What's the best way to run a game online?

[drs]

Hey Fourecks if you manage to get a game going in IRC or what ever, and are looking for a player in your time zone, just give me a yell!

 

[DDK]

Thanks for all the replies.

I think I've settled on a PbP. The realities of getting people in a chat room at the same time were challenging enough without the learning curves of OpenRPG or MU*'s and though Klooge looks sweet, getting 4-6 people to fork out $15 each is kinda unrealistic. Rondak's might be great for some but ultimately I found the site cumbersome and annoying. Though I'd love to have real-time gaming and I have a definite soft-spot for dicebots (I don't know why, but for some reason I could sit in a chatroom for ages and do little more than roll dice...), it looks like PbP is the best, all-round, option for me.

Some questions for you PbP'ers.

How do you structure your games? Are there common methods like one post per combat round? What online resources do you use to compliment your games? I know of Irony games dice roller and mapping utility, but they're Java, are there any other solutions? How do you resolve combats and combat rounds and movement, etc?

 

[drs]

It's done pretty straight forward, pretty much like a RL game. Your players say what they want to do, you slot it all into there initiatives and roll the dice (It's a hellova lot quicker if the GM just does all the rolls). Then just regurgitate it out with some flavor text and player stats (plus a map if your up for it). Well that's how it's been done in the 4 PBP games I was in

http://enworld.cyberstreet.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=12670&perpage=40&pagenumber=5
Have a look at HeavyG's post.
I don't think you would have unhappy players if you did something along those lines , does take a bit of time though.
But there's a gazillion games in the IC right now, best to skim a few and pick out the GM techniques that suit you.

 

[Aeolius]

How do you structure your games? Are there common methods like one post per combat round? What online resources do you use to compliment your games? I know of Irony games dice roller and mapping utility, but they're Java, are there any other solutions? How do you resolve combats and combat rounds and movement, etc?

The easiest solution is to let the DM handle all the die rolls. That definitely speeds up game play, in a PbP. Another option I have used is to have players roll 50 of each die and e-mail me the results, which I use when needed.

Granted, my games aren't all that combat intensive (aside from a holy war 2 Chapters ago...oh, nevermind). My games tend to read like fantasy novels; I let the role-playing tell the story, while stats and dice are secondary.

As for maps and graphics, I use a combination of CorelDRAW, Poser, and Bryce.

 

[drnuncheon]

Thanks but after taking a look through that website I have even less of an idea of what an MU* is

I've never understood the whole MU* thing. I tried it once with Rapscallion, a Mac client, but after a couple of hours of, "You go north, you can't go any further, you go south, you can't go any further" I was pretty much over the whole concept.

Rapscallion's my favorite.

Think of a MU* as a cross between IRC and Zork. Depending on the place, it can just be for people to hand out and chat, or it can be gaming set in a particular world.

MUDs have coded combat - they're like a textual version of Everquest. (Or, rather, Everquest is a graphical MUD, since mUDs are way older.)

MUSHes and MUXen and MOOs and the like tend to put more responsibility on the human players to act as the GM - they simply provide a way for you to create the virtual world and move around within it, and the users of the game add things to handle the game rules and the like.

Running your own MU* is overkill for a tabletop game, but like I said, there are plenty of places that will just give you a room. I don't think it actually gives you much more than IRC (without a lot of work) - we just use it because our online group met on a MUSH, so we're all familiar with it.

J

 

[Emiricol]

I've found OpenRPG simple to use. There are a number of sheets available that macro the dice rolls and such. I always have plenty people trying to get into my games - more than I have room for in fact. Most of the learning curve is... uh... Hm, I can't think of much. Sorry. It seemed quite simple to me.

For play by post, check out www.rpol.net or www.playbyweb.com. They each have their fanboys, but I've found they are enough different to make personal preference the deciding factor on which one I use (and I play in both, as well.)

 

[DDK]

Most of the learning curve is... uh... Hm, I can't think of much. Sorry. It seemed quite simple to me.

Maybe it's easier to install and run Python on the PC. I found it to be a headache and worse, it had a weird freeze where the splash screen wouldn't go away and all the background functions continued despite not allowing me to get past the splash image.

I'm sure that if I spent time trying to figure out the why's and wherefores of Python, I could fix it, but I'm simply not THAT interested in OpenRPG or Python. Also, if it is even half the hassle on the PC, then I don't want to have to go through the rigamarole with getting the players to install it and run it properly.

 

[Emiricol]

I certainly understand the sentiment.

Fortunately, the PC version is self-installng.

1) execute the Python download
2) execute the wxPython download
3) execute the OpenRPG download
4) go to start menu and click the OpenRPG logo.

The Linux version is a bit more of a hastle, or can be (though I had no real problems.) The latest version for Linux includes an odd little program that has always been required but was never linked on the download page before. now it is just included.

Anyway, rpm -uvh the files, then tar -zxvf the OpenRPG file. Voila. To run it, just cd to the directory it installed in (home for me), then type python2 start.py

That'll work! Unless you are on the latest RedHat. If you use RH8.0 you have to start the program by going to the directory as above, then typing "env LANG=C python2 ./start.py" because RedHat now uses unicode.

Give it a try, if it has been a while or if that is news to you. You'll be pleasantly surprised.