Fantasy Grounds Unity Kickstarter Has Launched

Based on the pledge levels, I suspect it's also a push to get people to upgrade.

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They really need to update the actual UI. So sad that this is not a part of the KS.

FG is still no alternative as it is not browser based. Some people might not care, but I need something that is browser based, does not need any admin rights, installations, any setup at all.

I believe this is the Unity version...at least the FG forum announcement makes it seem that way....Doug might swing by and clarify as he’s active on the forum. Looking forward to it as I know Carl has been working on FGU for a bit and like the weather and fog of war. Thanks Doug!

One of the biggest advantages of the Unity engine is it’s portability. This will finally bring Fantasy Grounds to the tablet which is what many of us have been wanting for years.

Mistwell said:

I thought they said dynamic lighting and fog of war was "in the works" years ago? Both are already a part of Roll20 and have been for years. Why can't they afford to develop this using their ordinary income source from Fantasy Grounds?

In fact, if Tile Based Map Building is what I think it is, Roll20 has had that from day one and for free! [Edit - I just watched their video on Tile Based Map Building and yes, I was doing just that with Roll20 for free all the way back to the 5e beta]

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The new features have been in the works for some time, but the thing that has delayed the development of the Unity version of Fantasy Grounds has been ensuring that it will be compatible with existing rule sets, assets, and campaigns. You will be able to take everything you have for the current program and plug it into the new one.

Having used both Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds, there is really no comparison. Even the current version of FG is much more of a full-featured virtual tabletop and is much much easier to use for preparing and running a game. Hell, the combat tracker alone is enough to make me lament the occasions when I have to use Roll20 because someone has to have a browser-based connection. Roll20 has had an advantage in terms of pretty looking doo-dads and a better set of map tools, but FG is set to leapfrog past it in that category, too. Roll20 has dynamic lighting while FGU, when it launches, will only have dynamic line-of-sight, but lighting and darkvision are supposedly early priorities for next year.

SmiteWorks has, in point of fact, been developing this with their existing income. The Unity program is in its last stage of development, with the beta release planned a couple months after the Kickstarter and the live program available before the end of the year.

There are a number of free tile-based mapping solutions available, but if you were doing everything in that video in Roll20, you weren't using the free version unless you were using one of the scripts that unlocks the premium tools and adds extra features to Roll20, and you were certainly not enjoying the level of responsiveness shown in the video with map tools in any browser-based solution.

EthanSental said:

I believe this is the Unity version...at least the FG forum announcement makes it seem that way....Doug might swing by and clarify as he’s active on the forum. Looking forward to it as I know Carl has been working on FGU for a bit and like the weather and fog of war. Thanks Doug!

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This is absolutely the Unity version.

The current program will continue on, by the way, as "Fantasy Grounds Classic."

Malovech said:

They really need to update the actual UI. So sad that this is not a part of the KS.

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The UI is heavily moddable and extensible, and there are a fair number of user-created extensions that add or change elements of the UI ranging from aesthetic themes to some pretty chunky mechanical alterations. I don't use any myself other than an occasional map layer add-on, but some of them are apparently quite popular.

Fantasy Grounds has fog of war already and has for years. It does not update it dynamically (manual process by the GM), but it is there. I actually am not that fond of the way that Roll20 does it, but that is a personal opinion.

Based on an email I received today, Roll20 just lowered the cost of WoTC DLC to the prices that Fantasy Grounds and D&D Beyond have been charging for a while. Fantasy Grounds is still cheaper either via bundle pricing or their regular sales, but they are closer now.

This Kickstarter is to introduce the new version that we've built to the world. Kickstarter is a great avenue to do that. In our case it was not needed for funding. We've been funding development of it with current revenue for the last several years. We showed prototyping of dynamic LOS many years back as well. It's one of the new features, along with tile based map building, painting with images and more. The big time-sink for us has been in simply rebuilding everything to run in Unity in a way that will let people simply port over their campaigns, modules or rulesets from Fantasy Grounds Classic.

This first phase addresses some of the biggest weaknesses in our platform. It doesn't address all of them, but it does hit some of the biggest items. We think we have a lot of other strengths in the current version and this should add to that. The way we deliver features that other VTTs may already have will also be a distinguishing factor for people in the market for VTTs. We will continue to build from this new point and we should be able to pick up speed now that we have reached this point.

We believe that the VTT space will continue to grow for all parties.