I know there have been other posts on this, but I can't quite find the search keywords.

My game, I've been putting together for a year, starts next week and half my players have flaked out. I've put so much work into this campaign, it's breaking my heart to see it collapse. I may have to turn to virtual gaming, but there's so many apps and learning one, to the degree I will demand of myself, will take considerable time. Any recommendations?

Roll20 is what my Facebook friends say is the best, but they don't play this system.

Help me FFG forums.. you're my only hope.

I use Roll20 and I also decided to become a subscriber when I chose to GM one for my friends (we're scattered from Arizona to Sweden). Some feel that paying for the added features for subscribers isn't worth it, but to have full character sheets and a functioning dice roller all combined is worth my $10/mo.

If you do go with Roll20 I do suggest a seperate voice/video chat such as Skype or meet.jit.si

Roll20 is my homeboy.

Add Google Hangouts with the numerous integrated FFG dice rollers, and you don't even need to pay for a Roll20 subscription. (I still do; I GM multiple campaigns and I want to support the nice folks over there.)

Google hangouts does work great. My group has just started using it as an addition to our normal around the table games to allow people to play more often.

I use Hangouts with the dice roller, but my situation is a little different in that I'm the only remote player in my group.

I did pay for roll20 for a couple months, but it turns out I didn't need it. I found the system to be a bit more clunky than I liked, due in part to my unfamiliarity with it. In part. YMMV, let's just say it felt too much like my job and less like my hobby.

I also purchased a license for Fantasy Grounds, which appears to have excellent integrations with this system. Support was beyond a doubt some of the best I've had with any company, gaming or not.

If I were to GM an online game, I'd choose the VTT in this order:

• Hangouts (it's free, thus #1)
• Fantasy Grounds
• Roll20

All work, but I think different people have different workflows and thus mileage may vary. I also heard rumor of a Tabletop Simulator supporting this system now, but I have't tried it.

Hangouts is pretty great, with or without Roll20. All you really need for this system is a dice roller. If you have a way to centralize character sheets (like SWSheets.com) and you can trust you players to adjust (or you adjust your own copies), you don't have to fiddle with Roll20. It's nice to have for backgrounds, character art, music, etc. I use it. But there's no requirement.

My only warning is that sometimes Hangouts is... finicky. It does odd things sometimes. Rarely, though, so you should be ok.

I’ve used Hangouts before. IMO, that is not a good solution. For gaming, I believe that Roll20 is much better.

I do not have any experience with Fantasy Grounds, but I’ve heard good things about it.

With regards to dice rollers, there are different options.

There is one that is integrated into Hangouts (to a degree), but I don’t believe it works with the new version of Hangouts, so you have to be careful where you launch it from.

There is a good dice roller for Roll20, which is a bit clunky, but still handles netting out the success versus failure, advantage versus threat, etc… and generally works pretty well. You have to understand the idiosyncrasies, but once you do and you can confirm that the back-end support server is running correctly, then you’re good.

There is also the independent Orokos.com roller, which can be used anywhere. People would have to go to the URL for each individual roll to see what the results were, or they could take your word for it. But it does have the advantage of not being dependent on anything other than a web browser.

I am currently a Roll20 subscriber, albeit not at the highest level. And I am not a Roll20 GM. For me, it works much better than Hangouts, and good enough for the purpose.

But I would encourage you to look at alternatives to see if there is anything out there that might work better for you.

There is one that is integrated into Hangouts (to a degree), but I don’t believe it works with the new version of Hangouts, so you have to be careful where you launch it from.

That's true, I forgot. The new version of Hangouts hates all apps by default. There's a pretty easy way to go back to the old version - and, when/if you do, make sure to leave feedback suggesting that they need to support apps going forward. Once you get all your apps back, the latest EotE Hangout Tools works (mostly) fine. Every error I've encountered with it is solved by everyone closing the app and opening it again.

It wins points for having an easy re-set button for the selected dice, integrated Destiny point tracker, and ability to roll any numerical dice (defaults to d100, obviously). Everyone can see rolls, and they've (recently?) adjusted it so that all players can see the results of individual dice.

