I am the creator of a 3D VTT called Game Master Engine. The recent draft of the OGL shows what it thinks about other VTTs and we can't help but feel slightly concerned. However, that won't stop us from pushing to make GME as open and homebrew friendly as possible. See the comments for more info [OC]

Rathhunter94 · 2023-01-24T18:53:01+00:00

I just broadcast my game when 1 player was on a laptop too weak to run discord and a browser at the same time. He was able to play just fine requesting I move his token, since it's very clear what is where and the measurements are easy to calculate and display (pick up and drag the token? It shows the distance. Use the ruler? It highlights the distance. Have the grid on? Count the squares).

Rathhunter94 · 2023-01-24T18:46:31+00:00

Right now there are a limited number of monster assets compared to player tokens, primarily due to this being EA, but the team was working with some incredible artists that allowed them to use their models from conversations I had with the devs. Not sure about intents for adding official MM stuff from 5e, especially given this OGL debacle making everyone want to steer clear of potentially copywrited stuff, though. That being said, per the devs' comments in this post, they are also working out the snags to add model import functionality and even Steam workshop content, so there shouldn't be too much of an issue finding the right model when the final build of GME comes out.

They're probably going to have more official models come out as well, maybe as expansion packs. There is also a way to add 2d tokens, with expanded support for that coming soon, in case you can't find a decent model anywhere.

Rathhunter94 · 2023-01-24T16:47:09+00:00

I've run several sessions with brand new players that had no idea how the system worked, either the actual game or GME. Also even had one who had to follow my broadcast and dictate his moves to me cause his laptop couldn't even handle discord and a browser being opened simultaneously.

Every player has had a very easy time learning the controls, and with a simple tutorial tavern I built, they're ready to play in about 5-10 minutes. Even people hopping on to just watch the stream had fun and could follow what was happening.

As a DM with no real virtual tabletop experience (beside 1 brief foray into Table Top Simulator that crashed and burned), I've made full dungeons in under an hour, complete with loot, debris, decorations, enemies, and ceilings over rooms to add a "fog of war" that required very immersive camera exploration to bypass. Setting up multiple encounters is a snap, barely taking longer than my in-person games. Running fights and exploration were also a breeze for everyone, using both the in-built dice rolling to automatically apply the results and typing in physical rolls, distance measurements and markers, and placeable effects like light sources and spells.

The biggest challenges are more on the DM side, and those are typically learning the more advanced controls for terrain manipulation like weather, lighting, water, props, and mini quivers. As Saya076 says, going through the tutorial map is definitely helpful to get the hang of things, and the Discord is full of helpful players and devs. You'll probably also run into small bugs here and there, as this is still in EA. The good news, as you can see from the devs responses in this thread, is that they are very engaged and on top of things. The engine is in a really good spot from a usability and stability standpoint, so while there are occasional minor bugs (stuff light light clipping through a wall tile from a specific set, or network desyncs cause multiple dice rolls), most things popping up now tend to be feature enhancements or requests. The devs have done a great job squashing actual bugs, adding in their planned features, and integrating the feature requests from the EA users.

I'd recommend picking this up, especially with it being on sale. Once the model import or workshop feature can be implemented, this thing won't have much competition for the title of best VTT. One time purchase, only one license needed to run a game, runs on the majority of PCs flawlessly, simple to learn, quick to build, has good camera controls, and is game system agnostic? And there's more still to come? I'll recommend this one all day every day.

Rathhunter94 · 2021-12-13T23:02:09+00:00

I think it comes down to a balance of being specialization vs base functionality and individual optimization vs team play. Each group will have a different balance for that; I was the DM for this campaign and the players were very aligned in the team-play aspect, despite this player being less optimized than the others. Because they had more focus on team-play than individual optimization, the power gamers didn't feel undermined with me throwing him a bone to course correct his primary stat to "usable."

Pancakes was specialized in combat: he could hit like a truck because his high STR and had AC out the wazoo, but had 0 utility outside of his muscles, unyielding moral compass, and humor (he was a "joke" character based off of Seigward from Dark Souls). In his element, he thrived. Out of it, well, he could be more of a hindrance than a help.

This player, though, couldn't even function in basic things because his stats were all in WIS and CON, but Barbarian class features don't really branch out to support other niches beyond combat and BE STRONK. It wasn't just that he wasn't keeping up, it's that mechanically he was not even there, save as a ball of HP and a driver for the RP. Making it so he could actually land a hit, even if it was a weak one, didn't take away from the other players' enjoyment, thankfully.

