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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jackelope King" data-source="post: 3725997" data-attributes="member: 31454">I pretty much only get to game online these days, and that's mostly via Instant Messenger. Our group is scattered across the East Coast, and for someone to really wow me with a virtual tabletop, here's what it'd need.1. Make dice rolling as easy as can be. I want to be able to roll quickly, not type in a command-string like "//roll-dice5-sides6". I want to resolve my action. Animation on the dice would be nice, but not needed. I just want to roll the bones and make it feel like it does when I'm playing at the table.2. Computers are visual media. For the love of all that's holy, don't forget this! If you could do something as simple as allow for players to upload character portraits, or even select them from a gallery already online, you'd be doing wonders. I'd absolutely love to see an avatar creation system like City of Heroes, but that's more of an ideal than anything else. And on that note, make sure the DM can take advantage of the visuals! Let him grab pictures out of the Monster Manual and slap them on the virtual table when he says, "Roll for initiative!" (Again, ideally, I'd like to see these critters fully rendered and modeled ala so many other video games out there, but I'll be happy with protraits).3. Give us the ability to seperate the out-of-character chatter from the game. Maybe put a chat-box beneath the table where we can quote the Princess Bride or ask if anyone saw Heroes last week, but also let us click our characters so that we can keep the game running. If the voice chat becomes a reality, that's very awesome, because it would help to alieviate some problems that I know slower typists in our group have. And ditto many times over on the voice synthesizer. If you could add accents to voices on-the-fly, you just solved a dozen problems at once. And of course, having sound effects would be awesome too (battle-cries, ambient dungeon sounds, city market noises, etc.)4. Make the character sheet seamless with the tabletop. I mean "seamless" in the way that modern console games are seamless in their displays. Make it a part of the tabletop, so that I can tell at a glance what my hitpoints are, how much gold I have, and how many uses I have left on an ability. And integrate the rules that drive our character sheets with the table! Make declaring and resolving a power attack with my longsword while charging as easy as clicking the mouse four times. And keep track of my bonuses, for that matter. I don't want to forget that the cleric blessed us last round and miss my target for that. The better you can integrate the rules with this tabletop, the more you can make it more than a glorified chat program. I want this to be my gaming table in cyberspace, not just another chat program I can use for gaming. At the very least, I want the tabletop to facilitate these things, maybe by letting me drag-and-drop modifiers onto the top before I make the roll. You have the opportunity to make gameplay even more accessible to more people: don't pass it up!5. Make sure that the tabletop supports all the mapping that 4e supports. If I'm running a game, I want to be able to drag-and-drop a few terrain pieces, or draw out the dungeon hall quickly and easily. I want to use the tabletop like I would at home. It doesn't have to be the most eye-popping art ever, but it has to be functional. And if there are modifiers assocaited with the terrain, I want those to be floating right there where I can see it. Is that hill steep enough to count as High Ground? Is the undergrowth thick enough to be Difficult Terrain? What's the DC to jump acoss the river?6. The table has to be integrated 100% with the rest of D&D Insider/Gleemax. If at the end of the session, my DM gives me 100 XP, I want that to show up on my character sheet that I saved online. I want my inventory to be saved too, and to have my character's expendibles tracked in general from game to game. Give it to me in a form that I can easily save in a common format (like .pdf) to my computer, so that I can print it out later, or so I can have a version of my character at level X for another game in real life. And if you really want to make this a screaming success, integrate a character creation program. Or even better, a character editing program. Let me bring my favorite character to a game, find out that we're starting 10 levels higher than I am now, and then help me slap 10 levels onto my character quickly and easily, without me losing my data for my usual game. Help me make it easier. Track what options are open to me, show me how many choices I have left, and advance my saves and attack bonus and whatever else automatically. You do the heavy lifting. I'll pick the fun stuff.7. If you want to truly be "D&D anytime, anywhere" give me that option! Set up "constant tabletops" arranged like taverns or markets in the Dalelands or Sharn. Let me get some roleplaying in and interract with other players. Who knows! Maybe this is how I'll meet another group I want to game with. Let me enjoy my favorite part of D&D: roleplaying! Or, if I feel like making things go squish, let me go find a table that's just an arena where players can join together to fight some iconic monsters, or even break out some player-versus-player gladitorial action! Sometimes you just want to meet interesting PCs and kill them, afterall. And note what a draw this is in online games like WoW...8. Let me advertise my game and my characters! Let my Gleemax account tell other members that I generally like to play fighters in mid-level games, and that I'm usually online between 7 PM and 11 PM. Let me note that I really like swashbuckling games, and I'm a sucker for anything with airships. And then make those keywords into something that other gamers can search to quickly meet up with me and possibly start a game! Or let me post about my game and whether I'm accepting new players. Help me get more players!9. And to reitterate the most important point: The interface has to be fantastic. Not "good". Not "okay". Fantastic. I have to be able to game at this virtual table as easily as I do in real life, if not more easily. I don't want to have to learn a bunch of commands to do everything I want. Make it easy for me to do what I want when I want. Let me root through my inventory with my mouse wheel, or declare an attack by clicking on the monster. If I forget what a spell does, let me roll my mouse over it and get the text right there. This virtual tabletop could eliminate the old pain of flipping through the book looking for tables or spells. Eliminate it. Interface, interface, interface.10. And as a little add-on, it'd be really nice if I could use some of that player-created content at the virtual tabletop. You know, try my buddy's stab at a prestige class, or playtest my own system for resolving chases on horseback. Make it possible for DMs to "program" the tabletop to use (or at least display) house rules and variant rules.(And if you really want to revolutionize the hobby, I want you to know that I also want to be able to use other open gaming content with your tabletop. I realize that this might not be great business sense, but if I could bring my copy of Mutants and Masterminds to your virtual tabletop and have it work in a way that I described above, congrats: you'll have truly revolutionized the hobby, and insured its existance for years to come.)</blockquote>

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