a5e.tools Announcing Level Up Gateway

Do we have a big, exciting announcement to make? Yes, yes we do!

Announcing Level Up Gateway — Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition (A5E)

Online character builder coming later this year!

www.levelup5e.com

EN Publishing (Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition) and Alexander Fredstie (Tableplop) are excited to announce Level Up Gateway, the long-awaited official, online character builder to support the popular Level Up game line.

Level Up Gateway contains official Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition material and enables players and Narrators to build characters, roll colourful, animated virtual dice, and access official A5E rules. Later, it will also include an integrated virtual tabletop (VTT).

• Create characters by selecting options in the step by step character builder.
• Avoid mistakes on character sheets with calculated equipment weight, item costs, and more.
• Roll ability checks, attack and damage rolls, saving throws, and more with a single click using colourful, animated dice.
• Pick dice to use for a roll or select ahead of time for damage types, attacks and skill checks.
• See where your bonuses come from with attack and damage details.
• Track inventory, feature uses, health and more.
• Roll on random tables with digital dice.
• Real time synced dice rolls for all connected players so everyone can experience the suspense of an important roll.

Level Up Gateway will be open later this year! Initially it will be available for beta testing to backers of the Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition Kickstarter, rolling out more widely afterwards.

Frequently Asked Questions​

What will Level Up Gateway cost? We have not yet finalised our pricing plans, but you will be able to make characters for free. Other features or content may have a price attached, and we will announce our plans as we get closer to launch.

When does it launch? The platform is well underway (as you can see from the screenshots below). We hope to have a beta version available for those who backed the Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition Kickstarter later this year, with more widespread access rolling out afterwards.

Do I need to download anything? Level Up Gateway is browser-based. You do not need to download any software.

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[Morrus]

It was definitely a thing last year, yup!

I never responded because I got hung up on the question you posed about the concerns on two points.

1) "Approved" 3pp materials, which would imply that some material is 'better' than others which you didn't want to do and I wholeheartedly support, since you'd need to read over material and weigh in on whether it was appropriate.

2) "Open Submission" where users just put anything they want on there for everyone's use. While more egalitarian, it leaves you open to issues of liability or perceived support for things you and your company might not approve of.

(Not that anyone I know of in the 3pp community would do such a thing, but the 'Time to Penis' factor has to be weighed. Which is an MMO Game Design mantra measured in milliseconds before someone draws a penis in a game where you can move objects, paint, or otherwise alter elements of the game world or design a logo for any purpose.)

And after being hung up on that question I forgot to respond... for months.

Ultimately I don't think there is a really solid answer. But if you open up the interface to the community, whether full or 3pp specific, I promise the Esper will be available to everyone. And so will the Champion, Gunslinger, Sentinel, and Warcaster at some point after Martial Artistry's release.

Well, it’s not a case of flipping a switch. It was whether to devote resources to developing code to let 3PPs do that… and we didn’t.

That’s A5e.tools, of course. Level Up Gateway is something entirely different.

 

[daddystabz]

Will this also support The Voidrunner's Codex stuff?

 

[Jonstark]

The concerns about 3rd party content being protected are valid, but ultimately 3rd party content is useless if it can't be integrated into the character creation process, imo. This Gateway will literally be the gateway by which new players can comfortably and seamlessly slide into A5E; for DMs of course reading and digesting the huge library is just par for the course, but that's not reasonable to expect of players. Players need an easy way in, and Gateway will provide that.

Anyway, there must be a way to do it which still protects the 3rd party creators. It could be as simple as a method for DMs to input homebrew and 3rd party stuff into the use of the tool, but which is not visible or available to anyone except those within that DM's campaign.

Either way, I'm really excited and looking forward to this being unveiled.

I'm new to A5E; I only discovered it and bought in fully during the Voidrunner kickstarter (which, like daddystabz, I'm hoping will be integrated into the Gateway), so I missed out on being an early backer for A5E. I'm assuming I won't get a glimpse at Gateway til it's broadly released next year, so next year can't come fast enough for me.