I find as a Roll20 Pro subscriber it offers a lot of features that help me out.

I have even edited the character sheet to make it more useful and utilized scripts that allow a lot of shortcuts so I can focus on GM'ing and my Players can focus on Role Playing and not be bogged down in trying to figure things out.

After having many people I have GM'ed for state "that game was really easy to figure out with that character sheet and the other features you used", I think it is successful at what I want. Is it potentially a more expensive option? sure, but you get value from it, and they are constantly improving.

Call me old fashioned, but I'd rather own the software and have everything stored locally. I do not like paying a tax to store things on the web. I've owned FG back when it was still 2.0 in 2008 and I've always gotten updates to the software free of charge. Currently, FG is on version 3.17 and they've added a lot of rule sets that you can purchase or you can create your own easily using the CoreRPG. You can even give your rules set to others and it doesn't cost them a dime. Also, you can pay a subscription for FG for the Player or the Ultimate license. The pro to having the Ultimate is that only you have to have the license and every player that connects to your game can be on the free/demo version.

Call me old fashioned, but I'd rather own the software and have everything stored locally. I do not like paying a tax to store things on the web. I've owned FG back when it was still 2.0 in 2008 and I've always gotten updates to the software free of charge. Currently, FG is on version 3.17 and they've added a lot of rule sets that you can purchase or you can create your own easily using the CoreRPG. You can even give your rules set to others and it doesn't cost them a dime. Also, you can pay a subscription for FG for the Player or the Ultimate license. The pro to having the Ultimate is that only you have to have the license and every player that connects to your game can be on the free/demo version.

You don't "own" software you license it. But licensing for local storage versus licensing for remote storage, is a fully acceptable choice. Aside from "owning it" you have only stated the "free for players" (which Roll20 is too) and the ability to share "rulesets" (which Roll20 has, as well).

If the only thing different is "owning" you do not have to paste that same list every time FG or Roll20 are mentioned.

The exact specific things I like about Roll20 are the following;

• Character Sheets
  • Customizable
    • I did not like how a character sheet was organized, so with some tweaks I now have everything in an easy to use display.
  • Able to automate tasks
    • Scripts are available to import a fully ready-to-go NPC
    • Scripts can be created to import from OggDude's Generator
  • 1 click rolling
    • 1 button to roll all the dice for an attack, with the results auto cancelled.
    • 1 button to roll initiative with the turn order sorted NPC/PC
  • Organization of materials (except for maps)
    • Folders for handouts/Character Sheets make it easy to pre-stage encounters.
    • With a custom sheet I was able to put a lot of campaign/adventure/encounter planning in an easy to use way.
• Maps
  • Grids for hexagons or squares.
  • Sizing can be modified for easy use for planets or bases, etc.
  • Can use scripts to auto-build maps
• Options
  • Like maps? they are there!
  • Hate maps? you can still benefit, as the play area can be just a background with general type range band listings
  • Like a fully fleshed out character sheet? its there!
  • Want a basic character sheet? boom, you have that too.
  • Have spare money? spring for pro and get scripts/character vault/neat toys.
  • Don't have spare money? use the google hangouts app for dice rolling and the basic sheet to keep track of things.

That is specifics that are why I like Roll20.

Of Fantasy Grounds;

• I found Fantasy Grounds look to be ... like what I remember about Windows 95/98 and none of the clean lines and happier look of other options.
• I tried to find a set of rules for the game, and struggled, after a long time of research I found something, but it looked barely there and did not have any of the features I came to expect from Roll20.
• I found trying to figure out how to use it, was rough and non intuitive, and it had a huge learning curve.
• I found the website for Fantasy Grounds looks like it was designed for an 800x600 screen.

In Summary:

Basically I felt that Roll20 was professional and easy to use, whereas Fantasy Grounds was ugly, clunky, and had no real useful support.

