Not sure if this is the right place to post this, but here goes.

I recently got back into D&D through this site and finding groups online. Most of these groups use some kind of Virtual TableTop (VTT) for combat.

Now, I love the idea of VTTs, I think it's a wonderful concept and I was excited to try it out, but due to technical limitations I am unable to access them and will likely remain so for a good while.

But a workaround was discovered. If I can have someone in the group send me a screenshot via Discord at the top of my combat turns, it gives me all I need to effectively strategize in combat, and my imagination takes care of the other 99% of the game. It doesn't hamper my play in the slightest, and it only takes 20 seconds maximum extra time from a friendly volunteer each round (not the DM because they have extra stuff on their screen that's hard to hide).

So I'm in one active campaign, and the others I had fell through for various reasons, and I'm looking to join more so I put in some requests through these forums. I get a few interviews and I mention the VTT issues and easy workaround upfront, and people act like there's no possible way I could play without being logged into it.

My question is...why? 

Why do people react like that? Especially when I explain how it works just fine? Yeah, it's not the most ideal situation, but if everything else vibes right why should that be considered such an impossible hurdle - again with evidence to the contrary? 

If I can roll on this website, and can take my turn quickly and efficiently with just screenshots ONLY during combat and ONLY on my turns, why should that alone be a barrier for entry? What else are VTTs supposed to do that someone would think a game with me would be unplayable?

I've never gotten a straight answer. Most refuse to, and the few that do make no sense. I had someone tell me once that I "would never be able to explore towns and wilderness without the group", which 1) Why would you split the party and go solo except on downtime or RP stuff in the first place, and 2) Of course I could explore without a VTT because my brain knows how to form mental images from descriptions.

Like, I'm okay if we just don't vibe, or if my character isn't what your group needs or if we have disagreements on content. Those are perfectly reasonable. But this attitude about the VTTs baffles me. Can someone help clue me in please?

Some campaigns have the party's character sheets on the VTT, not on D&D Beyond. Some do all the dice rolling on the VTT, not on DDB

Aside from that, you are creating more work for someone in the party, whether it's the DM or another player, even beyond taking and sending the screenshots. You may give detailed instructions for what you want to do on your turn, but somebody has to actually move your token where you wanted it to go, and the DM has to give that somebody permission to do it on their side of the VTT. And what happens if the action/movement you spelled out doesn't actually happen or needs to be adjusted, due to a reaction from the enemy, or triggering a trap, or something like that? Or the person moving your token gets it wrong, and the error isn't discovered until your next turn? There are all kinds of complications that could make it a hassle, so I can see why some groups might be reluctant to try and accommodate you when they can simply bring someone else in

There are online campaigns out there that don't use VTTs though, and are just Theater of the Mind via Discord or Zoom, so you can always focus on finding one of those instead

There are a few technical issues that can become extra steps pending which VTT people use.  Sure, they are all something you can overcome, but that doesn't make everyone willing to do so.  You can make an extra dice room on many different programs, you can give permissions out, but at the same time it's just extra steps that some don't want to bother with.

You went looking for a group just after i got my group going, so it was unlucky to some degree as i would not have such requirements.  However, the people that are in my boat as a DM that want to do more or less descriptions of the environment and the table is more mental than physical are less common than the ones that fully function on a board (or at least 75%+ on the board).  So your problem in my opinion is a tight 4 hour window of time.  If someone doesn't have a session that either starts at 8pm eastern or 8:30pm, you don't really fit.  If you can start at 7:30pm or can go until 12:30am with the occasional 1am, you open up more opportunity as now tables that start at 7:30, 8:00, 8:30, and 9 probably would all feel comfortable bringing you on board. 

If someone in our group leaves at any point i'll keep you in mind, but in the mean time hopefully my suggestions above might increase your odds if you are able to maybe get a bit more time secured once a week.

I don't know if it is the case with the lfg group here, but there are plenty of campaigns which are done "theatre of the mind" and so don't really benefit from having a map that a VTT provides.

Some DMs set up their VTT to have a lot of automation, so when you designate a target on the VTT then your attack will automatically subtract damage from that enemy. This sort of automation is far more difficult if one player doesn't have access to the VTT.

The following is purely intended to help illuminate what they're thinking and feeling. It's going to be harsh, but it's important to understand why accepting you (or rather, the challenges you have) into the party is a problem.

Putting myself in their shoes and looking at your post as an explanation of your challenges, this is what jumped out to me:

Why haven't you gone for the better solution of screensharing? That would give you real time updates and give you a full picture of the situation as it's happening.

