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ShriekingDrake
2010-10-14, 09:24 AM
I have a bunch of friends in a different state. When I lived there, we gamed a lot. Now that I'm away, I want to rekindle that spirit. From what I understand, play by post is picking up. I've never done it and have no idea where to start.

Can some who are familiar with this format talk about how it is to run/participate in D&D like this? Also what are the best resources that support this play and where are good pbp services, etc.?

Many thanks.

The-Mage-King
2010-10-14, 09:31 AM
Try here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=3).


Really, this forum has a dice roller (1d20 format, replacing the "1d20" with what you want to roll), a dedicated PbP section, and plenty of other stuff for it.

For sheets, I suggest that you use a place like Myth-Weavers (http://www.myth-weavers.com/forumhome.php) or similar, so that everyone can see everyone else's sheets (or just the DM can see everyone's sheets), and they're saved somewhere where you won't lose them.

Mikka
2010-10-14, 09:37 AM
Myth-Weavers is a better place to PBP in general. You have your campaign easily accessible in its own sub forums, with its own forums and sub-forums. And DM functionality , more forum functionality with more useful stuff you can do like private tags, ooc posts and stuff like that. Even the character sheets are implemented into the game profile for easy overview by the DM.

I can only recommend it, even as a player its better and more easy to manage.

Quietus
2010-10-14, 09:48 AM
My thoughts are more along the differences between pbp and real life gaming :

PbP is slower. A LOT slower. There's a few tricks that can be done to make things faster - fluid initiative, pre-rolling d20's for reactive rolls, stuff like that - but you're still likely going to take a few days for even a simple combat. If you intend to run a dungeon crawl, PbP is not the way to do it.

Where it excels is in the roleplay aspect. Even a player who in real life might be a little leery of speaking up, standing up, acting something out in a rudimentary way, can put a little effort in and make a good descriptive post. With practice, PbP'ers can really bring their characters to life, fleshing out minor details in a way that would never come out at a table. It's possible to reduce it to "I roll diplomacy, [roll]", of course... but PbP handles actually going through the scene in a much more in depth way than many real-life groups do.

As far as advancement goes.. don't count on it. As I said, PbP is slower. It'll take a month of regular posting, sometimes, and often longer, before you see enough experience to advance your character. The reward in playing online is the enjoyment of the story you and the other players are putting together, moreso than seeing your character grow stronger.

kamikasei
2010-10-14, 10:08 AM
Plothook (http://plothook.net/RPG/index.php) is also good, though Myth-Weavers may be preferable if only so that you don't need to register twice to get your game and your sheets.

Plothook's gimmick is that you can have an account for each of your characters linked to a central account you can use for OOC or DMing. It's nice, but if you only want one game then it's not going to be particularly important.

I'd recommend either over this forum if you don't all use this site already anyway and don't need to recruit for new players. Actually, I'd recommend them even if you do use GitP already.

For play by post, the main tips I'd give are:
a) have an active OOC thread so that players who aren't doing anything "on screen" can still talk and comment and plan and joke around; this helps keep the game feeling alive and active;
b) have an alternate way of contacting people, such as IM, so that you can resolve small queries quickly and ping people who disappear unexpectedly;
c) be relaxed about things like initiative, positioning etc. - PbP runs a lot slower than face-to-face and you don't want to slow it down further by getting bogged down in detail.

In general, PbP has higher bandwidth but also much higher latency. What do I mean? You have longer to think of what to say and do in each post, so you can produce better-written material than you could deliver at the table. The disadvantage is that any question and response takes much longer to go out and come back. This means it's important for the DM to present as much relevant information as possible when describing things rather than requiring the players to ask for clarification before feeling confident enough to decide on an action (or deciding anyway but discovering they've gotten something wrong), and for players to let the DM know what they're interested in and describe possible alternative actions for different scenarios (e.g., instead of asking a question and then posting your action based on the answer, post the question and "if the answer is X then I'll do Y, else I'll do Z"). It's also good for the DM to be able to check and post frequently so that questions do get answered promptly.

akma
2010-10-14, 10:15 AM
The PBPs I played were very fight light, so long fights weren`t a problam. But if I would DM a PBP I would do all the dice rolling to save time and prevent cheating.

Amphetryon
2010-10-14, 10:22 AM
http://www.dndonlinegames.com/cmps_index.php

J.Gellert
2010-10-14, 10:28 AM
I have a bunch of friends in a different state. When I lived there, we gamed a lot. Now that I'm away, I want to rekindle that spirit. From what I understand, play by post is picking up. I've never done it and have no idea where to start.

Aside from play-by-post, consider starting a game over Skype or somesuch. I'm suggesting it because it's a lot easier with friends.

I'm actually running such a game with people who moved away recently, and it's looking great so far.

Dragonmuncher
2010-10-14, 10:39 AM
What systems are good for PbP? I can't imagine 4e, with its emphasis on tactical positioning, works well.


Same with anything from Tome of Battle actually- do all those counters make it awkward?

akma
2010-10-14, 10:42 AM
What systems are good for PbP? I can't imagine 4e, with its emphasis on tactical positioning, works well.


Same with anything from Tome of Battle actually- do all those counters make it awkward?

Something rules light, so D&D (any addition) doesn`t sound appropriate for a PBP. As less dice rolling as possible.

Tengu_temp
2010-10-14, 10:46 AM
What systems are good for PbP? I can't imagine 4e, with its emphasis on tactical positioning, works well.


