Any online D&D communities?

[BoogieManFL]

I haven't played D&D outside of a computer game since I believe AD&D 2nd Edition. Yeah. The newest ruleset I've been exposed to was whatever was used for Neverwinter Nights 2. I think D&D 5e is current?


All the guys I used to play with have since had families and we all live far apart now, so games in person are impossible.

Is anyone aware of any online D&D communities where people can meet and play with strangers? I imagine such a thing exists and I did some searching but was hoping here had first hand knowledge and could point me in the right direction. Are there any good and current character generators around? I still remember my two favorite characters in detail and was hoping to re create them, adjusting for the changes in rules.


Can anyone help me out?

 

[Chessrook44]

I've actually idled in a pair of D&D-themed chatrooms for years, though they're generally quiet and I'm not sure how many games they do anymore.

That said, I feel like I should mention some difficulties I've had, as I've been trying to do D&D games online for... well years, and had many problems.

First, there's finding the group. I've looked outside such channels as well, and it can be surprisingly tricky to get the right people. One wants Pathfinder, another wants Mutants and Masterminds, a third will only play if he gets point buy.... finding four other people is difficult.

Second, there's finding a DM. Good luck with that, it often seems like everyone wants to be a player and nobody a DM.

Third, there's organizing a time. I know this can be difficult in RL, what with organizing around schedules and the like, but online it's a whole other monster as you also have to factor in Time Zones. When you have one player in California, two players on the East Coast, and two players in England, all with their own jobs at different times and hours? It can be a disaster finding a time. Believe me, I know.

Fourth, there's finding a way to play. There's plenty of options, sure... Forum-based can get over availability problems, but I dislike them due to how long it can take to play. Chatrooms work, but then you HAVE the availability problems, plus you need to find a diebot or other programs.

Fifth, there's getting people to actually show up, which again, gets complicated by time zones, and sometimes you never hear about WHY someone didn't show up until a couple days later due to no ability to contact them. I remember one game I played where for five weeks in a row we didn't play, because a different player was missing EVERY week.

Maybe some of this is just me, admittedly, as I've seemed to have poor luck with D&D (The only game I played IRL I got teamkilled two sessions in, and numerous other online games have ended with loss of interest, loss of players, player unavailability, the DM deciding they suck and quitting, and just plain not even getting to the first session.) but do remember, there are difficulties with online D&D that you wouldn't find IRL.

 

[BeerTent]

The only luck I've had for such a things are in eRP chatrooms.

I'll let you stew on that the 'e' stands for.

I know some people who do TTG over the internet, but it's generally not the same, and DnD now requires that silly little map. If I were you, I'd look up anything that's similar to the Shadowrun Returns series. People still develop and "DM" campaigns for something like that. Hell, I'm working on something that uses the Berlin assets from dragonfall. Problem is, I don't know if there's a SRR for DnD. So you might be out of luck and stuck on the F2P MMO's.

I could probably DM a TTG, but I'm not so sure I'd want to do it over escapist, and I sure as fuck wouldn't want to touch DnD. I'd do Unknown Armies, or Shadowrun. Probably more the former, because the rules are lighter and it's far sillier.

 

[Akjosch]

You could try Roll20 [http://roll20.net/] in combination with your VoIP solution of choice (Skype, TeamSpeak, ...). It has a web-based client, supports maps as well as on-the-spot scribbling on a "canvas", all kinds of crazy rolling, text chat, and you can find random groups to join (or create your own). It's free, but you can get a few extra features and support the people running it too if you like.

Koibu and itmeJP are streaming pretty awesome role-playing sessions with other streamers and YouTubers and they use Roll20 as well as the "back-end". They have fan communities where you might be able to find someone to play with as well, most easily on their subreddits:

http://www.reddit.com/r/koibu/
http://www.reddit.com/r/itmejp/

 

[Ratty]

You could try Roll20 [http://roll20.net/] in combination with your VoIP solution of choice (Skype, TeamSpeak, ...). It has a web-based client, supports maps as well as on-the-spot scribbling on a "canvas", all kinds of crazy rolling, text chat, and you can find random groups to join (or create your own). It's free, but you can get a few extra features and support the people running it too if you like.

Koibu and itmeJP are streaming pretty awesome role-playing sessions with other streamers and YouTubers and they use Roll20 as well as the "back-end". They have fan communities where you might be able to find someone to play with as well, most easily on their subreddits:

http://www.reddit.com/r/koibu/
http://www.reddit.com/r/itmejp/

Yeah Roll20 is good, I've used it for over a year now and depending on how elaborate you want things like your tiles to be (you can purchase/background maps/settings, I prefer to just draw the maps on like on a graph paper/vinyl mat) the games are easy and quick to set up.

