Hey guys
I usually meet in person with the group I GM for, but due to some practical reasons I suggested we do this one session online. I checked for some tips about this but most of what I could find refers to Roll20. We are not going to use Roll20, partly because I think setting it up will be too much of a hassle, and partly because there is a resistance in the group to play online and using Roll20 will psychologically feel like this will not be the only time. So we will be using either Skype or Google Hangouts with me in location A and the rest of the group in location B.
But this raises other practical issues... since everything will be done physically with no online tools, I'm not sure how I'll be able to see their die rolls or where they are on the map. If they use a laptop camera, which seems to be the case, it will be stationary and my angle will be static.
Is this not very doable, or do you have any ideas how to pull this off?
Thanks.
If they are using Google Hangouts on the computer there is a /roll *d* where * is the dice number and value (eg. /roll 2d6)...sadly and for some unknown reason it doesn't work if you're using the mobile version of hangouts.
Yes, but then they'll have to type on the laptop. They want to roll dice...
Yeah....it does take away from the physicality of rolling the dice, but aside from using a program like Roll20 or Fantasy Grounds (which is what I use for my online games), it's the next best thing. It still gives the players some control over the roll, as in they are the ones typing it vs just you rolling everything for them.
Or they can roll and I can trust them to tell me what they rolled... no? I think my bigger issue is seeing the physical map and their location on it. But other than sticking it on a wall in front of the camera I can't think of anything.
I didn't want to imply that you don't trust your players, but this is of course an option.
As for the map....you could download a map with a grid on it, write up coordinates on it (think chess-board style), and just get the players to tell you where the are and where they are going "I'm in B3 and going to use my move action to move up to B5, where I can attack the zombie in C5". A bit more effort on both you and the players though
We play with Google Hangouts, and it works good. For the map, we use a webcam on a tripod aimed at the map. The hardest part is the sound. If more than one person talks, it gets hard to hear
Pantorts wrote: We play with Google Hangouts, and it works good. For the map, we use a webcam on a tripod aimed at the map. The hardest part is the sound. If more than one person talks, it gets hard to hear Good point, I'll second that. As a DM it is important to control the talking with hangouts, otherwise someone gets drowned out and they don't necessarily know it, and get angry when you missed something they said. In combat is easiest, just make sure that the one who gets heard is on their initiative. Roleplay out of combat gets a little trickier...sometimes I let the conversation go on for a bit, then do the "ok, so what do you do PlayerA?". It's a little harder than at the table when people know they are overtalking each other and what not.
So we are thinking this: Google Hangouts, external microphone for the group for better audio, and two cameras, one master camera for the group, and one dedicated camera for the map. Audio is my biggest concern, to be honest.
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