As many of you know, I made a lot of friends and contacts around the time of Gen Con 2008.
Among those friends was Don, one of the members of the Wizards of the Coast Development team working on D&D insider. Don was one of the Seattle Wizards who read my Open Letter to WotC and didn’t call for my summary execution (i.e. no goons jumped on me when people like Mike Mearls and Chris Sims said ‘Oh you’re the Chatty DM!” at their Gen Con booth).
Hatching a fiendish Plan
While chatting with Don, I pitched the idea that it would be cool if I was to get a few bloggers together and tried the D&D Game table app (a virtual tabletop software) when it became available in Beta. I sold it as a way of getting prime feedback from fans with established authority on the net. He was all for it.
I’ve long wanted to try playing tabletop D&D over the Internet. I’m not much of a fan of play by post RPGs. While I really enjoyed creating and playing with TwittRPG I much prefer the instant action and reaction of a tabletop game.
The thing is, Wizards application is not ready to hit Beta testing yet. We don’t know when it will be but it won’t likely be for many months.
Since then, my blogger friends got excited about the project and asked me if we could set up an online D&D game before the WotC application becomes available in Beta test.
Thinking about it and discussing it with the small group we had formed, we agreed on the following:
We would play a series of D&D 4e game trying various virtual tabletop software, blog about the experience and give Don some good market research material from eager geeks who really want Wizard to give us a tool that meets our needs.
The list of applications initially included Gametable (not the Wizards one, its a free app already available) and Maptool (another free program).
I’ve since used my blogging fame and contacted Smiteworks, home of Fantasy Grounds II, and traded some publicity for a series of licenses to be used during the project. (Thanks to their CEO!).
If the project works as planned, we’ll explore all three over the next few months in a series of game sessions.
Drafting A posse!
So who’s part of this little project?
- Dave: The Game, Editor in chief of Critical-Hits.com, a game designer and co-founder of the RPG Bloggers network.
- Graham, author of criticalanklebites.com. He’s my Web Gadget mastermind and I owe him enough virtual money to put all his future kids through college.
- Asmor is our resident 4e tool web genius. Author of Encounter a day, Asmor churns out gem after gem of 4e goodness for our combined pleasure.
- Dennis, a friend of Dave’s who pens articles on CH as The Main Event
- Don from the dank dungeons of Wizards of the Coast, where they keep their coders! (This is strictly the view of this misinformed blogger and may not reflect the actual working conditions of the programmers at WotC… they’re probably chained too)
Needless to say that everyone was pretty excited about the whole thing. I sure am.
Oh and did I tell you we’d blog about it all?
Coolness cubed says this Suburban Overlord!
The Game Plan
The format of this game would be that we’d meet virtually on a few Friday nights (maybe once a month) and play out the game using Voice over IP chat software and one of the aforementioned virtual tabletop application.
Getting ready for the event, everyone made a level 5 PC:
- Dave: Warforged Fighter named Beatdown Machine
- Graham: Warforged Artificer named Rune Goldpiece Machine “brother” of Beatdown
- Asmor: Targ Bonechewer, Orc Barbarian
- Dennis: Ma’ahx Fahl’Dar; Gensai Swordmage
- Don: Ravas, Githzerai Ranger
Oh just so you know, this will NOT be a serious game. Expect much siliness.
As I was receiving the PCs, I started planning for an adventure we could play with a nearly all “monster” party.
Then it hit me and I sent this one liner to the guys:
Escape from the Monster Rehabilitation Asylum under the City of Treacherous Light (A Ptolus Adventure)
I love Ptolus, and as 4e was released, I had been looking at an occasion to showcase that this 700 page 100$+ sourcebook was as relevant as ever.
Here’s the adventure pitch I sent to the players:
You’re all going to start in Ptolus. Forget about Points of Lights, forget about the planes as we know them… This is good old Monte Cook’s city as he envisioned it. I’d use mine but it’s sitting somewhere in the Shadowfell, filled with sullen Shadar-Kai teenagers.
If you are unfamiliar with Ptolus here’s the gist of it. Its a fantasy metropolis that contains everything that used to be D&D 3.x in one city. Its filled with political, religious and criminal organization on the surface and it contains a series of dungeons that would make grandad Gygax proud underneath.
Evil and weirdness gravitates around Ptolus for something dark and world-eating slumbers underneath it… waiting for its time to come.
You, are all ‘monsters’. For whatever reasons you decide on, you have all been captured (or found) and brought in the tender care of the Brotherhood of Redemption. While its technically a meek monastery where gentled redeemed monsters toil with monks, it hides a more sinister ‘business’: that of an underground prison fortress used for detaining and brainwashing sentient beings to ‘purifying’ them of their evil taint.