Call me old fashioned, but I'd rather own the software and have everything stored locally. I do not like paying a tax to store things on the web. I've owned FG back when it was still 2.0 in 2008 and I've always gotten updates to the software free of charge. Currently, FG is on version 3.17 and they've added a lot of rule sets that you can purchase or you can create your own easily using the CoreRPG. You can even give your rules set to others and it doesn't cost them a dime. Also, you can pay a subscription for FG for the Player or the Ultimate license. The pro to having the Ultimate is that only you have to have the license and every player that connects to your game can be on the free/demo version.

You don't "own" software you license it. But licensing for local storage versus licensing for remote storage, is a fully acceptable choice. Aside from "owning it" you have only stated the "free for players" (which Roll20 is too) and the ability to share "rulesets" (which Roll20 has, as well).

The rules sets for FG are licensed and updated automatically. FG has the most licenses out of any virtual tabletop.

If the only thing different is "owning" you do not have to paste that same list every time FG or Roll20 are mentioned.

The exact specific things I like about Roll20 are the following;

• Character Sheets
  • Customizable
    • I did not like how a character sheet was organized, so with some tweaks I now have everything in an easy to use display.
• Fully Customizable in FG.
  • Able to automate tasks
    • Scripts are available to import a fully ready-to-go NPC
    • Scripts can be created to import from OggDude's Generator
• Oggy is working on being able to import directly into FG.
  • 1 click rolling
    • 1 button to roll all the dice for an attack, with the results auto cancelled.
    • 1 button to roll initiative with the turn order sorted NPC/PC
  • FG has automatic rolling. One click of the button for the skill and you add in the setback and difficulty.
  • Initiative is done the same way.
  • Organization of materials (except for maps)
    • Folders for handouts/Character Sheets make it easy to pre-stage encounters.
    • With a custom sheet I was able to put a lot of campaign/adventure/encounter planning in an easy to use way.
  • FG has the ability to do handouts plus sorting in the Library that you maintain for the campaign.
  • FG has the same ability using their built in Story planner. Just type and go.
• Maps
  • Grids for hexagons or squares.
  • Sizing can be modified for easy use for planets or bases, etc.
  • Can use scripts to auto-build maps
• FG has grids for hexes or squares with you being able to set the scale easily.
• Mapping can be imported from other sources as it recognizes most image formats.
• Options
  • Like maps? they are there!
  • Hate maps? you can still benefit, as the play area can be just a background with general type range band listings
  • Like a fully fleshed out character sheet? its there!
  • Want a basic character sheet? boom, you have that too.
  • Have spare money? spring for pro and get scripts/character vault/neat toys.
  • Don't have spare money? use the google hangouts app for dice rolling and the basic sheet to keep track of things.
• Maps are stored locally and use drag/drop functionality to easily integrate them into your map library.
• The same image for the background can be done as an extension that will automatically download to the player's computer.
• FG has the same functionality.
• Have spare money? Spring for ultimate and never have to pay the monthly tax.
• Don't have spare money? Play in someone else's game with the demo.

That is specifics that are why I like Roll20.

Of Fantasy Grounds;

