So, like most of us, I had to put my game on hold several weeks ago. With no end in sight to this hiatus on group events however, I've decided to get my group together to start a new interim campaign over the internet. I've already decided on a few things, but I could use some tips from those of you with experience running an online campaign.
1. I don't want to use an online tabletop like Roll20. I'd rather take the opportunity to practice my theater-of-mind DMing. However, I would still like to use some sort of mapping system for the more complex encounters and dungeon crawls. At the moment I'm thinking I will just use my usual physical map and show it using either a webcam or by taking a picture at the top of each round and sharing via. chat, so players at least have a basic layout.
2. Rolling Dice. I feel like I have a pretty trustworthy group, and am comfortable with letting them roll at home (half the fun of D&D is the dice rolling). Is this a terrible idea? Should I use an online dice roller?
3. Text/Voice/Video? I'm going to try using Discord, but recommendations for any other platforms for internet-conferencing would be appreciated. As the DM, I'll be providing a webcam feed so that I can gesticulate, show a map, and just so the players have something to look at, but I'm not going to make it mandatory for my players to have a webcam. A mic will be recommended, and they'll definitely have to listen to me, but I was wondering how to accept character input. Voice chat could get a little messy with multiple people all talking and playing over each other, so I was thinking about splitting communication between voice and text, most likely with voice chat being reserved for in-character talking/gameplay, with a text chat for out-of-character discussion.
4. Anything I should consider about running an online game that isn't obvious to someone trying it out for the first time? I honestly picture it being a little more focused with fewer out-of-character distractions, but if there's one thing I've learned it's that a game is never going to go how you imagine.
My friends and I use a video chat group in Google Hangouts. It's mostly fine though one guy has a bit of a slow-seeming connection. We use DDB for character sheets and I have the campaign here so I can see all their stuff. I use the encounter builder and combat tracker in DDB although I really don't need them.
We are using Astral Tabletop but you said you didn't want to use that so -- one option you can try is "screen share" in Hangouts. You can share an app window and just put the picture of the map in the app window. Make a PDF of the map and just share it in hangouts.
If you want a non-free option you can use Zoom. And also screen-share on that platform.
Our group is small-ish (4 + me) and we do not have problems with people doing cross-talk.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
On discord I can share maps and initiative and everything else through screen sharing. Plus you can do cameras.
Voice chat won't get messy with a few people talking at the same time. They do the same thing in person.
Voice quality is the issue. Not everyone has the best voice components. You just have to dial that in and adjust everyone's voice. It's simple and you'll be fine.
My group uses Discord for chat. No issues and we can post images, ect. We do use and online tabletop and I'm really enjoying it. We've tried Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds. The dice rolling and ease of popping up the maps is useful. You don't have to have all the players control their own tokens, you could have the DM control a party token just to move the map. I've been having more fun giving out player specific handouts and such that can later be shown to everyone.
One of our members streams our sessions, TheDragon***** (shameless plug).
So, like most of us, I had to put my game on hold several weeks ago. With no end in sight to this hiatus on group events however, I've decided to get my group together to start a new interim campaign over the internet. I've already decided on a few things, but I could use some tips from those of you with experience running an online campaign.
1. I don't want to use an online tabletop like Roll20. I'd rather take the opportunity to practice my theater-of-mind DMing. However, I would still like to use some sort of mapping system for the more complex encounters and dungeon crawls. At the moment I'm thinking I will just use my usual physical map and show it using either a webcam or by taking a picture at the top of each round and sharing via. chat, so players at least have a basic layout.
2. Rolling Dice. I feel like I have a pretty trustworthy group, and am comfortable with letting them roll at home (half the fun of D&D is the dice rolling). Is this a terrible idea? Should I use an online dice roller?
3. Text/Voice/Video? I'm going to try using Discord, but recommendations for any other platforms for internet-conferencing would be appreciated. As the DM, I'll be providing a webcam feed so that I can gesticulate, show a map, and just so the players have something to look at, but I'm not going to make it mandatory for my players to have a webcam. A mic will be recommended, and they'll definitely have to listen to me, but I was wondering how to accept character input.
Voice chat could get a little messy with multiple people all talking and playing over each other, so I was thinking about splitting communication between voice and text, most likely with voice chat being reserved for in-character talking/gameplay, with a text chat for out-of-character discussion.
4. Anything I should consider about running an online game that isn't obvious to someone trying it out for the first time? I honestly picture it being a little more focused with fewer out-of-character distractions, but if there's one thing I've learned it's that a game is never going to go how you imagine.
My friends and I use a video chat group in Google Hangouts. It's mostly fine though one guy has a bit of a slow-seeming connection. We use DDB for character sheets and I have the campaign here so I can see all their stuff. I use the encounter builder and combat tracker in DDB although I really don't need them.
We are using Astral Tabletop but you said you didn't want to use that so -- one option you can try is "screen share" in Hangouts. You can share an app window and just put the picture of the map in the app window. Make a PDF of the map and just share it in hangouts.
If you want a non-free option you can use Zoom. And also screen-share on that platform.
Our group is small-ish (4 + me) and we do not have problems with people doing cross-talk.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I'm on the boat just ahead of you.
We went from in person to online.
We use discord and that's it.
On discord I can share maps and initiative and everything else through screen sharing. Plus you can do cameras.
Voice chat won't get messy with a few people talking at the same time. They do the same thing in person.
Voice quality is the issue. Not everyone has the best voice components. You just have to dial that in and adjust everyone's voice. It's simple and you'll be fine.
My group uses Discord for chat. No issues and we can post images, ect. We do use and online tabletop and I'm really enjoying it. We've tried Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds. The dice rolling and ease of popping up the maps is useful. You don't have to have all the players control their own tokens, you could have the DM control a party token just to move the map. I've been having more fun giving out player specific handouts and such that can later be shown to everyone.
One of our members streams our sessions, TheDragon***** (shameless plug).
Everyone is the main character of their story
Just another plug of the Chrome extension Beyond 20 as you can synch it to Discord and have all of your rolls etc. displayed there.