If you're going to run a game on roll20 here let me give you some free stuff to help.

http://www.rptools.net/downloadsw/ <- Grab the token tool here. It will allow you to quickly and easily make tokens of any character or creature you want and have a picture of, which also means you don't have to spend money on tokens in the roll20 marketplace.

http://donjon.bin.sh/ <- Lots of cool, free stuff. From random dungeon generators to adventure scenario and tavern name generators.

Lastly since you've been out of the game for a while here's the free quick start/"Basic Rules" for 5e to see if you'd be interested in it-
http://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/basicrules?x=dnd/basicrules

Here's the SRD for 5e's primary competitor, Pathfinder (a game based on D&D 3.5) that should give you an idea of the mechanics of that game - http://www.d20pfsrd.com/

In case you'd like a more rules-lite game to start back into the hobby here's the SRD for Swords and Wizardry, a clone of D&D 0e - http://www.d20swsrd.com/ you can also get the complete book for Swords and Wizardry Complete on DriveThruRPG for free.

Call of Cthulhu Quick Start Rules - http://www.chaosium.com/the-call-of-cthulhu-quick-start-pdf/

Of course you may want to stick with 2e and you should be able to find/build a group for that on roll20 as well.

 

[BoogieManFL]

Thanks for the info everyone, much appreciated.

that Roll20 looks promising, but having to pay to get very basic features is kind of a downer. They need some kind of trial..

 

[sage42]

As far as I'm aware you only need to pay to get basic GM features. If you're just looking to play a game, you can create a free account no problem. I have one at least, and I haven't had to pay for squat.

 

[Akjosch]

Thanks for the info everyone, much appreciated.

that Roll20 looks promising, but having to pay to get very basic features is kind of a downer. They need some kind of trial..

You don't need to pay (as far as I can see). Not even for GMing, unless you want stuff like dynamic lighting and field of view calculations (nice to have, but not essential in my opinion).

 

[Lil_Rimmy]

Roll 20 is basically the best thing for this. It has a dedicated service for DM's and Players to organise parties/games and then run them, with saved battle maps etc. etc., built in rolling, tiles and macros, all the lovely stuff.

It also comes with chat and voice chat/camera, but it's service is a little unreliable, so you would probably just organise skype or hangouts with your players.

Happy RPing!

(and as the guy/gal above me said, check out ItmeJP or Koibu for all things D&D, they have got something like 7-10 series running between them and their friend group of D&D, Shadowrun, Stars without Number etc. They use Roll20, so if you want to see a good example of how it works in play you can watch that, or if you just want to watch hours of hilarious P&P games, that's bloody awesome too. There's a twitch for both of them where they stream it but all episodes are uploading to YouTube. Yay)

 

[Elijin]

Pretty bare bones, but if you want a forum where people play by post with various rule sets and games (Mafia, Werewolf, D&D, Pathfinder, etc) then nogoblinsallowed does that sort of thing.

 

[BoogieManFL]

Thanks for the info everyone, much appreciated.

that Roll20 looks promising, but having to pay to get very basic features is kind of a downer. They need some kind of trial..

You don't need to pay (as far as I can see). Not even for GMing, unless you want stuff like dynamic lighting and field of view calculations (nice to have, but not essential in my opinion).

It seemed to me that you needed the basic membership to save your characters to carry them from one game to another, or another "server" at least that's how I thought it was worded. If not, it seems like you'd have to make a new character for every different game/campaign you joined?

 

[Akjosch]

Thanks for the info everyone, much appreciated.

that Roll20 looks promising, but having to pay to get very basic features is kind of a downer. They need some kind of trial..

You don't need to pay (as far as I can see). Not even for GMing, unless you want stuff like dynamic lighting and field of view calculations (nice to have, but not essential in my opinion).

It seemed to me that you needed the basic membership to save your characters to carry them from one game to another, or another "server" at least that's how I thought it was worded. If not, it seems like you'd have to make a new character for every different game/campaign you joined?

Yeah, you need to copy & paste characters manually (and update the data in multiple places as needed). Roll20 basically sells convenience features and player-created graphic packages, so you can pay as much or as little as you want.

They are fully financed already (see the gauge on the page, you can get a detailed overview when you click on it IIRC), so they're not going away anytime soon.