Roll20: A new virtual tabletop focused on storytelling

[Janx]

Thanks for all the great suggestions! I've read them all and while I don't have time to type out the thorough response that post deserves right now, I'll be keeping them in mind.

no problem, they are worth at least what you paid for. Generally, my opinions are free, it's my labor you have to pay for

I'm looking at you're kickstarter project. It says if I chip in at the Hero level, I get access to the Closed Beta.

Will that cover getting my friends in as well (a VTT isn't very useful or testable if I can't get multiple users in at the same time)?

Roll20 looks like it has the right approach to a simple unified tool (rather like the Apple way of doing things, build a tool that works well within its definition and purpose, but leave off some advanced, specialty stuff).

 

[rileydutton]

no problem, they are worth at least what you paid for. Generally, my opinions are free, it's my labor you have to pay for

I'm looking at you're kickstarter project. It says if I chip in at the Hero level, I get access to the Closed Beta.

Will that cover getting my friends in as well (a VTT isn't very useful or testable if I can't get multiple users in at the same time)?

Roll20 looks like it has the right approach to a simple unified tool (rather like the Apple way of doing things, build a tool that works well within its definition and purpose, but leave off some advanced, specialty stuff).

Yep, only the GM has to be in the beta, you can then invite your players/friends to join your game after you create it.

 

[Janx]

Thanks for your support!

When you say "public character sheet viewing", what do you mean exactly? Are you using something like Obsidian Portal?

We're really just opposed to, for example, having a system-specific way to enter a bunch of stats on a character so that you can then have a bunch of pre-made "attacks" set up to check against stats that auto-roll...you see where this is going.

But if it's just a matter of you want to attach some info to a Character so your players or the public can see it, that's something we can probably put on the roadmap.

I suspect at the minimum, he was hoping for the ability to post his char sheet, and the GM could review it between/during games.

having a file share/hyperlink storage area might solve this, as people could post links to external CharSheet sites or just upload their char sheet file. Either way, you'd be out of the loop for managing that aspect, just holding onto things and making them available to players/GM.

Just storing hyperlinks might be lighter weight (they're small) than hosting files. No sense getting into that business if you can avoid it.

 

[Janx]

As part of my free-advice policy, I see folks are asking for things like Exploding Dice and card-deck handling.

You might want to rein that in, at least for your first version.

consider, your mission is a VTT with a focus on storytelling. Most RPGs don't use exploding dice (some do) or cards. Playing poker uses cards, but isn't a RPG thing. Might be worth NOT doing that, if it means handling video/voice/text/battlemat smoothly and simply better.

With exploding dice, consider that a macro problem. For "normal" RPGs, it is pretty simply nomenclature to use basic math notation and XdY to signify a die roll of Y sides and X quantity.

How the heck do you signify this next roll also uses Exploding dice?

My answer is, you don't. It's a coding problem, not a notation problem. With a decent macro language, anybody can code up a macro to reroll and add when a "6" shows up on a d6. They can then share that macro as a command users can execute that function from, by supplying their skill level and the DC as parameters to. Rather than you focusing on trying to solve it within your command language. Especially with however many versions and variants of the Exploding Dice concept there can be.

To sum up, push out certain problems to later or sub-systems which can handle it (also later), if it isn't crucial to the main mission. Do everything else well, and people who want to play a game with a wierd dice mechanic can do their rolls manually, write/download a macro, or switch to a different ruleset which enables roleplaying, without using a wierd game mechanic.


just something to consider.

 

[Dannager]

When you say "public character sheet viewing", what do you mean exactly? Are you using something like Obsidian Portal?

I mean a document (the word "document" here used loosely) that contains your character's information that is viewable by everyone playing in the same game as you, or at the very least viewable by both you (the player) and the DM. As a DM, it is critical that both my players and I be able to look at the same character sheet.

We're really just opposed to, for example, having a system-specific way to enter a bunch of stats on a character so that you can then have a bunch of pre-made "attacks" set up to check against stats that auto-roll...you see where this is going.