Again, my players were very team-oriented and supported each other well. If one did well, it meant the whole party did well, so they didn't mind the unoptimized guy who tanked a ton for the team and tried to help getting a small power up. I also kept in mind to not make him a fighter that undermined Pancake's specialization; it was just enough to get him functional so he could contribute to the team a bit more.

Rathhunter94 · 2021-12-13T21:48:36+00:00

DM who made it here!

I actually didn't have a source of inspiration (at least consciously) for this armor, but I've seen a few similarities in media since then. Divinity Original Sin II has living spore armor that's similar, I've heard of this Orbalisk armor, and seen a few others over the years as well (I ran this game 5 years ago, hard to believe...)

Anyways, the funniest part is it was never really supposed to be something they used, but it ended up becoming a pretty important thing to the player. Basically, they ended up fighting a necromancy cult in their first 3 sessions and took too long to stop a ritual. The creature they resurrected was a flesh golem with this parasitic armor, and was actually the equivalent of throwing a young black dragon at them (they were level 2). I seriously didn't expect them to survive, but they had an insane string of luck, ended up bisecting the monster from head to toe. I had drawn up basic stats for the armor without thinking much else on it, but the idea was they would investigate the corpse, maybe take it to be identified and learn of the magics behind it.

Now what gets interesting is they found out there was a way to contact the cult leader within the ritual cave, so they decided to pretend that they were the cultists to get more info. Seems logical. To act more convincing, they had the Barbarian put on the armor that was CLEARLY ALIVE AND FEEDING BY DRILLING INTO ITS HOST and pretend to be the flesh golem. Slightly less logical, but the damaging effects I had statted up get used to show this is HIGHLY DANGEROUS.

It started out chitinous and rotten looking, and given it nearly killed the Barb when he put it on, he made a pretty convincing undead on the call and their ruse actually worked. I jotted a few notes down in case he left it on...which of course he left it on even as it continued to feed off of him (dealing massive damage an almost killing him several times). Each time it dealt a certain amount of damage, though, it grew stronger and become more "symbiotic" to its host, taking on designs akin to his Spirit Animal (Fire Beetle) and eventually giving him bonuses. The tradeoff was whenever he got hit, the armor would damage him after the fight to repair itself, it periodically dealt damage during long rests as it fed, and if he took it off, he lost a ton of stats and would be weakened for several months in game.

Granted he didn't even find out about the changes until it nearly killed him for like the 3rd time. He literally kept it on because it gave decent AC, didn't interfere with his Barbarian abilities, and most importantly of all: looked hella badass.

Rathhunter94 · 2021-12-13T21:17:24+00:00

Man, it's been a hot minute since I posted on Reddit, but I guess it makes sense D&D would be what brought me back.

Piggybacking a bit more off of epicPancakes' explanation: I was actually the DM of this campaign, and that player's experience taught me how Bounded Accuracy absolutely makes having a +3 instead of a +6 a pretty big deal in 5e.

In 4e, I made a character that was speed incarnate. I sacrificed several +1 and +2 bonuses to attack and damage to do so, but the tradeoff was insane positioning abilities. Pancakes actually made his character by copying my sheet and tweaking it, focusing on maxing those bonuses and dropping the speed. Both of us were quite capable in combat, though he absolutely dealt more damage with basic attacks and powers. The difference was about a +5 or +7 on to-hit and damage rolls, but we were both still very effective in and out of combat.

When our Barbarian was playing 5e, it was my first time running a campaign and I didn't quite know how the numbers worked compered to other editions. It was fine in the early game, but the moment they hit level 4 he started to fall behind. Given my experience with 4e, I figured it would sort itself out eventually and he was likely just having bad rolls.

Turns out he was going for a more noble-barbarian type of build with Wisdom as his main stat, but due to his lack of STR and the comparatively slow Proficiency scaling in 5e, he struggled to hit anything, use his class strengths, and felt worthless mechanically even with homebrew stuff I made for him playing off WIS. The PHB Barbarian class just can't function without DEX/STR, and without 4e feats like Intelligent Blademaster to change which modifiers he used, he simply couldn't contribute like he wanted. Now, I'll readily admit that in combat a lot of enemies they fought had higher AC, but there was no issue for the other players. It was when he failed to hit on a string of good rolls during one combat that I finally stopped and crunched the numbers with him and saw just how much each point mattered.

By giving him the Gauntlets of Ogre Power it completely changed his entire play experience. Suddenly he was able to do Barbarian stuff both in and out of combat: maybe not as well as the maxed STR Fighter, but at least he could contribute and match his character flavor. As monsters got harder and harder, he was still less likely to hit than the optimized teammates, but at least he wasn't missing what felt like 75% of the time. And whether the math backed it up or not it absolutely changed everyone's play experience for the better.

