Chronica

I like Chronica because it does what I need it to do, build a role-playing world, easily create templates specific to my needs, and then run campaigns within it. I appreciate that it is not bloated with unnecessary features.

The developers are incredibly responsive on Discord, and implemented an Accessibility feature I requested very quickly.

Other Pros: It has a clone feature, where if the manager of a campaign gives you permission, you can clone their templates, databases, and nearly every module possible to help facilitate campaign growth, give you ideas on using the features, and save you a lot of time of data entry.

The shop mechanic is nice as it allows players to directly interact with shops you create and populate with items. It gives the players agency and feels more interactive. A lot of great features, and Discord suggestions and requests are acknowledged and in time, many are implemented.

I have used the trial/paid for versions of World Anvil, Kanka, Obsidian Portal, and others.

I always come back to Chronica. The UI and just general thought process behind using it is incredible. I think some of those others might be "better" for general world building, but to be honest, they are just reskins of wiki engines.

Chronica is purpose built to run RPGs. I love all the extra features like shopkeepers, Encounter builder, the Places feature(my favorite), and the event planning tool. Every feature makes sense to some system or player need including custom dynamic spell lists and player/NPC stats that can be fine tuned to whatever system you run.

The NPC Codex, Player Codex, and Places feature all do a great job balancing art and stats, with as much public and GM/Player only notes as you want.

Also the community is great, for more popular systems, you can "clone" templates so you don't have to re-create the wheel with every campaign.

In regard to cost, I think is very affordable because you can do it per campaign rather than a larger cost for your entire account, so for the two really "upgraded tiers" its only $3 or $5 respectively depending on if you need file hosting. This lets me work on the framework for campaigns for free before "spinning it up" when about to run it. Plus you don't have to spend money to keep your data private, thats free.

The dev team is small but very open to feedback and communication. For "cons" I'd have to say there are some more awkward ways to input large amounts of data. I would like to see custom icons via markdown and API access but there are really edge case uses, and the dev has a list of more popular feature requests that they are working through.

But all in all, even if it's not as expansive as some of its rivals, its look and feel, and actual usability is second to none. Start here, and I think you will have all the support you need to run a great campaign.