Using Fantasy Grounds for home play

[vjhv]

All,

Bottom line: Please help me understand how I can use FG to play a "home game".

I've watched videos about many VTTs and I've come to the conclusion that FG may be 'the best'. I've seen how it works (and am interested in pulling the trigger) but haven't found a lot of data specific to running an "at home" campaign. I'd love for anyone with experience to let me know how it works to do a game almost exclusively "at home".

What I'd like to do is use a laptop (Surface Book 2) connected (some how) to a TV. An additional requirement (later) is to have 1 remote player 'dial in'. My questions include:

1. How would I run two instances of the game; 1 on my laptop and 1 on my TV?
2. If it's as simple as running 2 .exe's, how much 'micro' would be required for me as the DM to run both instances? What I mean is: is it going to require a lot of managing all of the player tokens / monsters / etc. on the 2d instance? My intent is to simply use it as a 'larger, digital battle map' as opposed to using ALL of the digital, automated features that would work more naturally for lots of players manipulating their own characters / etc.
3. Are there any recommendations for remotely connecting my laptop to my TV? I'd prefer not to use a 15' HDMI cable; but I can if that's the only good choice.
4. In the future, I'd like to play with 1 remote player. Would it be possible to have 2 instances (as referenced above) w/ 1 DM instance (my computer) and 1 player instance (on my TV) and still have 1 player 'dial in' to see / manipulate the player instance on my TV? If so, how would I make that happen?

I apologize if all of these answers exist somewhere in the threads. I've done a bit of online + forum searching and haven't found good answers to these questions.

Thanks for the help!

-vj

[LordEntrails]

Welcome!

Connect your TV to your laptop via a cable, I use a HDMI cable for my TV, but it depends upon what ports your laptop and TV have.

1. Start a second instance of FG on your laptop, connect to your GM instance using a different name (i.e. 'Display') and an address of 'localhost'.

2. Use the second instance as a display only device, consider using this extension; https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?33834-Map-resize-to-TV-resolution-for-Face-To-Face-games

3. I use a 50' HDMI cable. I have a Chromecast, but that doesn't work since FG can't cast and the Chromecast can only duplicate a display and not be run as a second display. Cable is easy and reliable. Buy from someplace like monoprice.com and not a local electronics store, much much cheaper and no need for high-end cables.

4. Sure, just have the remote player connect from the internet... The only thing is licensing, a Standard license can only have one demo player connect and doesn't allow you to save, so either you need an Ultimate license or you and the player(s) need a Standard licenses.

[Zacchaeus]

Huge thread on this subject here https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?25600-Using-FG-at-the-tabletop

[vjhv]

Sweet, thank you both!

[JohnD]

I think you'll want to be conservative in your expectations using a Surface; at least from the discussions I remember (which may be linked above).

[damned]

The Surface Book is a very powerful unit. It may however have the dice rolling issues due to the new gfx card.

[laerun81]

Welcome!

Connect your TV to your laptop via a cable, I use a HDMI cable for my TV, but it depends upon what ports your laptop and TV have.

1. Start a second instance of FG on your laptop, connect to your GM instance using a different name (i.e. 'Display') and an address of 'localhost'.

2. Use the second instance as a display only device, consider using this extension; https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?33834-Map-resize-to-TV-resolution-for-Face-To-Face-games

3. I use a 50' HDMI cable. I have a Chromecast, but that doesn't work since FG can't cast and the Chromecast can only duplicate a display and not be run as a second display. Cable is easy and reliable. Buy from someplace like monoprice.com and not a local electronics store, much much cheaper and no need for high-end cables.

4. Sure, just have the remote player connect from the internet... The only thing is licensing, a Standard license can only have one demo player connect and doesn't allow you to save, so either you need an Ultimate license or you and the player(s) need a Standard licenses.

Hey there! Ok I have also been looking to do this now for some time. I recently picked up Fantasy Grounds Unity on steam and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to do what you just described. I have the second instance open, I select join and.....I type localhost in the "Join LAN Game" box....? Also not sure where display name goes. Either I'm just slow with this stuff or Unity is way different but I can't get it going lol... Thanks in advance!

EDIT: NVM I did indeed pull a dumb. I figured it out, I didn't have my main campaign setup correctly. I'm pretty sure it was not set to LAN. Now I start the long journey of figuring out how to use it! Thanks guys! :D

[damned]

welcome **laerun81**

FGU and FGC do have different connection methods.
For FGU start a cloud campaign and on the player side connect to the Cloud instance

[laerun81]

welcome **laerun81**

FGU and FGC do have different connection methods.
For FGU start a cloud campaign and on the player side connect to the Cloud instance

That's odd, I started a new campaign with a LAN game and the second instance connected no problem. Thanks for the reply!

[BaneTBC]

With FGU, if you are only going to be accessing it locally, LAN is fine. If you want to allow someone else to connect to it outside your location, then you'd want to make sure it's a Cloud game so it will be listed and able to be found. Otherwise you would have to setup a bunch of port forwarding, firewall rules, et al. So ultimately, you have a little bit of leverage as to which way you want to do it and how you want to allow anyone else to connect (IF anyone else is even going to connect).

[laerun81]

With FGU, if you are only going to be accessing it locally, LAN is fine. If you want to allow someone else to connect to it outside your location, then you'd want to make sure it's a Cloud game so it will be listed and able to be found. Otherwise you would have to setup a bunch of port forwarding, firewall rules, et al. So ultimately, you have a little bit of leverage as to which way you want to do it and how you want to allow anyone else to connect (IF anyone else is even going to connect).

Ok, thanks for that info. It will just be me and the family at home with a gaming table equipped with a TV.