One thing I do like about VTTs, tho, is the ability to deal with players one on one without the other players knowing about it.
If a character receives a secret letter, I can send it to just that player.
If a character fails a save and gets dominated, I can send them a private message, rather than say it out loud and listen to the other players try to justify why they are suddenly casting dispel magic on the other character because he's "acting funny (when he literally just failed his save one round ago).
Yeah, a few sessions ago my roleplaying of a Calm Emotions that silently hit my character left my companions a little baffled. They understood that something was going on, but didn't know what or why.
At a physical table, the DMs would have had to hand me some secret message for that, and the effect for the other players wouldn't had been the same.
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Was initially resistant to VTT. I have always preferred to sit face to face with my players. The social aspect of the game is why I do it. Otherwise, I could just as well play an MMO or PlayStation. But, I’ve found that I can do so much more visually with imagery, table rendering, etc to provide a much more visually pleasing game. Plus maintain a library of reference material at the player’s fingertips with both past and current NPCs, maps, etc. I can much more easily prep and organize all the handouts and such not to mention ready-access to the character sheets without having to ask for them thus allowing me to reference modifiers, equipment, languages, etc without alerting the players to administrative manipulation I’m doing with the narrative without disrupting their immersion. Not to mention I can literary play whenever I want to without having to coordinate travel, be concerned about adverse weather, transporting all the gaming materials I will need (minis, maps, reference books, terrain, etc) etc. or worry about leaving my pets home alone for extended periods. I can sit in my comfortable chair with an ice pack or heat and take whatever medication I need for my disability without fear of it affecting my ability to drive. I’ve done a complete 180 and vastly prefer virtual gaming to live at this point. I don’t know that I’ll ever go back to primarily doing live gaming after the Covid issue allows for it. This is just too damn convenient. (Though I still don’t enjoy play by post :-D) YMMV
One thing I do like about VTTs, tho, is the ability to deal with players one on one without the other players knowing about it.
If a character receives a secret letter, I can send it to just that player.
If a character fails a save and gets dominated, I can send them a private message, rather than say it out loud and listen to the other players try to justify why they are suddenly casting dispel magic on the other character because he's "acting funny (when he literally just failed his save one round ago).Yeah, a few sessions ago my roleplaying of a Calm Emotions that silently hit my character left my companions a little baffled. They understood that something was going on, but didn't know what or why.
At a physical table, the DMs would have had to hand me some secret message for that, and the effect for the other players wouldn't had been the same.
There's always the option to use a VTT in person. It combines the best of both worlds, I think.
For groups without a laptop for everyone, you can try what I've done - if you know some shenanigans are likely to happen (dominate, darkside mirror, etc.) type up the effects ahead of time on a sheet of paper and fold it in half. Also type up several sheets with about the same amount of text on it that is nonsense (lorem ipsum works wonderfully). Then when something happens hand the player the appropriate sheet. If you give out at least one decoy sheet ahead of time when nothing big happens, then when the real sheet is handed out players won't necessarily know something is amiss. You can also do the same by taking the player into another room and either just chat with them a minute or so about nothing in particular, or tell them what horrible effects they suffer from their failed save. Or you can combine them by handing the player the paper once you've pulled them aside.
I find the paper method is more efficient but pulling a player aside really ratchets up the tension.
Was initially resistant to VTT. I have always preferred to sit face to face with my players. The social aspect of the game is why I do it. Otherwise, I could just as well play an MMO or PlayStation. But, I’ve found that I can do so much more visually with imagery, table rendering, etc to provide a much more visually pleasing game. Plus maintain a library of reference material at the player’s fingertips with both past and current NPCs, maps, etc. I can much more easily prep and organize all the handouts and such not to mention ready-access to the character sheets without having to ask for them thus allowing me to reference modifiers, equipment, languages, etc without alerting the players to administrative manipulation I’m doing with the narrative without disrupting their immersion. Not to mention I can literary play whenever I want to without having to coordinate travel, be concerned about adverse weather, transporting all the gaming materials I will need (minis, maps, reference books, terrain, etc) etc. or worry about leaving my pets home alone for extended periods. I can sit in my comfortable chair with an ice pack or heat and take whatever medication I need for my disability without fear of it affecting my ability to drive. I’ve done a complete 180 and vastly prefer virtual gaming to live at this point. I don’t know that I’ll ever go back to primarily doing live gaming after the Covid issue allows for it. This is just too damn convenient. (Though I still don’t enjoy play by post :-D) YMMV
I haven't got to play enough in person games to tell but in general I actually really enjoy VTTs compared to video games. Only issue is trying to get 4+ players to show up at a normal time.