• I found Fantasy Grounds look to be ... like what I remember about Windows 95/98 and none of the clean lines and happier look of other options.
• FG has very clean lines and the looks are completely customizable by using extensions. I don't know how long ago you actually looked at FG, but it has come a long way.
• I tried to find a set of rules for the game, and struggled, after a long time of research I found something, but it looked barely there and did not have any of the features I came to expect from Roll20.
• I guess you didn't look hard enough. The following list is from the wiki for FG and the link is accessible in the top right corner.
• Included Rulesets
• 5E (D&D)
• 4E (D&D)
• 3.5E (D&D)
• PFRPG (Pathfinder)
• CoreRPG (Generic)
• Numenera
• FATE
• Core System
• Store
• Savage Worlds
• Rolemaster Classic
• Mutants and Masterminds
• 3E Castles and Crusades
• 5E Basic Roleplaying
• Call of Cthulhu 6E
• Iron Heroes
• Arcana Evolved
• D20 Modern
• Community
• 2E (AD&D)
• Advanced Fighting Fantasy 2E
• Ars Magica
• Babylon 5
• Base Cairn Conspiracy X
• Dresden Files
• Earthdawn
• Extinction Event
• Fantasy Dice
• Generic
• GURPS
• Labyrinth Lord
• Maelstrom RPG
• Night's Black Agents
• OSRIC
• Pavillon Noir Reloaded
• Rifts
• Shadowrun
• Stargate SG-1
• Star Wars d6
• Star Wars: Edge of the Empire
• Star Wars Saga
• Strands of Fate
• The One Ring
• Trail of Cthulhu
• Traveller
• Traveller20
• Unicore
• Vampire: The Masquerade
• Warhammer 40K: Black Crusade
• Warhammer 40K: Dark Heresy
• Warhammer 40K: Deathwatch
• Warhammer 40K: Only War
• Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay
• World of Darkness
• Yggdrasill
• I found trying to figure out how to use it, was rough and non intuitive, and it had a huge learning curve.
• Learning curve has improved and is more intuitive. It also has the rough edges removed.
• I found the website for Fantasy Grounds looks like it was designed for an 800x600 screen.
• Website has recently been redone for higher resolutions. Seriously, you're going to complain about the website? Speaking of the website, it holds your entire order history and if you have problems with your order support is just an email away. They will go so far as to work with you using Google Hangouts to figure out any problems you have with the software. I don't see Roll20 doing that.

In Summary:

Basically I felt that Roll20 was professional and easy to use, whereas Fantasy Grounds was ugly, clunky, and had no real useful support.

My responses are blue.

In Summary:

Fantasy Grounds has matured and gotten a lot better than what it used to be. Of course, this is to be expected when they are actively pushing out patches for the software. I've found that Roll20 is completely amateur in comparison and looks crappy too boot.

I don't want to sound like a buzz kill but reading this has reinforced my suspicion that we can play without either program. Character sheets, maps, dice etc..there are...well lo-tech ways to handle all of it in something as simple as a chat interphase.

I don't want to sound like a buzz kill but reading this has reinforced my suspicion that we can play without either program. Character sheets, maps, dice etc..there are...well lo-tech ways to handle all of it in something as simple as a chat interphase.

It is not a "buzz kill" if you found the information you needed.

I don't want to sound like a buzz kill but reading this has reinforced my suspicion that we can play without either program. Character sheets, maps, dice etc..there are...well lo-tech ways to handle all of it in something as simple as a chat interphase.

A friend of mine is part of a White Wolf game group that gets by just fine using Teamspeak3, Obsidian Portal, DropBox/GoogleDocs, online dice rollers, and one webcam (GM-side). It's a bit rudimentary for my tastes but they like it and have been playing with these tools for a couple of years now.

Game announcements are posted weekly at /r/shadowofthebroker. Coming up is a 2-Team, 2-GM adaptation of Perlemian Haul.

PLEASE post a report of that, my players are about to do the Perlemian Shuffle

In Summary:

Basically I felt that Roll20 was professional and easy to use, whereas Fantasy Grounds was ugly, clunky, and had no real useful support.

This is where I stand as well.

Regardless of cost and/or total utility, I don't want to have the program itself be a bear to use, which was the case with Fantasy Grounds, for me. Roll20 regularly tells me or shows me how I can make things easier for myself. FG's response to my needing to perform a task seems to be: look how many more fiddly bits you could fiddle with!

I don't want to sound like a buzz kill but reading this has reinforced my suspicion that we can play without either program. Character sheets, maps, dice etc..there are...well lo-tech ways to handle all of it in something as simple as a chat interphase.

I will say that I find some kind of public dice rolling utility useful, not because I don't trust my fellow players, but because seeing the other person's role means other people can offer dice pool interpretation suggestions or else just celebrate/commiserate on a particularly good/bad roll. It also makes it easier to spot when someone has made an honest mistake in assembling their dice pool (e.g. forgetting they have a setback die from a handling penalty, losing track of various boost dice they've been given, etc.). If you don't want to mess with a utility like Roll20 or FG, then a simple website like Orokos can allow you to roll publicly and link the results to the other players.

