Electronic play

[ColinOfBrechtur]

Does anyone know of any good tools for facilitating a table-top style of play, but over the internet? Not a play by post kind of thing, but where everyone logs on to the same site or something and plays, as if they were sitting around the same table.
Would be awesome if it had some kind of Voice over IP deal, but I imagine that will have to come separately.

Thanks!

[Atamasama]

With 2 PCs, 2 webcams and microphones, and free software you can do a video chat and it's just like having someone there. This can work if someone can't physically make it to the game but still wants to play.

If you have multiple people though... I'm not sure what software will effectively do that.

[lsfreak]

No images, but you could always get yourself a Ventrilo server. Last I checked I think an 8-person server is free. Each person gets a $5 microphone, or you can even use text-to-speech if someone's piss-broke but wants to play.

[Zherog]

I've used OpenRPG in the past, and had no problems. While my group didn't use any sort of voice, I've heard of groups using OpenRPG coupled with various voice programs - Skype, Ventrilo, etc - for live chat rather than text-based.

[Zaq]

I've played over AIM (any instant messenger will do) before. You need to come up with battle maps beforehand that you can distribute to everyone (a forum is a nice way to do this), then describe all the motions ("The dwarf moves up two squares west of the sprite and pulls out his bow.") It's everyone's responsibility to keep their own map.

It's not very elegant, and combat can take a loooooooong time if you're not careful, but it's doable.

[Krankheit]

http://www.rpgtonight.com/
this should fit your needs
browser based virtual table with a chat room, dice, and a voice program (I never tested the voice)

[Nightson]

MapTools + Ventrilo

[Mando Knight]

MapTools + Ventrilo

Links usually help...
MapTools (http://www.rptools.net/) home,
and Ventrilo (http://www.ventrilo.com/).

[ocato]

I'm a fan of Gametable and Skype, but I hear Maptools is good also.

[Starscream]

I have used Gametable and OpenRPG and like both of them. I haven't tried out RPGTonight but I hear good things.

A lot of people use Fantasy Grounds, but that one is not free. However, it has a large community, so finding people to play with is supposed to be pretty easy. If you already have someone to play with I wouldn't bother.

[Brimlock]

For the past six months, five friends and I have been playing a weekly online game of 4th-Edition D&D using Klooge.werks and Skype. Klooge lets us all view the same battle grid and manage our characters, and Skype gives us real-time voice communication. Klooge isn't perfect, and it does have a slight learning curve before playing through it becomes second nature, but it's certainly been adequate for our needs. Our games are a blast, a highlight of my week. Good luck.

[Colmarr]

My group is currently using Battlegrounds RPG for our tabletop and Mumble for our voice communications.

I can't link to either from work, but they come up in a Google search.

[Hunter Noventa]

My group uses gametable and skype, they're pretty excellent tools. Helps that we can use empty classrooms at a local college and hook a laptop up to the projector, but it works without that even.

[Seventh Dwarf]

Our group that spans multiple time zones uses rptools (for maps/combat) skype (for voice communication/transferring files) and e-mail (off-line planning, rules decisions, etc.).

It is far from perfect - setting yourself up as a server for rptools took us about a week to figure out all in the ins- and outs, particuarly how to accomplish port forwarding to get around the firewall. We have had problems with dropped players with Skype. With all that said, the technology does work and rptools is fantastic for maps - anyone can create and use maps by just watching the tutorials.

[Gahrer]

Nice topic.
I'm running a game with four friends based in widely different parts of the country. We are using Ventrilo and everything is working extremly smothly (exept for combat, wich I think will go better with the hints here).

Also, with some practice you can run one NPC over MSN and one over Ventrilo at the same time when the party temporarily split up. Just have one player leave the vent server and no one knows what happends with the other group.

[DanReiv]

We're currently using Fantasy Ground to allow a friend of ours who lives in Japan to play on our pnp sessions (webcams and a big TV helped)

It's pretty nice, with an integrated d20 database, it should do the trick. It's not freeware though.