Post by Deleted on Jul 3, 2015 17:46:40 GMT
So earlier this week, I dropped in on Hawk's account to get a look at what the ultimate license offers DMs and players, and just wanted to share some of my reactions...
It has absolutely everything you need to run an online game, no questions there. The maps pane and combat tracker appeared to be robust enough to handle grid combat well, though I forgot to ask for a demo of "Fog of War," so I'm not sure if that even exists in FG. Hawk?
There are a lot of panes you might have open at once, and they fill up the virtual table top fast. Moving among them isn't difficult, but I found myself wondering if they could have found a less cluttered way to go about it. Overall, the interface does not have a very high learning curve, it's just not as intuitive for the newcomer as I think it could be.
My biggest disappointment was the character creation panel. It only does a little auto-calculating, and I was hoping for something closer to the 4e character generator. For instance, you can only manually enter a Background. I would have liked it better if you could select from the default Backgrounds, which would in turn autoselect the associated skills and give you the starting equipment that Background provides. Another example, if you're a human variant or hit level 4, the program should raise an "incomplete" flag until you've selected a feat (or ability score increase). Speaking of feats, more mouse-hover popup info boxes would be nice. I would like to be able to see from my character sheet the exact text of a feat without having to open another panel.
The various panels for notes (NPCs, story, locations) would be super handy for staying organized. It's easy to cross reference important details by embedding links to other notes.
FG does not have an internal voice/video chat. Hawk and I used Skype, and I think a professional VTT should include its own protocol.
Overall, I think the system is better than roll20, but it doesn't have all the bells and whistles I'd expect for the $150 ultimate license.
It has absolutely everything you need to run an online game, no questions there. The maps pane and combat tracker appeared to be robust enough to handle grid combat well, though I forgot to ask for a demo of "Fog of War," so I'm not sure if that even exists in FG. Hawk?
There are a lot of panes you might have open at once, and they fill up the virtual table top fast. Moving among them isn't difficult, but I found myself wondering if they could have found a less cluttered way to go about it. Overall, the interface does not have a very high learning curve, it's just not as intuitive for the newcomer as I think it could be.
My biggest disappointment was the character creation panel. It only does a little auto-calculating, and I was hoping for something closer to the 4e character generator. For instance, you can only manually enter a Background. I would have liked it better if you could select from the default Backgrounds, which would in turn autoselect the associated skills and give you the starting equipment that Background provides. Another example, if you're a human variant or hit level 4, the program should raise an "incomplete" flag until you've selected a feat (or ability score increase). Speaking of feats, more mouse-hover popup info boxes would be nice. I would like to be able to see from my character sheet the exact text of a feat without having to open another panel.
The various panels for notes (NPCs, story, locations) would be super handy for staying organized. It's easy to cross reference important details by embedding links to other notes.
FG does not have an internal voice/video chat. Hawk and I used Skype, and I think a professional VTT should include its own protocol.
Overall, I think the system is better than roll20, but it doesn't have all the bells and whistles I'd expect for the $150 ultimate license.
