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What are some of the things you would discuss (or want discussed) during session 0 for a VTT game? I'm preparing for a new campaign, and I've got some ideas already (shown below), but I'm also curious to hear what others have in mind.
Player Introductions
- Personal Player Introductions
- Experience with Roleplaying games, PF2E, and Roll20
- What you hope to get out of the game
Rules
- House Rules (such as "no PvP" and other behavioral limitations)
- Home Rules (such as changes to the Hero Point system or XP vs. Milestone leveling)
Game Literature
- Relevant rules (such as the Circus rules for Extinction Curse, for example)
- The Player's Guide
- The latest errata
Character Building
(For example...)
- Do not use optional rules (such as Voluntary Flaws, for example) without discussing them with the GM first.
- You do not have access to Uncommon, Rare, or Unique character options unless (1) they are GM approved, or (2) a Common option grants access to them (such as with many focus spells or ancestry feats).
- You begin play with 15gp with which to buy common items. If you are starting the game at higher level (such as when joining the campaign late, or replacing a deceased or retired character), use the Lump Sum rules found on page 511 of the Core Rulebook for determining your starting gear.
- Please remember to pay attention to traits! They dramatically effect the rules and how abilities work!
Fog of War / Dynamic Lighting
Player preferences. Fog of war is easier but more gamist, whereas dynamic lighting is more immersive, but can also cause confusion.
Special Needs
Do any of the players have any disabilities or special needs that they feel might impact gameplay or need to be addressed in some way?
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I can think of a few things that are always part of the conversations I have in the Session 0 onboarding that might be helpful.
Trope embracing/avoidance
Some people REALLY get rubbed the wrong way when they spend a dozen+ hours coming up with something unique and interesting to them only to have another player jump in and roll up an OBVIOUS recreation of some fictional character that they like such as some video game or anime character. This kind of thing can be truly destructive to a game if everyone is not on board with obvious homage characters.
Tone
Is this going to be a serious or a silly game? Is it meant to be fantastical or gritty? Is the game supposed to have a horror feel, pacing, and theme, or perhaps something completely different like Zena Warrior Princess and Hercules?
Loyalty to the RAW
Do you plan on making calls at the table in the moment and trusting that the table will honor your decisions or do they want to stay on course with the RAW whenever possible, even if it means stopping the game to have a discussion about it?
Downtime
Will the game be organized or planned in a manner that allows PCs to take full, partial, or NO advantage of the may Downtime systems for the campaign in question?
Missing Players during a session
What happens if we are missing one player? What happens if we are missing two players? Do we consider replacing them mid-campaign if they miss a certain number of sessions?
Sensitive topics/themes
Will any of the Players be made uncomfortable by some potential aspects or elements of the story/game that you're trying to run? Are there any particular sensitive topics that the Players want to avoid at all costs?
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In addition to those mentioned don't forget the technical stuff.
Can people talk and hear comms properly and see everyone if using video?
Are people able to properly mute their microphones (either through push to talk or higher quality microphones) so people can't hear them eat etc.
Can people access the VTT Ok? Are they able to control their token properly and is it working as expected. Is there an expectation that people contribute to the cost of the VTT if appropriate.
Also can people please turn off there microphone if they go to the bathroom. Seriously. It's very off putting. It really shouldn't happen. At all.
Are voluntary flaws an optional rule? I assumed the optional in the rulebook was meant it was optional for players to take rather than it being an "optional" rule.
I have never played a campaign before with strangers, didn't realize it was ever something players wouldn't be okay with.
Oddly I have always just played with friends and normally we don't have much of a session 0 other than making characters sometimes.
I would much rather make my character during my first sessions for these reasons though, but understand some people might not like to have a session where players just make a character.
Another VTT specific one, do players and the GM all have to roll in the VTT, or are people allowed to use physical dice? My group has been purely online for nearly three years now, and we only used digital dice when we first met, but as we got to trust each other more we allowed anyone who wanted to to use physical dice. Might be something good to think about.
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In addition to those mentioned don't forget the technical stuff.
Can people talk and hear comms properly and see everyone if using video?
Are people able to properly mute their microphones (either through push to talk or higher quality microphones) so people can't hear them eat etc.
Can people access the VTT Ok? Are they able to control their token properly and is it working as expected. Is there an expectation that people contribute to the cost of the VTT if appropriate.
Also can people please turn off there microphone if they go to the bathroom. Seriously. It's very off putting. It really shouldn't happen. At all.
Technical/Logistical Matters deserves its own bolded bullet heading, because, honestly, it's as integral to the experience as character creation.
- How often is the group playing? Will there be other times required/available for 1-on-1 if players want extra help with {character creation / item purchases / rules clarifications}? If players are on an academic schedule, will the game pause in May and December?
- How strict are the time constraints? What happens if the session starts X minutes late? What happens if the session runs Y minutes long?
- What happens if a player cancels? What happens if a player no-shows?
