FG Forge Linking Guidelines
The Forge is still under active development. Items shown in the following documentation may be recently outdated or differ slightly from current feature sets.
Documentation for The Forge is currently in development. Thank you for your patience.
FG Forge Guidelines for linking to other products
The way Fantasy Grounds Unity is built allows crafters to easily link to other official products, as well as to other FG Forge items directly within the program. This means that original content and intellectual property (IP) is not duplicated at all, but is instead referenced. If Product A links to Product B within FGU, then accessing the linked item in Product A will prompt the user to open Product B.
This is a very powerful feature that allows people to build off of each other's work in a way that increases the value of the original product, without undermining it. The possible downside of this approach is that it requires crafters to clearly communicate this to users so that they don't get surprised by missing dependencies during usage.
Product Description Requirement
Any dependencies should be listed clearly in the product description at the top of the short and long description fields.
Short Description Syntax
Requires: Tome of Beasts
[Rest of short description]
Long Description Syntax
Requires: Tome of Beasts
[Rest of Long description]
Note: the formatting for the URL linking, font sizes, and colors is different on the forums and here in the wiki than it is in the FG Forge. Use the editor buttons to style it appropriately in the FG Forge.
Ruleset and Extension Dependencies
These should write an announcement listing any dependencies. This announcement should occur immediately after any primary announcements for the extension.
Module Dependencies
There is no announcement functionality for modules. Instead, include a list of Dependencies in the reference manual or main story entry text for the module.
Anonymous Linking
You can use the FG Dev Tools: Anonymous Linker to make your links anonymous. Links in Fantasy Grounds Unity include a path to the module by default.
For example, a link to a dragon eel from Tome of Beasts might look like this: reference.npcdata.dragoneel@Tome of Beasts.
An anonymous version removes the module name and will find any matching record with reference.npcdata.dragoneel among any open modules. The link will look like this: reference.npcdata.dragoneel@*. This is great for cases where you only need a reference to a goblin and you don't care if it comes from the SRD or another source.
Participating Publishers
SmiteWorks USA LLC - you can set the FG Art Pack Subscription as a dependency or link to individual products
AAW Games - You can link to any of their map products, tile packs, or other modules.
Devin Night - you can list any of his token packs or require Devin Night Bundles. You cannot duplicate his individual token images in your module directly.
Kobold Press - Map Products or other modules.
Mongoose Publishing - link to anything
Pinnacle Entertainment Games - Follow same rules as "guild" program offered at DTRPG. You can link to main SWADE rules but not to content of actual worlds or IPs.
Other publishers - As confirmation from further publishers is received, this wiki section and its corresponding forum thread (located here) will be updated. If you are a publisher and you would like your name listed, please email ddavison@smiteworks.com or post in the corresponding forum thread.