No frame of reference
Posted On July 6, 2020
In an earlier post, Jon P commented, “I’d like to suggest, if you can find the time, to join a FG game as a player–even if it’s only for a one shot, or short adventure.”
I’ve been thinking about that for a few days now and Jon’s right. As a dungeon master I have no frame of reference to compare my style as a Dungeon Master. I owe it to myself to see what it’s like to play Dungeons & Dragons, and I owe it to my friends, to ensure that I am the best DM I can be.
Over the next few weeks, I will be on the lookout for a game, but if anyone following the blog does have a one-shot coming up, I’d be really interested!
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Don’t forget to check out the Fantasy Ground forums. They have a LFG area to keep an eye on. I believe they also have a topic specifically for one-shots.
Couple of questions for you:
Are your players having fun?
Are YOU having fun as the DM?
I started playing D&D in 1979. I was 9, almost 10 years old. My first session was just me and my best friend at the time. I rolled a fighter named Noran the Barbarian, which if I remember right was a suggested name in one of the books we had. My DM had clearly not understood what he read of the rules. My first encounter, as a 1st level fighter, was with an ancient white dragon…I died to its breath weapon on the first round of combat. I rolled a mage after that. Met the same white dragon on the road and killed it with a single firing of my magic missile spell… My DM didn’t realize Hit Dice and Hit Points were different…he thought it meant to roll a single d8 for hit points, so the dragon only had 4 hit points…That was all we played in that session.
I was hooked. At that time, I was struggling in school. Particularly in reading. I was reading well below my grade level. However, I had a burning desire to learn how to play this game. My mom took me to a hobby shop and allowed me to buy two books to start out with. I got deities and demigods, and the players handbook–the only books the store had on the shelf. A few weeks later was my birthday and I got the DMG and the Monster Manual. I was on my way, but I struggled understanding everything I was reading. I had a group of friends that wanted to play and one of my friends said, “Hey, do you want to read a book this is based on?” I said yes and he handed me a well worn copy of the Hobbit. I remember sitting down on our couch and reading it from cover to cover in one setting. It opened up a whole new world to me. D&D flung that door wide open. I credit the game with teaching me to read and making me a voracious reader. I also became a pretty serious war gamer, and played almost every game Avalon Hill made. I quickly became my groups’ DM–something nobody else wanted to do.
DMing can be hard. You are assuming a certain amount of responsibility for the fun your players are having. That can put a fair amount of pressure on you. One of the things that took me a long time to learn was that the players have to take responsibility for some of their own fun too.
All this to say, make sure you’re having fun too!
So something I’m a little nervous about as I finish up my own prep to run a game on fantasy ground. I’ve always DM’d face to face groups. I’ve never done the online thing for D&D. We’re only doing voice, no cameras. So I won’t be able to gauge my players reactions as events unfold. I’m worried about not being able to “read” the group and adapt my story based on their reactions. Have you run into this issue?
Hey Jon. I started my D&D campaign in 2018 playing in person with friends. I had to move a great distance away with my partner, who is one of the players. We transitioned to playing online. At first everyone else would meet up at one house with a webcam, mic, and our VTT software. My partner and I would join from our house. After Covid-19 we transitioned to all playing from our own homes. Webcams definitely help a ton, at least for getting a sense for how everyone is doing and engagement levels.
I recently ran a one-shot where only a couple of people had webcams and others didn’t. This still worked out really well. You have to pay more attention to tone of voice and make sure everyone gets equal time to speak and prepare. I think it would be a little difficult for me if no one was using a webcam, as I’d have no one to look at when speaking. I’d say webcams are a luxury.
More important, in my experience, is stable internet connection and good audio. My worst moments were a player’s wifi cutting their audio every so often and forcing them to repeat things. That and battling volume levels and making sure the players have their microphone ready to go at session start.
We use Discord in a group call and it has served us well. As Tony mentioned, if you can get any kind of webcam setup going it would go a long way. Camera phones connected to Discord, cheap webcams plugged into a desktop, using a side laptop or tablet with the camera going. They don’t even have to be looking at you if they prefer having the VTT on screen. So long as you can see them!
I’ve spoken to the group and they have said they are having fun. However, I get the feeling they are not as emotionally invested as much as they are in the computer games we play. That may come in time or it may not.
Running any form of conversation over conference software is ALWAYS much harder than having a conversation in real life. Transitions between speakers is more difficult as soon as you introduce the smallest amount of delay and the inability to read body language. I’ve never run a session face to face but it’s clear that we’d benefit from that interaction. I don’t think there is much you can do about it.
I would encourage you to look at some of the video conferencing software packages though so you can at least get cameras going.