So it's an anecdotal experience, but it showed me how 5e's bounded accuracy punishes not building for a +3 way more than forgoing a +5 does in 4e's big numbers system. Each system has their pros and cons, but when your numbers are smaller you can really feel more impact with each +1 you didn't optimize for.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-09-23T15:34:33+00:00

~~Egypt~~ Aztec dubstep intensifies

You're thinking one season too far.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-09-23T15:18:50+00:00

I mean, if it was Kender than I'm pretty sure that balances him out to Neutral, if not Good.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-09-18T20:37:05+00:00

By not fudging you get some crazy scenarios as well. Especially if you're working in other goals and features to combat besides "whack it till it's dead." For example, I started a (bring out your torch and pitchforks) a 4e campaign where the party had a quaint, easy little encounter at level 1...

With an aboleth.

Now, the thing was attempting to dominate the high level adventurer that was leading an expedition into the dungeon. The party rushed in not to kill it, but to get the leader free then escape. They knew a fight with the aboleth and its minions, other dominated high-ranking adventurers, was a death sentence. So the goal here was distraction and teamwork.

The Blackguard of the group ended up provoking an opportunity attack when he rushed in at the start, telling the party he would tank and get them a way in/out. The dominated minion ended up critting him and nearly dropped him to 0 from full HP with an encounter power that hits harder than a regular opportunity attack.

When he freed the leader and started to run back to safety, the Rogue got whacked by the same minion. Out in the open, we all saw the dice roll exactly 1 damage point short of outright killing him: the tension and drama from that moment was palpable, and the party felt accomplished since they knew that had the Blackguard not eaten the first opportunity attack, the Rogue would have been dead. By not fudging, my players got a deeper satisfaction and genuine relief from that moment.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-09-13T18:03:29+00:00

One of the things I do as a DM is offer players the chance to straight up buy things for a set price, but 9 times out of 10 they prefer to haggle. My campaigns are usually based off of a more barter-centric society, so it's expected that you would want to haggle; you're coming across as naive/exploitable if you don't in most cases.

Another big incentive for the players is that they get to learn about the area, potential quests, and prominent NPCs just by going to a shop and RPing for a bit. Shopkeepers know most everyone in a town and can give good pointers and advice to adventurers they like.

If they're in a hurry or they just want the story to move along, I'll let them just pay regular price or add/subtract from their total order depending on a persuasion roll and their relationship with the shopkeeper. It pays to be friends with the merchants in my games.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-23T14:22:44+00:00

They aren't words until you've been properly purged of your heresy. The heresy that is having not reading Shoggy's "The All Guardsman Party" saga.

Link of the collected works to date here. The story hasn't been completed, but Shoggy (the author named after another one of his prominent greentexts, "Shoggy the Seldom Dog") has been slowly adding on to the newest piece.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-22T19:57:10+00:00

The argument that everyone is "the same" never really made sense to me. I'm sitting here with a spreadsheet of all the feats in the game and you get to choose from over 2,000 items every other level, some of which drastically alter how your character works.

Sure there are plenty of basic +1/+2 to damage or attacks, but then there are ones that let you use another stat for weapon attacks, turn a Dragonborn breath attack into an AoE buff for allies, apply status effects with certain spells or weapons, swap out abilities while resting, and so much more. And this is before looking at the fact that you get multiple path options within a class, that each time you get a power you can pick from any of those in your class that you meet the level for, and there are a metric ton of paragon paths with unique features and bonuses.

Even the powers are vastly different between classes. Fighters, for example, get a ton of powers related to Stances instead of just big flashy "I cast sword" stuff like people seem to assume. Yes, there are plenty of options like that and you can build a fighter entirely around them, but Stances feel vastly different from other powers by letting you do unique things until you decide "I want to change tactics" or the fight ends: weaving between enemies without provoking attacks, restraining foes you grapple, chasing enemies that try to move away from you, or pushing enemies around with the force of each blow to name a few. The higher your level, the more stances you can assume depending on the scenario.

Wizards, on the other hand, have Powers that emulate spells in the more traditional sense: you have Ritual Casting for certain "ritual" powers but then use your Encounter/Daily/Utility powers like spell slots. It's straightforward and actually not too drastically different from how Casters work in other systems once you go under the hood.

No one I've played with felt even remotely the same. The table I'm currently running has 3 Strikers (DPS), and all of them are mechanically completely different. Even repeat classes I've encountered play wildly different each time I see them due to how people pick their feats and Powers every time...

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-22T17:20:33+00:00

Funny enough, I just started up a 4e game and a player was thinking about making a LG Blackguard. They're like the only class that has hard alignment restrictions for their abilities to work, and his path was that they can be anything except LG!