This shall be a prison break scenario… Your magical/mundane equipment will briefly be grayed-out as the Prison break scenario trope requires starting with nothing.
Since this is about as fun as playing Rolemaster with 100 paper chits in a cup, I suggest that the 1st scene starts with both Machine brothers being inert on a laboratory table deep under the fortress and they are somehow “switched on” while all other PCs (and their equipment) are conveniently nearby.
Since, the players gave me some good feedback on how to integrate the group as a plausible party and how the game would start. I’m keeping this for the play reports.
Now this game/project is officially slated to start on December 5th. I’m so looking forward to this and count on us to share it with you all!
Trial Run
In the meantime I plan to do a little trial next Friday where we’ll likely waste about an hour setting our Chatting software and getting our game going. I plan to make the session about fighting a Red Dragon and maybe a few more koboldy allies in some sort of Lava filled cave.
To start things off, I’ll be using Gametable as the main software, referring to Alex’s excellent primer found here.
Now I could use some help from you.
Could someone help me with creating a series of Kobold Tokens (at least 3-4 different one), a Red Dragon one and a in-theme battle map? In return, I’ll site credits and publish my adventure notes (including Terrain effects and such) along with the jpgs and files to pull it off using Gametable.
Thanks guys. I plan to post an Adventure Prep article soon about Gametable and how I went to make the short adventure.à
Have a great week.
I’m confused. You’re beta-testing the D&DI Game Table… but using another game table app?
Rafes last blog post..The Three "R"s of Session Planning
Sorry if that wasn’t clear. The D&D Game table app is not ready to be beta tested. It wont be for quite a few months.
In the meantime, we’ll play with other software available so WotC can take notes from the experience and make a better one!
I’ll clarify in the post.
That’s a cool idea. And – wow, you’re connected.
Wyatts last blog post..Fleurian Pact Warlock
Nice idea. I would like to form an on-line, stable group of spanish players too. But it seems quite difficult to find something like that.
I am be looking forward to see how it works for you guys!
Regards,
Tharlorn
@Wyatt: I’m connected in the sense that I finally met with people who had read or heard about my blog and who just happened to be industry people! 🙂
@Tharlorn: If you reach out to the Spanish Blogsphere and connect to both continental and South American gamers you migth be able to have such a group.
Next you can play cross ocean.. Then Sweden will finally be on the map 🙂
Oh yeah.. right it already is… Sort of…
You should really include D20Pro in your list of Virtual Game tables. I feel it’s the best one out there myself. It is native to 3.5 but easily jiggerable to 4E. I’m using it for a few 4E campaigns and it’s great.
http://www.d20pro.com/
Duly noted! I’ll look into it.
Thanks!
Good luck! Very jealous of those taking part!
Sorry if I missed it somewhere in your post, but how receptive is WotC in your proposal to test the game in BETA (assuming you’re trying to get your group into the closed BETA testing)? I think it’d be great to see a third-party source do a series of previews for the Game Table.
Jack Smith IVs last blog post..The Kroola! (Preview)
@Baboune: Yeah, I miss playing with you man. If this does pan out, I’m not against considering a Chatty’s International Tour of Kobold Love next year!
@Jack: Lets just say that we hope to be first in line for the closed beta testing from the moment that we’re allowed to blog about it.
It will all depend on wizards’ community managers and legal departments.
Just to note that Rune Goldpiece Machine may be changing into a Gnome Bard. The Bard playtest stuff has me excited about it, and it is a lot more in keeping with the spirit of “silly” Chatty mentioned.
He’ll still be a “brother” of sorts for Beatdown. The backstory is still getting hammered out, but it should be good.
A curse may even be involved… 😀
@Tharlorn: If you ever set up an online game in spanish, I’d like to play… the NewbieDM is cuban-american… but I’ve never played a D&D game in spanish… it must be interesting….
I speak perfect spanish though, so I’d love to try…. let me know if you set something up, if it fits my times, I’d be into it…
Soy un enano… guerrero…. I don’t even know the D&D terms in spanish!!
newbiedms last blog post..About the 4th Edition Forgotten Realms…
@newbiedm: Usualmente yo lo que hago es usar anglicismos. Soy puertorriqueño, y nosotros hacemos pedasos el lenguaje, asi que no nos molesta decir cosas como “Hago shift un cuadrado” o “Voy a tirar mi saving throw”. Yo no conosco muchos cubanos, asi que no se lo que piensan sobre esa mezcla, pero habia un dandy Español (de España) en un grupo que tuve hace mucho tiempo, que le daba rabia cuando combinabamos el ingles de esa manera. Tambien el usaba un Bard que tocaba flamenco, como si el estereotypo no fuece lo suficientemente obvio.
Wow, I never thought I’d be using my Spanish online.