I love all the features that virtual tabletops offer. It just makes everything easier overall. Fantasy Grounds especially can get rid of lots of mundane things.
There are just a lot of little things I enjoy about the technology. Biggest one is that most VTTs get rid of all the math for you. This is just so great.
I did end up moving South because I had enough of winters. So sadly I have no other way to play these games, also my family/friends are spread out between Seattle, Wisconsin and Michigan. So yes I am glad so many people have put so much effort into building great VTT world.
I find MMOs/coop RPGs video games get boring really quick and have tried getting friends/family to play one of those but it 100% always ends with the group splitting apart within a month or less. Before VTTs I pretty much only talked to my brother once a year so it has been nice talking a little more than that.
Overall VTTs have some issues but the ability to just play with people across the world is too much of a benefit. Also sidenote I hate messing around with paper character sheets.
Yeah, a few sessions ago my roleplaying of a Calm Emotions that silently hit my character left my companions a little baffled. They understood that something was going on, but didn't know what or why.
At a physical table, the DMs would have had to hand me some secret message for that, and the effect for the other players wouldn't had been the same.
Yea. At a physical table, you can get handed a note. But then, the other players immediately know something's up. I use VTT even in person these days. For one, because I'm awful at drawing. And I just don't have the room for hundreds and hundreds of minis (as much as I'd like to).
Everyone brings their laptops and we get line of sight on maps for each player. Plus, when I private message one of the players who's sitting there, no one knows but them.I do like Fumarole's idea. When not everyone has their laptop, hand out decoy notes during the session, so no one necessarily knows anything is up.
Our game session today ran pretty slowly. The players spend an hour planning an ambush while I searched for a suitable map and terrain-feature pictures on the Internet. Then I threw 14 individual creatures of 4 different types against the 7-player party. That made turns run slowly. We had to quit for the night partway (60% I think) through the battle.
Though we player via Roll20 and Discord, three players sit in the same room as me, each with their own computer. One was scrying in ESO, another was farming surveys in ESO, and the third was solving crossword puzzles. Yet they were all paying attention to other people's turns and responded promptly. They said that they had chosen activities that occupied their hands more than their minds, so that they could listen to the game and pause went they needed to.
Note that two of the players did this before we went to VTT. The third one joined the game after VTT.
Thus, we had no problem.
I keep a ton of stock maps in a map folder on my hard drive. City streets. Camp sites. Forest. Jungle. Forest road crossing. River bridge crossing. Tavern. That sort of thing. I usually add several to a campaign in Fantasy Grounds at the very beginning so I've got lots of generic terrains in case a battle comes up I wasn't quite ready for.
I keep a ton of stock maps in a map folder on my hard drive. City streets. Camp sites. Forest. Jungle. Forest road crossing. River bridge crossing. Tavern. That sort of thing. I usually add several to a campaign in Fantasy Grounds at the very beginning so I've got lots of generic terrains in case a battle comes up I wasn't quite ready for.
I have been collecting forest maps on my hard drive since our campaign in the Fangwood Forest in Nirmathis moved to Roll20 and Discord in March 2020. The first two modules in the Ironfang Invasion adventure path take place in the Fangwood. However, my party has temporarily jumped ahead to the 3rd module, which takes place in the Hollow Hills west of the Fangwood. I had not been collecting maps that fit that hilly area.
The module provided a map of the Ridgeline Camp where the battle against a tiny army was supposed to take place. My players had ambushed a 12-hobgoblin patrol a quarter mile from the camp (I used the top 8 squares of the Ridgeline Camp map). Instead of advancing to the camp or returning to the besieged town, they wanted to set up a 2nd ambush on the road, ... and I had planned on marching the entire army to town, so we needed a big battle site.
Before VTT, I would spread out my 30-square by 30-square big playmat and scribbled a few lines, "Here is a road, a few bushes, a few rocks, a cliff, ..." In VTT visualizing the scene is tougher, so the map needs more realism. And we can take advantage of maps bigger than my playmat. The map yesterday was 30 squares wide and 120 squares tall.
Instead of advancing to the camp or returning to the besieged town, they wanted to set up a 2nd ambush on the road, ... and I had planned on marching the entire army to town, so we needed a big battle site.
Yea, they had you scrambling.
But, despite the frustration, that's an example of why I love TTRPGs so much. The storyline truly is in the hands of the people at the table. =)