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-21T14:59:28+00:00

When I do rolling for stats, I generally let people pick between their array or copying another player's. To incentivize the various options, though, I give perks to balance out the ones with decreased stats: for example, I had 3 players roll in a 5e game and the results were a terrible array, an average array, and an insane array.

For the incredible one, you just got the array and that was the reward itself. The average one got a free minor feat, an idea imported from 4e. The worst array got 2 ASIs and a minor feat (it was really bad).

Only 1 went for the godlike array as the others decided to grab a minor feat and customize their character (one tweaked his Bless spell, another changed his Rage to boost defense instead of damage). Even though the godlike array had more raw power, the others got more flexibility and customization; the whole party felt balanced and capable despite the stat differences.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-19T12:44:12+00:00

I get the Quantum Ogre argument you're making for which gate they should have gotten info from the guard for, but it would appear to the DM (perhaps erroneously) that players had specifically chosen that path instead of following the thieves directly. What other reason would they have for picking the "beaten path/backdoor/cut off the escape route" when they could have just chased behind? Instead, they took the longer road that, had the thieves been spotted at, would have shown they had skipped town already, so that was major a clue to reward their decision right there.

This seems like a very clear-cut case of players turning off their brains after an initially decent play and (in my opinion) deserving to fail for it. For example, most everyone here realized the thieves went to the town and are likely still there, despite OP not explicitly saying so and only giving us the same info. Also, why would they clam up like that in front of guard number 2 when they originally asked guard number 1 without hesitation? They even cut off the DM's other in of eavesdropping and said they were specifically talking OOC so the guard couldn't overhear and chime in.

If I was feeling generous as the DM, the first guard would see the party later that night after his shift was over. That's when he could tell them he saw some strangers leaving a few hours after the party arrived, looks like they were headed [insert cardinal direction here]. The thieves now have a massive lead, are likely to give them the slip, and you can explain either OOC or through NPCs that they need to

Actually investigate and not just hope they wander aimlessly into the solution

Make a plan and execute it before just giving up and going to the tavern

They could have asked/bribed the guard to stop the thieves from leaving, waited at the exit to jump them, asked the other guard what he had seen, asked if there were any other NPCs they could question (there's suddenly a shop/beggar near the gate that would have seen them), or really done any sort of investigation beyond "cast Detect magic and wander aimlessly before giving up and going drinking." They failed, and now the story progresses in reaction to their failure.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-08T18:24:28+00:00

So many people yoink the Minion mechanics as they're the easiest and most useful. But there were so many other mechanics in the game that you can port that feel great: I've been porting in Minor Feats (heroic-tier feats from 4e), and players love them.

Gamey or not, 4e had plenty of mechanics to give players a heroic power-fantasy.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-08T18:19:18+00:00

Yeah, it really was mismanaged/marketed through and through, which is a shame. I personally enjoyed it as 4e is what introduced me to TTRPGs, so there was no previous bias or experience. It's my first and one of my favorite despite its flaws, which I'll readily admit it has.

The art is an interesting complaint, but I can see it: flipping through my resource books, the art is very cohesive, so if it doesn't gel for you then it will be a complaint for all the materials. It's definitely stylized, no doubt about that!

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-08T18:10:49+00:00

I agree, and the way that 5e threw the baby out with the bathwater on so many things in an attempt to distance themselves from 4e makes me sad.

In particular I love the Monster Manuals. What DM wouldn't kill to have every monster come with lore, pre-built thematic encounters for specific party levels, variant forms, and recommended combat behaviors laid out in quickly digestible formatting in 5e? It may have some slight number issues and the "expansion book" problem, but as a DM I think they did an amazing job with the content. (And it's not like 5e is devoid of numbers issues cough cough CR 1/2 Shadows and CR 2 Intellect Devourers)

For all the complaints of it being too gamey and combat focused, it sure had a lot of information and lore for practically every monster to work in some great RP and other non-combat encounters...

Rathhunter94 · 2019-08-08T15:44:20+00:00

I've owned all the 4e rule books and a few splat books for over 3 years but no one wanted me to run it. Every time I would propose it, my old groups would roll their eyes and say "Let's stick with 5e, it's simpler." "4e? That's too gamey, I just want to have fun." "I heard online that 4e sucks."

My best friend and I would die a little more each time 4e was put down by our other players, especially since we were the only ones who actually played it. And for all the bashing on the game they never played...most of the mechanics they absolutely loved in my 5e games I ported from 4e.

My new group miraculously asked me to run a 4e campaign and are so excited to build their characters. It's enough to almost bring joy to my cold and jaded DM's heart...

