New to Roll20 or RPGs? Need Guidance? Click Here. (Read the OP First)

Hi Is there a way to use Roll20 purely as a face to face utility? I've a map I want to show on a monitor along with the fog of war.  On my laptop monitor, I (GM) have the full map, but what I display on the external (pc's) monitor, is their map, complete with fog of war Can this be done? Thanks

Many people hook up another computer or tablet to a separate monitor or tv and use it that way. If you are talking about using one laptop and two monitors (laptop and a second monitor), I'm not sure.

Mark J, the way I've seen have the best success is the GM is logged into GM's account on GM's computer, and then a secondary machine is logged into a 'player' (free) account to display the player's view either on that machine or a projector/TV hooked up to the player machine. This allows GM secrets to stay secrets.  If you search the forums, you'll see a handful or two of threads on the subject.  If you need additional help, feel free to start a thread in Specific Questions :)

Thanks all I never created a new topic as I wasn't sure how to do so. Then it dawned on me I had to click on the 'View Forum' button  That's old age for you!

Haha... So I'm new. I'm already in a game so I don't need a game.

Hey all, totally new to Roll20, and I probably missed this answer somewhere, but who all needs to subscribe?  If I get a pro sub, do my players also have to have one?  If I have it and they don't, do they see the "content" I've paid for, or do they see something plain?  We'll be running a Star Wars Force and Destiny game, and would like to use the Star Wars dice, but if I'm reading it right, that cannot be done without paying for the pro-level subscription.  If I have that and my players don't, can they access the API for the game I'm running, or are they just out of luck until they subscribe? Thanks all, this is my first post here, so please be forgiving if this has been asked a million times :)

Hi John.  Welcome to roll20. Players get to enjoy the benefits of the GM's subscription level even if they only have free accounts.  You'll need to be Pro level if you want to use API scripts like the one used for Star Wars dice/sheet.  Cheers.

Thanks Vince, that's what I needed to know :)

John B., here is a breakdown of benefits by subscription level .  The creator of a game is who needs to have the subscription for the players of that game to enjoy the benefits.

Hi, I am new to D20. I dabbled in D&D once around the end of the 3.5 phase and into the start of the 4.0 but lost all my books and papers to a flood. I have a few questions I would appreciate it if I could get some answers. 1- Dose D20 allow me to play D&D  with other people online? I have no one to play with ;( 2- How do I set up my character sheet, and do I get to use the same character in multiple campaigns or would I need to make a new one for each campaign? 3- is there an app that goes with this, that would make for easier access and use? if the answer is yes even twice then I love D20 already and am excited to get started.

Welcome to Roll20, Moon B. Answering your questions: 1) Yes, that is the entire point of Roll20. 2) a) Character sheets are assigned by GMs of games, once you join them.  Discuss with your GM how to create characters and fill out a sheet. b) If you subscribe to Roll20 you have access to the Character Vault , which allows you to save characters to use in other campaigns 3) Roll20 is a web-based and web-hosted service, there is nothing to download. To get kicked off right, I'd suggest watching one or both of the introductory video series: 1) If you're absolutely brand new to RPGs and want to know the general idea of how they are played, which game to choose and then find a group of fellow gamers: Check out our Introduction to Tabletop RPGs series . 2) If you've played tabletop RPGs before and just want to get a understanding of how Roll20 can be used: Check out our Roll20 Crash Course . This is a step-by-step overview for creating your very first Roll20 game . This tutorial uses the Pathfinder RPG to frame itself, but it's not a system specific tutorial and you should be able to follow along without knowing one single thing about Pathfinder. Starting your own test game to play with the controls is an excellent way of getting used to the software, and you really can't break anything I promise! Secondly, check out the Looking For Group Tool and Looking for Group Forum daily for games that may be of interest to you. Thirdly, be sure to completely fill out your User Profile . Your Bio is where you have a chance to catch a GM's eye with a well-written statement about yourself Enjoys Playing is important for two reasons: Every entry you put here is a data-point for the The Orr Group Industry Report of games being played, and it lets other people looking at your profile know a bit more about you Actively Seeks Group For is where you can add yourself to the Player Directory for systems you want to play Feel free to ask any questions you have about Roll20 and post in the various forums on their particular topics (Don't stress about putting topics in the right sub-forums, we mods really don't mind moving topics when needed!) Happy gaming!

