5E: Last Gasp of Theater of Mind D&D? (aka D&D Killed by Windows 10!)

[Celebrim]

And a likely reason for that is the time and effort it takes to assemble content. Even with the best tools, it won't be fast enough for the players ability to zoom around the map looking and touching everything. Just like they do in Skyrim, and unlike that they do at the table when then walk into that imaginary pub.

A computer with this sophistication of Watson could achieve at some levels the same understanding of, "You see a pub.", as a player. Such a computer could respond to, "You see a pub.", by bringing up an example pub for you, and indeed could learn from trial and error what you most likely had in mind when you particular said "a pub". You could also correct it, "No, a pub in a rural village.", and have it return an example.

Eventually, a helper like that could learn to share the creative space with you, not merely retrieving images, but modifying them, so that if you said something like, "Ok, like that, but more ivy on the walls.", it could search for an image with ivy on the walls and extrapolate where ivy might be on this image. Or you could say, "Ok, add a second story", or "Put a sign with a green dragon hanging above the door." A really 'smart' such program could respond to things like, "Extrapolate a floor plan."

 

[Umbran]

A computer could do such things, but I am not convinced that would actually serve well.

There is functionality in not over specifying. Say the GM doles not have time to specify for the computer in detail, but there are many specifics that matter. He can say, "a pub" to a player, and that player gets relevant information without specifics. The player is ready to change the mental image as details become meaningful.

But, if the computer puts in specifics for the GM, everyone is then stuck with that image. It is easy to increase detail, hard to change details once given.

 

[Janx]

A computer could do such things, but I am not convinced that would actually serve well.

There is functionality in not over specifying. Say the GM doles not have time to specify for the computer in detail, but there are many specifics that matter. He can say, "a pub" to a player, and that player gets relevant information without specifics. The player is ready to change the mental image as details become meaningful.

But, if the computer puts in specifics for the GM, everyone is then stuck with that image. It is easy to increase detail, hard to change details once given.

Additionally, when the tabletop GM says "you see a pub" it is because the party just turned the corner/it came into view. The party might get closer, or walk by. Thus, the GM doesn't need to clarify the pub unless it becomes relevant (imagine ad hoc/shroedinger's GM as an extreme case of this).

Whereas for the video game (or variant thereof), the pub must be defined in detail long before the party gets to it. The players can physically get there in the game world faster than GM can make it up on the fly (even using a tool). The GM couldn't do all the pub setup while the party was walking in the forest to the pub, because he had to lay down forest tiles on the virtual map and figure all that out.

In practical terms, a GM can't define a video game world on the fly fast enough to keep up with the players, even with the best of tools. Unlike a tabletop RPG where the GM can say a few words to evoke a mental image in the player, and that is sufficient for the player to make their next choice or request for more detail. So the GM has to prep much of the game world content before the party sets foot on the map.

There might not be anything wrong with that paradigm. Imagine your GM spends time entering the regional map into the VR world. Dungeons, monsters, towns, NPCs. That stuff can all run on auto-pilot well enough for the players to walk around and see and find them, without DM intervention.

The DM would be able to take control of monsters/NPCs to make sure they respond "in character" or intelligently. Since it's all VR, the players see a barmaid with a nice accent, or an orc speaking gruntfully. But it's really the GM, portraying the character the same as he used to in a tabletop game.

 

[dbm]

For the last couple of years I've been close to buying a decent sized LCD flat screen TV for use as a digital gaming board (with a Perspex sheet over the screen for protective purposes). The price has come down so much that cost is no longer a blocker - it's the time and effort which would be needed to create a map for use. It's just so much easier to draw a simple map on a Chessex mat.

 

[Jhaelen]

Point of fact, HoloLens has a 1up on Occulus, it has a opaque/transparent effect that lets it take over your entire view, or integrate with the surrounding environment.

Does HoloLens do both? I thought HoloLens = Augmented Reality, and Oculus = Virtual Reality. The latter is much better suited to support 'immersive' roleplaying.

 

[Janx]

Does HoloLens do both? I thought HoloLens = Augmented Reality, and Oculus = Virtual Reality. The latter is much better suited to support 'immersive' roleplaying.

I think I see the problem. don't equate each device to a category.

Both devices cover your eyes relatively completely

the HoloLens has the capability of taking over your entire vision, or partial as it projects parts of a virtual world by obscuring sections of view.

Occulus isn't transparent at all/ever and thus isn't sufficient for augmented reality.

As such, BOTH are capable of virtual reality, as in taking over your entire vision.

 

[Jhaelen]

the HoloLens has the capability of taking over your entire vision.

Hi Janx,
I've now read another article on the HoloLens and it doesn't seem to support your claim that it's capable of true VR. Actually, one of the participants of Microsoft's presentation stated that it felt like having 'tunnel-vision' since the HoloLens is only capable of projecting 3d graphics in a relatively small central area at the center of your vision.

Where did you get the information that it's supposed to support VR?

 

[GMMichael]

Video games are a much bigger threat to the Theater than those shareholder-meeting-augmentation-specs. Companies like Bethesda and Blizzard don't just make roleplaying games; their business is making ENDLESS roleplaying games, which is almost direct competition for table games. And you've seen how popular they are.

I suspect the question (is this the last gasp?) shouldn't be new though. The Miniatures Handbook put a big, gaping gash in the Theater's abdomen. Then Dungeon Tiles kicked it to the ground. 5e finally ran up, put its shield out over the Theater, and said, "no! Let this one live!"

 

[Umbran]

Occulus isn't transparent at all/ever and thus isn't sufficient for augmented reality.

Unless you mount a camera on your head, and have that be part of the input, such that it is. Or you are working in an area that has been mapped in VR, such that the VR you are seeing is just the real world, having much the same effect.

Information technology - flexible!

 

[pemerton]

There is functionality in not over specifying.

<snip>

The player is ready to change the mental image as details become meaningful.

But, if the computer puts in specifics for the GM, everyone is then stuck with that image.

Furthermore, there are plenty of RPGing techniques that depend upon filling in the details in response to action declarations by the players,and/or the resolution of those action declarations.

Fixing the details in advance prevents the use of those techniques.