So I started D&D in 1979 when I first read the AD&D DMG. Technically I've been DM'ing longer than I've been playing. I ran an RPGA gaming group for many years [playtesting games was always fun]. I've been going to gaming cons since the early 1980's. I started Living City at their second convention, and then migrated to Legend of the Shining Jewel. I have been running home campaigns since the early 1980's. I've been on a forced hiatus [unimportant sad story] for a few years. My teenager is playing D&D in a school club, completely on DDB, and also plays in an in person campaign at the local library, and they use DDB too.
I've seen a few screens in DDB but not much. What I am not finding anywhere is a 'running a home game on DDB for idiots' type of website. The Encounter Builder is there, but a string of encounters does not a campaign make. What I used to do was write entire games, modules [two were published in those Living games] and I cannot seem to find how to write a module in DDB. It doesn't make sense that the story part of the module exist outside of DDB but the encounters in it, because then there's be a lot of back and forth between word docs [or whatever] and DDB.
Could someone point me somewhere that I can read info for an experienced DM that has zero DDB knowledge?
A virtual tabletop is a system than you can store maps monster details, character sheets and the like and when you play players can move their token around the map and roll dice.
DND beyond is currently developing a tabletop but there are others such as Roll20 and Foundry. The only problem with them is that if you want to use content you have purchased on DND beyond you need to either purchase it again on the VTT or copy it over manually (as if it were homebrew). There is however a stystem call Beyond20 that allows you to roll from a DNDBeyond character sheet into Roll20.
I think you should make your campaigns the way you used to.
DDB isn't exactly a campaign building tool. It is however a great tool to reference official and partnered content. You can also keep track of the PCs in your campaign. Most of the information on the character sheet is mouseover or click which links to the D&D ruleset.
Run the game you used to, but you can easily access monsters, spells, conditions and whatnot through DDB.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
It didn't occur to me to include why I'm interested in online gaming.
Our group is geographically diverse and debilitated by schedules. Having the ability to game together via video removes a lot of obstacles that are keeping us all from getting together.
Again, I'm thinking practically, how would we game together over video and incorporate DDB advantageously?
It didn't occur to me to include why I'm interested in online gaming.
Our group is geographically diverse and debilitated by schedules. Having the ability to game together via video removes a lot of obstacles that are keeping us all from getting together.
Again, I'm thinking practically, how would we game together over video and incorporate DDB advantageously?
If you aren't using a virtual tabletop, it's easy for the players: run your meeting software of choice, and have their character open in a browser (or on their phone), and swapping between the two as needed. Even if they're doing it all on the phone, it works.
For the DM, it's much the same, but with more browser tabs. I have at least three open all the time (usually encounter, NPC, and whatever I'm currently looking up), and it can easily spiral into many more. (And my notes are mostly in my head, not a google doc or anything.)
If you are using a VTT, everyone also needs to have that open, which probably means phone-only isn't going to fly anymore. There's many options; I've only used owlbear rodeo and DDB's Maps, and not much of either. (My group was mostly theater of the mind even before somebody moved two timezones and then the plague times happened.)
TotM is the term used, at least around here, for games where you're not typically playing on a map. Everything exists only in people's heads. It's not great for tactical combat, but it simplifies a lot of things, especially online.
DDB is a toolbox, not a typewriter. Story and content is still something DM's basically still do themselves, unless you want to run published adventures (which cost money). Even if you're running published adventures, there's often some behind the scenes work the DM normally does to adapt it for their group.
DDB is good for character sheet optimization, monster stat blocks, spells and magic items, etc. It's a database to keep your nitty gritty details in order, but the story is all yours.
It didn't occur to me to include why I'm interested in online gaming.
Our group is geographically diverse and debilitated by schedules. Having the ability to game together via video removes a lot of obstacles that are keeping us all from getting together.
Again, I'm thinking practically, how would we game together over video and incorporate DDB advantageously?
I starting DMing a game during the pandemic over Zoom, which is still going. The players have their character sheets on DDB and I use the Encounter Builder sometimes as a rough guide for balancing battles, but just about everything else is old school -- I log into the room with my phone to use as a camera to point at physical maps, write up the campaign details in a notebook, everyone rolls their own dice etc.