Wyatts last blog post..Fleurian Pact Warlock
Your project has piqued my interest. Recently I’ve not been using a game client due to lack of need for maps for combat, but in the future I plan to have a map heavy game. I do hope you detail all of the technical quirks of each gaming software as ease of use, ease of connecting, and response time when using the software are high priorities for me.
I look forward to the results of this project. Will you be switching between software each time?
@Vortling
Maybe not switching each time, but every so often, yeah. We need to have enough time to evaluate each piece of software we try, so as to give appropriate feedback about them.
We should be detailing all of those things, though most are easy to connect (or at least equally hard, as all require port forwarding for the host if behind a router), and response time is not really an issue with a map program (unless it is exorbitant).
But yeah, we will be going through those things.
Gametable is currently the default, as it is the simplest and most straightforward. As we get used to the others, one of them may become the new default.
@Graham: Hmmm… ever see Full Metal Alchemist? That show starred a magic using teenager and his brother-turned golem (warforged effectively).
TheMainEvents last blog post..Paying the Buy-In
Heh, yeah, that’s one of the ideas I tossed around with Dave. It still may influence the backstory.
Hey… I *like* Rolemaster!
But seriously, this sounds amazing! And I’m quite anxious to hear about it. Speaking of my love for a not-D&D system, I’m hoping your reviews of the programs will include flexibility for various systems.
I’m even interested to read the campaign. It sounds so over-the-top it’ll be a fantastic little tale to tide me from my gaming abstinence! Do provide us some in-game detail goodies.
@Michael M
Most of the programs we’ll be using are system-neutral. So long as your game uses a grid for playing (some/most of the programs also support hexes), you can use the programs for it.
Even the WotC gametable will be usable for non-D&D games, from what I’ve seen in reviews. No idea if it will support hexes, though.
That said, Chatty and I are pretty much straight D&D gamers. Some of the others, like Dave, may be able to give better advice on the applicability for other games. Also, we will be playing D&D 4e, so our ability to test this will be limited.
Good thought, though. We should try to include that.
@Tharlon: Witness the power of community!
@Graham: He has returned! Wee! Its all right if you want to switch, I’m sure you guys will think of something… heck, you can ever apply the 6 million dollar man trope and make Dave into an ex-gnome turned warforged to save his life.
@NewbieDM and Wyatt: From what I can decipher from Wyatt’s Spanish, you play D&D in Spanish like I play it in French with my friends. French verbs and stuff, English names.
@Michael: I didn’t want to dig Rolemaster… it was the paper chit thing 🙂 As Graham says, the application are mostly system neutral but assume that it uses battlemaps and minis. That being said its also a way of conveying visual props like maps and documents to the players while playing the game.
I hope that each blogger will tackle the project in their own ways.
The chits thing reminded me of an old dragon article, “What to do when the dog eats your dice.”
Lots of fun stuff about how to roll when your dice are not available. I remember playing while driving some place and using random numbers off license plates.
But the testing sounds great. As a thousand others are thinking, “Let me know if someone can’t make it.”
And hearing from some “regular” players is always good for a company. Though I’m dreading WotC raising their rates with the new pieces. Oh well.
If ever the idea of a virtual ChattyCon ever becomes more than a pipe dream, I’ll start taking names!
I can already envision doing Kobold Love playtests on such software!
Ah ideas… how they curse me so!
@Wyatt – I’ve never had the need to play D&D in spanish, becuase we are all english speakers… except for the occasional curse word… “coño, carajo” when I fumble or so on…. for you P. Ricans it would be like “puñeta, I rolled a 1!”
newbiedms last blog post..About the 4th Edition Forgotten Realms…
newbiedms last blog post..About the 4th Edition Forgotten Realms…
Wow, that’s great news. I play with Fantasy Grounds for over an year now, and I’ve enjoyed a lot. I’ve run age of Worms AP, Keep on the Shadowfell and now I’m running a homebrew 4th edition D&D on it.
I’m also a huge fan of Ptolus! I have an autographed one, as Monte and Sue Cook came to Brazil in 2007.
I hope to see not only comments about the software, but also the campaign journal. Good luck guys! May your roll be critical!
Daniel Anands last blog post..Skill Challenge #2 – Simpatia pelo demônio
Chatty DM’s blog, where people curse in all languages! 🙂
@Daniel: HA! I knew that your name was familiar. I recall Monte blogging about his stay in Brazil and I was wondering if some of the Brazillian readers who appeared here in the last few months were from that group!
Small world!
So cool!
I will definitively need to pick your brains for using Fantasy Grounds as I’m meeting a big barrier to entry with the software.
I too co-own a copy of Monte’s book (Pre-ordered with my friend Math way back when).