The answer that jumps out to me is that your problem isn't specific to VTTs.  The problem is that either your rig really isn't up to scratch or your connection is rubbish, so livestreaming is unfeasible. That's concerning for me as a DM. If that's the problem, then the screen captures and waiting for them to be uploaded, received and dealt with will be the least of the party's problems; they can look forward to hang ups, freezing, incoherent gibberish as your audio breaks up, and all the other joys of dealing with struggling technology. Even if that's not the reason, it's what'll be going on in the back of many people's heads as they wonder if that's the real problem and you're just saying that it's for reason X so they'd accept you.

Even if things go well, you're adding 20 seconds onto every round (at least, what about Reactions? What if you or someone else uses and ability/spell that causes involuntary movement?) in a game that already is slow and combat is time consuming. I'm requesting players do things that shave off like 5 seconds just to get things moving faster, and you want to add 20+ seconds every round. 

There are also the previously mentioned concerns.

This is going to sound harsh, but it's vital to understanding what's going on, but...After all that...why would I, a random (to you) DM, want to deal with that, when I can easily get players that come without those issues? If you were my personal friend, I'd do it and put up with those inconveniences, but for some random person on the internet? I wouldn't be excited, that's for sure.

There are two kinds of DM that will accept you into their campaign. One is the desperate DM that just wants players; they're desperate for a reason. The other is the all-welcoming DM, and that means there's a good chance that you're not the only one bringing challenges to the table. It could be really good, or you might find that being accommodating comes with a cost to the whole party.

I don't know what your specific challenges are. However, I suggest you resolve whatever it is stopping you from playing using VTTs, or find games that don't use them. Screensharing might be something you hadn't considered and might serve to allay a lot of the fears the DM's are having. Alternatively, upgrading your hardware or connection might be in order.

The other choice is to not use VTTs. Instead, Theatre of Mind, PbP or physical games might be the better way forward for you.

That's harsh, and I don't like saying it, but you need to understand why it's not working out for you so far. Perhaps you don't need to change anything, the next game you apply for could accept you as-is, and it'll be the most awesome game you'll ever play. I'd be glad for you if that did happen. However, that you're not getting accepted thus far suggests that something needs to change, and as far as I can tell, those are the biggest barriers (I'm assuming that you're not answering the greatest weakness question with you being a stalker or somesuch).

Quote from SavageStar >>

There are a few technical issues that can become extra steps pending which VTT people use.  Sure, they are all something you can overcome, but that doesn't make everyone willing to do so.  You can make an extra dice room on many different programs, you can give permissions out, but at the same time it's just extra steps that some don't want to bother with.

You went looking for a group just after i got my group going, so it was unlucky to some degree as i would not have such requirements.  However, the people that are in my boat as a DM that want to do more or less descriptions of the environment and the table is more mental than physical are less common than the ones that fully function on a board (or at least 75%+ on the board).  So your problem in my opinion is a tight 4 hour window of time.  If someone doesn't have a session that either starts at 8pm eastern or 8:30pm, you don't really fit.  If you can start at 7:30pm or can go until 12:30am with the occasional 1am, you open up more opportunity as now tables that start at 7:30, 8:00, 8:30, and 9 probably would all feel comfortable bringing you on board. 

If someone in our group leaves at any point i'll keep you in mind, but in the mean time hopefully my suggestions above might increase your odds if you are able to maybe get a bit more time secured once a week.

I appreciate your offer, even if nothing ends up coming from it. I'm assuming you got my preferred time from looking up some of my other posts, and while that does restrict what I feel I can apply to that rarely factors into people's decisions on me because, well, I respond to people in that general timeframe. 7:30 is hard because kids go to bed at 7 and I usually need more than half an hour to eat and clean up. I did try a 9-1 and it worked for a while, but when the household got sick I fell asleep near the end of two sessions and while that's a rare enough thing that I would have happily continued with it if there hadn't been other complications, I want to avoid putting myself in that position again. Also, I don't always have to rigidly end right at exactly 12 every night, just saying that's a preferred end time to aim for as I tend to hit my wall around that time.

As for everyone else, the answers either seem to be either "people assume I'm lying about how big the problem actually is", which puts me in a catch-22 situation since not mentioning it upfront is really bad form; or "people have grown too reliant in extra bells and whistles some VTTs provide", which...I'm not going to judge because bells and whistles are cool and all, but it's hardly necessary to play a good game.

I did want to clarify a few things. My LAPTOP rig/connection isn't working that's true (and you say "just upgrade" when I already said I can't afford it), but I do voice chat through Discord and Discord (and D&DB) through Mobile, and my data plan is excellent. So that's a non-issue. I've had people suggest screensharing through Discord, but the few times it was attempted the thing wouldn't work on *their* end. And the 20 seconds thing was an overestimation by me. I've shared screenshots and pictures this way many times and it takes me less time to do it, but I allow for people to not have to rush (they are doing me a favor, after all). Like, I'm also not looking for games that are just combat or are trying to rush through things.