I don't find it too difficult to juggle the different elements and bounce between my notes, DDB references for statblocks or whatever and talking to the Zoom room
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
We all have gotten dispersed. I was glad it happened to our group pre-pandemic. We use Discord to talk to each other. DDBeyond is where our characters live and die. Our preference has been Roll20 for a shared tabletop which the Beyond20 extension makes it simple for us to click on our character sheets to roll any checks or attacks as needed and the rolls show up in the journal pane of our Roll20 Campaign. Having played a 9 year campaign in Classic World of Darkness, we played a lot of theater of the mind where most of us had small dry erase boards we used (2'x3' if I remember), the Storyteller would draw maps on his, one of us would keep track of turn order so everone could see it quickly and others were used for better description of what we were doing as needed or whatever, plus we all kept notebooks. Sure our fights weren't necessarily as technical as mini based combat, but we sure used the environment to do a lot of crazy things you cannot do on a battlemap. You know, with a camera you could still do the whiteboard and just use Discord and DDBeyond if you really wanted to keep it scaled down.
I run two online games weekly with some friends. Both of these use Roll20 for the virtual table top/maps/tokens and we use Discord for voice chat. D&D Beyond can be integrated into Roll20 using the Beyond20 app for Chrome/Firefox.
I've chosen to use mostly published content for my campaigns - or adapt published content. I can purchase these on the VTT like Roll20 and they significantly reduce the amount of preparation time I have to put in. Other folks just use a blank page and sketched maps on the VTT which also works fine. It really depends on what sort of experience you want, how much you want to spend, and how much time you have.
Recently, D&D Beyond started creating their own VTT called Maps. It is ok. It doesn't yet have as many features as Roll20 but it has somewhat better integration into D&D Beyond.
There are also a largish number of other choices for VTT out there ... Above VTT, Fantasy Grounds, Owlbear Rodeo, Talespire, Tabletop Simulator, and others which all enable online gaming for role playing and in some cases also board games. Support for purchasing sources and published content varies a lot by platform. Roll20 and FG both sell all of the D&D content (rules/character sources/adventures).
If you are looking to keep most of your investment in D&D beyond then you would probably need the Master tier subscription so that you can create campaigns and share your purchased content with the folks in your campaign and then probably use the Maps app on Beyond for your virtual table top. I haven't tried this yet personally since the games I run have been using Roll20/Discord for about 4 years now - but the D&D Beyond offering does seem to be improving.
D&D Beyond campaigns include tabs for public (shared to players in the campaign) and private notes (visible to the DM). The campaign also has a log where die rolls made in D&D Beyond are recorded. However, that is about it for campaign support. As usual, the creative parts are completely up to the DM, though if you base a campaign in whole or in part on published modules it can save a lot of preparation time. D&D Beyond is working on making the maps from the published content they sell available in their Maps app.
It didn't occur to me to include why I'm interested in online gaming.
Our group is geographically diverse and debilitated by schedules. Having the ability to game together via video removes a lot of obstacles that are keeping us all from getting together.
Again, I'm thinking practically, how would we game together over video and incorporate DDB advantageously?
The virtual tabletops are pretty great for this. My groups also use Roll20 for the VTT and discord for chat/video. We also use the discord for asynchronous text roleplay between games and random chats among the players in each campaign, with channels for scheduling and for any campaign documents like maps, NPC character images, PC backstories, etc.
Roll20 will let you join for free, and it has a tutorial mode where you can get walked through the interface. You can make a simple campaign for free also.
The VTTs will let you do things like work off a shared map, and make your character sheets into buttons so that for example you can press a link on your +1 longsword and it will roll the dice and add your modifiers. You can set up dynamic lighting so characters can only see things based on their vision and position. Or you can not use those features and continue to use physical dice and report your rolls in voice or chat. What you want out of this probably depends a lot on how much you enjoy setting things up digitally.
Having your shared map is great for combat so that every player can see where they are with respect to other players and opponents and NPCs, and the player can move their own token. Pretty battle maps are great but not necessarily essential.
Discord and Zoom and Google Meet and the rest all have the ability to share a screen, also, so if you prefer you could skip the VTT and screenshare some document that you control or even a camera view of some physical thing. (You can use a second device like a phone for this if you wanted.)
A nice thing about Discord vs Zoom or Google Meet is that Discord will maintain your chats, while in Zoom or Meet, chats during events are ephemeral. Discord does let you organize all the material in one place in a way that works well for gaming.
Hi, am in a similar position for "getting with the times" and for much the same reasons. DDB seems excellent for storing you rules, characters and allowing for fluid gameplay/rolls. If it's worldbuilding assistance you are after, also on a shared online space, then you could do worse than Scabard.com - which you can play with 100% for free in the first instance. Best of luck with the GMing!