Hello Rollers. My name is Carrington and I played D&D 4E a good bit back in the day, even made my own campaign that lasted 3 sessions. I'm new to this site and haven't been able to tabletop anymore due to work taking my soul and time. If anyone has some tips for a good group to start with, please let me know. I am free on Sundays and Mondays. I like to think that I have a good sense of humor to bring to the table and look forward to getting to know some people here. Thanks for having me. :)

Welcome to Roll20 Carrington, this is certainly the place to reclaim some of that lost soul that work is so determined to suck dry... admittedly GM's will spend most of their time trying to claim it from you but at least it'll be fun! I would give you some tips on getting started but instead I would highly recommend reading the bulk of GenKitty's post directly above yours, everything you need to know and then some to get a game :)

Is there any way to create charactsrs without starting a new game? Im looking for something that i can store my existing characters on for face to face p&p, without having hordes of paper

Anthony, there is not a way of doing that, though there are suggestions in the suggestions and ideas forum around externally editing characters for a given Game, which would be similar.  However, anyone can create a Game, so you could certainly create one to house your characters for offline gamine, if that's what you wanted to do.

anthony m., Characters exist within the framework of games as character journals , but you can create a game of your own (with just you in it) at any time for making characters.  A number of us have solo games for testing and other purposes.  If you need help with the built in character sheets , don't hesitate to ask over on the Character Sheets Forum. Something to consider: one of the benefits of a subscription is being able to create your own custom character sheets .  ;) (Gotta love a site where we mods trip over each other trying to help people ;)  )

There is a spot on my profile that says to "tag" games, but I can not figure how to do that.  I've read a lot of the different forums and searched, but can not find out how to actually tag a game.  Can someone please help? Thanks

Brian, I took a look at my profile and yours but did not see the word tag. Where did you see the word tag on your profile? There is a enjoys playing menu that you can select your systems and there is an actively seeking group for menu also but I did not see any thing called tag. 

Sorry .. on the "my games" menu ... it says this but I can't find a way to "tag" games. My Tags You haven't tagged any games yet! Tagging is a great way to organize your games, making them easy to find later.

That is for sorting your games. To edit it, you have to click on edit tags then just type in your keyword in the empty bar space then click on I'm done. <a href="https://wiki.roll20.net/Game_Management#My_Tags" rel="nofollow">https://wiki.roll20.net/Game_Management#My_Tags</a>

Hi, I started to play a few months ago with a bunch of friends. We really appreciate the site and all of this feature, thank you for that :) After some game session, our GM decided to upgrade his account, so that we'll have more gameplay options etc. I was wondering if it is possible for other players than the GM to pay the account subscription, but still granting the advantages to the GM account, directly on the website ? (not trying to get on the good side of the GM there ^^) If not, we'll manage IRL, but it can be difficult as we are not close, geographically speaking Thanks for your answer :)

Hi Patrick, from a users profile page you can opt to gift a subscription. You can then define how much to 'donate' which will be added to the users subscription account. Hope that helps

Oh, ok, guess I must be blind ^^ I only checked through the subscription page and the option to make a gift isn't available on this page. But there it is, just right there on my user page Thanks for the quick answer :)

Howdy, so I'm kind of new to this whole world of roleplaying; that is to say not entirely new to be fair but I've never really been lucky enough to know or live near to people who do tabletop roleplaying and I've always wanted to get into the ol' pen and paper but an unfortunate combination of not enough time, not enough money and not enough people have prevented me from getting stuck in (at least I had some playthroughs on YouTube to amuse me in the meantime). Well with luck I can change that on here! All I want to know is, do I need to start going and buying up as many rulebooks and so on as I can get my hands on or is most of that sort of stuff for the GMs? I get the basics of how tabletop games are played but I don't really know how to make characters yet or what, if anything, I need to play on this site.

Callum D., The answer to your question depends on the GM of the game. Many GMs will appreciate you having a passing familiarity with the ruleset for whichever system the game is playing, but there are a lot of newbie-friendly games and intended-for-newcomer games out there if you look around, and those GMs will teach you what you need to know to play. In addition, there are systems with free rules, or free 'basic' rules to get you started. Check out the Looking For Group Tool and Looking for Group Forum daily for games that may be of interest to you, focusing on games that are welcoming new players. Happy gaming!

I'm sorry, was that the sound of a reply whooshing past my head or am I being shot at? Or in human-speak, you sure are fast at replying, much appreciated! Anyway that works for me, thanks, I'm already browsing the newbie friendly games and hoping to see what horrible fates await my characters! Once again, thank you for being so fast and so helpful! You take care out there!

Hello folks. &nbsp;I am a begginer on this sight. &nbsp;(though I have played in several traditional pen and paper RPG's and am looking to GM a game for some friends and family. &nbsp;I was thinking of using one of the character sheet options supplied through the basic Roll20 account but have found that the only one on there that I am familiar with is Gurps which is a little bit above the complexity level I'm looking for. &nbsp;Any suggestions for which of the other character sheets are most flexible/begginer friendly&nbsp;

How does one create a forum topic? I can only see a way to reply, but I would like to be able to speak out in the community via my own topic.

