Let's talk about play by post gaming!

[garyh]

Inspired by the Discussion Thread for Living Enworld, I decided to start this thread. Most topics in TtT revolve around recruitment and organization of games... but I thought might be a good idea to have a thraed to discuss whatever PbP topics come to mind - you name it, we can discuss it, anything from effective PbP DMing, to what are good colors to post with in character. Plus, it'll give me ideas to improve the FAQ.

So, what's on you minds regarding PbP gaming, my friends?

 

[Erekose13]

One thing you said I wanted to inquire about is some DMing tips. Im guess im not really that new to pbp gaming though it still feels like it. I started out running a game in July and it finished. Now I am in entirely too many games and running two. I have found that generally combat intensive adventures do not flow as well as rping/discussion/plot driven ones. Though I have only just started my second game with that in mind so we shall see how it goes. I was wondering how others handle the balance between the two. Also I have yet to be in a game where anyone has gone up in level. Given how slow things move are their ways to speed up that part of things to allow characters to advance?

You also mentioned things like colours in your post Gary, thought I would comment on that. For my latest game I decided to try and be really strict about things like posting format and such and while it looks nice I dont know if it was necessary.
"Speech in silver and in quotes"
Thoughts in plum and italics

OOC: Out of character comments in brackets, purple and small.

Each post has the character name, race and class in the Title
In Combat the title is Character name, Ac, Hp, Atk, Dmg

Anyone else try anything like that?

 

[Thanee]

I started out running a game in July and it finished.

!!!



Funny enough, I do the colors almost the other way around, using magenta italics or "just italics in quotation marks" for speech, just italics for thoughts and size 1 silver for OOC comments!

I've just started DMing my first PbP game here, so I can't speak of much experience yet, have played in one of the first ones (Non-Iconics Adventure, the first one to finish as well ) and also am playing in a few games now.

What I feel important is, that players and DM are posting regularily, altho that's sometimes difficult, if RL gets in the way. Therefore I think a fairly large group (6 instead of the usual 4) is a good idea, so there are always enough players around to keep the story going!

I'll try to be fairly generous with XP, because I'd like to see some character advancement and given the slow nature of PbP gaming, this usually happens not that often.

Bye
Thanee

 

[dpdx]

As for colors, I prefer sandy brown and some of the light blue shades, as they contrast with black. I started out with the medium turquoise for Fendric, my PC in Casual, but Cyan's much more readable. I'm looking hard, too, at Pale Turquoise. It's a trick, differentiating your PC's speech from the text, and still making it readable. That light purple looked good, too.

 

[darkbard]

i wonder if it would be useful at all to have the dm of PbP games give a rough window of times s/he's likely to post. it could help speed up play if everyone tries to check in around a similar time. something like lunchtime and from 7-9 pm [EST] or the like.

of course, this totally disrupts one of the advantages of this gaming medium--playing whenever you're free. plus, with the global nature of this site, organizing posting times could prove nigh impossible.

i've given the issue quite a bit of thought since the slow rate of play seems to be the most significant drawback to the medium. any thoughts from others on the matter?

 

[Uriel]

As far as Posts go...
I post colors for actual things said by my NPCs,I prefer yellow and cyan, but lime and orange as well. Anything readable.

I use OoC: for Out of Character Comments

<....> for game Mechanics and/or dice results.

 

[Radiant]

I'm only running one game here but I never had problems with colours or post format even though all the player do it however they like. Took me two pages getting used to it and that's that.

@darkbard: I sometimes saw how fast the flow can get if many people in the game are online and it's fun but I don't think it's possible to organize it. Mostly 'cause of the time difference. In my case it's a generall time problem. I don't even play other Rpg's anymore since I can't spare the time. The really great part about pbp is that you can log on thenever you have a break.

@Erekose13: You'r right about the combat problem, it slows down the game incredibly. I can post outside of combat dozens of time each day by just loggin in from somethere but to roll out a combat turn, I have to be at home, have my dice and the chars handy and find the patience to make all those rolls. Haven't found a solution for that yet.

 

[Caliber]

I haven't run any myself, but I think a lot break down in the begining because of lack of a hook.

I've seen several games start with the DM more or less saying ... "ok ... you're in an Inn ... introduce yourselves."

While that kind of into might work in person, I think PbP requires some more direction than RL gaming, simply because its so much more ... fragile? I guess is the word I'm looking for.

Any thoughts?

 

[Endur]

The other problem with combat is that you may need to wait for every player to make a post to resolve a single round of combat. Which means potentially 24-48 hours per combat round. Which means a single combat can easily last a week.

In a mega-module/campaign with over one hundred combats, you are talking about an adventure that would last several years not even including all the other role-playing.

 

[Jemal]

In a mega-module/campaign with over one hundred combats, you are talking about an adventure that would last several years not even including all the other role-playing.

Yes, but if you can keep a campaign like that GOING for the seveal years, then I'ld say it'd be highly worth it!

Anyways, I always check my posts from at home anyways, I'm currently at a place in my life where sometimes I'll go a week with nothing happening IRL and other times WHAM life's so full of stuff that has to be done that I don't know where to start. As for the combat, I usually don't find it too hard, though it is a bit time consuming. What I've seen some DMs do is ask the players to post all the relevant info (IE post their total attack modifiers, AC, HP, etc for a round based on whether they charged, raged, power attacked, and counting buffs they have on, etc.) That makes it go a bit quicker as you don't have to always check their char. sheets for the info. Another I've actually been thinking of doing myself is letting players make their own rolls for combat, and then telling them the results... I'ld still make all the rolls for saves, skill checks, etc, but it would make combat easier. BUT then you get into the problem that it means the PCs have to be around their dice + characters to do it... Unless they know where to find a good online dice roller.

Wouldn't it be cool if ENworld had a dice roller built on here somewhere with a link to it?


And, don't forget if all else fails - You're the DM, make something up.

I've seen several games start with the DM more or less saying ... "ok ... you're in an Inn ... introduce yourselves."

While that kind of into might work in person, I think PbP requires some more direction than RL gaming, simply because its so much more ... fragile? I guess is the word I'm looking for.

*L* actually that's how a lot of my the games I'm in IRL have been starting lately.. not many of them last too long either (But that's b/c recently my gaming group's been going through several changes, people coming + going)

But I agree, and with Online I usually try to have a good (From my PoV) hook for the characters, and I've found it's probably best to figure out how the PCs know each other (Or whether they DON'T know each other) before the game starts.