I'm not saying it's a better option than any of the other rollers. I imagine having an integrated roll20 roller would make roll20 much more attractive, but you have to subscribe, which is the "con" there. The cons to hangouts being everything I've listed above - finicky, requires some work to get right, sometimes requires reset, etc.

I'm not saying it's a better option than any of the other rollers. I imagine having an integrated roll20 roller would make roll20 much more attractive, but you have to subscribe, which is the "con" there. The cons to hangouts being everything I've listed above - finicky, requires some work to get right, sometimes requires reset, etc.

You do have to set up an account for Roll20, but you don’t have to pay money if you’re just going to be a player. You have to set up an account for Google Hangouts, too. So, that’s not really a fair comparison.

If you’re going to be a Game Master who uses Roll20, then yes — you’d probably want to pay money for an upgraded account. But that’s not required if you just want to be a player.

And there's nothing that says you can't start in hangouts, using roll20 and the dice roller apps for free, and then upgrade to straight roll20. The API character sheet still works as a normal character sheet, so if they are up to date then if you decide to pay the transition will be largely painless...

I spent a little time investigating Tabletop Simulator (available via Steam) and found it impressive. I haven't used it yet, but man it looks pretty slick.

I'm not saying it's a better option than any of the other rollers. I imagine having an integrated roll20 roller would make roll20 much more attractive, but you have to subscribe, which is the "con" there. The cons to hangouts being everything I've listed above - finicky, requires some work to get right, sometimes requires reset, etc.

You do have to set up an account for Roll20, but you don’t have to pay money if you’re just going to be a player. You have to set up an account for Google Hangouts, too. So, that’s not really a fair comparison.If you’re going to be a Game Master who uses Roll20, then yes — you’d probably want to pay money for an upgraded account. But that’s not required if you just want to be a player.

Only the GM has to subscribe to get the dice roller working? That's cool, for some reason I thought everyone did. However, SOMEONE has to pay to unlock it on Roll20, so I'd say it's a fair comparison. The OP either has to pay monthly or ask their GM to, and it's an important thing to know beforehand.

Oh, in my experience, setting up a hangout account is more difficult, though, so that's fair. Roll20 is your standard "register and done", but hangouts actually requires you to have a Google+ page affiliated with the account you're using before you can use any apps - something that the program won't explicitly tell you.

EDIT: Wait, does the dice macro system work (well) with the FFG dice if you subscribe to Roll20? I mean... I guess dice rolls are a lot less standard, what with setback/boost and all that, but...

Thanks for the feedback! On a happy note, a couple players "unflaked".. my meat-space game is on

Still, in a year or so, my husband joins the military and I will be bouncing from base to base, being a military spouse. I will check roll20 and Google hangouts, this way I have a year to learn the ins and outs of each program.

Thanks again guys!

We are using Tabletop Simulator on Steam.

It works well. There is a really good SW dice roller on there that you can import to other tables/maps.

Plus they have 3d renders for figs from other games that you can import in.

Speaking of importing, on TS, if you find a map on the internet, you can import it in for your players to use.

It just gets some time to get used to that format, but this is our preferred system.

I have also used Fantasy Grounds, but it was a tad pricey for what we were going to do with it.

EDIT: Wait, does the dice macro system work (well) with the FFG dice if you subscribe to Roll20? I mean... I guess dice rolls are a lot less standard, what with setback/boost and all that, but...

I don’t know that anyone actually has to subscribe to Roll20 in order to get the dice system working. However, I don’t have any experience using Roll20 without at least the GM plus a few other players also subscribed — myself included.

The dice roller we use has a few quirks, like you have to remember to use the up/down buttons to increase or decrease the number of that type of dice and then click somewhere out of that box in order to get the number to “stick” for the roll, but it does do proper auto-canceling of success versus fail and advantage versus threat, as well as counting a Triumph as both a Triumph and a Success, etc….

So long as you keep the quirks in mind, and it does take a little while to get used to them, the roller works pretty well.

