Fantasy Grounds Sale - 75% Off Full License

Yep, the Fantasy Grounds Full License is currently 75% off (through the morning of October 6th, 2025). This brings the price for a Full Fantasy Grounds License to $12.50. If you have a paid Roll20 plan, you are paying at least $5.99 a month - forever. Fantasy Grounds is a one-time payment.

Nearly the entire Fantasy Grounds store is 20% off - not D&D 2024, though, but who's playing that ;)

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Castles & Crusades Player's Handbook - 7th Print FREE in PDF (and more goodies)

So, I was wandering around the Troll Lord Games website and I notice that the Castles & Crusades 7th Print Player's Handbook was free in PDF format. I literally had a Holy Shit moment, so I snagged it up.

There are actually two different covers available, both for free.

https://www.trolllord.com/tlgstore/#!/Players-Handbook-7th-Pr-FREE-Digital/p/89198209/category=119538267 

https://www.trolllord.com/tlgstore/#!/The-Players-Handbook-FREE-PDF/p/89198194/category=24093125

Also for free is the Castles & Crusades Quickstart, covering the core for classes through sixth level.

Through the end of the month, the Castles & Crusades basic ruleset for Fantasy Grounds is available for free.

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Fantasy Grounds 4th Quarter Report Shows 71% of Game Sessions on the VTT are using D&D 5e

If we needed other proof that Dungeons & Dragons 5e was the "bully on the block", dwarfing all other RPGs, the 4th quarter report for the Fantasy Grounds Virtual Table Top shows the stark reality. 5e comes in with an ungodly 71% of 4th quarter game sessions on the platform.

Paizo comes in at 15% IF you combine Pathfinder 1e, Pathfinder 2e, and StarFinder as a single figure.

The following graph shows the influence of the pandemic on virtual play, at least using Fantasy Grounds (I'll be discussing 5e specifically below ):

Holding steady at around 20k sessions a month through February 2020, 5e spiked to over 80k sessions by April, and even the summer dip didn't go below 45k-ish. As for January 2021, it's knocking on 100k - nearly a five-fold increase.

These are just the numbers from Fantasy Grounds. Roll20's last ORR (3rd quarter 2020) report is less revealing, as we don't get to see the increase, if any, in sessions played (although 5e has a 53% share of the games and Paizo's share is even smaller than on FG). There is one tidbit of interesting information on the latest ORR report, and I'll share that below:

For less 5e games played to still equal a greater part of the pie, would mean that Roll20 saw a decrease in usage compared to the Second Quarter of 2020. Interesting.

Actually, FG2 might have seen a similar, small drop

I'd love to see Foundry's usage stats.

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News - Fantasy Grounds College Presents: Spooktober (This Weekend - Online Con)

I'm really getting close to playing around with Fantasy Grounds again. I loved it as a player, loved it less as a DM (too much work to set things up). But with the new version of Fantasy Grounds coming out soon and Frog God Games having releases for Fantasy Grounds in the pipes, I may just have to return.

Fantasy Grounds College is having a Spooktober this weekend, which is why I'm thinking Fantasy Grounds at the moment. They will be hosting spooky games all weekend. I'd jump in but I've got to prep and pack for Gamehole Con next week.

What is Spooktober? 

The weekend of October 25, 26 and 27th, or “Spooktober” is an event where we will have our GMs run games for everyone to play. What kind of games? Spooky games, of course! Anything horror related, or even spooky fun games, or Halloween-type topics.
So check out our schedule and sign up for a game. As of Friday, October 18, we have 29 games that need players. 

You will need to be a member of the FGC Discord in order to participate, as that is where we will be running our audio for our games. 

FGC Discord Invite: https://discord.gg/Ew6nYyw 

You will also need to register for an account on our website in order to book a seat at a table. Please use your Discord name and sign up at: 

FGC Website Registration: https://fantasygroundscollege.net/new-user-registration/ 

After those two things are met, you can search our Events Calendar for games. I’ve added links to games on specific days during the Spooktober event so if you are only available on specific days, you can narrow your search. Please keep in mind that all our events are scheduled in UTC 0. You will need to add or subtract your UTC offset to find out when the game starts in your personal time zone.
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/events/2019-10-24/ October 24th Events
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/events/2019-10-25/ October 25th Events
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/events/2019-10-26/ October 26th Events
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/events/2019-10-27/ October 27th Events
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/events/2019-10-28/ October 28th Events

News - Top RPG Rulesets for Fantasy Grounds through 2019-Q3

Smiteworks released the above piechart showing the top Fantasy Grounds games run by ruleset for the last 12 month period, and I think its a very interesting graphic.

