One of my in-person games is switching to half online(hopefully), two of the players have moved away from the area but still want to play. I am looking for recommendations for a program that I can run livestream/video chat on. I am not looking for a virtual table top, I have tons of minis and terrain, my plan would be to set up a few cameras(I have two pretty good webcams). I am looking for a program that I can host on and have multiple cameras. any recommendations would be apricated.
I have some experience with running partially online games. I have also had friends move away but continue to play, and while a few of us were in-person during Covid, we were mostly online. We used Google Meets. It works well and it’s even possible to put up a map on-screen if you really want to. Best of all, it’s free!
I've been playing online games for four years and for the past year and a half, I've been using Discord for my Text Chat/Video/Audio. Also if you ever need to use a VTT check out Owlbear Rodeo.
It's going to vary depending on your styles and preferences.
Discord is extremely popular these days and most every has an account (ditto for Google), so you'll want a platform for voice or video.
I'd recommend that you don't make video mandatory. Despite everything that's happened in recent years many people don't know, or can't get ethernet or a hard line connection to their routers or modems. Add in the variability in connection speeds and bandwidths...it's more accessible to make voice mandatory. It's less fun sure, but I think it's an important step to be accessible.
I tend to use DDB for character sheets and dice rolling as it's impractical to get sent a PDF copy of the character sheet after every session. This way too you can add feats, items and conditions as the game it played with the minimum of fuss.
Finally, if you're a battlemap person I highly recommend Owlbear. It's an intuitive VTT and works across platforms, browsers and device types (touch/mouse and keyboard). It's pretty low latency and has options to toggle between high performance and high quality depending on connection speeds etc.
Additional extras I'd recommend are Kenku if you like ambiant music or sound fx piped into the game session - it works well with discord but is a bit of a PITA to get set up. I'd also tip my hat to Inkarnate for maps. Once you have an account you can actually browse other people's maps to use or clone and edit. Or you can create your own with their really straightforward system. Even better they've got a brilliantly supportive community on discord and some excellent tutorial videos on Youtube. If you want digital minis I'd suggest HeroForge - get a subscription for a month make up your party's minis, download them and then ditch it until you need it again.
That's my loadout which sounds like a lot but it does work well.
Some honourable mentions though to Shard VTT (more campaign management than just a VTT imo). Diceweaver appears to be a new entrant with a lot of promise though I haven't been able to use it as much as I'd like.
Then there are the more expensive (and in some cases more buggy options) such as Foundry VTT, which is pretty high polish. There's Roll20 - the most buggy and least user friendly in terms of UX and UI in my opinion, but does try to be an all in one solution. I'm sure there are more but that's just my round up.
Tabletop simulator rules, combined with this DM screen (https://********/dmscreen.html) and a notebook. Discord for voice chat. There are good DnD boards with rolling trays on the workshop as well. Create maps online, and you can draw on an empty grid in game to improv any map quickly.
So far as advice goes I think the best direction I can offer is... don't do the camera table top thing.
I say this only because I have experienced it from the perspective of the player and frankly it's just not very good. Even with high quality cameras you end up with all manner of problems with angles, lighting, zoom levels. You are going to end up fiddling with equipment all the time.
For me this was probably the single worse way to play D&D that I have experienced so far and it was very hard on the DM as well.
Virtual Table Tops are a much easier to manage and far better gaming experience. In fact there are a lot of things you can do with VTT's that actually improve the game over real games and in a lot of ways, the experience is more tangible and interactive if done right.
If you are looking for a more robust 3d solution, Talespire is pretty fantastic, especially when you are streaming it through Discord and don't have to worry about people logging in and stuff like that. There are utilities and extensions that allow you to use DnDBeyond to roll dice directly in Talespire.
Only drawback is that there is more prep involved and personally while I used it for several years, I went back to more tradition flat VTT's like Fantasy Grounds and DND Beyond MAPS simply because its easier and faster to do prep. The experience is less visual but smoother overall.
It's going to vary depending on your styles and preferences.
Discord is extremely popular these days and most every has an account (ditto for Google), so you'll want a platform for voice or video.
