D&D General My experience with paid D&D tools after 3+ years as a DM/Player

[Blue]

In my experience, most people use Roll20 for video and Discord for audio. I know your post was about paid tools, but I'm curious if you use Discord or some other audio tool.

Has Roll20 improved? We rabidly use anything but Roll20 for video or audio, it was horrible in the past but no idea if they've made improvements. Like all of the normal types of issues but more frequent, but also things like "one player's video is locked up but for only one other player" and no idea which player's side it was on.

We use Discord for both video and audio, and while I prefer with boosts for higher audio quality it works fine without them. And frankly with multiple screens being able to have it not located taking up real estate where I'm trying to play isn't negotiable. I'm with one group playing PF2 remastered on Foundry, and it's great but I can't pop-out the character sheet like I can the 5e one on Roll20, and I curse that each and every session. (I understand there was a module for this, but it's no longer supported.)

 

[evilbob]

My favorite campaign tool is still good ol' One Note. Syncs between devices, holds pics, subdivides nicely, easy to search: and totally free.

We use WhatsApp for organizing sessions. I can also share pics through there, which are easy for them to see, but it usually takes like 30 seconds for me to find and share and I hate that. It's easier if I plan ahead but you never know.

Started using Discord to hold notes for players, but I'm 99% sure none of them have touched it. Like others, I don't think session summaries would be useful to our group, as they wouldn't read them. Also, having a tool to relieve them of note-taking makes me feel like they'd have even a harder time remembering.

Tried music once for a boss, but the battle took like 2 sessions that were 3 hrs each and even with an hour long song it ran out repeatedly and we eventually ditched it. Every music service seems more expensive than it'd be worth, but I'm sure I am missing something and will watch this thread for ideas!

Haven't used roll20 in years either, but I was both impressed at the coolness and saddened by the time requirement. It's also rough for open-ended stuff. Still, maybe I should take another look!

 

[LordEntrails]

I still love to make playlists for in-person play though!

Up for sharing? Maybe they even happen to be in Spotify?

 

[Mort]

There are a number of LLM transcription-to-summary services budding up now... I'm (not?) surprised that some of them are charging as they're all in active development, but there are some good ones out there that are free as they're developed. One that I've tried is Archivist AI, it's currently no-cost (if someone's trying to dip their toes without paying) and AFAIK you can share the summaries. (Automatic Notes for Your TTRPG Campaign | Archivist AI)

Archivist AI looks decent, but I'm showing a cost of $10-$60 per month depending on tier.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Up for sharing? Maybe they even happen to be in Spotify?

Great idea!

D&D Combat

D&D Exploration

D&D Town

 

[Algorithmancer]

One question: Is this Obsidian - Sharpen your thinking

Yes its this one! I didn't realise there was another TTRPG called Obsidian portal

Its not tailored to TTRPGs but is extremely flexible and works very well for all my TTRPG needs

 

[Algorithmancer]

As for Roll20, why'd you pick it over the other options?
Like others, I've found it to have significant issues and it's much more experience than the other top tier VTTs. Fantasy Grounds is $25 right now for a one-time license. And Foundry is only $50 for a one-time license. Both have everything you say you are using plus a lot more. And their are free ones that have FoW etc if you are looking for something simple.

Thanks for the recommendations! The main reason is I just haven't tried out the other ones yet honestly, I've been recommended Foundry quite a bit recently so will definately give that a shot.

Initially I chose Roll20 because they had a free tier I could try out and the learning curve seemed easier IMO, I was reluctant to try out the others which seemed a lot more complex. That said I've been entrenched in the Roll20 ecosystem for a while now so will look into trying out more of these recommendations

 

[Algorithmancer]

Thanks for posting, I've tried some of the tools and features mentioned, so throwing in my 2c...

From the player side, dynamic lighting has always felt like an anti-feature to me . Often it means I can't see what anyone else is doing during a combat, which throws me out of the game faster than a hasted monk. Worse case is you're a human and there's no light around so you're staring at a blank screen for most of the combat. From the DM side, I found setting up walls/visibility areas was too tedious/time consuming for the benefit. I also want the map to show me where I've been, even if it's greyed out because I can't see it at the moment due to lighting/line of sight. No dynamic lighting engine really does this as far as I have experienced.

On the VTTs: Roll20 has always felt clunky to me, and Foundry feels both complicated and too automated (as in, it blurs into feeling like a computer RPG, not a TTRPG, if too many of the add-ons are in play) and it seems heavy on the maintenance side (plugins are constantly breaking due to updates, if the grumbles of the DM's I've played with are any indication!). I use ShardTabletop now in my games, having found it's a great middle ground between those extremes.

On notes/worlds: At the free tier, I used Kanka over Obsidian in one campaign simply because it was hosted and could be shared easily with the players. I guess it's not an issue if you've subbed, but for convenience it won out at the time.

Thanks for sharing your experience! That's interesting about dynamic lighting - I've always really enjoyed it and thought it made sessions more immersive, but I can totally see how staring at a blank screen as a human character would be frustrating.

I can see the appeal of Kanka's free sharing features. Since I pay for Obsidian sync that takes away the need, but for free users that's definitely a big advantage. And yeah the automation thing is totally subjective - I like having some of the tedious stuff handled automatically but I get how it can feel too much like a video game.

How do you find ShardTabletop compares feature-wise to the bigger VTTs? Haven't heard much about it but sounds like it might be worth checking out

 

[Algorithmancer]

Archivist AI looks decent, but I'm showing a cost of $10-$60 per month depending on tier.

Yeah I can't see any free tier either, showing $10-$60 a month for me as well. There definitely seem to be quite a few options in this space.

I've been really happy with Saga20 - the voice recognition and auto matching across sessions is fantastic, though I wish the summary sharing was easier. Archivist looks interesting for the Discord integration side if you're running games there, but Saga20 worked better for my recorded sessions setup.

 

[LordEntrails]

Thanks for the recommendations! The main reason is I just haven't tried out the other ones yet honestly, I've been recommended Foundry quite a bit recently so will definately give that a shot.

I definitely recommend you check out a few others. No one VTT is perfect for every person. They have different strengths and weaknesses. And those of us who use them all have biased opinions (as you know). Here's my suggestions...

Check out both Foundry and Fantasy Grounds (FG). They are the imo top 2 VTTs for full features, active community, etc. Except for sales, both are the same cost for the same type of license (GM one-time). I don't know about Foundry but FG has a 30 day refund period if you don't like it. Also check out OwlBear Rodeo. It's a lower/mid-tier one that I hear a lot of good things about and I think if you only want maps, tokens and line of sight does them well.

So my bias is FG. I chose it for the following main reasons: 1) long term stability and active development (20+ years) 2) official content, thousands of official DLC in the store 3) Architecture, since you host the games everything is on your computer, forever (same as Foundry).

What's kept me away from Foundry is: 1) stability, to get the same level of features and automation with Foundry that FG has out of the box you need community extensions/modules. When using community modules it's often a lot of work to keep everything synced and working when wanting to update (this is true about both platforms, and both have active community developers). 2) Port Forwarding, FG has cloud brokered connections. Foundry's solution is to pay a monthly hosting fee if you can't port forward your ISP connection.

Happy gaming