Fae, If you click on the view forum in the main forum index (chose your forum) it will turn into an expanded list of all posts in that forum. You will have a post new topic button in the right side towards the top.

Is there a way to either mark or tag games we apply to? &nbsp;It s hard to remember which games I've applied to, unless I'm accepted as a player. &nbsp;It would be even more awesome if the "topics followed" link on the profile page included LFG topics, not just forum topics. &nbsp;Thanks

Brian, Currently, using your browser's native bookmarking feature is the best way to handle this.

Hello -- new user here, and I apologize if this has been asked and answered somewhere else. Is there a way to transfer custom decks of cards from one campaign to another? I use a deck-based power set for characters (sort of Pathfinder style) and it would be great to be able to use an existing deck in more than one campaign rather than recreating it every time. Thanks!

Anthony W. said: Hello -- new user here, and I apologize if this has been asked and answered somewhere else. Is there a way to transfer custom decks of cards from one campaign to another? I use a deck-based power set for characters (sort of Pathfinder style) and it would be great to be able to use an existing deck in more than one campaign rather than recreating it every time. Thanks! Check out our Game Management wiki:&nbsp;<a href="https://wiki.roll20.net/Game_Management#Settings" rel="nofollow">https://wiki.roll20.net/Game_Management#Settings</a> - As long as you are the creator of the game, you can use the copy feature to duplicate the game, including your deck. You can choose which elements to include or remove when you make the copy.

Thanks very much!

Hello! I just upgraded to the Pro version of subscription, and I saw that I now have access to premium tokens, but I am not sure what that means. When I go to add tokens to a game that fall under the premium flag, I am still redirected to buying it in the marketplace. So does the Pro version allow me to buy them? Or does it actually provide it for my use? Just curious, and sorry if its stated elsewhere, but I've been looking for a couple of hours online and I can't seem to find an answer. Thanks for your time!

Ahoy, Roque; If you open up a game table (that you have GM rights over), and open up your art library , and go to 'Your Purchases', you will see tokens listed there that are free for your use by virtue of your Pro level account.&nbsp; These tokens will also appear on art searches you do on the Art Library tab.

Thank you for your help! Have a nice day.

Hello, players! Ich have a short question: Ich have played PnP only one time with a small group of friends and we didnt use a normal "Dice-Technic", we actually had something different but I simply cant remember what we had to wrote to get it, thats why I have to ask in this forum... maybe someone could help me with that. All I know ist, that it calculated 4 numbers which had to be -1, 0 or +1, so in the first step it said something like 1 0 -1 1 and at the end it said the sum of it (1). I want to use this in my current game, so it would be very cool, if someone could help me. Good day to everyone. - Desgun

Zach that sounds like Fate/FAE, fudge, or something similar to them.

Those would be, indeed, Fudge/Fate dice.

Hey guys I'm having issues getting my DMs link to work. I keep getting an error message that says not authorized. Is anyone familiar with this and how to make it work?

Zach, are you saying your DM has given you a link and you can't seem to join it? &nbsp;Try having your DM send you an email with a join link. &nbsp;Emailed links seem to go through a different system. &nbsp;I've seen rare cases where the normal join link doesn't work, but the emailed one does.

Hi. &nbsp;Fairly new to Roll20 but our group and I are enjoying it after our first session. &nbsp;Going through the learning curve but looking forward to getting better with the interface. &nbsp; Quick question though from a GM design/interface perspective. &nbsp;If I want to show portraits of NPCs or landscapes what's the best method? &nbsp;I've only thought of putting them in the maps area and then making that active. Thanks in advance. Lengard

Hi Glenn, if you want to display information graphically without having to utilise a page of the game I would recommend putting them in handouts and journal entries. You can then use the 'show to players' button to automatically make the handout/journal available in their journal tab as well and thrusting it onto their screens. Don't worry about character sheet related info, unless a play has control of a character journal they will only be able to view the avatar and bio... the best thing is that they can then look at that info any time they want after your initial display :)

Primo Yuriku,&nbsp;Due to time constraints in keeping Roll20 going, we only allow discussion directly related to the interface here on the forums.

bonjour tout le monde je voudrait savoir si il n'y a que des personne qui parle en anglais sur roll20 car je suis débutant et j'aimerais bien avoir des conseil pour bien commencer en tant que mj et je ne parle pas très bien anglais

Bonjour florent p. -&nbsp;Il ya beaucoup d'utilisateurs francophones sur Roll20! Essayez les forums pour "francais" et vous devriez trouver certains utilisateurs français, comme ceci: <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/2366891/slug%7D" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/2366891/slug%7D</a> - Je espère que cela! (Traduit par Google )&nbsp;

Thanks&nbsp;Ziechael!!! Lovin' the interface so far and have had two success adventures with our group. Appreciate it Lengard (Glenn)