Is Fantasy Grounds newbie friendly?

[Sylus]

Hello everyone,,
I have never played D&D before but would really love to get into it. Unfortunately I don't have any friends that have open games right now or in the near future. Is there a community that uses Fantasy Grounds and is friendly to newcomers? I would love to play
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[esmdev]

Hello everyone,,
I have never played D&D before but would really love to get into it. Unfortunately I don't have any friends that have open games right now or in the near future. Is there a community that uses Fantasy Grounds and is friendly to newcomers? I would love to play.

Hi.

I think that it is generally newbie friendly.

There is an organization called the Fantasy Grounds College that offers free classes in how to play using Fantasy Grounds, make characters, how to DM, and how to do various general things with the software. You might check it out.

https://fantasygroundscollege.net/

[LordEntrails]

Also check out the Organized play forums. D&D has the Adventurer's League that you can join and play with numerous DMs at various events and non-events. There is also organized play for other systems including Pathfinder and StarFinder.

There are also several Discord based groups that organize games, but unfortunately I don't have their links. But I think FG College has links to some of them on the FGC Discord server.

[LordEntrails]

Here's a specific post you can read and get involved in an AL game this weekend; https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forum...l=1#post544052

[A Social Yeti]

I'd say the FG community here is quite open.

As for getting in on a table, there is but one process basiaclly on the entire internet sadly. At least for more typical ongoing campaigns.

Find a website community for RP that you decide you like, and then just go to the LFG/LFP thread every day a coupe times a day until you get a game.
I find way better luck seeking an LFP(look for players) than i do posting LFG(looking for group/game).

All the websites are pretty bespoke, either being really old RPG sites that haven't evolved much from the mid/late 90's.
Or being sites/communities dedicate to a specific VTT product, provided by the maker of it.

The generalized RP sites allow mention of all RP systems and all VTTs or not VTT games.
While the VTT product sites only allow posting for their VTT product and the games supported by it.

the general sites have a bit of focus loss issues, one single LFP/LFG thread for every RP system and any VTT or not, in one massive pile is not exactly the most useful system for finding a seat at the game you want.
But does get you maximum variety of choice, i just find the unevolved designs leave a bit to be desired.

While a site/community explicit to a single VTT will have a bit more focus due to the limted number of RP systems it can support, even though they too commonly have one LFG/LFP thread for every RP system all at once.
Additionally, i persoanlly find the communities centered around a single VTT site, seem a little more welcoming, than generic RP site communities have been.

So depending on what all RPGs you find you like, you may just have to be ready to work multiple RPG sites, rather than have a single RP community site that can cover all your interests.
But for getting started i'd recommend picking a VTT site like here or roll20 or dndbeyond, and just F5ing the LFP thread a few times a day to try and be an early poster to get in on an open seat.

It may take a few days to a few weeks, but if you just put in some repeating grindy time effort on it, you will get one eventually.

as an aside
The app's design itself is by my POV a near 50/50 for how noob approachable it is. Whihc for a powerful and complex app is likely about as good as you can ever get. Complexity is just the otehr side of the spectrum line from easily approachable. So the more complicated stuff the app has to be able to do, there's only going to be so much simplification that will work. Like photoshop if you only do the simple stuff then it's fairly simple to use, but if you want to really access the power of that app, there's a real effort of learning curve in front of it all. But then that's more the GMing side of using the VTT apps anyway.

[Granamere]

I would recommend you check out https://fgpug.com/ which is on the link LordEntrails listed above.

On being newbie friendly. This forum is awesome. Fantasy Grounds college is all about teaching new players. They have some great teachers there.

Fantasy grounds does have a learning curve. Once you take a class or two you will be good to go but there is always new stuff I am finding. If you have any challenges please come post here and someone will help out.