I've been playing like this for almost a decade now, pretty much since I moved to Sweden and found I missed gaming dreadfully.  Started with audio-only Skype calls to my home group, but moved to Hangouts and other gaming circles when Google offered free video conferencing.

As a GM I never use any of the table-top emulation software, and indeed hate using it as a player since it drags the pace of the game down to a crawl, at least with the PF game I occasionally play in.

Otherwise if we need to visually see a battle, say for instance if playing sprawling battles-prone Savage Worlds, then the GM just angles his camera down to his white-board/table and uses miniatures. The RQ games I run/play are always theatre of the mind with the occasional screen share if there's an image of a scene or monster which players should see.

Neither do any we use any dice rollers or the like. Its all trust, imagination and fast flowing verbal exchange. The video is just there so we can see each other's faces when cracking jokes or witnessing someone fluff an important roll.

Quote from: Benoist;733008Roll 20 is already too much for me.

What do you find complicated about Roll20's whiteboard. I mean I can understand messing around with tokens and such. But I genuinely curious because I found general purpose whiteboard software to be too fussy for tabletop. Namely it great for one image people messing around with that image but trying to switch between things during play is where the headaches come in. At least for me.

Quote from: estar;733045What do you find complicated about Roll20's whiteboard. I mean I can understand messing around with tokens and such. But I genuinely curious because I found general purpose whiteboard software to be too fussy for tabletop. Namely it great for one image people messing around with that image but trying to switch between things during play is where the headaches come in. At least for me.

I think i know what Benoist is saying now that i have had a chance to fiddle with things. Roll 20 looks like a solid platform, but i can see how i might get caugt up in loading files, or images, working the knobs behind the scenes, and that might muddle with my GMing because i am easily distracted.

Right now what I have decided to do is learn the platform, but keep things minimal until it feels like we need more. So we will start with just the video chat, and play as we normally would, using the honor system for dice rolls etc (dice rollers to me just never feel quite right). I tend to play more sans miniatures anyways, so the grid will probably only be required if we have a big battle. I think the roll 20 platform will be like pulling out the battle mat for my group. We dont use it all the time, but occassionally we find it necessary and break it out.

I've played this way for several years.

Do a microphone check with each person separately before game night. If you don't, you'll eat up half an hour trying to figure out whose hard drive is buzzing, or whose shitty laptop microphone is picking up the sound of their nearby refrigerator. With only stereo sound, the brain filter out stray background noises nearly so easily.

I require all players to have a decent quality headset (no integrated mikes).

My personal preference is to play audio only; I don't see much value in seeing pasty, slack-jawed faces staring slightly off center (since the camera isn't in the middle of the screen).

IMO, the maximum group size is smaller - again, with only stereo sound, you can't have parallel conversations. Steve can't whisper to Amy, or get help figuring out what page his feats are on. The whole conversation goes into serial mode (my turn to talk, your turn, etc.)

As GM, I find it's helpful to be more explicit whenever there's a delay.  "Are you looking that up in the book?"  "Are you ready to act now?"  Sometimes the turn-taking people are silent, each waiting for the other.

I use a Google Docs spreadsheet for the character sheets, one tab for each character.  That lets me consolidate everyone's key info on a GM's tab, and it's easy to change the sheet format, or add a new cell.  (Changing the structure of five character sheets at once is still annoying.)

I started off with a white board (twiddla), but eventually ditched that in favor of audio-only combat.  I'd bring it back if I were playing, say, a WWII game with 4+ players, or something griddy like 3.5e. (Well, I might not try to play anything griddy online.)

Dunno if this helpful or not, but I'd alter your timeline when playing online. You can get a lot more done and get through more of a campaign in person. I'm not sure what it is about an online campaign, but it takes a long time to move through it. Part of it is adjusting to the medium and technology, but there's something else there that I can't really explain.

Games just move slower online for whatever reason.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;733052I think i know what Benoist is saying now that i have had a chance to fiddle with things. Roll 20 looks like a solid platform, but i can see how i might get caugt up in loading files, or images, working the knobs behind the scenes, and that might muddle with my GMing because i am easily distracted.

If it helps I played around with it and tried to use it just for displaying images.