It certainly shows the dominance of D&D 5e, with 70% of the games played on Fantasy Grounds using the ruleset. Pathfinder, both 1e and 2e, combine to about 10%. If you add Starfinder into the Paizo slice of the pie, its probably around 12%. Paizo is now a very distant number two.

What really brings a smile to my face is the fact that AD&D comes in with over 11k games run. That's about half the Starfinder numbers (and more than the number of 4e games run) and not bad at all for a ruleset from the late 70s ;)

Here's the link: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/entry.php?360-Top-Rulesets-for-Fantasy-Grounds-through-2019-Q3

Note, you need to be logged in to view the graphics.

Kickstarter - Fantasy Grounds Unity

"Fantasy Grounds Unity - Help us Launch the RPG Virtual Tabletop of the Future"

I've been "invested" in Fantasy Grounds since 2006, when I picked up a bundle of GM and Player's licenses. When I met Rach I was a player in my second FG campaign. The first was a Dark Heresy campaign. The second was Castles & Crusades.

I wanted to use it as a GM but could never wrap my head around how to set it up with a homebrewed adventure. It seemed to need coding language, and that has never been my strong point. Then I went to using a Mac and Fantasy Grounds did not play well with it, and I found Roll20 and I stepped away from Fantasy Grounds.

Fantasy Grounds Unity may just bring me back.

Fantasy Grounds is a popular system for playing a host of different roleplaying games online.  It is used by more than 130,000 gamers worldwide to connect and play popular games such as Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder, Savage Worlds, Call of Cthulhu, and more.  This type of program is commonly referred to as a virtual tabletop, or VTT, due to their ability to emulate various part of an RPG session in a digital form. 

What makes Fantasy Grounds different than competitors is how we expose character sheets and automate large portions of gameplay specifically for each system we support.  This is done through rulesets.  Your experience playing Deadlands Reloaded will differ from D&D and will be unique to that environment, contain custom graphics, character sheets, and automation specific to that game system.   

One feature shared across most game systems is maps.  Some may use hexes while others use square grids and some may not use grids at all.  Facing is important in some and less so in others.  While FG has featured maps for many years, they have been primarily focused as reproductions of maps in existing adventure modules from our many licensed publishers. We believe that we can enhance these to provide dynamic line of sight, fog of war, and even map building support with painting and tiles.

What you get for backing this project will be a license for Fantasy Grounds Unity (or FGU). This new game engine has all the great features of current version of Fantasy Grounds (soon to be called Fantasy Grounds Classic) along with new enhanced features. 

Original Features Supported:

• Multiplayer support for playing tabletop games of Dungeons & Dragons (2E, 3.5E, 4E and 5E), Pathfinder RPG 1, Pathfinder RPG 2, Starfinder.
• Built-in content for D&D 3.5E, 5E and Pathfinder 1
• Officially licensed add-on content available for D&D, D&D Classics (2E), Pathfinder, Starfinder, Savage Worlds, Call of Cthulhu, Basic Roleplaying, Castles & Crusades, Mutants & Masterminds, 13th Age, W.O.I.N., Traveller, and Rolemaster Classic
• Generic system support through our CoreRPG ruleset
• Brilliant Campaign Management
• Integrated character sheets with lots of automation built in for playing and leveling (depending on ruleset and content owned)
• Combat Tracking
• 3D dice

Fantasy Grounds Unity Enhanced Features Include:

• 64-bit support to allow for more content (quality and quantity)
• Native support for Mac, Linux and Windows PC
• Network lobby for easy hosting and joining of games (no port forwarding required)
• Tile based map building
• Enhanced Drawing Tools
• Additional Dice Macros support
• A new FGU only skin
• Dynamic Line of Sight with enhanced toggle blockers
• Paint with images, such as walls
• Animated image effects

Backward compatibility with all existing campaigns and DLC from FGC
In addition to these features, we are now poised to add even greater functionality going forward. We have lots of ideas for new features and this rebuilt engine will make it easier for us reach those goals and deliver consistent updates for free. 

