Remote gaming

[davemb]

I wanted to share a view of a recent campaign I ran on Roll20, this is more about the experience than the system. The post turned out to be quite long so there is TLDR at the start.

**TLDR – IT issues aside, distance gaming has a lot of to offer and is way better then not gaming at all.**

With work, life and people moving away getting a group together regularly was getting really difficult, with some time to spare I looked at using an online system like Google hangouts or Roll20 to get a group goin. Roll20 seemed like the best option as you get character sheets, maps, images, chat, voice and video in one package and the basic version is free. Aside from getting to grips with the system which did take a bit of getting used to, we needed an episode zero week to get everyone online together to get used to the interface and work out the IT issues, (this went on to being a bit of a weekly issue) and learn how to work the system. We quickly found that video and voice was a bit of a problem, getting everyone’s browsers and webcams setup and working so everyone could see and hear everyone became a regular issue, you can quickly see when someone’s image freezes that something had gone wrong but often the audio would drop so only some people could hear each other, you’d speak and realise after a few minutes that although the mic bar was moving not everyone could hear you or each other, which resulted in lots of reconnecting through the Roll20 settings. Whether or not this was an issue with Roll20, our PCs or poor internet I don’t know but it did become a real distraction, in the end we dropped video altogether and had Discord setup as an audio back up.

On the upside I really like the way you can set up maps, images, handouts and have them ready and hidden and reveal them as you go along, fog of war works really well on the maps and you can still use a lot of minds eye theatre with maps more for positions and ranges. Dice rolling is all shown and the character sheets are clickable so takes out the effort, click strength on the sheet and it adds your bonuses and rolls the dice for everyone to see. The prep work takes some time and I really felt that I couldn’t just wing it. It also worked well in that people could join from home for a long way from each other and there was no commuting, you had your stuff to hand and could setup as you liked.

I’d recommend it to anyone to have a go and see how it works out for you, for me there were much more positives than negatives. I still much prefer to host or go to someone place with all my stuff and game face to face it’s more social that way but if that isn’t available to you this is way better than no gaming.

I’d be interested to hear other people experiences.

[Fembreck]

Yeah our experience with Roll20 is similar. My current group uses Roll20 and while we have had alot of issue with the video and voice (end up using google to handle the voice/video) the rest of the tools are great. It is worth noting however, our GM has done a massive amount of prep work, including automating alot of our characters tool and he also has paid for a higher level of access.

[davemb]

You definitely need to put prep work into getting handouts, maps and npcs ready to work in Roll20. I wasn't ready to pay to upgrade I wanted to run a first campaign to see how it went before committing. I'd be happy to run another one and this time put more organisation in handouts and arranging them into folders as the campaign progresses this time.

[Fembreck]

I think Roll20 would have been amazing for our group back in the day when everyone was spending alot time outside of the gaming sessions, thinking about the game and prepping for it. No grown up responsibilities, no kids and at that stage no other hobbies meant ALOT of time for gaming. Unfortunately those days are 20-30 years behind us. It would be cool to hear from someone who has a group that uses it frequently and where everyone knows how to use it well

[GamerstableEric]

I've found that my prep work is way higher with Roll20 games than with face-to-face games. That said, I have over planned for Roll20 games and wasted a lot of time. I spend a way more time searching maps, images and icons than prepping my plot points and subplots

[v1rtuadept]

I find the amount of prep needed for Roll20 to be excessive unless I'm running one of the pre-built D&D modules they sell on their marketplace. Then it's pretty freakin' awesome, it doesn't really require that much prep, and it allows me to play online nearly anytime I have some free time which is far easier to manage in my schedule than putting together live sessions with anyone not in my immediate family. Having said that, there are complications that arise - technical glitches, players not showing up (I guess for some reason people find it easier to bail and not mention ahead of time for virtual vs real-life). GM's not showing up (I've accidentally been on the "wrong day" mentally and forgot about a session I was supposed to host before). But it certainly is gosh darn close to sitting around an actual gaming table especially if you make use of video and voice capabilities either through the VTT software or via Discord or something similar.