I can understand an argument for wanting to avoid automated rules adjudication - though I'm not sure the merits of that argument wholly validate it - but I think have the ability to put dice-rolling macros into your sheet for commonly-rolled expressions is a reasonable and easily-implemented feature. In fact, it's a standard feature in nearly every extant VTT.

But if it's just a matter of you want to attach some info to a Character so your players or the public can see it, that's something we can probably put on the roadmap.

Yep, that's what I'm looking for at a bare minimum.

Mind you, you already have my financial support. These are just things that I would like to see happen, and which would encourage me to actually use the VTT, rather than simply funding it because I think it ought to exist.

 

[Janx]

I mean a document (the word "document" here used loosely) that contains your character's information that is viewable by everyone playing in the same game as you, or at the very least viewable by both you (the player) and the DM. As a DM, it is critical that both my players and I be able to look at the same character sheet.

On a technical note, having a document or link sharing system should be trivial (one of my products is document management technologies, I know how I'd solve it). And it makes a lot of sense, you get a lot of happiness for a little bit of work and disk space.

I can understand an argument for wanting to avoid automated rules adjudication - though I'm not sure the merits of that argument wholly validate it - but I think have the ability to put dice-rolling macros into your sheet for commonly-rolled expressions is a reasonable and easily-implemented feature. In fact, it's a standard feature in nearly every extant VTT.

Enabling the VTT macros in the char sheet means the char sheet has to be modeled inside the VTT and not just a posted Word or Excel document. It certainly encroaches on that. I suspect this is a line Roll20 is hesitant to cross, for now. I would agree.

However, consider this game situation. I have a 12 for my Climb skill (let's say 8 ranks +4 dex).

With zero in-VTT support, when I want to make my check, I could type:
I roll a Climb check at 1d20+12

The GM would see my result as:
Janx: I roll a Climb check at 1d20+12=18

There could be a d20 Skill check macro loaded that let's me type:
/skill Climb 12

and the screen sends:
Janx rolls 18 for Climb

If the VTT has the runtime variables (globals) like mIRC does, I could load up my skills pre game with commands like "/skill Climb=12"

and then in the game I send:
/skill Climb

and it sends back:
Janx rolls 18 for Climb

With any of these variants, the VTT itself doesn't have to hold or manage my character sheet for useful automation. I can easily consult my paper char sheet (actually, I use my iPad and the Numbers spreadsheet app) for my stats as needed.

Macros can handle doing the automation, and depending on how robust that system is, it can handle the whole problem.

If the VTT includes and import/export of these "runtime" variables, the user can save their game state seperately. Or somebody could write an external CharSheet manager app to take the import/export file, parse it and add the data to bring in your char sheet data back into the VTT's variables so the macros can use them.

I would also recommend having autocomplete/intellisense for your chat interface with regards to macros. Note, I assume like I did for IRC, macro comamnds are launched in the chat window, often prefaced with a / to differentiate them from normal speech.

In which case, take the following function definition for a macro (in pseudo-code):
macro SkillCheck(SkillName from SkillList, SkillLevel as Number)

note, I'm using a VB-like syntax. As a user, the moment I start typing "/skill" Intellisense should be showing me all the macros that start with skill. Next, when I lock in "/SkillCheck" note how it solve for case-sensitivity. When I press space, it should be showing me a list of Skills to pick from the SkillList (an enum data structure defined outside the Macro, that the Macro uses).

Continuing the example, I'll press cl which will jump to Climb from the list, and press space to type a number. The number will use the dice parser, so I could type "12" or "1d6" and it would know what to do with it.
the final command I enter will be:
/SkillCheck Climb 12

but I have less typing to do, and am not going to make a mistake in entering anything. The parser won't let me screw up and reduces my keystrokes.

Intellisense is the number one reason I like coding in Visual Studio. It speeds up development, and actually helps me explore the system, because I can start typing the name of something, and it shows me all the possible things with that name, and then if I choose one, it shows me their parameters so i get it right the first time.