So yes, I'm very excited.

There are a ton of backer levels. Read them carefully. If you have a current license, you need to know when you purchased it to ensure you back at the proper upgrade level.

This is what I'll be backing at:

 As far as the funding is going, the Fantasy Grounds Unity Kickstarter is on fire!

News - Fantasy Grounds has just released Officially Licensed AD&D 2E modules for the PHB, MM, DMG and N1 Adventure

I received the following from Doug Davidson (Fantasy Grounds) via the Tenkar's Tavern Facebook page:

Fantasy Grounds just released officially licensed AD&D 2E modules for the PHB, MM, DMG and N1 adventure.  

We added a 2E ruleset to all Standard and Ultimate licenses where people can enter their own data if they don't want to buy the preloaded module content we sell. 

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/store/?sys=27

I would have preferred 1e or B/X but this is a heluva good sign that there are more classic rulesets in the works. Notice that the adventure converted to Fantasy Grounds is N1 - a classic AD&D 1e adventure.

Interesting times!

edit - From a comment of Facebook:

There is a free extension that makes the 2e ruleset a AD&D ruleset.
You actually get the rules engine (automation) free with the program. You need to buy the books to get the content, but you could enter is all yourself if you wanted to.
DCC also got an official ruleset the same day.

SmiteWorks Acquires Tabletop Connect (Fantasy Grounds VTT to go 3D?)

I back LOTS of Virtual Table Tops on Kickstarter. I like VTTs in general, even if the only one I've ever used as a GM is Roll20.

Tabletop Connect was an interesting project when it was kicked on Kickstarter 2 years ago. It raised over $34k and is about a year late on projected delivery but that is not unexpected. Software plus Kickstarter usually means later than sooner.

This isnt the first VTT merge either. Roll20 is itself the result of a successful merging.

Time will tell whether Smiteworks acquisition of Tabletop Connect leads to major changes in the Fantasy Grounds interface, but it should be interesting to follow in the near future.

Here's the press release from Carl Pinder / Tabletop Connect:

I am pleased to announce that Tabletop Connect has been acquired by SmiteWorks USA, LLC, the developer of the industry leading Fantasy Grounds virtual tabletop. As part of this acquisition I will be joining the SmiteWorks team to accelerate the port of Fantasy Grounds to the Unity platform. " 

Doug Davison, President and Co-Owner of SmiteWorks added, "We have a distinct vision of what virtual tabletops can and should look like over the coming years and how Smiteworks can accomplish those things with Fantasy Grounds. For that reason, we began porting the core engine for Fantasy Grounds to Unity so that we could streamline and enhance the experience for players and GM's alike and distribute it more easily across all platforms. We've been following the progress of Tabletop Connect since it launched on Kickstarter and we've been very impressed with what Carl has been able to produce as a one-man operation. He shares the same vision we do on many areas and brings a unique level of talent, passion and creativity that is very hard to find. After some great one-on-one discussions, we believe that together we can do more than we could working separately. Work has been progressing on the Unity rebuild for the last year and I am genuinely excited about how the addition of Carl to the team will allow us to speed up the completion of this project and provide additional enhancements to the resulting product. " 

During the development of Tabletop Connect your feedback and support have been invaluable. This is a unique opportunity to contribute to the next generation of virtual tabletops and to deliver the experience that you deserve. 

As a backer of Tabletop Connect, you should soon receive the details of the realignment to Fantasy Grounds and your options during this transition. 

Sincerely, thanks again for all of your support and I look forward to you joining me on this exciting new adventure!

Fantasy Grounds Virtual Table Top Officially Licenses Dungeons & Dragons 5e - There Can be Only One

Now it all makes sense.

Yesterday I received 3 enquiries about Fantasy Grounds, anything from "where can a get a spoofed key?" (can't help you) to "how does it play compared to Roll20?" (FG has a heavier load for the GM to lift in prep, at least last time I checked.) Today, I woke up to an email letting me know that Dungeons & Dragons 5e had been officially licensed by Smiteworks for use with Fantasy Grounds.

Holy shit. It looks like WotC figured out a way to associate a viable VTT with their product.

We are proud to announce that we are officially licensed to sell D&D source material and content inside of Fantasy Grounds! This is the beginning of a great new partnership between SmiteWorks and Wizards of the Coast that will benefit gamers worldwide. 

