Over time, I've come to the conclusion that the most important part of any table is to find a group whose views on the many and varied aspects of how to approach the game are compatible.

To me, it doesn't really matter if your table is a bunch of hard core tactical war gamers which bathe in blood as they lurch from dungeon room to dungeon room and to who never do any Character development, or a group of drama majors sitting around and talking in Character for 6 hours without a single die roll. So long as everyone is one the same page, and keeps coming back - it's a good table.

It's also the age of the Internet - where Discord, Roll20, and Fantasy Ground are available.

So - provided that online play doesn't leave out some important social element for you ( pizza? ) so that online play really isn't for you - we really don't have a reason we can't find or build a compatible gaming group. Contrast that with picking up all the available Players in your neighbourhood where you can be pretty sure you'll get a mix of Player type, and the risk of incompatible Player types is high.

I'm not suggesting that everyone be clones - diversity is healthy - but I think we can have a diversity of Players and still notch up the compatibility of everyone at the table.

So - I've been thinking about the aspects that I'd want to interview Players about for a new group - and that's a huge, complex, and convoluted rabbit hole, and who the hell would want to be interviewed and grilled about their playing style, anyways?

So - why not use a Darwinistic approach: run an ongoing series of one-shot adventures, and test out new Players. Occasionally, you'll run across a Player whose style makes you go "yeah! I really want to play with that person in my game on an ongoing basis". If you're lucky, they'll want to keep playing with you as DM. Do that enough times, and you eventually might have an online group.

So - who has done this sort of thing to set up a new online gaming group? How well did it work? Where did you set up? Any advice?

Thanks,

I haven’t done it so I can’t help you there. I can say this sounds like a potentially good idea with one major risk: Time.

Depending on how you set this up... if you go through a series of these over some months (I assume, to get a group, prep, run, finish, get a new group, prep, etc...), you run the risk that the players you found in the first session who are waiting for you to start the real campaign, might find another campaign or something else to do and not be still available when you get ‘round to inviting them into the full campaign.

In my experience many players are impatient. They want to play D&D *now*, not wait 3 months to be able to play it. So if someone else gets going on a full campaign while you are still “sifting” other players to find your dream team, the early-round drafts might not still be waiting in the wings for you when you are ready for them.

That's a great observation, perhaps mitigated by the following:

• Having 1 or 2 Players already "in the bullpen".
• Starting a small ongoing campaign with those Players. This is the main campaign outside of the draft rounds.
• Finding/Building a consistent "audition adventure"; this should eliminate the need for constant prep - just pull the standard one-shot off the shelf.  Heck, if you design/refine this right, you end up with an adventure that touches on all bases, and really allows Players to show their stuff in all aspects.
• Run this standard "draft adventure" one shot session periodically when you're looking for new Players.
• Invite Players from the "audition rounds" to join the ongoing main campaign, if they're a good fit.

Just to be clear, I don't think of this as me testing Players to see if they're good enough. They might be great Players, and I may not be a good fit as a DM for them.  It's about evaluating compatibility before inviting Players to the table.

I guess you had to say that last part but I did not interpret it as “good enough” but as compatibility. You were clear enough in your OP about that.

I think your ideas could work but I would be careful about having the first couple of people start out in the campaign while others are still being “drafted” — it could lead to perceived inequalities as some players have more familiarity with the game world than others (potentially). Again I think this could work really well as long as you can solve the time issue.

I love this idea! Do you have any advice for a noob DM for how to construct the oneshot audition? 

I think that would be highly dependent on the kind of game and game group you want to put together. Figuring that out is the first step.

Then, think of the kind of Player that group would require: what are their wants, styles, focus, etc.

Then find, or put together, an adventure which has scenes and encounters which allow the Player to showcase their particular approach to those aspects that you're "screening" for.

Run them through the adventure - take notes.

Honestly, I'm kind of drifting away from this idea, based on BioWizard's observations about time and delays.

I'm wondering if a better approach is to rigorously define the kind of game style you want, and then find interested, but total newbie Players, and "train them up" in the style you want to run. 

I was not trying to talk you out of it!

I have just had bad experiences with trying to get compatible players into RP Guilds in online games (TOR and COH being two examples) and lost some good players to the time it took to be sure we wanted them in the guild. They just found another RP oriented guild that had less rigorous application procedures and got going ASAP, instead of having to wait a week to do an application, have it read, do an interview, do an "intro RP" in character, etc. So I wanted to warn you what could happen.

But I think it is maybe worth a try if you can find a way to avoid the time delays. Like for example, if you could get all the one-shots (using the SAME adventure to reduce work) done in a 2-week period that would probably be fast enough.

It's a reasonable idea and worth trying.  I'm thinking of doing something similar by buying a module of short adventures like Tales from the Yawning Portal, looking for a particiular adventure that contains combat, usable furniture, social RP elements, and traps and running a few games on Discord.  

However, I've seen some people use the "Looking for Group" forum here to screen players and now I'm thinking of using that instead.  Of course, there's different ways to "interview" players, esp when you can't outsource the time of someone to do that work for you.  Sometimes, an open-ended question or two is enough.  For instance:

  " * Create a character at level 3.  Roll 4d6 and drop the lowest.  Include a background if you want. "

   " * Upon going through and closing the secret door, your character finds her/himself in a strangely lit room where alternate colors of light wink in and out from a large box set on a locked chest to your left.  At the far end of the room is a kobold with a gag stuffed in his mouth sitting in a chair.  The kobold appears to be tied up and asleep. From behind you, you can hear four angry voices from the hobgoblins you just avoided by going through the secret door.   In a few sentences describe: What do you do?  "  

Keep things open-ended, let the prospective player use as much or as little detail to explain their character or actions  to you.  In an interview or personality assessment process, saying little is often better than saying much.   

I've had the idea of Character Auditions before. My idea was more along the lines of pregens that fit into a module's story and using it's suggested hooks, then having players apply to play them using an online application that includes some open-ended questions such as "What are you expecting out of this adventure?" "What are your character's personal goals?" etc. then running them through a one-shot relative in tone to the main module.

I have also toyed with doing a West Marches style campaign with Discord. All one-shots. It would probably emerge very quickly who was invested in showing up and organizing adventures vs. who wanted to be audience members.