Tabletop Gaming Over the 'Net?

kebes asks: "I'm the GM for a group that has been gaming together for about 12 years. We're starting to move away from each other, and want to switch to playing our tabletop RPG online. So far, we've been using a combination of TeamSpeak and IRC. It works, but is not ideal. What protocol/chat service and applications would make for a great online gaming solution? The voice and text chat abilities are crucial, but having a collaborative white-board would greatly help. Ideally, the solution would be integrated (one app), allow logging of the session, run on multiple platforms (Mac OS X, Linux, Windows), work with web-cams, and permit file-transfers. What service or app (or combination thereof) would work best for our needs? Anyone else have stories of success or failure?"

Comments

Simple, yet effective.

[aetherspoon]

Although I've glanced at OpenRPG before, personally I just use an old fashioned IRC chat room and a dice bot.

Been there, done that.

[Chas]

Did it with BattleTech years ago.

What would normally be a 3-4 hour game became a 7 hour game.

The problem is making certain everybody's on the same page (and not cheating).

Now tabletop simulations like Megamek outstrip tabletop over IRC by orders of magnitude.

Stick to IRC

[thebdj]

Seriously, it works just fine. Setup your standard OOC and IC channels and in some cases a separate dice channel and let it go. I personally would ditch the team speak, the vocal communication is not needed and in many cases most people I know are better at explaining themselves in type because they can actually work it out before sending it.

I have roleplayed on IRC for over 10 years. Some of my best friends play on there and I haven't even met all of them in person. You will have a plethora of players at your disposal (recommended finding sane networks, irc.sorcery.net isn't bad for RPG). Most people in the channel I play in still do TT games on occassion, but they are more grown up then me (but not that much so) and have established groups of friends.

To be honest, I still think the IRC path works better for WoD games. Honestly, I never recall coming across many, if any, D&D games. If you are a D&D crowd with decent PCs, may I suggest attempting running campaigns using NWN. I have not had the opportunity to try it, but since the game with two expansions and Kingmaker can be had for $30 (the Diamond Edition), it isn't too insane and has good single player campaigns as well.

Otherwise, you can try openRPG, but I really do not think it is that necessary. It sometimes takes a bit of getting used to not having everyone sitting five feet from each other, but you can definitely have enjoyable experiences with RPGs on IRC.

This is how we do it

[grondak]

My weekly DnD 3.5 game has a local DM, me, and two internet-based out-of-towners. We use a Logitech webcam and Yahoo instant messenger's voice + video services. We have a great time playing, now that the technology discussions and problems are out of the way.

Our requirements:
1. The DM wants to be able to move the minis around the map and sit on the DM's side of the table, and wants me to run the tech side of things for him. He wants to be able to draw a quick map or a picture of what we're seeing and show either to the players. This means hands-free communication for the DM and me to the out-of-towners and a picture of what he's drawn, taken by some type of camera.
2. We need to be able to "talk over" each other-- or at least know when more than one person is trying to talk.
3. Quickly sharing a changing map environment is crucial-- and the DM can't get me to draw everything in a tool because of the time it takes to explain things, or have himself draw them on paper and have me re-draw them in a tool.
4. We need to have a way for the players to communicate without the DM overhearing (and without chasing the DM out of the room)
5. I have a nice iBook and an iSight camera-- we should use it!
6. It shouldn't cost us anything "per month" to play. I didn't want to turn our out-of-towners off the game due to service subscription fees "just for a game."
7. We need the tech "out of the gaming process" so we can focus on DnD.

How things worked out:
1. I looked for a lot of cross-platform voice + video solutions with "talk-over" capability. Wouldn't you know it, but a two years or so ago, when I did the research, cross-platform, integrated tools with all other requirements just wasn't happening. We looked at stand-alone video tools running simultaneously with stand-along voice tools. We looked at "camming software" and only joked about playing in the buff. Consider AIM, which Apple's iSight can talk to with iChat. That seemed to be my only cross-platform solution, but the out-of-town players didn't want to sign up for "yet another IM system." So, I removed the cross-platform requirement. Things got easier. Remember, I did this research 2 years ago, so specific details are lost to me. I play DnD now, and don't spend my days looking for tech solutions to a problem I've already adequately solved.
2. We settled on Yahoo IM on the PC only. Yahoo's voice system allows you to know if you are "talking over" someone else because it beeps at you when a voice collision happens. The video support is decent, too. When the players need to communicate without DM knowledge, we just type. The DM doesn't look at the computer screen often.
3. Our little camera can go anywhere. We reposition it according to need. I have a little test pattern placard I can put in front of the camera for when the GM and I are setting up. That's double-nerdly, in case you didn't notice. :) We have various-sized boxes upon which we place the video camera to allow the right viewpoint for the out-of-towners. Sometimes we need to move the camera to allow different out-of-towners to see different parts of the game, but mostly, the battles converge to a single area and the camera movement slows down until the "move to next battle area" part of DnD.
4. We use an external microphone, a little cheap one, and lay it on the gaming table between the DM and me. Sometimes the players hear mumbling, but that's mostly when we accidently talk away from the mic (say, past the table, down to the floor.)
5. Sometimes the tech fails: eg: Yahoo wants to upgrade the client. The DM's internet is out (again). The wireless router is dead. The reception is poor because of the running microwave. Yahoo booted us again. The wireless reception failed.
6. We did not get a tool that lets us draw on the screen. We just draw on a piece of paper and point the webcam at it. Much faster and much less prone to perfectionism.

7. Most of all-- this feels like real DnD. The tech, now that it works, is out of the w

Gametable is good..

[Doppleganger]

Gametable, by the guy who does the "Casey and Andy" webcomic, is pretty good as a simplified whiteboard. It's a java app, and works cross-platform (I run one instance on a linux system as a server, and the players all use different Windows versions to run it). It's not as full-featured as something like OpenRPG, but it is also a lot easier to set up and learn. It covers the basics, and doesn't focus on particular systems other than choosing between square or hex grids.

No built-in web cam or file transferring, but it has a whiteboard, text chat, dice roller, and unit markers.

Tabletop Gaming and the Internet

[grouchofan]

As I was attending Origins 2006 in late June/July, walking around looking in the exhibit hall at all the items available for sale, I wondered how in the world a game can keep up with all the developments in the industry... new games, new companies, expansions, etc. After it was over I decided to set up a site to make that a little easier. We now scan over 230 sites each day for news and information, have a mailbox where companies can send product announcements, etc., and post daily news updates about goings-on in the tabletop game industry.

If you're a gamer - and you probably are if you're reading this - you may want to check out the site: http://www.gamerhotsheet.com/

We even offer RSS feeds of the latest articles for those who prefer their news by RSS... something not too many game information sites do.

We'll be covering GenCon Indy next weekend.