Check out sale on Single License, PHB & Lost Mines Module

[Varsuuk]

Seems there's an unannounced (forum wise) sale on a couple FG items. Seems a subset is also on Steam.

Enjoy!

[ddavison]

Thanks for posting this Varsuuk. I should also start another thread for it to raise visibility. One thing that is of note here is that these sales stack with the discounts in the D&D Complete the Set Bundle. If you pick up the bundle, you get 25% off all the remaining items in the bundle but you get 20% + 25% (45%) off the two D&D items that are on sale.

[Varsuuk]

That is an awesome discount.

Too bad I have those all (I definitely recommend those 3 as the perfect starter kit...Probably NOT coincidence that those are the ones on sale)

Lost Mines is really nicely put together with a particularly nice homey feel to those of us who started a campaign via Under Ilefarn back in the day after our Greyhawk campaigning.

[callahan09]

I finally bought my license (someday will still need to upgrade to Ultimate... question, does the upgrade ever go on sale, or should I just buy it now? I can wait until it goes on sale if it ever does, but if it never goes on sale I will just buy it now. But it isn't urgent for me to have Ultimate).

The Core Class Pack also. Even though I have the PHB in hardcover already, I hadn't realized how much of it was ported over to the SRD for free. Every class and race is in there, just not all the schools and variants and subraces. It's cool to have all those character portraits though, it really makes it easier to pick a portrait that represents each character, so I'm glad for that, and it's definitely nice to have all the backgrounds and variants, so it was worth it for 40 but would not have been worth it for 50. I wish WotC would ramp up their partnership with Fantasy Grounds in the future by letting us buy the book and the Fantasy Grounds module for a discount combo price, but I'm not sure exactly how they'd handle that, but it would be cool, because I'd like to have both in a lot of cases. But I don't expect that to happen any time soon (if ever).

Question: Should I just run Lost Mines from the booklet that I have from the Starter Set, or is it worth spending another 16 bucks to buy the module on Fantasy Grounds? I'm sure it makes things easier to run having the module, but eventually I'm going to be running homebrew stuff anyway, so is it better for me to get used to that by running Lost Mines from the paper booklet rather than spending extra money on the module? Or should I just get the module as a way to learn how to run it and then once I'm used to it I will better be able to run stuff without a module?

[Trenloe]

Question: Should I just run Lost Mines from the booklet that I have from the Starter Set, or is it worth spending another 16 bucks to buy the module on Fantasy Grounds? I'm sure it makes things easier to run having the module, but eventually I'm going to be running homebrew stuff anyway, so is it better for me to get used to that by running Lost Mines from the paper booklet rather than spending extra money on the module? Or should I just get the module as a way to learn how to run it and then once I'm used to it I will better be able to run stuff without a module?
Get the module. This will save you sooooo much time in running your games. Even if you plan to do homebrew stuff in the future, you'll learn a lot about module organisation, what you use and don't use, how to run and game in FG, and have the whole module in FG so you can concentrate on playing rather than preparing.

If you're short on cash and have lots of free time, or simply enjoy prepping then just do it all yourself (you'll have to scan in the maps etc. or get most of them from the cartographer's website: https://mikeschley.zenfolio.com/p856083253) then don't bother buying the module and do it yourself. Otherwise, $16 is well worth it to get you gaming quickly and easily. Check out the screenshots and walkthrough video on the product page to see what you'll get: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/store/product.xcp?id=WOTC5ELMOP

[ddavison]

The upgrade does occasionally go on sale. If you aren't in a rush, you might wait until that happens.

Either option is fine for the LMOP. As you mentioned, it is not a bad one to practice building if you want to eventually do homebrew stuff. Then again, it might give you a clear idea of how you want to later do your own homebrew stuff.

[LordEntrails]

I like to run homebrew types of things myself. But I bought LMoP on FG early on and found that it was so simple to use and saved me so much prep time I now run two campaigns, one that uses pre-built FG modules (currently PotA), and my psuedo-homebrew (Undermountain). Wish I would have bough LMoP before starting on my version of UM, would have learned a lot that would have made my UM more re-usable (and now I'm having to go back and update).

[Varsuuk]

I can't praise Lost Mine's FG prep-work saving enough.
At like 15-16$ it's money well spent.

Although you cannot see any of how it was made etc, because it isn't downloaded as a "Module" per se, it is still great for an example of a well-done finished product.

I never got the paper version so perhaps I am looking at this differently, but still - I loved it.

[callahan09]

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I will likely buy it while it's still on sale, but I haven't decided yet. I joined Adventure A Week as well, and I as able to download 2 introductory adventure modules for Fantasy Grounds from the website with my one month subscription (two FG modules per month for $10 a month is a nice deal!). I downloaded A0 Crow's Rest Island and and A1 Crypt of the Sun Lord. I'm enjoying going through them as I learn the program. When we finish with these, I'll have a good idea of what I want to do to run Lost Mine, and if it's not still on sale by the time I figure it out I guess I'll just stick with running Adventure A Week modules until it goes on sale again.

[ddaley]

I can't imagine running an adventure without the module. I prefer having the physical book, or at least a PDF. FG is great for running the adventure, but, I don't find it to be ideal for reading the adventure ahead of time.


Question: Should I just run Lost Mines from the booklet that I have from the Starter Set, or is it worth spending another 16 bucks to buy the module on Fantasy Grounds? I'm sure it makes things easier to run having the module, but eventually I'm going to be running homebrew stuff anyway, so is it better for me to get used to that by running Lost Mines from the paper booklet rather than spending extra money on the module? Or should I just get the module as a way to learn how to run it and then once I'm used to it I will better be able to run stuff without a module?

[JohnD]

I can't imagine running an adventure without the module. I prefer having the physical book, or at least a PDF. FG is great for running the adventure, but, I don't find it to be ideal for reading the adventure ahead of time.
I'd have to agree with this.

[LordEntrails]

I used to be a hardbook required guy. Then I started travelling and didn't want to (and couldn't) carry everything I wanted to have with me. So, I've gone digital (for 5E, I only buy on FG). It takes getting used to, but now that I'm used to it, its usually not an issue. Especially with how their is an index in FG so you can go through and read each entry just like if it was a book. But, it takes a willingness to learn to do things in a different way than you are used to.

[callahan09]

I went ahead and bought the Lost Mine of Phandelver module, it's very nicely done, but I'm a little disappointed that each story item doesn't have links to the previous and next story items the way I've seen in other modules like from Adventureaweek.com modules. Just adds a little extra legwork to go to the next section when I get to the bottom of a story section.

[damned]

Hey callahan09 that is a useful feature.
I think much of LMoP is designed to be driven from the Map Pins.

[LordEntrails]

To me, the map and the pins on it are crucial to navigating. There is also the Index that you can use to navigate the story entries though if you don't like the map pin method.

[Varsuuk]

I love map pin method. it is the closest to how I used to GM since I was a write it all out guy.