This or Foundry?

[Bogart]

Title, why?

[Aussie Hope]

Depends.

Foundry has a bigger selection of RPGs you can use, for example if you want to run a blades in the dark game you need Foundry. Foundry is also cheaper.

FGU on the other hand is better in just about every way other than the fact it doesn't work in a browser so you need a client to run it. Because of the automation, as a DM, you get to spend a lot more time running the game and petty much no time on math. That said, while it's a lot better you do need to learn FGUs extension code for your game system.

If you have lots of time and don't mind spending 4 hours setting up a 4 hour game, go Foundry and save money.

If you have a busy life and don't mind dropping $20 to buy a module where everything is pretty much done for you. Go FGU.

[Trist]

Ill go the other way and say Foundry is the better package. Why?

You almost nearly pay the $40-50 for everything. There are 3rd party places that use ambiguity so they can provide you easy ways to import upload classes, monsters, items, manuals/books. 5etools.

All major systems are mainly free. They have their own coding system "Macros" that can be tied to TONS of keybinds. They have modules of EVERYTHING that can change your entire system while still being about 5e for instance; 3D dice rolling and Dice customization, soundboards, card game system, LOTS of automation mods to pre-apply buffs, item effects, debuffs, opportunities of attack, armor effects, damage negations, status effects- automatic visual effects for spells, different character sheets. Even modules that add more player friendly menu elements to simulate it being closer to a video game.

You could even use the scene system alongside clickable PNG menu items with a module to make a landing menu screen for players to be able to navigate to other 'menu' screens you set up for them.

Most of all whats largely useful is also their vault/db system, where you can store characters, NPC's, books, items, etc in a database system they have so that not everybody has to load in anything but what you currently have installed into your immediate instance.

You can link just about anything and everything via clickable text for convenience.

Only ONE person has to own Foundry, then you can create logins for those people- They can then access it from a IP link that Foundry automatically sets up for you.

Foundry allows customization and is really down to how much time youre gonna spend on customization of your setup/what you want in it. You pay $50 for a whole package, and honestly I have a lot of fun merely setting ♥♥♥♥ up.

[Steve (Dawn's Hubby)]

If you want to make an educated decision, then I would recommend spending some time on each of the official sites, because there is so much information it would take an essay to relate it all if you want the real nitty gritty details.

Basically, I would put it like this: There are those who casually play (V)TT RPG games and there are those for whom it is a hobby; there is a difference between the two.

If you are a casual player (just get it done) who wants to play on the cheap and doesn't mind putting in the extra hours, then the browser type vtts will suffice. If you are a hobbyist for whom presentation, quality and true customization matters, you want FGU.

As a former Foundry DM, I can tell you there is nothing Foundry does that FGU doesn't do better. As I mentioned before I will not go line by line, but I think two things needs to be said. One, none of my players ever put a dime into FGU, and secondly there is a learning curve for running games, but it's well worth it.

[Sentient_Toaster]

Probably should ask yourself first which systems you want to play with it and whether you care about the availability of licensed content. If you do want licensed conversions, they'll differ quite significantly in what's available. Those save considerable time and are actually legal, unlike piracy sites such as 5etools or using unauthorized scraping tools to automate accessing data from DDB. Some official content will be available for both, only one, or neither. *shrug*

If you're playing a really rules-light system, you might not want to bother with either. They're both on the heavyweight end in terms of complexity and power, but not all systems and not all groups actually need such. Systems like D&D 5E and Pathfinder can benefit a lot w/ all the game mechanics that can be properly automated; something like CoC is far less crunch, and esp. if running purely mind-theatre might not need anything beyond Discord and a dice bot (provided that one has already extracted images from the relevant PDF, should one be running a published adventure with handouts).

Personally I favor FGU with its rather large library of Lua extensions, the capabilities of the combat tracker, and its library of licensed content; but YMMV.

[Infinite Pudding]

I own both and they are both excellent. If you want officially supported modules though go with Fantasy Grounds, if you want more games to choose from and an excellent community that constantly makes more extensions and game systems go with Foundry.