If you can get your command parser running that smooth, it should make your system very easy to use at the keyboard.

 

[Dannager]

On a technical note, having a document or link sharing system should be trivial (one of my products is document management technologies, I know how I'd solve it). And it makes a lot of sense, you get a lot of happiness for a little bit of work and disk space.

Enabling the VTT macros in the char sheet means the char sheet has to be modeled inside the VTT and not just a posted Word or Excel document. It certainly encroaches on that. I suspect this is a line Roll20 is hesitant to cross, for now. I would agree.

Again, given the nigh-ubiquity of in-VTT character sheets in modern VTTs, it really would feel like it was missing a key feature if no character sheet support were present upon release. I'd like to see this project become a go-to for all VTT play, rather than simply being a good option for a particular niche of VTT play. Link sharing doesn't go far enough. I don't mean that you need to be able to import Word/Excel/Acrobat docs into the VTT, but rather that there needs to be some way of hosting your character information in a format viewable by others playing in your same game, without resorting to external applications (again, the whole point of the integrated video chat is so you can avoid having to wrestle with multiple apps to run your game).

 

[Mercutio01]

Again, given the nigh-ubiquity of in-VTT character sheets in modern VTTs

I haven't paid for any, but the free ones I've used don't have this out of the box. And the frameworks for MapTool bog my system down to unusable speeds, so that's not an option either. My group currently uses base MapTool and just shares our character sheets via email, and it works well enough.

What I like most about Roll20's concept is the integrated voice and video chat and the easy player adding via links. The web search art library looks interesting, and as a fairly long-time user of Dundjinni (and poster at the forums there), I recognized quite a bit of the art in the video. I wish you luck, and am going to follow the progress here. Sadly, I'm not in a place where I can contribute funding.

 

[Dannager]

I haven't paid for any, but the free ones I've used don't have this out of the box.

I've been messing around with VTTs since WebRPG came out last millennium. Even back then they not only had character sheet functionality built in, but they had a modular system where you could design your own functional character sheets, including graphics and macros! This is a feature that's been around for an eternity in internet years.

 

[amerigoV]

As part of my free-advice policy, I see folks are asking for things like Exploding Dice and card-deck handling.

You might want to rein that in, at least for your first version.

consider, your mission is a VTT with a focus on storytelling. Most RPGs don't use exploding dice (some do) or cards. Playing poker uses cards, but isn't a RPG thing. Might be worth NOT doing that, if it means handling video/voice/text/battlemat smoothly and simply better.

With exploding dice, consider that a macro problem. For "normal" RPGs, it is pretty simply nomenclature to use basic math notation and XdY to signify a die roll of Y sides and X quantity.

How the heck do you signify this next roll also uses Exploding dice?

My answer is, you don't. It's a coding problem, not a notation problem. With a decent macro language, anybody can code up a macro to reroll and add when a "6" shows up on a d6. They can then share that macro as a command users can execute that function from, by supplying their skill level and the DC as parameters to. Rather than you focusing on trying to solve it within your command language. Especially with however many versions and variants of the Exploding Dice concept there can be.

To sum up, push out certain problems to later or sub-systems which can handle it (also later), if it isn't crucial to the main mission. Do everything else well, and people who want to play a game with a wierd dice mechanic can do their rolls manually, write/download a macro, or switch to a different ruleset which enables roleplaying, without using a wierd game mechanic.


just something to consider.

I view this in the opposite light (probably because I play Savage Worlds - a game reknown for exploding dice and cards). If you are going to make a generic format, then you have to consider these items up front. If you are going to do them last, then I may as well use Google+ hangout (I think there is a app floating around to do a basic battlemat these days).

Or, pick 3 or 4 popular games and have overlays that does the basics of those games well. Or pick one game system and nail it so even a n00b can just log in and play and let people clamor for you to do their system of choice.