I'd recommend that you don't make video mandatory. Despite everything that's happened in recent years many people don't know, or can't get ethernet or a hard line connection to their routers or modems. Add in the variability in connection speeds and bandwidths...it's more accessible to make voice mandatory. It's less fun sure, but I think it's an important step to be accessible.
I tend to use DDB for character sheets and dice rolling as it's impractical to get sent a PDF copy of the character sheet after every session. This way too you can add feats, items and conditions as the game it played with the minimum of fuss.
Finally, if you're a battlemap person I highly recommend Owlbear. It's an intuitive VTT and works across platforms, browsers and device types (touch/mouse and keyboard). It's pretty low latency and has options to toggle between high performance and high quality depending on connection speeds etc.
Additional extras I'd recommend are Kenku if you like ambiant music or sound fx piped into the game session - it works well with discord but is a bit of a PITA to get set up. I'd also tip my hat to Inkarnate for maps. Once you have an account you can actually browse other people's maps to use or clone and edit. Or you can create your own with their really straightforward system. Even better they've got a brilliantly supportive community on discord and some excellent tutorial videos on Youtube. If you want digital minis I'd suggest HeroForge - get a subscription for a month make up your party's minis, download them and then ditch it until you need it again.
That's my loadout which sounds like a lot but it does work well.
Some honourable mentions though to Shard VTT (more campaign management than just a VTT imo). Diceweaver appears to be a new entrant with a lot of promise though I haven't been able to use it as much as I'd like.
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So returning to the DnD, there are the more expensive (and in some cases more buggy options) such as Foundry VTT, which is pretty high polish. There's Roll20 - the most buggy and least user friendly in terms of UX and UI in my opinion, but does try to be an all in one solution. I'm sure there are more but that's just my round up.
For communication, there is no better app than Discord, but this is just my personal opinion. As for games, my friends and I use Tabletop Simulator from Steam.
I don't recommend a mixed session. If you're online, you're online. If you're virtual, you're virtual. When you mix the two, the people who are physically present will always have priority and immediacy over the people who are remote. Not because you're a jerk but because you're human. You're going to naturally see more non-verbal cues from those players at the table then you will over a video call.
Ditto, I recommend the cameras if you're running a RP heavy or RP moderate game. Same thing: the non-verbal cues that show you someone is about to talk, is reacting strongly to something, is bored... those can make or break the table. Again: you probably don't mean to ignore players, but it's way easier to do with a mixed platform.
If you want to get Fancy you can use something like OBS to blend multiple web cameras into a single video output. Early in the pandemic, I would use it and then set the OBS Virtual cam as my cam on zoom calls. That way I could get a white board to write on while students could still see my face while I was teaching. And they could it over Zoom without having to join some kind of special "real time" white board. You can also use OBS to create scenes to change between so "your" video call could be just you, you and the overhead of the table, or picture in picture of a isometric table view and the overhead shot.
One of my in-person games is switching to half online(hopefully), two of the players have moved away from the area but still want to play. I am looking for recommendations for a program that I can run livestream/video chat on. I am not looking for a virtual table top, I have tons of minis and terrain, my plan would be to set up a few cameras(I have two pretty good webcams). I am looking for a program that I can host on and have multiple cameras. any recommendations would be apricated.
I have some experience with running partially online games. I have also had friends move away but continue to play, and while a few of us were in-person during Covid, we were mostly online. We used Google Meets. It works well and it’s even possible to put up a map on-screen if you really want to. Best of all, it’s free!
Awesome! ill check it out, thanks
I've been playing online games for four years and for the past year and a half, I've been using Discord for my Text Chat/Video/Audio. Also if you ever need to use a VTT check out Owlbear Rodeo.
It's going to vary depending on your styles and preferences.
Discord is extremely popular these days and most every has an account (ditto for Google), so you'll want a platform for voice or video.
I'd recommend that you don't make video mandatory. Despite everything that's happened in recent years many people don't know, or can't get ethernet or a hard line connection to their routers or modems. Add in the variability in connection speeds and bandwidths...it's more accessible to make voice mandatory. It's less fun sure, but I think it's an important step to be accessible.
I tend to use DDB for character sheets and dice rolling as it's impractical to get sent a PDF copy of the character sheet after every session. This way too you can add feats, items and conditions as the game it played with the minimum of fuss.
