Is Roll20 any good? Is it worth it?

Is Roll20 any good? Is it worth it?

It's great if you already have a group to play with. Don't try and find one there.

It's alright.

It has basic functionality and lets you upload your own images and stream your own music if you hijack its built in voice chat.

It's fine. That is the most you can say about it.

Recently tried upgrading my account and it is now better than just fine, but the GUI was designed by retards.

Don't be a bitch who sticks with a group you don't like or not kick blatantly terrible players.

Congrats, you've just gotten advice to get around upwards of 80% of Veeky Forumss issue with Roll20.

>not kick blatantly terrible players.
You'll end up all alone there.

Three steps to always have a good Roll20 group.
1. Interview the players.
2. Pick up 1 or two extra players. Someone is ALWAYS going to flake.
3. Don't be scared to kick out problem players. There will always be more players.

Basically I've been using it for a while since it's the only free one I know of. GUI is still a pain in the ass and trips me up all the time. But its a damn sight easier to type a secret message to a player verses writing notes all the damn time.

That said, I really only play with people I know IRL. Only time I went with randoms it was other elegan/tg/entlemen for a quick one-shot to introduce them to the system.

It's very good if you got a group you game with online. I've played in a few random groups before and they were alright but it's best to play with people you already know. Some of my most fondest memories playing D&D was with my online friends on roll20.

The main problems Veeky Forums has with it are that if you don't screen your new players you might get that guys and some players can be flakey since they aren't attached to the campaign since it's just online.

One thing you're going to encounter on just about all the VTTs like roll20 and fantasy grounds are people who want to play because they saw Critical Role and then get dissapointed that everyone isn't a professional actors and then lose interest in the campaign. But that's not roll20's fault it happens in live games as well. Just be sure not to add people who say "I got into D&D because of Critical role" The majority of the times I've played in a game with someone who said that tend to leave after a few sessions or so.

If you're going to play online definitely use roll20. It's free and you can upload your own art, maps and tokens. Fantasy Grounds needs you to buy a license and a lot of the shit for it is expensive.

Basically this. 99% of your problems with the roll20 playerbase will vanish immediately.

Do I need to have a copy of a game's book or can I just rely on the DM?

Depends on the game. Generally speaking though you'll want a copy of the rules. It can also depend on the character sheets as I've used some that automate the rolls so much you basically don't have to do anything but click buttons, assuming you entered all of the values correctly.

Usually the GM would link an online PDF of any books the players would need.

Yeah Roll20 is great. I usually only play with people I already know but the few times I've played with randoms haven't been as bad as Veeky Forums claims it to be, but everyone's experience is different.

For the most part you don't need to buy anything to play your games on it but the map and token packs are great. Since you seem new and are probably just going to start out, I run a roll20 trove so here's a link for you to download some stuff to get started.

p@st3b1n

/MrQYRqjY

You can find most of the books you need in the general threads on Veeky Forums. To download D&D 5e books go to the 5e general to download pathfinder books go to the pathfinder general. Anything else though you'll have to go to PDF request threads to ask for a trove.

The majority of the DMs I've played with will usually state what books are allowed in the game recruit page. I wouldn't mention that you don't have the books or pdfs openly unless it's a game that is tagged as accepting to new players. Otherwise the DM wants to play with people who already know the rules or own the books and will pass on your application.

I have d&d 5e but I been thinking of playing l5r

Go to the PDF share thread and ask for a trove then. That'd be your best bet to find books for that game.

>Trip dubs

Gotta be more specific.

As a player? It's fine.
As a GM? You need a paid account. Even then, its resources can get pretty byzantine.
As a group finder? It's no better or worse than anywhere else. The key is always your ability to find, recruit, and retain quality players.

>As a GM? You need a paid account. Even then, its resources can get pretty byzantine.

No you fucking don't.

You don't have to pay for shit to run a game. Just delete shit you're not going to reuse in your campaign and keep your other stuff in a folder on your computer.

Ok.

We can't all be right, but you do you.

>/MrQYRqjY
Thanks for being a contributor.

>not paying a tiny amount of money for something you use for hundreds of hours
One campaign with decent maps will hit the free size limit easily. Even faster if you run board games.

I believe you're talking to one of the constan/tg/amers. You know, the ones who can't stay with a group or a game for more than a few months at a time.

I am running two campaigns right now and I'm not having any storage space problems as a free user.

How big are you making your maps? The biggest map I have is this one which is 4500x4500 pixels and 150dpi and it looks huge in scale on roll20. This only takes up 4.0 mb.

Are you not scaling the map slightly down or leaving them as pngs? You shouldn't be having storage space problems.

That's not fair. I play there occasionally and I'm not blatantly terrible.
I'm subtly terrible, instead.

I've had okay luck finding groups on there. I think it's largely a matter of being able to read people through their posts.

Is it worth the zero dollars it costs to use it? Yes.

Is it better than client based virtual tabletops? No.

Can you share some of your tricks with me? I wanna find a good group on there since my other two groups rarely ever play, but im afraid im gonna find a bad group or something.

If you've never played online then many tricks won't matter. Being able to tell if a group/player isn't your style comes from experience. You pick up on different ways people describe what they want, or how they play. You can also pick up on early play styles that might evolve into something more exaggerated down the road. At the end box the day you were probably gunna waste a few hours anyway, so just have fun with the game, even if it's terrible. Bad games can be fun memories to share in story threads later.
> tl;dr - join some groups, don't expect anything, if you're a DM, don't start with anything important, just have a fun session to get to know everyone first

I'm not sure if I have "tricks". I was an English major, so I have done a lot of reading and a lot of writing, and am reasonably good at getting a vibe from people through their text posts.

I would say, if you're a player, try to look for GMs who use proper punctuation and grammar, since that usually indicates someone slightly older and better educated. I also avoid anyone who just word jumbles out a long, semi-coherent stream of information about their setting, or anyone who fails at basic organization of ideas. Like, if they say "let me tell you about the game", and then all they do is recite the history of their personal fantasy setting, that's a bad sign. I try to find a GM who doesn't sound really young, really spastic, or really arrogant and pedantic.

Then, to get picked, the most important things are to follow instructions and sound interesting. If the GM says "post your applications in this thread", and you start your own response thread to apply, that makes you sound like you don't listen. If he asks for you to give five specific pieces of information, and you only give three, looks like you don't pay attention. If you misspell words, fail to capitalize, ramble, you're more likely to be dismissed.

For me, I don't really focus on explaining what class I want to play, and I definitely never give some long summary of my character's life and times. I try to give an amusing elevator pitch, something that captures the spirit of what I'm going for, and sounds like it would be entertaining to watch. GMs will see tons of applicants poor typing skills who seem not to have actually read the game description, rambling about how their character has a dark and mysterious past full of pain which has made them skillful and cool. You'll stand out more if you are brief and concise, with an amusing (not lolrandumb) and/or unique-sounding idea.