In Summary:

Basically I felt that Roll20 was professional and easy to use, whereas Fantasy Grounds was ugly, clunky, and had no real useful support.

This is where I stand as well.

Regardless of cost and/or total utility, I don't want to have the program itself be a bear to use, which was the case with Fantasy Grounds, for me. Roll20 regularly tells me or shows me how I can make things easier for myself. FG's response to my needing to perform a task seems to be: look how many more fiddly bits you could fiddle with!

I guess you never watched any of the tutorial videos that show you exactly how to do something. The tutorial videos are done by one of the owners of Smiteworks.

I guess you never watched any of the tutorial videos that show you exactly how to do something. The tutorial videos are done by one of the owners of Smiteworks.

The fun part about Roll20 is you don't need tutorial videos to set it up. I can take my most tech illiterate friends and tell them to setup a Roll20 account and it is easy.

No downloading of new software (it works via a browser). Just setup an account go to the campaign invite link, and you can start making a character for the game.

I guess you never watched any of the tutorial videos that show you exactly how to do something. The tutorial videos are done by one of the owners of Smiteworks.

The fun part about Roll20 is you don't need tutorial videos to set it up. I can take my most tech illiterate friends and tell them to setup a Roll20 account and it is easy.

No downloading of new software (it works via a browser). Just setup an account go to the campaign invite link, and you can start making a character for the game.

The same can be said of FG. I've taken people that have never used a VT before and had them rolling with FG in 5 minutes.

Yeah, software is such a terrible thing that no one should ever install it. /sarcasm

Hmm a player with the demo doesn't even need to set up an account at FG's website to use. Install the software and you can create characters for any game. Did I mention that these characters can be transferred from game to game with only using the demo? Too bad that Roll20 doesn't have that as a free feature. Oh just give the players your external IP address or use the Alias provided for players to connect.

Game announcements are posted weekly at /r/shadowofthebroker. Coming up is a 2-Team, 2-GM adaptation of Perlemian Haul.

PLEASE post a report of that, my players are about to do the Perlemian Shuffle

Videos of each session are posted the day after on the SotB Youtube channel in my sig .

I guess you never watched any of the tutorial videos that show you exactly how to do something. The tutorial videos are done by one of the owners of Smiteworks.

I have seen the tutorial videos. They did not help me. Not in the least.

Remember, just because you find something to be trivially easy does not mean that everyone else in the Universe will do or feel the same.

In contrast, I have gotten up to minimal speed with Roll20. I definitely don’t feel like I am in any way advanced with it, but I can post stuff to the forums, and most of the time I don’t mess up too much when I’m actually in-game.

EDIT: When I botch the dice rolls (and so far I always botch at least one or two per game in roll20), the GM and other players can see what I’ve done and then tell me what I need to do to fix it. And when another player botches a dice roll, I can see that and try to help them in the same way that others have helped me.

I don't want to sound like a buzz kill but reading this has reinforced my suspicion that we can play without either program. Character sheets, maps, dice etc..there are...well lo-tech ways to handle all of it in something as simple as a chat interphase.

So I am a remote player for my group, and we just use Google Hangouts. We don't use an online dice roller or anything. I am a talking head on a tv and the rest of the guys sit around the table. It works really well with a couple sound issues (they don't have a conference microphone there) and we play just as if we were all sitting around the table. Of course there's inherent trust in dice rolling...

So yeah, you can play just fine without any fancy tools, they just make it easier.

[edit: I own Fantasy Grounds and I was a pro subscriber for roll20, yet I have messed with neither enough to have a clear opinion. If it ain't broke....]

