Pens and Papers

[Benji]

Sick of how God awful Roll20 is and yet for some reason it's the go to. Has anyone got any alternatives? I just gave TablePlop's demo a quick whirl and that seems kind of cool.

[Ruki]

38 minutes ago, Benji said:

Sick of how God awful Roll20 is and yet for some reason it's the go to. Has anyone got any alternatives? I just gave TablePlop's demo a quick whirl and that seems kind of cool.

I used Roll20 for about 2.5 years, just because it was free, reliable, and convenient (paid modules doing most of the heavy lifting). In February, around the whole OGL debacle, I was curious about Pathfinder 2e, and I heard that Foundry VTT works amazing for it. And it's true. Foundry is also great for 5e. It has all the tools that Roll20 has and MORE (lots of custom modules for whatever you could really need).

 

There are two issues with Foundry though. 1. It has an up front cost of $50 USD (will be on sale I think for Black Friday). But that's a one time fee, and it gives you all the tools that Roll20 makes you pay a yearly subscription for (which is also way more). 2. It does have a steep learning curve. But once you get the hang of it and gets the modules you want installed, it's so easy to run. I would say it took a good 10-20 hours of playing around and research (reading reddit + watching videos) before I felt comfortable to run a game. 

 

Some things I have Foundry doing:

-I have it so when an attack hits it automatically deducts the HP from the monsters or PCs

-Spell and attack animations

-Weather effects

-Blood splatters

-A Dark Souls style boss bar for the big bads

-With purchases on D&D Beyond, I'm able to import the spells, items, and modules into Foundry so I can run the stuff just like on Roll20 (with minimal work, as it's not quite official)

 

 

 

[Benji]

Eeesh, it looks good, but 50 bucks with no real demo for the GM is a big ask >_>

[Toe]

I've used Foundry as a player and found it to be pretty good. To me it feels like a more polished version of Roll20. 

[Mx. Canadian Destroyer]

1 hour ago, Benji said:

Eeesh, it looks good, but 50 bucks with no real demo for the GM is a big ask >_>

I let Ruki play around with my Foundry login at one point. DM me if you want to test it out and I'll build you your own world to play around in.

[Benji]

I appreciate that, cheers. I will wait and see what the Black Friday sale brings first cause I may just bite it. I can probably stretch the full price if it contains all a R20 sub does as a one off, it's just a bit steep at this time of year.

[Ruki]

If you already have a playgroup, it's good to spread that cost around! I had a player help me pay for Foundry and the PF2 beginner box, and another two players paid for the 2nd book for Blood Lords. When I first started DMing (and until very recently) I thought for some reason I needed to pay for everything, even though I was doing all the work of prep as well. It was silly .

[Benji]

I don't have a group. I just really want to play, even if it's as DM, but I'm also an incurable perfectionist who wants everyone to have the quickest, clearest, and easiest experience possible

[Benji]

No sale

[Ruki]

2 hours ago, Benji said:

No sale

 

So it looks like it should be up there sometime later today! Also a new video:

 

Also, I made the mistake of spontaneously start a new campaign yesterday. So that means I now have a bi-weekly Tuesday game (Wild Beyond The Witchlight), a Friday game (Blood Lords), two Saturday games that trade off weeks (I run Rime, and play in Phandelvor and Below), and Sunday (I play in a homebrew game). One day I will be satisified. 

[Benji]

Hooray! Thank you!

[Ruki]

Anything for you ❤️

[Benji]

License purchased. Will have a wobble with it this weekend. Thanks again.

[Ruki]

On 06/11/2023 at 09:53, Ruki said:

Speaking of killing a PC... had two sessions of Rime of the Frostmaiden this weekend! The first session was doing a bit more of the dungeon, some RP, and then heading back to town to prepare for a dragon attack. The second session was the actual attack broken into multiple bits.

 

First section, they fight the dragon (and a few duregar snipers) who isn't doing too much to focus fire, not being smart (was gonna fly off after taking 50 damage). Except the paladin has an ability to lock down the enemy where it can't leave more than 30 feet! So the dragon had to fuck him up to leave.

Second section was some more duregar that were killing civilians. Except one of the civilians was an assassin from the paladin's backstory who chose this oh so inopportune moment to strike. Knocked him out twice. And was about to get a killing blow... except the warlock landed a critical hit with an Eldritch Blast. Was a close one!

Third section was a mini-boss fight with a bunch of minions. It was a hill giant that the party had 'befriended' and then abandoned in the tundra, telling him he was playing hide and seek. So the hill giant returned with a frosty vengeance. This was ok.

Fourth section I knew was gonna get spicy. The Blood Hunter had pledged their allegiance to the frost maiden, so was tasked with hunting down people who cheated their way out of the human sacrifice lottery. Two of those people were characters from a past campaign... a level 17 druid and a level 10 bard. Rather than be sneaky about it, he just started blasting, and managing to drop the bard! The druid, not appreciating her girlfriend be almost murdered, unleashed hell. The other players turned on the Blood Hunter and managed to drop them... the paladin tried to talk down the druid with a 24 on his diplomacy check. She rolled a 25 to save. So she used a 9th level Blight to make a point... save failed, enough damage to insta-kill them. 

Everyone was hyped and loved it, which was great. Next week it's the final stand against the dragon!

The replacement character died after two sessions lol. Ran into a room full of enemies and got surrounded. 

[thepunkrockicon]

Is anyone else considering backing the new MCDM RPG that just funded on Kickstarter? I've been a fan of Matt's stuff for a while now, he's basically how I became a DM. I think the new RPG sounds interesting, with an cool vision for what kind of game they want to make. But maybe it's just because I'm burnt out with 5e

[ChanceDecision]

On 12/12/2023 at 09:16, thepunkrockicon said:

Is anyone else considering backing the new MCDM RPG that just funded on Kickstarter? I've been a fan of Matt's stuff for a while now, he's basically how I became a DM. I think the new RPG sounds interesting, with an cool vision for what kind of game they want to make. But maybe it's just because I'm burnt out with 5e

I've been interested in Matt and MCDM for a long time too, and Matt really helped how I run the game. I've never done a Kickstarter but I'm very interested in what they will produce. I'm hesitant to buy it though because realistically I think I'll really find it difficult to find folks to play with. More likely what I'll do it's take his ideas and port them to 5e truth be told. But I think it sounds exciting overall, hope it does well and leads to more success for MCDM 

[Ruki]

Almost TPK'd my party tonight! They shot a gnome mindflayer baby, so the two adult mindflayers went for a murder. The PCs were all stunned at one point. Two people had their brains eaten. 

[GhostMachine]

On 31/12/2023 at 02:15, Ruki said:

Almost TPK'd my party tonight! They shot a gnome mindflayer baby, so the two adult mindflayers went for a murder. The PCs were all stunned at one point. Two people had their brains eaten. 

If they attacked a baby mindflayer with more than one adult around, it sounds like they didn't have any brains to begin with.....

Seriously, though, that means 2 of them are perma-dead.

 

[Ruki]

Yup, I'm well aware. They are nowhere near having access to True Rez, nor are there any NPCs who can do that. 

[GhostMachine]

6 minutes ago, Ruki said:

Yup, I'm well aware. They are nowhere near having access to True Rez, nor are there any NPCs who can do that. 

What level (or level range) was the party?