Seeking reviews or comparisons of: Fantasy Grounds, kLoOge.Werks and Screenmonkey

[Dupre]

As a developer of Fantasy Grounds, my opinions are rather biased so I will focus on purely rectifying some of the falsities.

Fantasy Grounds was designed to be first and foremost an online version of tabletop pen & paper gameplay experience. Secondly, we designed it to be as flexible as possible for players to modify and extend it to their needs, including adding custom rulesets.

Tokens: There is a basic token pack you get with the software, but you have always been able to use your own. There are hundreds and hundreds of tokens available for Fantasy Grounds.

Maps: We have indeed implemented map improvements including map zooming, which is of the same quality as other features found in Fantasy Grounds.

Automation: Fantasy Grounds does not have success/failure resolution as it is explicitly forbidden in the WotC d20 Open Gaming License. We are, however, adding scripting support to Fantasy Grounds, which allows players to make their rulesets fully automated if they so wish.

Our player community is of highest importance to us and we are dedicated to adding features requested by our players.

 

[Bitr_Haag]

In the spirit of fairness and complete disclosure, I have purchased both FG and Klooge but I use FG exclusively at this point.

Klooge Review
Positives
Klooge has some really, really cool features (assuming they work). The distance calculator, the damage, AC, etc... calculators all look amazing and would help speed up my combat significantly. I would agree with the comment above that Klooge has more "brains" behind it.

Negatives
After purchasing Klooge, I tried to set it up for 3.5 rules but it wasn't available at the time. I think, after reading the bottom/top forums on Klooge (hate that format btw!), that the users have fixed this but you have to download, tweak, etc... to get it working. It may be a very easy process, but I didn't want to take the time to figure java, etc... out.

Fantasy Grounds Review
Positives
Rolling dice is fun. Call it a stupid quirk but I'd be willing to bet that the dice rolling feature is one of the Top 5 things users like about the program. Consider the "pen & paper" days with the friends... someone was ALWAYS randomly tossing a dice on the table or trying to make a die spin even though it annoyed the DM! Same effect here.

Additionally, the packaging looks great. FG has the shiny bells/whistles that attract the eye.

Finally, the community and developers seem dedicated to making it better and listening to the users. In my opinion, the fact that Dupre, a developer, was even aware of this topic AND took time to respond to this topic is a HUGE testimony to their commitment to the product. It shows that SmiteWorks (?) is aware of more than just the FG site and that they are not resting on their last achievement.

Unfortunately, I also feel compelled to correct Dupre's posting above and add that "map zooming" is, as of Aug 25th, unavailable. It is part of the next patch that is scheduled to be released "soon" (Dupre's word on the FG Forums). Apparently, at GenCon, the demo version contained the map zoom feature so the full patch release is hopefully right around the corner.

Negatives
Well, the negatives are all of the features that people are requesting on the FG forums. As a DM, the map zoom will be a HUGE benefit and make life a lot easier. There are still some connectivity glitches that will occassionally drop a player for reasons I can't reliably duplicate but they quickly log back on and we continue w/o any major inconvenience.

Final Thoughts
I think FG is a great product. The initiatl goal was to re-create the original "pen and paper" feel for RPG's. I believe it has done a great job with it. I suspect some things will NOT be automated either for legal reasons (mentioned above) OR for the desire to remain true to some of the manual processes, just like "in the day".

I'm also confident that FG will improve in the near future. In addition to SW development, the user community is actively working on different rule sets, tokens, maps, scenarios, etc... While I'm sure this is also true for Klooge, I have some firsthand experience w/ the FG community and believe in the members.

However, Klooge appears to have some really, really, really cool stuff that FG has not indicated they are working on. One feature that sounds cool is being able to place a token on the map and have it be "invisible" to the players. Or being able to indicate a light source and have the "fog of war" move with the character with the light source. I wish I had experience with this software more to make a better informed decision.

Unfortunately, Klooge appears to be very technical and user unfriendly while Fantasy Grounds makes it pretty easy to get started. For those of you old enough to know... think of Klooge as "Beta" and Fantasy Grounds as "VHS".

 

[artmc]

First off all thanks for the massive and detailed replies everyone.


I am still looking these comments and will most assuredly be considering the comments
on making my final choice.


One thing that really, really weights in the favor of kLoOge.Werks, is that I will be
switching to Linux for my main OS on my desktop. Though I will likely keep a small (10Gig +)
windows partition for 'emergencies'. And my laptop is a Powerbook.

Again thanks for the information.

* art *
…
/|\​

 

[azhrei_fje]

I wouldn't bother with Windoze at all except that I need it to run certain applications: DMGenie, Adobe Distiller (for work), and to visit some of the online poker sites I play at.

Whatever you figure out, please come back and report what you chose and why, as I'm sure it will help out others who are looking for software.

 

[bloodydrake]

one thing about klooge mentioned is the 3rd edition def works perfectly fine with 3.5 there really isn't any mechanics difference between them.
the difference lies in changes to the rules that are actually independant to the def files functionality.
another thing is there are many different defs availble ][ero aka hero 1st 2nd 3rd edition, G6 aka gurps, starwarsd20,travellerd20(someones workign on this)
almost all are player made defs and if you have a basic knowlege of xml you can make your own defs and charactersheets that match your own homegrown rules.You want a COCd20 rules set..tweak the default one to match ect.

I wish there was an industrious Klooge fan like msd that could setup a solid fansite to make tracking down all the usermade content easier..maybe someday.
Both FG and KW are fantastic programs that you really can't go wrong with either.

 

[Celestian]

I'm going to agree with Drake here. I use Klooge over all the others. It's stable, has all the features I need and the support from the authors has always been responsive when needed.

While I can't speak on the 3.0-3.5 issues I can say that it works fine for my 1e games. Thats right, there is even a rules set for 1e =)

I love the map and "fog of war", the grid scaling for said maps and the fact that it runs under java... that means it'll run under anything that RUNS java (Unix, PC, MAC/etc).

Of all the "pay for" applications I think this one is top notch. If you add something like TeamSpeak to this with your game place it's almost better than a real table =) Mind you, this sorta gaming requires a lot more prep.

 

[shadowlight]

So do any of these include voice chat, or do you have to have a second program running in the background to let the players actually talk to each other?

 

[shadowlight]

As a developer of Fantasy Grounds

This right here seems like an advantage of Fantasy Grounds. They're actually out on the boards (not just their own) listening to their customers. Nice!

 

[DMFTodd]

Neither klooge nor Fantasy Grounds includes voice chat with it. You either type your chat or you run a second program for voice (I use klooge with Ventrilo).

 

[bloodydrake]

currently we use teamspeak with it..how does ventrilo compair ?