You can purchase the D&D Complete Core Class Pack with all the class, feats, spells and equipment or you can purchase individual classes only. You can also buy the monsters in packs or as the D&D Complete Core Monster Pack. These products have been converted to work really tightly with Fantasy Grounds to give you the best possible gaming experience - we know you're going to love them. They contain all the great artwork and content from the official products and all the smarts and integration to work with Fantasy Grounds. Not only will you get the same content that can be found in print, but you also get an exciting new Fifth Edition theme, adventures and content customized specifically for ease of play inside of Fantasy Grounds. 

For Dungeon Masters and players on a budget, you might pick up a Player Customization Pack and one or two Class Packs of your choice. Dungeon Masters can often get by with just the Adventure of their choice and one or two Monster Packs.
Don't forget that players can gift purchases through Steam for Dungeon Masters who have linked their license on Steam. 

To read up a little more on Fantasy Grounds and the different license options available for the core software product, please follo w this link to take a tour.
See all the Wizards of the Coasts products available in the Store
D&D Complete Core Class Pack (49.99) In this module, you get all twelve core character classes converted for play in Fantasy Grounds. You get the class description, special features, spells and abilities used by your class and general character customization options such as equipment and feats. You also get: 

328 Character Portraits

Players Handbook custom theme
Random Tables
All feats from the PHB fully configured for Fantasy Grounds
Equipment tables fully configured for Fantasy Grounds
Weapons lists fully configured for Fantasy Grounds
All Spells from the PHB fully configured for Fantasy Grounds
Automatic addition of new class features when you drag class links to your character's level summary
You get all of this and much more
D&D Complete Core Monster Pack (49.99) The entire collection of core monsters from the D&D Monster Manual is now at your fingertips. Dungeon Masters can use this module to create encounters and combats within their campaigns. NPC records have been lovingly entered and organized for ease of use and reference during play. This pack includes:
273 monster images to share with your players
366 monster tokens for use on tactical combat maps
Full descriptions for all monsters in the D&D Monster Manual
Full stats for all monsters in the D&D Monster Manual
The complete reference material from the D&D Monster Manual
Searchable monster indexes by CR, type and in alphabetical order
You get all of this and much more - [ read more ]
D&D Lost Mine of Phandelver (19.99) Lost Mine of Phandelver is an adventure for four to five characters of 1st level. During the course of the adventure, the characters will advance to 5th level. The adventure is set a short distance from the city of Neverwinter in the Sword Coast region of the Forgotten Realms setting. The Sword Coast is part of the North--a vast realm of free settlements surrounded by wilderness and adventure. This product includes:
the entire contents of the Lost Mine of Phandelver adventure
image handouts that can be shared with players
5 pregen characters to get you going quickly
maps containing Dungeon Master (DM) information with all locations pre-linked to story entries, boxed text, encounters, images and treasure parcels
player and tactical combat maps
You get all of this and much more

Ain't cheap. The Basic Rules however, are $2.99.

* The content from this module is included in the Complete Core Class Pack
Set in a medieval fantasy world, D&D allows you to experience stories and adventures full of endless possibilities and amazing surprises. The Basic Rules for Dungeons & Dragons is a PDF that covers the core of the tabletop game. 

As Mike Mearls explained in Legends & Lore, the Basic Rules for Dungeons & Dragons is converted from the PDF (over 100 pages, in fact) that covers the core of the game. It runs from levels 1 to 20 and covers the cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard, presenting what we view as the essential subclass for each. It also provides the dwarf, elf, halfling, and human as race options; in addition, the rules contain 120 spells, 5 backgrounds, and character sheets. All of these features have been compiled into modules specifically formatted for ease of play on Fantasy Grounds at the table or over the Internet.
The PDF that this product was based on is available for free from the Wizards of the Coast website. 