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
GM: Adventure in the Mountains GM: After The Breach PC: Elagor Tyreen, in Dragon Heist-Hell of a Summer
So I started D&D in 1979 when I first read the AD&D DMG. Technically I've been DM'ing longer than I've been playing. I ran an RPGA gaming group for many years [playtesting games was always fun]. I've been going to gaming cons since the early 1980's. I started Living City at their second convention, and then migrated to Legend of the Shining Jewel. I have been running home campaigns since the early 1980's. I've been on a forced hiatus [unimportant sad story] for a few years. My teenager is playing D&D in a school club, completely on DDB, and also plays in an in person campaign at the local library, and they use DDB too.
I've seen a few screens in DDB but not much. What I am not finding anywhere is a 'running a home game on DDB for idiots' type of website. The Encounter Builder is there, but a string of encounters does not a campaign make. What I used to do was write entire games, modules [two were published in those Living games] and I cannot seem to find how to write a module in DDB. It doesn't make sense that the story part of the module exist outside of DDB but the encounters in it, because then there's be a lot of back and forth between word docs [or whatever] and DDB.
Could someone point me somewhere that I can read info for an experienced DM that has zero DDB knowledge?
Thanks :)
Maybe start with the How To Be A Dungeon Master post from the New Player Guide.
Are you looking for a virtual tabletop?
A virtual tabletop is a system than you can store maps monster details, character sheets and the like and when you play players can move their token around the map and roll dice.
DND beyond is currently developing a tabletop but there are others such as Roll20 and Foundry. The only problem with them is that if you want to use content you have purchased on DND beyond you need to either purchase it again on the VTT or copy it over manually (as if it were homebrew). There is however a stystem call Beyond20 that allows you to roll from a DNDBeyond character sheet into Roll20.
I think you should make your campaigns the way you used to.
DDB isn't exactly a campaign building tool. It is however a great tool to reference official and partnered content. You can also keep track of the PCs in your campaign. Most of the information on the character sheet is mouseover or click which links to the D&D ruleset.
Run the game you used to, but you can easily access monsters, spells, conditions and whatnot through DDB.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
It didn't occur to me to include why I'm interested in online gaming.
Our group is geographically diverse and debilitated by schedules. Having the ability to game together via video removes a lot of obstacles that are keeping us all from getting together.
Again, I'm thinking practically, how would we game together over video and incorporate DDB advantageously?
If you aren't using a virtual tabletop, it's easy for the players: run your meeting software of choice, and have their character open in a browser (or on their phone), and swapping between the two as needed. Even if they're doing it all on the phone, it works.
For the DM, it's much the same, but with more browser tabs. I have at least three open all the time (usually encounter, NPC, and whatever I'm currently looking up), and it can easily spiral into many more. (And my notes are mostly in my head, not a google doc or anything.)
If you are using a VTT, everyone also needs to have that open, which probably means phone-only isn't going to fly anymore. There's many options; I've only used owlbear rodeo and DDB's Maps, and not much of either. (My group was mostly theater of the mind even before somebody moved two timezones and then the plague times happened.)
Could expand on that?
Inquiring minds want to know.
But are they theatrical minds?
TotM is the term used, at least around here, for games where you're not typically playing on a map. Everything exists only in people's heads. It's not great for tactical combat, but it simplifies a lot of things, especially online.
DDB is a toolbox, not a typewriter. Story and content is still something DM's basically still do themselves, unless you want to run published adventures (which cost money). Even if you're running published adventures, there's often some behind the scenes work the DM normally does to adapt it for their group.
DDB is good for character sheet optimization, monster stat blocks, spells and magic items, etc. It's a database to keep your nitty gritty details in order, but the story is all yours.
You don't even have to spend money for a VTT. I use google docs and move icons around it if a map is needed.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
I starting DMing a game during the pandemic over Zoom, which is still going. The players have their character sheets on DDB and I use the Encounter Builder sometimes as a rough guide for balancing battles, but just about everything else is old school -- I log into the room with my phone to use as a camera to point at physical maps, write up the campaign details in a notebook, everyone rolls their own dice etc.
