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goken04
2008-11-23, 11:08 AM
I'm about to DM online for the first time for some friends of mine spread out across the country. We'll either use skype or AIM for communicating, and I've already figured out MapTool will work pretty well for combat. Is there a good tool like that for dice rolling? What do others do for real-time campaigns and dice rolling? I'd hate to be doing all the dice rolling myself.

Anyone have any other advice or resources for DMing an online game?

AlterForm
2008-11-23, 11:29 AM
You said you're using MapTool?

It has a built-in diceroller. Basic syntax/construction for a die-roll is [xdy+z], where x is how many dice, y is how many sides they have, and z is your bonus. Using {} instead of [] will allow you to see the math "behind the curtain," since [] hides this and gives it in a mouseover piece of text.

Ex:
[1d20] = A number 1-20 (mouseover for some extra information)
[1d20+10] = A number 11-21 (mouseover for some extra information/calculations)
{2d20+10} = The sum of 10 and two different numbers from 1 to 20, with the intermediary steps show in the chatbox as opposed to in a mouseover

Looking/Asking around on the RPTools forums (http://forums.rptools.net/) (specifically the Documentation and MapTool areas) will help you find other things you can do with the diceroller. IIRC, there's a page or something somewhere with a big list of all the syntax additions for dicerolls and their effects.

Ravyn
2008-11-24, 12:45 AM
I've done practically all my gaming online; I might be able to help a bit.

I favor AIM; if someone has to wander off to use the restroom and doesn't tell anyone, they still won't miss anything, there's less risk of being misheard, people can get through setting description at their own pace, logging allows for people to reference prior sessions, and you can color-code NPCs. This is blasted useful. It also lets you pass notes to your players without anyone noticing, and hides your snickers when the players are falling into your trap, and as a special bonus allows you to completely separate off-topic tabletalk from the game (and allows the group to do both at once, which I find helps). I do, however, recommend making sure that everyone's settings include making it obvious when they type.

If you're using text, and you're the kind of person who focuses on setting detail and the like, I'd recommend my blog (linked below). It's mostly story-stuff, but even I post on gaming-specific topics occasionally.

Other things I'd recommend: Know how to compensate for time zones. You have no idea how many times I've had issues with this, even with people who'd been messing with the times for ages and should have known better.

JackMage666
2008-11-24, 01:59 AM
My online groups usually have a rather simple way of doing this. We use IRC as a chatbase (using a channel we long since took over), both an IC and OOC room, and then use Gametable for our maps. We could just as easily use MapTools, but it's a force of habit, mostly. On IRC (usually the OOC room, so the IC room is all story), we have a dice-bot who handles rolls, and the Gametable/Maptools is strictly used to map out combats.

Maerok
2008-11-24, 02:02 AM
Does MapTool work for Linux? :smallcool:

ClericofPhwarrr
2008-11-24, 03:36 AM
I'm about to DM online for the first time for some friends of mine spread out across the country. We'll either use skype or AIM for communicating, and I've already figured out MapTool will work pretty well for combat. Is there a good tool like that for dice rolling? What do others do for real-time campaigns and dice rolling? I'd hate to be doing all the dice rolling myself.

Anyone have any other advice or resources for DMing an online game?

Maptool lets you communicate (text only chat), map, and roll dice. Both the players AND GM can roll. Note the Impersonate tool which lets you put an NPC icon's image next to your text; it's quite cool. Being able to give a few seconds of thought before a response is also nice (and something I wish I could do when GMing RL)

Skype is for talking, and for hooking up at the session's beginning (so you can supply your IP to the players; mine at least keeps changing).

Run them both, and you should do great; it's worked far better than I could have hoped for my group. We tended to use Skype mostly for OOC chat and Maptool for mostly IC stuff, with some spillover both ways.

Gaiwecoor
2008-11-24, 09:17 AM
Does MapTool work for Linux? :smallcool:

Yes. That's actually what got me using it to begin with. So far, MapTool (http://rptools.net/) (Java based - I think you need the real version, not just what came with your distro) and OpenRPG (http://www.openrpg.com) (Python based) are the only decent ones I've found for Linux.

My preference for real-time online gaming is MapTool. It has just about everything a person might need in a table top program, except voice chat. If you don't require that, it's perfect. If you do want it ... that can be fixed pretty easily with an additional program.

(I can rarely find a way to make real-time gaming work, though ... all of my gamer buddies are East of me, so it's pretty late by the time I'm available. I just wrote a persistent battle mat so we can do a PbP with a mat.)

Artanis
2008-11-24, 02:56 PM
Just to echo what the others have said...


I'm about to DM online for the first time for some friends of mine spread out across the country. We'll either use skype or AIM for communicating, and I've already figured out MapTool will work pretty well for combat. Is there a good tool like that for dice rolling? What do others do for real-time campaigns and dice rolling? I'd hate to be doing all the dice rolling myself.

Anyone have any other advice or resources for DMing an online game?
Other than voice chat, Maptool works for everything you've mentioned. Combat, text communication, dice rolling, even saving stuff like battle mats for campaigns so that you don't have to keep uploading them every time you go back to an earlier setting.

Also, if you want voice chat, go ahead with voice chat, but I've found that text chatting has some BIG advantages to it. It lets people put more description into their actions while actually taking less time than saying "I do X, move from Y to Z, then use Power 1 against Enemy 2" because they can pre-type most of the stuff. Even bigger is that OOC chat will never ever slow down the game. If you make a way to differentiate OOC chat from "official game stuff", people can chatter all they want without interrupting whoever's taking his turn. Color-coding the text by player can also really help.


Here's an example of what it would look like in a campaign I'm in. In this campaign, parentheses denote OOC stuff, while quotation marks denote IC speaking:

DM: OK, the Ranger is up next.
Rogue: (Anybody see the football game yesterday?)
Wizard: (Yeah, I did)
Ranger: I sneak behind the wall, keeping my head down to keep under cover, then pop up and unleash what looks like one arrow to the spot between two enemies. It's revealed to be two arrows, however, as they split mid-flight and veer off towards their targets.
Ranger: Split the Tree, the higher of [1d20+8], [1d20+8] is used vs. AC against BOTH Goblin 1 and Goblin 2
Rogue: (Too bad the Cowboys won)

Maerok
2008-11-24, 03:55 PM
I would use AIM and voice chat but I couldn't type/think on my feet fast enough. It is a more conducive environment though. It's also difficult for some groups to be on at the same time.

Sstoopidtallkid
2008-11-24, 04:43 PM
Skype. Love Skype. You still need a map and diceroller, but many systems don't need maps, and a lot of times my groups just trust people to roll their own dice.