Finally, if you're a battlemap person I highly recommend Owlbear. It's an intuitive VTT and works across platforms, browsers and device types (touch/mouse and keyboard). It's pretty low latency and has options to toggle between high performance and high quality depending on connection speeds etc.
Additional extras I'd recommend are Kenku if you like ambiant music or sound fx piped into the game session - it works well with discord but is a bit of a PITA to get set up. I'd also tip my hat to Inkarnate for maps. Once you have an account you can actually browse other people's maps to use or clone and edit. Or you can create your own with their really straightforward system. Even better they've got a brilliantly supportive community on discord and some excellent tutorial videos on Youtube. If you want digital minis I'd suggest HeroForge - get a subscription for a month make up your party's minis, download them and then ditch it until you need it again.
That's my loadout which sounds like a lot but it does work well.
Some honourable mentions though to Shard VTT (more campaign management than just a VTT imo). Diceweaver appears to be a new entrant with a lot of promise though I haven't been able to use it as much as I'd like.
Then there are the more expensive (and in some cases more buggy options) such as Foundry VTT, which is pretty high polish. There's Roll20 - the most buggy and least user friendly in terms of UX and UI in my opinion, but does try to be an all in one solution. I'm sure there are more but that's just my round up.
DM session planning template - My version of maps for 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' - Send your party to The Circus - Other DM Resources - Maps, Tokens, Quests - 'Better' Player Character Injury Tables?
Actor, Writer, Director & Teacher by day - GM/DM in my off hours.
Video Chat
Discord, Google Meet, and Zoom are great for getting on a call with friends online.
Campaign planning / DM running the game
For planning and in-game notes I would use Notion. Here's an awesome template that is one time fee, no subscription: https://minvarpg.com/products/lorekeeper-5e-notion-template
Tabletop simulator rules, combined with this DM screen (https://********/dmscreen.html) and a notebook. Discord for voice chat. There are good DnD boards with rolling trays on the workshop as well. Create maps online, and you can draw on an empty grid in game to improv any map quickly.
So far as advice goes I think the best direction I can offer is... don't do the camera table top thing.
I say this only because I have experienced it from the perspective of the player and frankly it's just not very good. Even with high quality cameras you end up with all manner of problems with angles, lighting, zoom levels. You are going to end up fiddling with equipment all the time.
For me this was probably the single worse way to play D&D that I have experienced so far and it was very hard on the DM as well.
Virtual Table Tops are a much easier to manage and far better gaming experience. In fact there are a lot of things you can do with VTT's that actually improve the game over real games and in a lot of ways, the experience is more tangible and interactive if done right.
If you are looking for a more robust 3d solution, Talespire is pretty fantastic, especially when you are streaming it through Discord and don't have to worry about people logging in and stuff like that. There are utilities and extensions that allow you to use DnDBeyond to roll dice directly in Talespire.
Only drawback is that there is more prep involved and personally while I used it for several years, I went back to more tradition flat VTT's like Fantasy Grounds and DND Beyond MAPS simply because its easier and faster to do prep. The experience is less visual but smoother overall.
For communication, there is no better app than Discord, but this is just my personal opinion. As for games, my friends and I use Tabletop Simulator from Steam.
I don't recommend a mixed session. If you're online, you're online. If you're virtual, you're virtual. When you mix the two, the people who are physically present will always have priority and immediacy over the people who are remote. Not because you're a jerk but because you're human. You're going to naturally see more non-verbal cues from those players at the table then you will over a video call.
Ditto, I recommend the cameras if you're running a RP heavy or RP moderate game. Same thing: the non-verbal cues that show you someone is about to talk, is reacting strongly to something, is bored... those can make or break the table. Again: you probably don't mean to ignore players, but it's way easier to do with a mixed platform.
If you want to get Fancy you can use something like OBS to blend multiple web cameras into a single video output. Early in the pandemic, I would use it and then set the OBS Virtual cam as my cam on zoom calls. That way I could get a white board to write on while students could still see my face while I was teaching. And they could it over Zoom without having to join some kind of special "real time" white board. You can also use OBS to create scenes to change between so "your" video call could be just you, you and the overhead of the table, or picture in picture of a isometric table view and the overhead shot.
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