Things that are not obvious

1) You can drag and drop images onto a page with having to use the uploader.

2) Before you do this turn off the grid.

If you have the monitor space you just stay on the one page drag/drop and delete images as needed. Just make it as big as your largest potential image.

Ignore the other functionality.

Quote from: Kaz;733059Dunno if this helpful or not, but I'd alter your timeline when playing online. You can get a lot more done and get through more of a campaign in person. I'm not sure what it is about an online campaign, but it takes a long time to move through it. Part of it is adjusting to the medium and technology, but there's something else there that I can't really explain.

Games just move slower online for whatever reason.

This is fascinating, as I've had the opposite experience!  For us, because side-tracking would side-track the entire audio stream, we managed to stay fairly on topic for most of the session.

Were you using a VTT?

A separate headset for audio is a must IMHO. It has the effect of focusing the player (me!) on what I should be doing and not on drifting off while people talk.

And the point about campaign speed/speed of play: Is this impacted by stages of group dynamics? Do you play faster if you know the people/are friends?

I have had a lot of success translating modules into a VTT for grid based play.  Both in Maptool and Roll20.  Personally I would recommend the latter on the basis of avoiding Java and version problems alone.  I also see they added some tablet support recently which might make it comfortable to play on the couch rather than at the computer desk, etc.

By and large though, I would warn about burnout.  Using all those fancy features takes time and effort.  As much as you want to sink into it.  Try and find a balance.

Another bit of generic advice - no shows were more of a problem online than face to face.  Almost twice as likely by my guestimate.

Ran our first session online tonight. It was a bit tricky at first because one of our player's had some difficulty getting the mic to work but once he switched to google chrome that resolved. Just did the video chat on google +. I like it but there are some notable differences from face-to-face. Just as a GM it feels different and takes getting used to by the end of the session I felt comfortable. The chat does not handle multiple people speaking at the same time well, so that made communication hard at points. Still we did get in a block of gaming and will be having another session next Wednesday.

Man, the pre-game sound check is totally mandatory!  Glad you got it sorted out.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;733742Ran our first session online tonight. It was a bit tricky at first because one of our player's had some difficulty getting the mic to work but once he switched to google chrome that resolved. Just did the video chat on google +. I like it but there are some notable differences from face-to-face. Just as a GM it feels different and takes getting used to by the end of the session I felt comfortable. The chat does not handle multiple people speaking at the same time well, so that made communication hard at points. Still we did get in a block of gaming and will be having another session next Wednesday.

Yes. People should be more disciplined and not try to talk over one another too often, or talk to one another while the DM's talking. That gets some getting used to but if you're talking with responsible (read: non-douche) individuals, they'll get used to it pretty fast.

The other thing I find is that naturally exuberant people, need to learn to tolerate the few beats of uncomfortable silence it takes for the more reticent to step up.

In a face to face game, there are nonverbal cues to let someone know they're going to be asked a question, but those are absent online, so all that needs to be replaced with verbal equivalents.

I agree with everything Fuseboy has said in this thread.
I have done a lot of the online stuff over the last few years and my experience has largely identical to his.

I also agree with Ben in the sense that the less software the better.
We have used Skype, Infrno and hangouts; I think I prefer skype, voice only, with theatre of the mind combat and email for images. Sure there are flashier more integrated systems- but everyone knows how to use email. I want to play games not do software training.


Infrno which we used for about six months was just a fucking buggy mess. Hangouts can really fuck with a slightly older computer. We had two separate systems that would just lock up after an hour or two. Also, lets be honest, G+ membership is a high price to pay for access to video chat.

Another important point here is that if you have a player who has a hard on for a new app or VTT or whatever, feel free to tell them to forget about it. We lost entire evenings early on because one guy could not live without this or that.

Speaking of that guy, here is my biggest online disappointment- that dude who is always late to FtF games- he is going to be late for online games too, because it isn't the traffic, or his schedule, or something unexpected that came up that makes him late- he is just late, always and forever. The excuse is really just garnish.

I had two of these guys in my last online group, and had played with both ftf in the past. If anything they were worse about it while online. I scuttled the game as a result. Now, I take a good deal of satisfaction in not answering their emails.