[edit 2: reminder, I had problems getting the free demo to run and someone from FG did a hangout with me to work through the issue, on a weekend! For free! ]

Back in 2008, I bought 1 GM and 2 Player licenses. Since FG has merged the Player license with the GM license, I get a discount of $20 off for each of my Player licenses to upgrade them to the current GM license. I also can upgrade my current GM license to Ultimate that takes into account for what I already paid for.

If someone that has the FG GM/Ultimate license or the demo, I will be happy to walk them through the process of using it on Google Hangouts.

I might take you up on that! By the way, how robust is the free version in terms of GM'ing? While I would get the full version if I switched over, I GM only half of the time. The other half is split between multiple co-GMs. Would my co-GMs also need to buy the full version, or could they get by on GM'ing with the demo version? Since they only individually GM once every other month or so, buying the full version doesn't make as much sense for them.

I might take you up on that! By the way, how robust is the free version in terms of GM'ing? While I would get the full version if I switched over, I GM only half of the time. The other half is split between multiple co-GMs. Would my co-GMs also need to buy the full version, or could they get by on GM'ing with the demo version? Since they only individually GM once every other month or so, buying the full version doesn't make as much sense for them.

The demo version doesn't allow players to GM a game. They would need to buy the standard license.

Drat!

I'm still not sure I get the need for this sort of thing in a decidedly narrative driven system.

I'm still not sure I get the need for this sort of thing in a decidedly narrative driven system.

The need for Roll20 or Fantasy Grounds is easy to see.

• Organization of materials.
  • Both FG and Roll20 offer options for the GM and Players to sort character sheets, maps, notes, handouts, etc.
• Ability to play remotely, even with people you have never met.
  • Say you want to play the game and everyone you know if busy (or you are sick!) you can pull up FG or Roll20 and setup a game and start inviting people and play!
• Ability to play if there is not really room for an area to roll dice and get more than 2 people together.
  • If you have a computer (or in the case of Roll20 even a tablet) you have what is needed to play the game. Sure someone still needs to buy the books, but you can use generated dice.

Not everyone has the same availability of room or people around that want to play. So remote options allow for new choices for new adventures!

I know when someone comments on every point it sounds hotty but..

Organization of Materials - Im the GM and players have their own materials at hand, not sure how having electronic copies helps. We can email copies, show pictures of them instantly etc. without FG or anything else.

Playing Remotely - that's exactly what we are doing, using nothing more than a free chat service like Yahoo Messenger. Voice, camera, file sharing.. everything there if you need it or just written communication if you prefer.

Room to Play - not really a factor, I wouldn't think you would use any less room on FG or Rolld20 than we do using Yahoo, it amounts to the same experience.

Maybe you didn't understand my question or I phrased it wrong.

I absolutely see the need for remote playing but why spend money, download software, learn to use the thing, mess with updates etc. when all you need is a method to communicate? Heck, you could do it by phone if you wanted.

I absolutely see the need for remote playing but why spend money, download software, learn to use the thing, mess with updates etc. when all you need is a method to communicate? Heck, you could do it by phone if you wanted.

There are some games where integrated support from an underlying system can be very helpful. There are other games that are almost exclusively in the respective minds of the participants, and therefore there really isn’t any support that you can give to them beyond establishing basic communications.

IMO, FFG SWRPG is roughly in the middle of those two extremes, and I find that Roll20 works reasonably well for remote play. And I believe it works a lot better for me and the group I’ve tried it with than just plain voice/video chat and nothing else.

But if plain voice/video chat works well for you and your group, then more power to you! Congratulations! You’ve managed to get to a place that I cannot, and I do envy you a little on that regard.

Meanwhile, I continue to be interested in this topic (in case there is anything out there that is much better than Roll20), and I look forward to seeing further good reasoned discussion here.

I absolutely see the need for remote playing but why spend money, download software, learn to use the thing, mess with updates etc. when all you need is a method to communicate? Heck, you could do it by phone if you wanted.

Same reason we pay for almost everything...comfort

I haven't played online yet, I'm curious about trying it once, because sometimes I'm out of the country, and being a floating GM-Head on a television screen sounds like fun call me Zordon!