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  1. #11
    It is important to note that FG is a tool to allow players to play a paper & pen roleplaying game that exists in your imagination.

    CRPGs & Video games are awesome! I love them, ive been playing them since they were text based like in that old old movie "Big" (tom hanks)... but there is a very limited set of options you have in CRPGS that literally does not exist in RPGs. You can do anything and be anyone. You are only limited by your imagination (and the GM's imagination).


    Your comparison of the limits of FG vs. CRPG is similar to saying, "I love watching movies, but i think they are missing the functionality of allowing me to control what the character does..."
    Movies can be great too, but its a closed story, you are simply an observer.
    CRPGS are fun, its a closed story & set of rigid options available based on the specific ruleset and options / map / characters programmed by the developers.
    TTRPGs are unlimited by story, unlimited by options, and most importantly the character is yours to create anyway you want and develop anyway you desire.

    Reading about Drizz't or watching Conan can be super entertaining... but it barely holds a candle to some of the story arcs & character development my own player characters have experienced.

  2. #12
    There are a couple of important clarifications. First, FG is not a game; it is a tool to facilitate the playing of other games. Think of it more like Excel than The Witcher. Second, D&D 5e is first and foremost a TTRPG, not a CRPG. CRPGs, by necessity, start from there being nothing that the player can do, and then add capabilities; everything is impossible except what the game says says otherwise. TTRPGs start from the vast infinite realm of free choice and then add rules and guidelines to create a framework in which gameplay and story can meld smoothly and have a common ground; nothing is impossible. So I'll be a bit blunt: if you want a CRPG, FG simply isn't the right choice, give Divinity: Original Sin a try. If you have interest in playing a TTRPG, then FG is one of the better options out there (best in my personal opinion), but a perspective shift is necessary to get the full benefit of the genre.

    In writing this I had thought originally to go through each of the bullet points in the initial post and respond, and then I figured that the majority of them stem from thinking in CRPG terms, not TTRPG terms. Its probably not useful to keep harping on that though. So I'll keep it shorter.
    • I can see where you're coming from on portraits being shown for your use case. For me, that would be super annoying in a D&D 5e game I'm running, there are many more members in the party than players in any given session, and screen real-estate is already at a premium. I think it does make sense as an optional feature; there may even be an extension in place already.
    • For character movement and distance, you can hold Alt while moving as the DM to see what the player would.
    • For custom item weights, as an example, the 5e ruleset has a weight for a book, but doesn't have the weights for every book in every world created by every DM. Frequently my players will want to pick up and keep something they find in the world that I hadn't thought of ahead of time, so I tell them to add the item to their inventory and set its weight.
    • Ravina has Draconic Resilience. This is actually an example of where too little can be edited, not too much. Her AC formula should be 13+Dex when not wearing armor, but since the base 10 can't be edited the workaround is to have 3 Armor.
    • I agree with the observation about items not have actions completely, and in fact am working on an extension to provide just this functionality.
    • I find ammo tracking to be tedious and unfun, so I rarely make players edit their ammo in inventory. It is assumed that they are able to recover ammunition after the fight barring special circumstances, so the tracker on the Actions Tab is fully sufficient. So I do see your point of this being an opportunity to improve one use case, many implementations would degrade other use-cases.
    • You actually can edit the current turn manually, but the UI doesn't give any indication that the field is selected of editing (which is a bit annoying but I hardly even notice anymore).
    • Regarding custom effects, modules, and extensions. The lion's share of features are very much so possible to implement with manually created actions and effects. And the rest can be handled with the more advanced case of writing extensions if you are up the that. The price of any that you see in the store is for convenience. There is nothing that these modules do that can't be done on your own. You'd have to make the decision on a case by case if the cost of the module/extension is worth it you you. Some things take literally seconds once you're used to it, some may take a couple weeks to write code for. And very few might represent months or even years of work, but that is pretty exceptional.
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  3. #13

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    Quote Originally Posted by MrNone View Post
    I am trying to compare Fantasy Grounds to other video games, yes, because it may be considered a full-fledged video game rather than an auxiliary app to support live table top sessions, depending on one's perspective.
    And herein lies the issue, Fantasy Grounds is not a video game, and was never intended to be one. That is why it is called a Virtual Table Top program. It was designed to allow fans of tabletop rpg’s to play online with people around the world, and it does so quite well. Some of tje things you raised have been added on by 3rd party extensions, and some are in the planning phase for future development.

  4. #14
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    FG isn't a video game it is a virtual table top. Anyone arguing that FG is a video game is only displaying their complete misunderstanding about what it is FG does.
    "I am a Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, or free to choose those who shall govern my country. This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind."

    - John Diefenbaker

    RIP Canada, February 21, 2022

  5. #15
    And I add more wanting a demo | tasting to have the same features as a full version is something that doesn't exist.

  6. #16
    Perhaps the OP should consider to buy Baldur's Gate 3 instead of FGU ?

  7. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Egheal View Post
    Perhaps the OP should consider to buy Baldur's Gate 3 instead of FGU ?
    Agreed

    EDIT: Also this is totally the wrong part of the forum to post this opinion piece.

  8. #18
    EDIT: Sigh, I just noticed the dates of the posts. Nothing I wrote hasn't already been written better by someone else.
    Last edited by malvok; February 19th, 2021 at 04:04.

  9. #19
    Trenloe's Avatar
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    The OP has pretty much done a post and go. They haven’t been back to the forums since a couple of hours after posting.
    Private Messages: My inbox is forever filling up with PMs. Please don't send me PMs unless they are actually private/personal messages. General FG questions should be asked in the forums - don't be afraid, the FG community don't bite and you're giving everyone the chance to respond and learn!

  10. #20
    Closing thread; since nothing is really being added at this point.

    Thanks,
    JPG

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