[unboundlopez]

Honestly both are rabbit holes you will fall into and spend an excessive unnecessary amount of time learning unique features that could be otherwise spent on creating a better game for your players. That being said foundry is my go to, and I would still advise keep the essence of the game in mind rather than trying to do fancy things with the Virtual tabletop. Don't forget about theater of the mind is what I'm saying regardless of the choice.

My answer Foundry, it's a 1 time payment and all key features are provided to you AND your players.

[DM Juden]

I bought Fantasy Grounds Unity (FGU) and all the D&D 5e books (yes, all of them—every single piece of content available for this system). I spent hours watching tutorials trying to understand how it works, and it just simply sucks. I read in a forum that this is because the old players (founders) are comfortable with it this way, so the developers won’t optimize the UI.

Looking for help on Reddit, I heard about Foundry VTT and started watching videos. There’s a ton of information, the community is amazing, and there are so many people developing mods and tools for the game that it’s overwhelming. I bought it and switched.

I tried to find a module to export the modules and books I bought for FGU to Foundry, but unfortunately, it’s not possible anymore (there was a tool to do this, but apparently, many people were switching from FGU to Foundry, so the developers changed something, and it’s no longer possible). The good thing about Foundry is that you can search for some free modules that emulate all the content from D&D 5e (unfortunately, I can’t mention them here, but if you search enough, you’ll find them).

The only issue with Foundry is that you need to use Hamachi or ZeroTier to host the game (or pay for a private hosting solution). But despite that, it’s the smartest decision you can make.

I regret buying FGU so much… but I learned my lesson. Never buy before investigating.

[Trist]

Originally posted by DM Juden:

I bought Fantasy Grounds Unity (FGU) and all the D&D 5e books (yes, all of them—every single piece of content available for this system). I spent hours watching tutorials trying to understand how it works, and it just simply sucks. I read in a forum that this is because the old players (founders) are comfortable with it this way, so the developers won’t optimize the UI.

Looking for help on Reddit, I heard about Foundry VTT and started watching videos. There’s a ton of information, the community is amazing, and there are so many people developing mods and tools for the game that it’s overwhelming. I bought it and switched.

I tried to find a module to export the modules and books I bought for FGU to Foundry, but unfortunately, it’s not possible anymore (there was a tool to do this, but apparently, many people were switching from FGU to Foundry, so the developers changed something, and it’s no longer possible). The good thing about Foundry is that you can search for some free modules that emulate all the content from D&D 5e (unfortunately, I can’t mention them here, but if you search enough, you’ll find them).

The only issue with Foundry is that you need to use Hamachi or ZeroTier to host the game (or pay for a private hosting solution). But despite that, it’s the smartest decision you can make.

I regret buying FGU so much… but I learned my lesson. Never buy before investigating.

I fully support this sentiment 100%. A lot of people say Roll20 or FGU simply because they for the most part arent really willing to go back on their investments (why would they $200 later and campaigns into them).

But I will say Foundry doesnt require any sort of 3rd party system to host, it can just be self hosted off your PC- It SHOULD work from the getgo after you have the live session going, not really any setup or additional services required. At most, you might have to manually port forward the port with your IP AND firewall that Foundry uses so that players can connect to session IP it hands you- And thats only if for whatever reason your PC or firewall arent letting you correctly selfhost.

[nylanfs]

Originally posted by Trist:

I fully support this sentiment 100%. A lot of people say Roll20 or FGU simply because they for the most part aren't really willing to go back on their investments (why would they $200 later and campaigns into them).

But I will say Foundry doesn't require any sort of 3rd party system to host, it can just be self hosted off your PC- It SHOULD work from the get-go after you have the live session going, not really any setup or additional services required. At most, you might have to manually port forward the port with your IP AND firewall that Foundry uses so that players can connect to session IP it hands you- And that's only if for whatever reason your PC or firewall aren't letting you correctly self-host.

You mean exactly how FGU works? The lobby is only there because users quite often couldn't figure out how port forwarding works and this was simpler. FGU still lets you direct connect to your GM.