I’ve been having so much fun putting together our first adventure and planning for the long haul in a real D&D Campaign. I’m seriously excited! These past few weeks have really reminded me how much I enjoy the whole process of DM’ing. I love the process of designing and creating a good story, working in my players personal backgrounds to make the story more rich and rewarding for them, carefully planning out encounters to be challenging for the group but not so challenging it leads to a total player wipe, and anticipating how my players might break or bend the rules on me in the first five minutes to make all those hours of preparation go out the window. This is all part of the labor of love that is known as DM’ing and I enjoy every second and hour of it (and there are many, MANY hours of it). Unfortunately however, DM’ing does not only cost me my time, it also costs me real life money. Due to my limited resources this only allows me to do so much so fast for you as players….unless you help!
NO ONE should feel obligated to pay a thing. I do not charge for my services as a DM nor does the game client for Fantasy Grounds cost you any money (you should be playing the free Demo). If you want to play entirely for free, I totally want you to have that option without ANY guilt. Having said that, if you just so happen to be blessed financially enough to spare a little donation, let me explain to you what I would do with your donations to make the game more enjoyable for everyone.
The way Fantasy Grounds works is that the basics are free. As a player, it costs you nothing to download the client and create a free account. This allows you to join games hosted by other DM’s who are either paying a monthly subscription or have paid for a one time license. In order to host the type of game I am hosting for you (with all the bells and whistles), I have had to sign up for a subscription at $10 a month for the past two months. Realizing now how powerful the client is I decided to get out of playing month to month and have now purchased a full one-time license for $130. No more monthly fees.
Much of the core rules of D&D are provided for free to you as players and to me as the DM, however, these are just the BASIC rules. There is a lot of information left out however. For example, if I want the party to encounter a goblin in the adventure, I could get a paper copy of the book, look up the stats for a goblin, type it all up into Fantasy Grounds and then use that goblin in the next adventure. Or, if I bought say the “Monster Manual” module I simply look up a goblin online in a quick search and then drag it from the online book into my adventure and BAM, all the typing is done for me including images of a goblin, miniatures tokens for the goblin to use on a map, all it’s stats already entered, etc. It’s a MASSIVE time saver but comes with a cost in money so that Wizards of the Coast get their royalties and so those who coded it for me get some compensation for their time.
The good news is, only one person has to buy a module for everyone to take advantage. Whomever owns a module can share that module with all other players so long as they are in the same session together. So for example, If I buy the monster manual and you connect to my game, suddenly YOU have access to the monster manual too so long as your logged into my game. No need for you to buy your own copy of the Monster Manual. As players you COULD buy a module I don’t have for yourself and I would have access to it when you join my game, but ONLY for while you are joined to my game. So, as the DM, I mostly need to have the modules on MY account so I can prep offline when you’re not around and have full access to everything.
As a DM, I found buying the Monster Manual invaluable to me as a time saver so I bought it and added it to my account for $30. In addition, I’m hoping to run our campaign long term and the campaign book I’m using (which I also own in hard copy for $50), cost me another $30 to buy the electronic version in Fantasy Grounds. Buying that however allows me to click and drag any NPC from the campaign instantly into my adventure, have all the beautiful maps already loaded with map pins in it for Fantasy Grounds to let me know secret information about places on the map, etc. It’s awesome! And, because you are joining my game, you too have access to these modules if I share them with you at no charge to you for as long as you are signed into my game. Obviously some of that is going to be hidden from you so it doesn’t spoil the game.
As you can see below, I own the Monster Manual but do not own a full copy of the Player’s Handbook or the Dungeon Master’s guide yet which would be really helpful. Unfortunately those are both $30 a piece and I’m already hundreds into this thing. For example, I already had hard copies of both books I bought at $50 each but now I also bought the electronic versions for $30 each. In addition there are other amazing supplements out there Xanathar’s Guide to Everything and so much more.
SOOOO, after all this, here is my shameless pitch. If you have the financial means to donate to the cause, I’d like to provide you a pay pal option to make a private donation to me here. Because I do not want anyone shamed for not being able to donate I will keep your donations private to everyone else. If you send me donations I will use donations made to me here to purchase NEW modules or material that we can all use so long as we play together. In other words, I’m not asking for compensation for what I’ve already spent, just some help buying NEW material we can all benefit from.
