How to Try a Virtual Tabletop Free, and Actually Evaluate It
Short answer
Test a VTT with one real session, not a feature tour. Run the subsystem you care about most in the first hour, get a second person logged in, and deliberately break something mid-session to see whether you can fix it while people wait. Our tabletops are free for one full campaign per game with unlimited sessions and unlimited players, so the evaluation costs nothing but an evening.
How to Try a Virtual Tabletop Free, and Actually Evaluate It
Almost every virtual tabletop can be tried without paying. The problem is that most people evaluate one by clicking around a feature tour, which tells you what the software has and nothing about whether it will hold up on a Thursday night with five people waiting.
The short version: run one real session, put the subsystem you care about most in the first hour, get a second person logged in, and break something on purpose. Below is what that looks like, and what our free tier actually includes so you can do it here at no cost.
What You Get for Free
Every GM gets one free campaign per VTT. No credit card, no trial countdown, no expiry: - One Stars Without Number campaign, unlimited sessions - One GrimDelve campaign, unlimited sessions, for Shadowdark RPG
Players are always free. There is no player subscription. If a GM is paying, nobody else at that table has to.
Unlimited sessions on the free tier is the part worth reading twice. This is not a demo that expires — it's one whole campaign you can run to its end without paying.
How to Start
- Click "Start Free" on the home page
- Sign in with your Patreon account, or create one — signing in is free
- Select a VTT from the launcher
- Create your first campaign
- Invite players with a shareable link
Players are in the moment they click the link. There is nothing to install.
How to Actually Evaluate It
A feature tour tells you very little. One real session tells you almost everything. Some things worth deliberately testing while you're in there:
Run the subsystem you care about most, first. If you run Stars Without Number for the sector and faction layer, generate a sector and resolve a faction turn in the first hour. If you run dungeon crawls for the pressure of light and time, start a crawl and let a torch burn all the way down. Whatever made you go looking for a purpose-built VTT is the thing to test immediately, not the thing to save for later.
Get a real player in. Everything looks fine with one person logged in. Invite someone and check that what you want them to see is visible, and what you don't, isn't.
Break something on purpose. Edit a character mid-session. Change a world after the party has already been there. The question isn't whether the happy path works — it's whether you can fix things while five people wait.
Notice what you didn't have to set up. That's the actual product. If you got through a session without opening a second window or a spreadsheet, that's the difference.
What a Subscription Adds
The free tier is a complete campaign, not a crippled one. Subscribing adds: - Unlimited campaigns per VTT - The GM Library — rules reference, stats, encounter tables - Early access to features in beta
Per-GM. Your players never pay.
When This Is The Wrong Tool
Worth saying plainly, because finding out three sessions in is worse than reading it now.
If your group plays a different system every couple of months, a generic VTT will serve you better. These are built one game at a time, and only the finished ones exist. The reasoning behind that trade-off is its own post.
If the game you want isn't on the list, there is nothing here for you yet, and the free tier won't change that.
Questions
Use the Tell Us button inside the app, or find us on Patreon. Every message is read by the person who builds this.
Related questions
- Can you try a virtual tabletop for free?
- Yes, and here it is a whole campaign rather than a countdown. Every GM gets one free campaign per VTT with unlimited sessions, no credit card and no expiry. Players never pay at all, on any tier.
- What should you test when evaluating a VTT?
- Run whatever made you go looking for a purpose-built tool, first, not last. Get a real player in, because everything looks fine with one person logged in. Then break something deliberately, such as editing a character mid-session, since the question is not whether the happy path works but whether you can fix things while five people wait.
- Do players have to pay for a virtual tabletop?
- Not here. There is no player subscription and no per-seat fee. If a GM subscribes, nobody else at that table pays anything, and players join through a link with nothing to install.
- When is a purpose-built VTT the wrong choice?
- If your group plays a different system every couple of months, a generic VTT will serve you better. These are built one game at a time, so only the finished ones exist. If the game you want is not on the list, the free tier will not change that.