The problem with 100% TotM is that having something of a battlemap is vital to me for things like making sure I can get somewhere without provoking opportunity attacks, or aiming an AoE spell to maximize enemies hit and avoid hitting friends. But that's literally all I need it for, so I can get by without it more of the time. Like I said before it's not an ideal situation but in practice the inconvenience is negligible at worst, and I wouldn't suggest my way as a viable workaround if it hadn't already been successfully tested many times. 

No one said "just upgrade", and your financial situation wasn't mentioned.

You have a problem that is causing you grief that is largely caused by "technical limitations". No one here can control the prospective DM's reactions to these challenges, and you're correct that you can't keep it from them (both for honesty and the fact that the consequences would be worse when it came up). The only solutions then, are to either remove the limitation or to find another medium of play. Look, it's not that I'm being dismissive. I've only ever played in a normal sized party for two sessions because I just don't have many people to play with - most of my sessions have been with my wife. That sucks, and I'd really like to play regularly with larger parties. My alternatives are not appealing to me though, in part because my internet connection is crappy and I can't justify paying for a better one. That it's not feasible for me to pay to solve my problem doesn't change the fact that I have to either pay up or just accept my situation. We're both in (as far as D&D goes) crappy situations with no magical solution that let us have our cakes and eat it. 

I wish I could magic away the issues for you, but I can't. You've asked why DMs are being reluctant to accept you, at least part of that has been answered - they're concerned that it's an extra burden that they won't have to deal with if they get someone else to join instead. That sucks. Are they right to behave that way? That's a controversial question. Regardless of the answer though, that's how they are behaving. I'm not saying you're wrong for disliking it, but it is what it is. If you're not being given a chance, then something has to change.

I wouldn't be dismissive of their concerns. It may have worked well for you in the past, but it probably hasn't for them, and it's not unreasonable for them to have concerns about how it would work out. You've asked for help understanding why they are acting the way they do - and one thing I've learnt is that you can't understand someone if you dismiss their concerns, priorities and motivations as "negligible", even if it seems that way to you.

When recruiting for a game, every special consideration required to accommodate your presence, no matter how minor or workable it may be, makes you a less attractive addition than applicants who fully meet the criteria. This is unfortunate for you in this case but can be expected in most any situation where there are a variety of candidates to choose from—the candidate that most closely fits the bill gets selected. People don’t have to justify their criteria to you. People also don’t owe you their time or a spot in their game. It’s best to just move on and find a group that is willing to accept you without cajoling rather than torture yourself over the rejection or becoming embittered towards those who rejected you.

This is not me being dismissive, it’s me recommending the only course of action truly available to you since there is no way to make a DM or group let you play with them. It’s like looking for a job: not getting hired sucks but you don’t spend a bunch of time trying to make the company that rejected you hire you instead; you keep looking for work elsewhere until you find someone that hires you. 

Best of luck finding a group to accept you as is! Kudos to you for being honest even when it means you don’t get to play. That’s tough but you are doing the right thing there. 

I can't add much beyond the points others brought up, other than to lend to what I've learnt from World of Warcraft's raiding scene. Though the video below is entitled "Elitism vs Expectations of You as a Raider," I'm not saying you're calling people out for elitism, but I link it because it asks that prospective raiders look at things from the point of view of the raid leader and the rest of the group. Things like using text chat instead of voice comms, having others make a macro for them, stepping down for an encounter, or needing a computer good enough to fight the boss.

The point is you're asking the DM to do something that takes time out of the session, and unless you can bring something that makes up for it, they can easily turn to the myriad players who won't have this hurdle, however small.

I can in some way relate to your problem. I do session recap videos for my group, and I have the responsibility of taking timely screenshots to litter throughout the video in editing in order to support the story I'm telling. Windows' Snip & Sketch can be unresponsive, I sometimes have to ask others to wait or reload an old screen (say we've just left the wilderness and are now in town, I might need to see the wilderness again), and uploading pics to Discord can be slow at times. I personally don't see it as the easy workaround you make it out to be, and regardless of if "it doesn't hamper my play in the slightest," it hampers the gameplay of others every round a token is moved. It is possible, but it's intervals the group can do without over the course of a campaign.

I would recommend against virtual tabletops unless you advertise that you're looking for a group and need this accommodation rather than applying to DMs. Otherwise, I'd either recommend theatre of the mind, play-by-post (PBP) which can be done on this here forum or physical tabletops.

I wish you the very best.