sweetandtreats.co.uk

What It Is

5etools is a digital reference and tabletop-assist platform for D&D 5E, covering player options, rules, adventures, books, spells, items, bestiaries, DM Screen, loot generators, CR calculators, and more. Based on the site’s own wording, it is not traditional enterprise software; it is closer to a community-driven free tool site, and it emphasizes that users should only access digital reference content for products they own where permitted by local law.

Core Features and Integrations

Its core value lies in rules lookup and virtual tabletop integration. Foundry is a major focus: through the Plutonium module, users can import classes, backgrounds, races, feats, monsters, spells, items, adventures, books, and tables into the sidebar, compendium, or character sheets. The Rivet browser extension supports one-click content sending and dice rolling when both 5etools and Foundry are open. Roll20 can also be used, but it requires Tampermonkey and the betteR20 script, making setup more demanding.

Pricing and Deployment

The site clearly states that it is free and that the source code can be downloaded. No paid plans, subscriptions, payment methods, or enterprise licensing information were found. For deployment, in addition to online use, self-hosting is supported: any device capable of running a basic web server can host it, including a computer, phone, Raspberry Pi, EC2 instance, or Compute Engine instance. This is friendly to technical users who want to keep a local copy.

Collaboration, Security, and Developer Support

The platform has no account system, and all personal data is stored in cookies. If cookies are cleared or an incognito window is closed, the data will be lost; backups can only be downloaded through the settings menu. As a result, it lacks the team collaboration, permission management, auditing, encryption compliance, and SLA capabilities commonly found in enterprise SaaS products. Developer support mainly comes in the form of GitHub source code, a Wiki, contribution guidelines, a Discord community, and the Foundry module manifest, rather than a formal API.

Pros, Cons, and Best-Fit Users

Its strengths include being free, broad feature coverage, practical DM tools, deep Foundry integration, and self-hosting support. Its drawbacks are weak data persistence, browser support that is only explicitly stated for the latest desktop versions of Chrome/Firefox, a Roll20 workflow that depends on scripts, and compliance/copyright boundaries that users must assess for themselves. It is suitable for D&D 5E players, DMs, Foundry users, and hobbyists capable of self-hosting. It is not suitable for enterprise teams that need account systems, permission management, and compliance guarantees.

Access from China

The source text does not provide information on access from mainland China, network stability, or payments, so its availability in China is unknown. If access is unstable, alternatives such as Foundry VTT, Roll20, D&D Beyond, and Fantasy Grounds may be considered, though their actual availability still needs to be tested.