This purchase includes the following items:
-A custom theme derived in the same style as the Player's Handbook
-Random tables for rolling background bonds, flaws, ideals, origins, etc.
-Equipment tables containing items that can be dragged to character sheets, treasure parcels or NPCs for ease of reference, encumbrance calculations and ease of disbursement. The searchable lists contain all items listed in the Player's Handbook (Adventuring Gear, Tools, Armor, Weapons, Mounts, Tack and Harness, Vehicles.)
-Draggable weapons that auto-enter the inventory, weight, attack type (melee, ranged, thrown) and the damage (with damage type.)
-Reference material and artwork which is not specific to any one particular character class
-A list of spells from the D&D Basic Rules, ready to drag and drop to your character sheet
-The class description from the Player's Handbook for all 4 basic core classes: cleric, fighter, rogue and wizard
-Details and features from levels 1-20 for the 4 included classes
-Automatic addition of new class features when you drag the class link to your character's level summary
-This product is licensed from Wizards of the Coast. Dungeons & Dragons is a registered trademark. Unauthorized use or distribution is strictly prohibited.

And of course, this doesn't include the price of the Fantasy Grounds software itself. Still, for the right group, this could be an excellent option,

Latest Peek at the iTabletop VTT

I have a special place in my gaming heart for the iTabletop/Pandoren Virtual Table Top. It's come far from it's early start as a web-camera / chat interface and is now nearly a full service VTT that has build in video and voice chat.

It is still missing a Whiteboard, which from my point of view is more important then the video or voice features (especially now with G+ available for free and its video / voice feature).

ITT is free these days. It wasn't always, and it may not be for much longer, as the "Free to Play" experiment isn't bringing in the Ad revenue that was expected it seems. The cost for the servers alone is about $600 a month apparently. That's a huge amount for the small company to have to put up front each month.

I'm one of the "lifers", having purchased not one, but two lifetime accounts when they were trying to raise the initial funds for the upgrade. I give the guys credit, they're still plugging away at it, but at some point their dream of making this their full time paying gig is going to give way to the need to support themselves (if it hasn't already).

I've always seen the potential of iTabletop and I check in every few months to see if it's where I need it to be to work for me. It isn't, at least not for my needs.

I suspect when my campaign finally gets of the ground, I'll be using a combination of Fantasy Grounds 2 and Google+. It's not the cleanest solution to meet my needs and desires, but it's the closest I think I can come to my ideal VTT... at least until iTabletop reaches it's true potential.

Good Food, Good Friends - Now Where's the Game?

Last night I had dinner with some old friends in memory of one that we lost on 9-11. It appears that all the OSR games I've distributed at the multiple Gathering of Fools over the past few years have finally paid off. It looks like folks are itching to start playing using Fantasy Grounds or some other Virtual Table Top. Not sure what my game of choice will be - C&C, S&W Complete and ACKS are all contenders. C&C has the advantage that I've given out copies of the Player's Handbook to to everyone on the group over the years and there is a very complete FG2 add on for the system.

It was good to see my friends and their wives at a time when we really needed each other to recharge our emotional batteries. We communicate multiple times each day via mail and the occasional G+ video huddle, but nothing compares to hugs and ass grabbing at an upscale restaurant in Manhattan - it even better when you can embarrass the women folk with your actions ;)

Oh, and Holy Crap! The Jets won!

What to do When the Game is Put on Hold

The C&C game I play in monthly via Fantasy Grounds is being put on hold after the next session, tentatively scheduled for 3/19. The last time this game was put on hold, it was off for over half a year, and the sessions went from weekly to monthly - we also lost a good chunk of the party.

So, I either need to find myself a new game to play in (if it's on a weekend no more often then once every two weeks) or I need to get my T&T game off the ground, or even both.

I've been lucky in that both groups that I've played with using Fantasy Grounds as my VTT have been very good. One knuckle headed playing in 3 years... "knock on wood" ;)

Of course, one could also see this as even less of an excuse to put off the renovations around the house that I can do on my own, or with a little help.

Still, I'd rather be gaming ;)

One Square Equals Five Feet Equals Awesome!

I just received the latest issue of Christian's One Square Equals Five Feet zine.  It's actually one paper (red in the case of issue #5).

Christian could probably consider me a stalker at this point, as I've been reading his stuff since ScrollWorks and Iron Rations.  (I do believe I am the longest continuous subscriber) Oh, and Iridia.  Damn, the man can write.

The latest mailing also includes Issue #1 of Qwellian's Journal.  This sheet would make for a really good and quick intro adventure if converted to Fantasy Grounds... not large at all and system agnostic, so it can work with anything from Swords & Wizardry to Tunnels & Trolls.  Possibly even 4e... I wouldn't know ;)

See, some things do work better in print, even to a PDF lover like me... heh