18 months on : FG vs. Roll20 vs Foundry

[Xydonus]

Blindly ignoring the issues doesn't fix them just FYI.

If you can't see that opening a browser vs downloading/installing a program on a computer is a lot harder, I'm not sure what to tell you. Maybe your limited exp with people who know how to use computers thus never ran into these problems or something else. I've dealt with 100s of people playing FGC and FGU vs Roll20, and I can tell you there are a lot of issues with installing a game vs playing it from a browser (starting standpoint not talking about use after it's up and running).

This has been my experience as well. I have 9 going on 10 years of utilizing Fantasy Grounds. Christ, the amount of problems that have popped up with FG... Not just for myself with router forwarding, but getting my players to install and run FG. It's never been a simple case of 'download, and install, run!' Never. Something always pops up. Either an access violation or a corrupt install or failure to join that requires nuking the cache. Compared that with browser in Foundry which my group has had no issues at all.

@Weissrolf What you've said about tribalism within the communities is fairly on ball. Very hard to have a constructive take on stuff. I've had to block & report someone on this thread who basically thought it be a good idea to PM me and basically tell me to sod off from the community for airing my views concerning FG:Unity. That's despite the fact I'm still using FG Unity, as well as other VR platforms.

[Zarestia]

That is nice anectodal evidence, here is ours:
- One of my players' computer cannot meet the minimum spec requirements of FGU, especially concerning memory. As a result he stopped using Chrome for Discord chat and now runs Discord on his phone to save memory on the PC. FGU's large memory requirements makes using potato computers harder. Foundry/Chrome seems to need (much) less memory compared to FGU.

Ok.

Foundry:
Client(player or GM) Minimum Requirements

Relatively modern computer running Windows 10, macOS Big Sur (or newer), or Linux operating systems, with support for 64-bit architecture.
An integrated GPU to enable hardware acceleration.
8GB of RAM
A monitor no smaller than 1366x768. At this minimum resolution many aspects of the UI will feel cramped.
A modern web browser like Chrome, Firefox, Opera, or Edge with hardware acceleration enabled. (Safari is not a supported browser at this time).

Client(player or GM) Recommended Specifications

Relatively modern computer running Windows 10, macOS Big Sur (or newer), or Linux operating systems with support for 64-bit architecture.
A dedicated GPU which supports WebGL 2.0.
16GB of RAM
A monitor with 1920x1080 or higher resolution.
A mouse. You can use the software with a touchpad but the current software is designed for mouse and keyboard.
Chrome or a Chromium-based browser provides an experience closest to the FVTT desktop application.

Fantasy Grounds Unity:
System Requirements for Fantasy Grounds Unity
Windows

MINIMUM:
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: 64-bit (x64) Windows 8x or 10x
Processor: 1.6 GHz or higher processor (SSE2 instruction set support)
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card with DX10 (Shader Model 4.0) capabilities and a minimum of 2 GB of graphics memory
Network: Broadband Internet connection
Storage: 200 MB available space
Sound Card: a sound card is required for voice communication using external programs like Google Hangouts, Skype or Discord.
Additional Notes: Requirements vary by the add-ons installed and the number of players connecting to your game.

RECOMMENDED:
Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: Windows 10x (x64)
Processor: 2.0 GHz or higher processor (SSE2 instruction set support)
Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card with DX10 (Shader Model 4.0) capabilities and a minimum of 3 GB of graphics memory
Network: Broadband Internet connection
Storage: 2 GB available space
Sound Card: a sound card is required for voice communication using external programs like Google Hangouts, Skype or Discord.
Additional Notes: Requirements vary by the add-ons installed and the number of players connecting to your game.

Btw: (Safari is not a supported browser at this time)

[DM_BK]

I haven't had any issues with iPhone, Android, or the various tablets. You do need to load the mobile modules to make Foundry usable on non-PCs.

Myself, I'm a PC person.... but I also realize that not everyone is anymore, but everyone does have a cell phone.

Not to seem ungrateful because I have had many wonderful times on FG...but beyond the lack of web support...
How in the heck do we still not have any form of sound support in FG?
Nor any form of animated graphics support (beyond a couple of filters)?

I don't know which of these VTTs has the most staff, but my gut tells me SW ranks up there in terms of resources (these days). Yet everyone else has these cool features?!?!?! It's just starting to feel like we are all making excuses for FG because of product loyalty, and I don't know that that's a good thing.

[Zarestia]

Myself, I'm a PC person.... but I also realize that not everyone is anymore, but everyone does have a cell phone.

Do you guys not have phones?

The mobile market is strong, especially in many asian countries but not everyone has a smartphone nor wants to use it for gaming.

I don't know which of these VTTs has the most staff, but my gut tells me SW ranks up there in terms of resources (these days). Yet everyone else has these cool features?!?!?!

A LinkedIn search shows:
- Roll20: 76 employees
- Smiteworks: 12 employees (2 ruleset devs, 2 client devs)
- Foundry: 2 employees (had to create an account for that since their profile is not public)

Take those numbers with a grain of salt.

