see if it would help with the issues we were having.  We were able to v-chat same as always through Discord, but the maps and lighting and compendium on Roll20 were all still hosed.


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## evildmguy (Oct 27, 2020)

I use d20Pro myself.  I had used maptools over ten years ago but something happened and it didn't work for me, so I thought it was dead.  It's nice to hear it's still used.  

Even six months later of only virtual games (the other times were for a mix of local and remote players), I still struggle with how I want to use a VTT.  My style is to plan high level and then let the details happen in the sessions and I will steer as I need to.  I used minis and plexiglass to draw things out on it.  Obviously it worked for me for a long time.

However.

What I'm finding VTTs have done is open up character options.  I would have the occasional archer/crossbow wielder but didn't think about not having many.  When outdoor maps are suddenly huge, like 300' x 200' and opponents are in bow range but it takes a long time running to get to melee, it changed the game!  Archers are now a viable build and do a lot more than when they got a round or two before melee happened.  I still have dungeons and it's mixed in there as I would expect.  

The other thing this has changed is really improved my map making skills.  Agian, I was used to winging a lot, and drawing it out, either on the plexiglass or a sheet of paper and then describing it.  This has really made me prepare more.  Nothing bad about it but it's different for me.  

So, my full setup is a zoom call and then using d20Pro.  I have four players in a 5E game and six players in a PF1 game.  There are quirks to d20Pro but the devs are nice and on discord.  I tend to use easy fog of war, not a reactive set with lights.  I have done reactive fog of war and it was very interesting but, for me, a lot of work with little benefit.  

Having said this, d20Pro probably works best for d20 games as it started for DND3.5.


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## Randomthoughts (Nov 5, 2020)

Retreater said:


> I'm looking for a virtual tabletop for a 5e game for players across a few different states. We would like to also have voice chat (though that can be done through a different service). People will likely be using a variety of devices, not just PCs.
> 
> Feel free to explain in the thread your reasoning and to share your experiences.
> 
> Thanks!



So, I jumped on the VTT bandwagon a few months ago. I chose FG (Classic, the newer version is called Unity). 5e is heavily supported both in automation (which others have already posted) and content (e.g., all the official WOTC adventures have been converted). Looking at the totality of the work that must have been put into them, the $$ spent was _well _worth it. I don't have the time to learn and do it myself and I wanted to just jump in and get things up and running.

Now I run weekly tables (from monthly pre-COVID). Extremely convenient (just log off when the session is done). Friendly and helpful community. Tons of players looking for a game to join. Couldn't be happier.

Oh, I use Discord for voice/text.

EDIT: Oh, forgot to mention I also supported the Role kickstarter. Haven't used it much but what I was looking for was two different platforms: a VTT to support crunchier, tactical, and well-supported games like D&D and something that has less features but can be used at a moment's notice for games like Ironsworn or Paleomythic. I've used Zoom (but don't want to continue to use my work account) and Discord can do it in a pinch. But then the Role KS came along, and thought I'd give it a try.


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## tetrasodium (Nov 5, 2020)

I use arkenforge & a tv box similar to this for meatspace play


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## kenada (Nov 6, 2020)

I changed my vote. We’ve been using roll20 for a while (and the other game will continue using it because someone else is running it), but my game will be moving over to Foundry. I’ve varied my roll20 subscription, but I hate paying for it because it works so poorly with large maps, and the PF2 support stinks compared to using Hero Lab Online to manage characters. We’ve done the HLO thing for a while, but I think it’s annoying for my players, and it is incredibly clunky (and flaky).

I decided to switch because I’d heard good things about the PF2 support. From what I can tell, it seems pretty nice. It’s not as sophisticated as HLO, but it’s a lot more intuitive. The containers actually hold items. It’s incredible!  There are also some nice modules, particularly the Dungeondraft importer. Being able to import my maps with boundaries will be a huge timesaver. And I don’t have to pay extra for the privilege of doing that.

Another thing I like about Foundry is being able to self-host. I spun up nanode, installed FreeBSD, and then set everything up how I wanted it. My players can just connect to a subdomain on my website, and we’re all good to go. That’s really nice.


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## harliquin (Nov 6, 2020)

Arkenforge is my goto for VTT.  Hands down.  Easy to use.  And the developers are very much in touch with the community.  Works we Zoom and Discord, etc. for virtual games.  And is great if you have a second monitor for your VTT in person.


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