So, I'm starting to think that I might need to run a game myself, in order for it be a Goldilocks pace. There are games that I'm glad to *not* be in because they post too much for me to even follow as an observer, and others where I'll check threads for responses to my posts and find none. "Just right" would be nice.
However, I haven't run a tabletop RPG in many years, I've only run one-shots, and I've certainly never run a PbP game before. So. Aside from the obvious -- post frequently -- what are the PbP-specific challenges that I should expect for recruiting and running a game, and what are the tips and tricks you recommend for overcoming them? Common pitfalls and how to avoid them? Anything else you can think of?
And now I'm throwing the floor open to any other questions DMs (and potential DMs) might have, and any tips you want to share!
I'm a player in a hybrid PBP/Skype game. We generally try to get everyone together to skype weekly, game for 4-5 hours, then take handle things on the forum over the course of the week. It leads to a very streamlined narrative experience, since we make many of the elements that can take up game time (shopping, planning, gathering rumors) are handled in posts.
For the purely PBP games, I find it helps to have separate areas for combat (or anything that's happening at "tactical speed" 1 round at a time), plot, and strategy. I haven't played a game here on the paizo boards yet so I'm not sure if the interface supports this. Basically, most of the play is done in the plot thread. The GM announces "Crunch Time" and the play switches over to the tactical thread. That gets resolved, then things go back to the plot thread. The strategy thread is for working out long-term developments for your PCs- things you don't want to interrupt the plot posts for, but you want to discuss for character development or future plans.
Here's a couple things I've noticed from DM'ing (briefly), playing, and just observing:
1) Be very careful with alignments. If you have an evil character (or CN) and a character with strong principles, you may encounter some trouble. If you can manage it, it's no problem, because conflict between party members can be really good for roleplaying. But they can also lead to out of character animosity, which no one wants.
2) When picking characters, pay some attention to grammar and spelling. While it is not completely important, it can be frustrating to play with someone who doesn't capitalize their sentences.
3) Map-making is tough. I extracted the maps directly from the PDF and pasted it into Publisher where I used black shapes to block out anything the PCs couldn't see. It takes a lot of time, even to do something as simple as that. And you have you update it every round during combat.
4) Speaking of combat, come up with a good way to run initiative. If you can't post often, you may want to group players together in a "Block Initiative" format. This limits the usefulness of certain feats and traits, though, so run it by your players first and allow them to adjust.
5) Once you pick a format, stick to it...
That's all I've got for now! I'd like to hear more, though.
That's all I've got for now! I'd like to hear more, though.
So would I, but they moved my threads from Recruitment to Gamer Talk. PbPers are already a small-enough segment without limiting it to the ones that also read the Gamer Life section. Oh well, c'est la vie.