Mutants and Masterminds, because tactical movement is almost non-existant and combat takes very few rounds. 4e is doable, but very slow.

Quietus
2010-10-14, 10:46 AM
What systems are good for PbP? I can't imagine 4e, with its emphasis on tactical positioning, works well.


Same with anything from Tome of Battle actually- do all those counters make it awkward?

I imagine they would. That's the exact reason that the sorcerer I'm playing now won't be taking Wings of Cover; Anything that interrupts an action, also interrupts the entire flow of PbP, essentially making the turn it interrupted take twice as long. In tabletop play, the DM can go "And he moves in to attack you" -"Wings of cover!", and five seconds at most is lost. In PbP, you're typically losing closer to a day.

Now, depending on the individual counters - note, I'm not that familiar with ToB - it might not be so bad. Many things, like saves, you can say "The enemy wizard casts fireball, 36 damage, reflex save DC 15", and let the players targeted with it each roll their saves and count off their own HP, applying whatever Moment of Maneuvers they want. Something like "You get a free trip attempt against someone who misses you" isn't bad if the opponent has only one attack, but if they have multiple? Then the DM instead has to describe the opponent attacking you with a flurry of hits, several quick slashes of his blade, then give you the individual attack roll totals and damages so that if you do trip the opponent - oh right, he'd have to include an opposed strength roll to avoid the trip, as well, preferably in a spoiler so the player only opens it if he uses that trip, AND trust the player not to open it to see how likely he is to pass it - then the player can modify all those attack rolls and apply damage as appropriate. It gets messy, when players can take actions out of turn regularly. Once in a blue moon, fine.. but every combat? That's just unpleasant.

jmbrown
2010-10-14, 10:55 AM
Something rules light, so D&D (any addition) doesn`t sound appropriate for a PBP. As less dice rolling as possible.

All editions prior to 3e are easy to run pbp because they don't stress tactical combat. That's what kills D&D games. You don't need to make a map to play a game but any battle that's more than 10 guys swinging at each other will definitely need one.

I'll throw out Mouse Guard (and by proxy Burning Wheel) and Dogs in the Vineyard is practically pure role playing with some dice being thrown here and there.

Fouredged Sword
2010-10-14, 11:07 AM
I have had good experiences with a front heavy combat setup that the players all post thier actions all at once at the start of the turn and then have the DM go through and post a turn resolution (makeing any rolls necesary) following initiative.

Players have to give up a little micromanageing control over thier character, but the speed increase is dramatic. You are looking at a round of combat every 2/3 days rather than 2/3 weeks. The system breaks down a little when a character is required to make a choice in the middle of a round, but it still runs faster than call and responce every time the player would make a roll.

Damascus
2010-10-14, 12:11 PM
Skype + Fantasy Grounds II = Problem solved. :smallwink:

Quietus
2010-10-14, 12:21 PM
All editions prior to 3e are easy to run pbp because they don't stress tactical combat. That's what kills D&D games. You don't need to make a map to play a game but any battle that's more than 10 guys swinging at each other will definitely need one.

I'll throw out Mouse Guard (and by proxy Burning Wheel) and Dogs in the Vineyard is practically pure role playing with some dice being thrown here and there.

In the same vein, I know very little of the game, but from what I've heard, Spirit of the Century is a really rules-light game where rather than rolling dice for many things, characters are defined by short phrases about their characters, and there's a "chip"-trading mechanic that you can either spend a chip to use one of those phrases to gain a bonus (I'm "old", so I know a lot of things), or the DM can spend them back at you as a penalty (You're "old", so you have a hard time keeping up with these younger kids). That seems like it'd lend itself well to play by post, but it's also not exactly as mainstream as D&D is.

ShriekingDrake
2010-10-14, 01:26 PM
I'm surprised there's not a mechanism in place at some of these services where the DM can proffer a button to the relevant players to make the die roll and that all can see the results.

What's Fantasy Grounds II?

I'm hoping to do this with 3.X, so I like the idea of being able show a battlemap, that all parties can draw upon. But I guess that's asking a lot.

Lhurgyof
2010-10-14, 01:42 PM
There's a couple programs you can download to help play online (openRPG was one, I think), also skype it up.

Much better than PbP imho.

Susano-wo
2010-10-14, 01:47 PM
The counters are usually roll this when this happens. SOme are easy (like rolling concentration instead of a will save, or what hae you), some are more difficult (roll attack instead of AC), and would definitely slow down gameply by [at least] a post every time they are used

Pinnacle
2010-10-14, 04:51 PM
Plothook's gimmick is that you can have an account for each of your characters linked to a central account you can use for OOC or DMing.
I'm surprised I haven't seen any recommendations for Role-Play OnLine (http://www.rpol.net), which probably does this better. Your main screen name is only used on the main forums and to apply to games. In a game, you have a profile for your character and post as that character, with his/her/its name, image, etc.


I'm surprised there's not a mechanism in place at some of these services where the DM can proffer a button to the relevant players to make the die roll and that all can see the results.

If the forum you're using doesn't have a built-in roller (and many do), try Invisible Castle (http://www.invisiblecastle.com/). It saves your rolls, so you can link back to them to verify.

big teej
2010-10-14, 07:19 PM
having been in the same situation not to long ago, I direct you to this

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=9548243#post9548243

hopefully that will give you an idea of what pbp is like.

starting a thread similar to mine should hopefull elicit the same results.

Elfstone
2010-10-14, 08:09 PM
By far mythweavers, if only for the awesome online sheets.