I don't find it too difficult to juggle the different elements and bounce between my notes, DDB references for statblocks or whatever and talking to the Zoom room
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
We all have gotten dispersed. I was glad it happened to our group pre-pandemic. We use Discord to talk to each other. DDBeyond is where our characters live and die. Our preference has been Roll20 for a shared tabletop which the Beyond20 extension makes it simple for us to click on our character sheets to roll any checks or attacks as needed and the rolls show up in the journal pane of our Roll20 Campaign. Having played a 9 year campaign in Classic World of Darkness, we played a lot of theater of the mind where most of us had small dry erase boards we used (2'x3' if I remember), the Storyteller would draw maps on his, one of us would keep track of turn order so everone could see it quickly and others were used for better description of what we were doing as needed or whatever, plus we all kept notebooks. Sure our fights weren't necessarily as technical as mini based combat, but we sure used the environment to do a lot of crazy things you cannot do on a battlemap. You know, with a camera you could still do the whiteboard and just use Discord and DDBeyond if you really wanted to keep it scaled down.
I run two online games weekly with some friends. Both of these use Roll20 for the virtual table top/maps/tokens and we use Discord for voice chat. D&D Beyond can be integrated into Roll20 using the Beyond20 app for Chrome/Firefox.
I've chosen to use mostly published content for my campaigns - or adapt published content. I can purchase these on the VTT like Roll20 and they significantly reduce the amount of preparation time I have to put in. Other folks just use a blank page and sketched maps on the VTT which also works fine. It really depends on what sort of experience you want, how much you want to spend, and how much time you have.
Recently, D&D Beyond started creating their own VTT called Maps. It is ok. It doesn't yet have as many features as Roll20 but it has somewhat better integration into D&D Beyond.
There are also a largish number of other choices for VTT out there ... Above VTT, Fantasy Grounds, Owlbear Rodeo, Talespire, Tabletop Simulator, and others which all enable online gaming for role playing and in some cases also board games. Support for purchasing sources and published content varies a lot by platform. Roll20 and FG both sell all of the D&D content (rules/character sources/adventures).
If you are looking to keep most of your investment in D&D beyond then you would probably need the Master tier subscription so that you can create campaigns and share your purchased content with the folks in your campaign and then probably use the Maps app on Beyond for your virtual table top. I haven't tried this yet personally since the games I run have been using Roll20/Discord for about 4 years now - but the D&D Beyond offering does seem to be improving.
D&D Beyond campaigns include tabs for public (shared to players in the campaign) and private notes (visible to the DM). The campaign also has a log where die rolls made in D&D Beyond are recorded. However, that is about it for campaign support. As usual, the creative parts are completely up to the DM, though if you base a campaign in whole or in part on published modules it can save a lot of preparation time. D&D Beyond is working on making the maps from the published content they sell available in their Maps app.
One thing I haven't noticed mentioned that may help with the Online play in Discord is https://avrae.io/, which is the D&D Beyond Dice Roller.
The virtual tabletops are pretty great for this. My groups also use Roll20 for the VTT and discord for chat/video. We also use the discord for asynchronous text roleplay between games and random chats among the players in each campaign, with channels for scheduling and for any campaign documents like maps, NPC character images, PC backstories, etc.
Roll20 will let you join for free, and it has a tutorial mode where you can get walked through the interface. You can make a simple campaign for free also.
The VTTs will let you do things like work off a shared map, and make your character sheets into buttons so that for example you can press a link on your +1 longsword and it will roll the dice and add your modifiers. You can set up dynamic lighting so characters can only see things based on their vision and position. Or you can not use those features and continue to use physical dice and report your rolls in voice or chat. What you want out of this probably depends a lot on how much you enjoy setting things up digitally.
Having your shared map is great for combat so that every player can see where they are with respect to other players and opponents and NPCs, and the player can move their own token. Pretty battle maps are great but not necessarily essential.
Discord and Zoom and Google Meet and the rest all have the ability to share a screen, also, so if you prefer you could skip the VTT and screenshare some document that you control or even a camera view of some physical thing. (You can use a second device like a phone for this if you wanted.)
A nice thing about Discord vs Zoom or Google Meet is that Discord will maintain your chats, while in Zoom or Meet, chats during events are ephemeral. Discord does let you organize all the material in one place in a way that works well for gaming.
Hi, am in a similar position for "getting with the times" and for much the same reasons. DDB seems excellent for storing you rules, characters and allowing for fluid gameplay/rolls. If it's worldbuilding assistance you are after, also on a shared online space, then you could do worse than Scabard.com - which you can play with 100% for free in the first instance. Best of luck with the GMing!
GM: Adventure in the Mountains
GM: After The Breach
PC: Elagor Tyreen, in Dragon Heist-Hell of a Summer
Feel free to check out my Period Fantasy novella: Storm on the Cathe