One is a drawing app you own, one turns a written scene into a finished map. Here’s how to pick for your table.
Choose Dungeondraft if you want to own a drawing tool outright: $19.99 once, offline, with smart dungeon tools and a VTT export that carries wall and lighting data. Choose NeedAMap if you want the map without the drawing: describe the scene and get an encounter-ready map in under a minute, in any genre, right in the browser.
| Dungeondraft | NeedAMap | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Desktop map-drawing app with smart dungeon tools | Scene-to-map tool: you describe the encounter and get a finished map |
| How a map gets made | You draw it: walls, floors, and objects, with a built-in dungeon and cave generator for layouts | You write a few sentences, then pick shape, style, and resolution |
| Time to a table-ready map | Minutes for a generated layout, a real drawing session for a detailed map | Under a minute |
| Price | $19.99 one-time; community asset packs sold separately | Free: 5 maps. $4/month for 15 credits that roll over up to 30, or a $3 pack of 10 credits that never expires |
| Commercial use | Allowed for original creations, no royalties | Allowed on every tier, including free |
| Genres | Fantasy out of the box; other genres need community asset packs | Fantasy, sci-fi, horror, western, modern, and anything else you can describe |
| Platform | Windows, Mac, and Linux desktop app; ARM machines unsupported | Runs in the browser on any machine |
| VTT export | Universal VTT format with wall and lighting data; Foundry and Roll20 through modules | Standard image export; at 2K that’s about 146 pixels per grid square, above Roll20’s recommendation |
Dungeondraft is the better fit in three situations. You run Foundry with dynamic lighting and want walls baked into the file: its Universal VTT export carries wall and lighting data that an image import does not. You want to own your tools: $19.99 once, offline, no account. Or you like the drawing itself and prefer a map you authored tile by tile.
The usual reasons people look are time and range. A detailed Dungeondraft map is still a drawing session, and stepping outside classic fantasy means shopping community asset packs before you can start. NeedAMap trades the drawing for a written description: any genre out of the box, under a minute to a finished map, in the browser on any machine. Our maps import as standard images: you draw lighting walls in your VTT the way you would for any downloaded map.
Curious how the described-and-done side works? See how NeedAMap works, compare plans, or see every battle map maker compared.
For getting an encounter map to the table quickly, yes: you describe the scene and get a finished map in under a minute, with no drawing and nothing to install. If you need wall and lighting data baked into the export for Foundry, Dungeondraft keeps that advantage.
Dungeondraft costs $19.99 once. NeedAMap starts free with 5 maps; after that a $3 pack buys 10 credits and $4/month buys 15 that roll over up to 30. Both cost less than a rulebook; the real difference is how much of your evening each map takes.
Yes. Both import its maps, and Foundry reads the wall and lighting data through a module. NeedAMap maps import into both as standard images; at 2K that works out to about 146 pixels per grid square, above Roll20’s recommendation.