Afaik: FVTT itself only manages the 5e ruleset, Roll20 I don't know. Smiteworks itself does D&D 3.5e - D&D 5e, PF1e & Starfinder and CoreRPG (getting updates for all rulesets basing on that).

FVTT & R20 have sound and animated maps/tokens.
FGU has a combat tracker and a party sheet with parcel functionality.

I don't see a huge discrepance between the feature sets of those three. Look at the last 9 months of changelogs of each software for new features in the ruleset/character sheet maintained by the company and the actual VTT (if R20 even has something like that) and you will see how slow/fast each VTT is developing.

[DM_BK]

Wow! 76! Now I want to know why R20 isn't a LOT better lol
Im having a hard time imagining how they are paying 76 people!
Interesting numbers though.

As to the combat tracker, party sheet, and parcel functionality - I've got them all worked out on Foundry and they are pretty good after a lot of research/work. I've had some spare time recently or that never would have happened.
Out of the box FG is WAY easier...even with having to learn the so-called odd interface. I don't think its odd, mind you, but a lot of people do. But I'm wired to FG after so many years...so Foundry seemed (still seems) strangely designed. But I'm slowing re-wiring my brain on how Foundry runs.

Foundry - 2 people! Pretty impressive for only 2 people....

[Weissrolf]

Ok.

Real-world memory consumption - instead of just listed specs - for both Foundry in Chrome and FGU loading the same Pathfinder 2E system (PF2 Core Rulebook unloaded in FGU for ca. 100 mb less memory usage), same Fall of Plaguestone adventure, same map.

Foundry showing a higher resolution version of the map with all encounter tokens on the map vs. FGU showing a lower resolution version of the same map with no encounter tokens on the map:


Running a GM + player session on the same PC (both FGU processes started fresh):


Foundry server running on my Synology NAS (to which the Chrome client connects):

[seycyrus]

...
How in the heck do we still not have any form of sound support in FG?...

Don't want it! I think the resources are better spent elsewhere. ANYWHERE else for that matter!

[similarly]

Don't want it! I think the resources are better spent elsewhere. ANYWHERE else for that matter!

I agree. If I want to play a video game, I'll go play a video game. I'd rather FGU just focus on showing maps and running the game. That's my vote. I spend enough time on prepping. I don't want to have to load sound effects and bgm etc etc etc. It's a roleplaying game. What happened to imagination?

Same with voice. I can use discord for voice. I don't need integrated voice or video chat.

Real-world memory consumption - instead of just listed specs - for both Foundry in Chrome and FGU loading the same Pathfinder 2E system (PF2 Core Rulebook unloaded in FGU for ca. 100 mb less memory usage), same Fall of Plaguestone adventure, same map.

Foundry showing a higher resolution version of the map with all encounter tokens on the map vs. FGU showing a lower resolution version of the same map with no encounter tokens on the map:


Running a GM + player session on the same PC (both FGU processes started fresh):


Foundry server running on my Synology NAS (to which the Chrome client connects):

Out of curiosity, what would you suggest Smiteworks do about that? Yes, foundry uses less resources. Good for foundry! How does this help Smiteworks?

[Weissrolf]

Out of curiosity, what would you suggest Smiteworks do about that? Yes, foundry uses less resources. Good for foundry! How does this help Smiteworks?

Curiousity is always good. Why do you ask about helping Smiteworks? This is a comparison thread about sharing user experiences with the different VTT systems. If nothing else then it gives both users and devlopers a broader perspective and a look over the edge of the plate.

Here is one support/discussion thread about FGU's memory usage, for curiosity's sake.

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forum...age-collection

There were various others over the last two years.

[DM_BK]

I was thinking about all of this a bit more...and I'm not here to say Foundry is better...I'm simply stating my experiences, as that is the point to this thread. Allow me to state the facts in a different way.

In order to get Foundry to a state that I felt that it was something I could use I had to to spend 3-4 day and load 22 modules. Which made me bounce off the product multiple times because of that time investment and the pains of learning something new.

BUT

In order to get Fantasy Grounds to a state that I feel like it is something that is working well for me I have 25 active extensions. Over 15 years I can most definitely state that I've spent WAY more then 3-4 days in researching and working on overcoming various issues. Not accounting for the need for secondary programs such as Discord and sometimes Syrinscape.
It didn't feel all that bad at the time because the time investments were small, each time, and 15 years ago nothing compared to the FG experience (and it was far less feature rich then it is today).

But that's the thing, we don't live in a bubble - things change, everyday. The Jones have caught up to the king of VTTs and possibly even surpassed it (opinions will vary).

Despite what you may think, I truly want to see FG/SW prosper. However, call it a loss of faith, as myself and quite a few others have repeatedly begged for tidbits of a hints as to what the FG future holds and policy is to not reveal anything. But that policy isn't helpful when outward appearances seem a bit stagnate.

Finally, community comes up quite a bit in this thread. While the community here is good the moderation has trended towards heavy handedness in the last year, with quite a bit of thread suppression occurring. It was starting to feel like no one was allowed a dissenting opinion on these forums. I think someone might have noticed it because it's been better lately. Could have all just been my imagination though.

Take it for what you will, I'm still here and the product is still serving my needs mostly well (with 25 extensions heh).