We are using Tabletop Simulator on Steam.

It works well. There is a really good SW dice roller on there that you can import to other tables/maps.

Plus they have 3d renders for figs from other games that you can import in.

Speaking of importing, on TS, if you find a map on the internet, you can import it in for your players to use.

It just gets some time to get used to that format, but this is our preferred system.

I have also used Fantasy Grounds, but it was a tad pricey for what we were going to do with it.

After a quick internet search, I'm seeing good things on this.. thanks for putting it on my radar.

The Roll20 roller is a custom API script for a campaign, and to implement it - and the appropriate features in the Roll20 FFG Character Sheet - someone (probably the GM?) needs to subscribe at a level that gives access to the API. That's the highest level, at $9.99/month USD.

Tabletop Simulator is really cool for a lot of things. Never tried it for RPGs. It has its own quirks, but I'm probably not qualified to discuss them. If the SW dice roller is like the dice used in many of the board games, everything is physics based, so you have to pick up and actually toss dice, which can run into anything else and/or go off the table. Just like real life! But with a mouse. At least, that's what Betrayal at House on the Hill is like. It's pretty neat, though, and getting it gives you theoretical access to any game the modding community puts up.

Actually, I'll bet TS would be awesome for RPGs, if you got used to it.

Actually, I'll bet TS would be awesome for RPGs, if you got used to it.

I watched a number of videos and I agree, this thing looks fantastic for RPGs. Now, to actually try it.

I'm going to chime in on here. I run an online group and use Fantasy Grounds. I love it, as I find the interface on roll 20 dated in my opinion. Everything is in fantasy grounds, dice rolls are calculated automatically so there is no slowing down while you interpret your players rolling 10 dice,they automatically see what they have and start narrating.

With both these systems though, it does leave out the real world feel of rolling dice, and to that point, I think tabletop simulator could be fun, I'm in the process of working on getting a Deathwatch game on there,the visual representation of having 3d models, as well as actually rolling dice I think would appeal to a lot of people, although there is no automation compared to fantasy grounds or Roll20. So you as a DM would be manually adjusting everything, although it's a tradeoff that might be worth it.

So you as a DM would be manually adjusting everything, although it's a tradeoff that might be worth it.

I hope this is something that helps make that easier.

Well... That is actually really awesome. Although I doubt my star wars group would all be willing to buy tabletop simulator.

I am a fan of Maptool from rptools.net. It's completely free, the basic functions are very easy to use, and it has a lot of advanced capability if you really want to get into it. There are also other free programs from the same site, like Tokentool, which makes tokens that you can use in Maptool. It also has chat capability but text only. Another nice benefit is that being a Java program, it can run on OS's other than just Windows.

It's very handy for having a visual layout for combat. If you want to use it for exploration, it has a Fog of War function, which blacks out the map for the players and then reveals the map as their tokens are moved around (you can define how far each token can see and define vision-blocking areas like walls).

You can program macros to automate certain actions. There are complete rules frameworks available for download, including frameworks for FFG SW.

I use it to track basic combat stats and it has a dice roller. You can input entire character sheets into it but since I use OggDude's Character Generator I see no need to create another sheet inside the program.

I pair Maptool with Google Hangouts for video chat since I find that more conducive to roleplaying.

What is wrong with tabletop simulator?

Edge of Empire Table setup

Tokens, Cards, Tools

What is wrong with tabletop simulator?

Edge of Empire Table setup

Tokens, Cards, Tools

It's not free.

But if you've used it, can you tell me if only one player needs a copy or does everyone need to purchase it?

I am a fan of Maptool from rptools.net. It's completely free, the basic functions are very easy to use, and it has a lot of advanced capability if you really want to get into it. There are also other free programs from the same site, like Tokentool, which makes tokens that you can use in Maptool. It also has chat capability but text only. Another nice benefit is that being a Java program, it can run on OS's other than just Windows.

I’ve tried maptool on OS X. I was never able to get it to work correctly.

But you are right that it is another alternative that should at least be considered.

Thanks!