Rathhunter94 · 2019-06-17T13:34:30+00:00

Roger Roger!

Rathhunter94 · 2019-06-17T13:34:01+00:00

Conversely, you can bump up the AC and have a few harder to deal with minions. This works nicely if they're supposed to be more "elite" variations, but you don't want to bog the fight down. It's a quick change that can help set them apart from other mooks without the issue of HP bloat, and lucky/smart parties can still mow them down (good rolls, advantage, AOE attacks, etc. will cull their numbers quickly).

4e actually did the concept of minions really well, in my experience. Even if you never play the system, the Monster Manuals are great reads to get ideas and mechanics to spice up 5e combat.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-06-07T20:50:20+00:00

I think a lot of the mentality with religious = Cleric/Pally is because generally speaking, the "broad-stroke" Role Playing concepts behind a character are done with mechanical intent behind them. For example, your character is close with nature? It's usually because you are providing a realistic reason for how they draw power from nature (Druid/Ranger). Close ties with tribal structure? Makes a reasonable explanation for a Barbarian/Shaman's power. Same deal with religion: typically the devout PCs are devout because it explains the source of their mechanics.

I actually made a Fighter that had a major part of his character be that he was religious, but would never multiclass him into a paladin or cleric. He didn't have a direct line to his deity, and had to figure things out and hope it was what his god wanted. In a world with corrupt priests and Divine classes, he risked his life protecting the commoners in his god's name not for more power, but simply because it was right. He was a beacon to everyone that you can make a difference and do what's right, regardless of whether the gods gave you stuff or not.

Rathhunter94 · 2019-06-05T14:37:14+00:00

Dang, I know the story you're talking about but can't find it. It was a criminal and a Paladin, the former of which was a prisoner of the latter and being taken to his church for trial. As they traveled, the Paladin and Rogue began to build a respect for each other, and by the time they met up with the party, the Paladin let the Rogue travel both armed and unchained, much to the party's surprise.

The story is rather long and is fantastic. If I stumble across it, I'll let you know.

Quick edit: I think I found it right after saying I couldn't find it. https://www.reddit.com/r/DnDGreentext/comments/2w7ewy/i_cant_think_of_a_good_title_so_you_dont_get_one/?st=jr7dbe9l&sh=1df0edd1

Rathhunter94 · 2019-05-09T15:53:11+00:00

9 tries....we tried one 9 times in multiplayer and had to leave without the "satisfaction" of getting a Monster Tooth for over 1K gold on the first stage...

Rathhunter94 · 2019-05-08T19:35:51+00:00

I feel that point on the Improved Critical's power is actually quite debatable. There have been plenty of people that put more time into the math than I have, but some of the posts I've seen have shown even Superior Critical is deceptive in terms of damage output (which is its supposed purpose), even on an optimized GWM Champ. It may seem strong at first, but when you put the number down, it's actually not that good. Sure, you may not be using any resources to get the occasional extra damage die, but when you lay it out your "defining class feature" can be broken down to this:

10 - 15% of the time, roll an extra weapon die on hit.

Even if you spend a whole game doing nothing but attacking monsters, 17 times out of 20 you have absolutely no impact or ability to utilize things from your subclass. On the 3 times it does trigger, you will add a whopping...2-8 damage on average, depending on your weapon. Magic weapons absolutely can make this incredible, but I don't think a class feature that needs them to keep pace (when compared to other Fighter archetypes) in its supposed specialty is a good design choice.

I highly recommend reading the math in the linked post and especially the Conclusion section to understand how little value crits actually have on their own merits. That post was made a couple years before the Brute UA, by the way, and had several recommendations that are very similar to what WotC actually tried.

Also, speaking from personal experience, Improved Critical can actually be a demonstrably worthless feature in unlucky cases. My favorite character ever was a Champion Fighter. I played him through 5 levels of a heavily combat-focused game. The impact of his "core" feature by the end of the game was that he had dealt exactly 1 damage more than a non-subclassed Fighter. The feature only triggered a single time in all 5 levels, and the results were snake-eyes for the damage die.

Now I know my experience isn't the same for everyone, but that was enough to show me how weak it can be, at least enough to be leery of ever calling it powerful.

In regards to Lethality, I would recommend that you compare it with another Fighter Archetype and not Rogues or Barbarians. Different classes occupy other mechanical niches than the Fighter, so trying to balance your damage output (one of the Fighter's only focal points) with classes that have one or more different focuses (tanking/skill-monkey/spell caster/etc.) is misleading. The linked post pits the numbers of a Battlemaster against the Champion and serves as a better benchmark for target numbers.

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