Encounter+ Reviews

Best DM tool for combat

Splinter714

I briefly tried other options, but have never found anything as smooth as this. Developer is very involved, community is incredible, hop on Discord if you have any issues or questions!

I’ve only used it for a few hours but I already cannot imagine running a game smoothly without it. Keeping monster stats and spells stored locally on my device is so much better than any online resource. It recognizes the names of spells and creates hyperlinks to the corresponding spells in the compendium. Projecting the initiative order to my tv using airplay is also such a great idea. It even randomizes the hp and initiative properly. Once you figure out the app, it’s easy to add visual portraits for the monsters and players characters. And I can control it all with my phone so my players cannot see me looking up monster stats over my shoulder. Amazing. I had to make this review cause the app just amazed me. It’s incredible that this is free. 10/10

Outstanding!!

DarkLord3721

This app have made my DMing life far easier, through the different ways of organizing or the use of almost any map, since I can custom the grid sizes super easy. Storing all my custom monsters I make in here. This app is simply beautiful.

What an app!

Bonba46428958

There’s no other app out there like this for DMs. The developer is SUPER active in receiving feedback and improving the app. I’m very impressed. Every DM should use this as their primary tool.

I love this app and the game now

Lumabells

I have always wanted to play dungeons and dragons but none of my friends played so I took on the great responsibility of learning how to be a dungeon master. At this same time I downloaded encounter plus. When I subscribed and got access to the discord I was greeted warmly by a very friendly and helpful community. There are multiple chat rooms where you can talk about your love of the game and also receive help. I have always gotten a very fast answer especially from rrgeorge and the creator of the app .They are always talking about new updates, new ways to use the app, new projects they’re working on themselves that are related. As a female I’ve always been nervous going into a male-dominated hobby but these are the most friendliest, knowledgeable, and coolest people ever. When you download this app you are not only enriching your gameplay, but you are also able to learn about dungeons and dragons along the way like I have.

Maybe the best DM tool ever

TonyRios83

This app is quite possibly the best thing to ever happen to my DMing. As a truck driver, I end up DMing my group from all around the country. Having this app on hand to be able to run our games remotely has changed the game! We used to do it on FaceTime and through text based systems, but this will open up an entirely new world for our group. If you’re a DM and you travel, even if it’s just to someone’s house, there is NO BETTER UTILITY THAN E+!

Best encounter management app for D&D

dmbigmish

I tried pretty much every app for encounter management and this one is by far the best. Now I can create encounters for my players at the right difficulty level and have them all saved and ready to go for our session. Love being able to click through to the stat blocks and to their spells. Really makes the game faster and more fun for me and players! One problem: the help documentation. I do not understand how to import more monster xml from GitHub. I really want Strad monsters and I can’t figure out how to do. Explain that and you got a 5 star app!

Nice but Complicated

LokiiSavaj

It’s a super cool app but you’re pretty much on your own to figure things out. The instructions are super outdated and not even for mobile. None of the buttons are titled or explained. There are pretty irritating bugs when it comes to saving your maps as images ( I use it for play by post games on discord) but I think I will switch to something simpler and more user friendly.

A Lesser-Known Marvel in the VTT Space

MatthewBivins

There are some great Virtual Table Tops out there: FoundryVTT, Fantasy Grounds, Owlbear Rodeo. I have tried a number of them. Owlbear could not be simpler to use, which can be nice for the tech-adverse. And I dearly love the "for nerds, by nerds" approach that Foundry takes—if you can think it, it can exist, and that's fun to experience. But over and over, I keep coming back to Encounter when I need to get the "job" done. Partly because it's wholly Apple-centric, and works so well on both my Macs and iPad. Partly because in so many ways it's much easier to just get going: throw up a map, load in some players and monsters, start an encounter. You can get that with Owlbear, too, but Encounter is amazing because it can be as simple or complicated as you need it to be. This is something that is actually more difficult to achieve when using FoundryVTT…IMHO, Foundry is rarely "simple", and my players can speak to this, too. They prefer Encounter . If you want or need more than a basic combat tracker, Encounter doesn't offer user-created modules that extend your play, but there are some incredible developers that seem to live all day in the official E Discord that have built some freaky amazing tools of their own that work within the confines of this app. Want to write your modules in markdown and then import them into Encounter ? You're looking for @JacobJ. Need to import content from dndbeyond.com? @rrgeorge has your back. The community is scrappy, helpful, hard-working, and supportive. Yes, the documentation is extremely sparse, but find the community using this app and you'll be A-OK. Don't hesitate to start using this incredibly well-made one-man-show of an app to bring your TTRPGs to life (remotely or in person!) just for one or two elements of your game. You'll pick it up in no time, and when you're ready for more, we'll see you in Discord!

Best I've found, but still has issues

Proteus846

For starters: this software is awesome. I've run two campaigns and countless one-shots with it, and once I'd familiarized myself with it the experience was great. It allows me to write and draw less, and keep the flow going without wasting time doing math and figuring out everything else involved in the DM process. That being said, there are some issues and shortcomings: for one, line-of-sight has a serious issue; even with daylight set at max, characters without darkvision are completely blinded when line-of-sight is enabled. I've had to disable it for outdoor encounters during the day, because it made the battlemap completely useless for the two people in the party without darkvision. I understand the web console is a beta feature, but as it is now it's very hit-or-miss. I look forward to the day that's figured out, but for now I keep my external screen running and streamed through Discord for the party's reference. The lack of music support is another issue. I understand music can be handled separately, but I have a friend with another program for VTT and that has music which adds a lot to the experience. We used Rythm on Discord, but that's been taken down and I don't have any other reliable way to stream music over Discord while presenting from Encounter . It would be really great to see some sort of music integration in the app. Aside from that, the only issues I've noticed have been minor annoyances. For example, there are some creatures in the base Monster Manual that aren't in the compendium. It's clear this app is designed for iPad first and foremost, but it's far more useful for me on Mac. (For use with Discord, for simple mouse input, etc) That's fine, but I wish it would be more polished for Mac use. Overall, I love this app. So far it seems to be the best option there is for DM/battlemap software, and I'm on my second year of the annual subscription now. I definitely recommend it!

Encounter+ Reviews – Page 5