- Will there be scheduled breaks? (Aside from bathroom breaks, for night games, I have always asked for a scheduled break around my kids' bedtimes so I can maintain our family nighttime routine.) Will there be impromptu breaks? Are players expected to wear adult diapers? ;)
Plus, all the VTT stuff other people have mentioned, especially turning off the microphone if you're going to the bathroom or surfing pornography during breaks.
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I think it's important to remember that the "discussion" should be an actual discussion, not the GM already having prepared all the answers and just laying down the law. If you're writing an invitation and asking people to think about these topics before the session 0, pay attention to the TONE you put in the invitation!
Alignment is important - a lot of APs sort of assume the PCs are good-aligned heroes who'll do the right thing.
Campaign premise what is the campaign going to be about? If you've ever had to deal with characters that just didn't really want to go on to the next chapter in the adventure because it totally didn't fit the character, you know what I mean. You need to talk about what this campaign is going to be about, so that players can make characters that will actually want to go on these adventures.
Attention - are players expected to be fully focused on the game while it's happening? I would hope so, but it's good to get people to actually commit to this expectation.
Party composition/roles Who's going to do what in the party? A little coordination helps to prevent three people all expecting that they are going to be the Face, or having nobody with any healing skills.
Party "glue" why will the party be adventuring together? Are they part of a formal team (Agents of Edgewatch), colleagues (Extinction Curse) or some looser reason (Ashes)? Can you come up with background connections between the characters?
Are voluntary flaws an optional rule? I assumed the optional in the rulebook was meant it was optional for players to take rather than it being an "optional" rule.
I have never played a campaign before with strangers, didn't realize it was ever something players wouldn't be okay with.
You are correct. It's an optional step for the player, not an optional rule. A GM can literally never stop you from doing it.
Also important to ask: content to avoid. Lines and veils are in the CRB for a damn good reason. Ask about them. This should be done in real life too, obviously.
Campaign premise what is the campaign going to be about? If you've ever had to deal with characters that just didn't really want to go on to the next chapter in the adventure because it totally didn't fit the character, you know what I mean. You need to talk about what this campaign is going to be about, so that players can make characters that will actually want to go on these adventures.
I can not stress enough how important this is, namely campaign premise and character motivation.
If you want engaged players you need engaged characters and there is a lot that can go wrong here so this topic needs attention from the very start. Once your players respectively their characters loose interest and commitment in the story you are trying to tell your campaign is probably already almost over.
Our group just had this moment in our current AP (Ashes) where most of us started as happy-go-lucky adventurers, never really got involved in the story (either the AP or our GM probably did a bad job) up to a point where we had to ask ourselves: Why again are we doing this? Right, because there is "good" on our character sheets somewhere..."
Are voluntary flaws an optional rule? I assumed the optional in the rulebook was meant it was optional for players to take rather than it being an "optional" rule.
I have never played a campaign before with strangers, didn't realize it was ever something players wouldn't be okay with.
You are correct. It's an optional step for the player, not an optional rule. A GM can literally never stop you from doing it.
Also important to ask: content to avoid. Lines and veils are in the CRB for a damn good reason. Ask about them. This should be done in real life too, obviously.
..actually, they can toss out voluntary flaws. I don't see it as a harmful rule, but a GM can toss it just like any other. A GM can technically say 'no humans'.
That said, about everything else is a good thing to go over. Our GM was a little surprised when one player in our group went with actual torture during an interrogation, the same game had another player have issues with focusing (albeit we were a bit big then), and our current one has folks going in and out at times (involuntarily but it happens).
A GM can literally never stop you from doing it...actually, they can toss out voluntary flaws. I don't see it as a harmful rule, but a GM can toss it just like any other.
It can be harmful if people use it to build supernarrow-purpose 18/18/14/8/8/8 characters and the GM (or other players) don't want that.
The problem with tossing voluntary flaws as a whole is that you're addressing the mechanic by which a problem happens (trying indirectly to solve the problem with a lot of innocent use of voluntary flaws caught in the crossfire), rather than state the problem directly. It's better for a GM to say, directly, "I don't want any players mentally checking out of social encounters or anyone to dominate the combat encounters," which is the core problem.
Then, there are layers of rules that are increasingly indirect:
Semi-direct: "I want half-plus-one of the party to have non-negative scores in every ability" or "I don't want a character with more than one 8 or 18."
Indirect: "No voluntary flaws."
Any of the more direct methods would preserve the desired outcome that the GM wants, while allowing some legitimate uses of voluntary flaws, e.g., allowing warpriests to start with 18 STR or alchemists with 18 DEX.
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Any of the more direct methods would preserve the desired outcome that the GM wants, while allowing some legitimate uses of voluntary flaws, e.g., allowing warpriests to start with 18 STR or alchemists with 18 DEX.
This isn't actually possible with the CRB rules - the boost happens during the Ancestry step and can't be used to get a total bump over +2.
However, what you can do, and what I think is in fact the main reason for it to exist, is to use it negate ability flaws - like if you want to make a Charisma 18 dwarf sorcerer.