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Support for face to face RPG gamers.

S

Spence

Well-known member
My questions areabout how RW will support the GM that is only interested in face to face RPG gaming.

While I agree that remote gaming via the internet is growing, it is still a very small fraction of the overall face to face RPG gamer (this based on my small bit of the world). Using computers to prepare everything from characters to adventures, yes. Actually running the game, not so much. In my local area I personally know over a hundred RPG gamers, about half of them GM. And of that number only two actually participate in a PbM or other remote version of a Paper-n-Pencil RPG. Of course that does not mean that this sample is representative of the gaming world as a whole. Just my corner of it.

Now to the actual questions.

So far RW looks great for planning and managing a campaign and then being able to print off documentation should be fairly routine. If, and here is a big “if”, RW will allow the GM to see or print items exactly as the player would see it. In the screenshots and video we saw that the GM can select area’s to be revealed to the players and on his screen he can see the extent of the revealed area cleanly with the rest of the map shaded. The problem with that is I cannot print that image to show the players because the entire map is visible. How much thought has gone into the ability of face-to-face gamers to be able to actually use the information in a face to face format?

I know that like gamers tend to drift together, but most of the local gaming community I know prefers the more personal social element of face to face gaming. Our computers are not the venue, but rather tools to support the face to face game.

So another big question is whether or not RW will be supporting that style of gamer, or is it primarily intended to support computer based remote gaming with face to face gaming an afterthought?

I do want to emphasis that I am just asking for clarification and in no way am saying that computer based remote gaming is bad or anything. I am just wanting to see if RW will meet my personal gaming needs and those of people like me.
 
Everyone here at Lone Wolf plays almost exclusively face-to-face RPGs. Players will occasionally be looped in remotely for a game when they are out of town, but that's the exception and not the rule.

I started with that statement because I want to emphasize that Realm Works is very much written for use with face-to-face gaming in mind. In fact, it's always the first usage model that I think of when designing how the product works, and I've been one of the key people driving the design. As you point out, this is definitely the most common practice among gaming groups, so that's where our emphasis is as well.

The one aspect of Realm Works that is generally assumed, though, is that the GM will have a device at the table during play. If all the GM has is a laptop and nobody else has personal machines, it still works great, and that's what we've optimized for. Using the Player View mechanism, the GM can reveal portions of a map, press a button to show it to the players on the laptop screen, and then turn the laptop to face the players. The same logic applies to all aspects of showing material to the players. So in-play support for face-to-face GMs is absolutely a cornerstone of how Realm Works is designed.

If the GM has *no* device during the game, then some important aspects of Realm Works can't be leveraged. However, it can still be used in such games. At that point, though, the incremental reveal of maps doesn't make much sense, since the GM can't reveal areas during play anyways.

I'm going to point you back to the video we released with the Kickstarter to illustrate how this works. Jump to the 5:25 mark. You'll see a few tabs showing what content has and hasn't been revealed. Then you'll see the Player View mechanism at work. There's a tab where the GM sees exactly the players will see. And then there's a full-screen mode that can be shown to the players. You can trigger this on a laptop screen and turn it to face the players, or you can put the player content on a second monitor for viewing by the players. With either approach, the players only get to see what's been revealed during play.

Hope this helps!
 
I too am a fan of the in person gaming groups.


I run a kindof in between. I run a face to face game, but two of my players moved away. So we use maptools and skype to include them in. Instead of using a standard battlemat with minuatures, We have one computer hooked up to a flat panel tv screen, so the res tof the player see pretty much the same thing. But due to complications of real life, we game maybe twice a month, sometimes once. I keep my notes on my laptop, but its still a pain to find them. Sometimes it takes me some time to remember an NPC's name. Or what I revealed to players about a town. So one of the things we always spend a lot of time on is "recap". Its a very role play oriented and story oriented game, so recap is important. I am planning to make realms works not so much useful DURING the game session, but making sure that players have as much time as they want in between sessions to look at what they know.

Im also planning to use realmsworks with its printing capabilities to produce handouts. Hopefully in color. For the "away" gamers, i havent decided what im going to do with that. Anyway, Im definitely looking forward to trying it out.
 
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mirtos said:
I keep my notes on my laptop, but its still a pain to find them. Sometimes it takes me some time to remember an NPC's name. Or what I revealed to players about a town.
Click to expand...

Realm Works should help immensely in these areas. So it ought to be very useful during the game as well as between games.

mirtos said:
So one of the things we always spend a lot of time on is "recap". Its a very role play oriented and story oriented game, so recap is important. I am planning to make realms works not so much useful DURING the game session, but making sure that players have as much time as they want in between sessions to look at what they know.
Click to expand...

This sounds very much like the way we typically play. Using the Reveal History mechanism within Realm Works ought to make your recaps much more efficient. It should also eliminate a lot of the confusion that often ensues when Player1 remembers something one way and Player2 remembers it a bit differently. It will be easy to double-check with Realm Works and get everyone on the same page quickly.

mirtos said:
Im also planning to use realmsworks with its printing capabilities to produce handouts. Hopefully in color. For the "away" gamers, i havent decided what im going to do with that.
Click to expand...

One option would be to get yourself a free PDF printer driver and just print to PDF. Then you can share the handouts with your remote players via PDF. :)
 
rob said:
One option would be to get yourself a free PDF printer driver and just print to PDF. Then you can share the handouts with your remote players via PDF. :)
Click to expand...

Yeah, i assumed id do something like that. This is why i was glad to hear about the printing functionality.
 
rob said:
Everyone here at Lone Wolf plays almost exclusively face-to-face RPGs. Players will occasionally be looped in remotely for a game when they are out of town, but that's the exception and not the rule.

I started with that statement because I want to emphasize that Realm Works is very much written for use with face-to-face gaming in mind. In fact, it's always the first usage model that I think of when designing how the product works, and I've been one of the key people driving the design. As you point out, this is definitely the most common practice among gaming groups, so that's where our emphasis is as well.

The one aspect of Realm Works that is generally assumed, though, is that the GM will have a device at the table during play. If all the GM has is a laptop and nobody else has personal machines, it still works great, and that's what we've optimized for. Using the Player View mechanism, the GM can reveal portions of a map, press a button to show it to the players on the laptop screen, and then turn the laptop to face the players. The same logic applies to all aspects of showing material to the players. So in-play support for face-to-face GMs is absolutely a cornerstone of how Realm Works is designed.

If the GM has *no* device during the game, then some important aspects of Realm Works can't be leveraged. However, it can still be used in such games. At that point, though, the incremental reveal of maps doesn't make much sense, since the GM can't reveal areas during play anyways.

I'm going to point you back to the video we released with the Kickstarter to illustrate how this works. Jump to the 5:25 mark. You'll see a few tabs showing what content has and hasn't been revealed. Then you'll see the Player View mechanism at work. There's a tab where the GM sees exactly the players will see. And then there's a full-screen mode that can be shown to the players. You can trigger this on a laptop screen and turn it to face the players, or you can put the player content on a second monitor for viewing by the players. With either approach, the players only get to see what's been revealed during play.

Hope this helps!
Click to expand...

Absolutely,

You covered everything perfectly and it looks like RM be as close to what I am looking for as I could possibly expect.

I went back and re-watched the video from the time mark and I really don't understand how I missed something that obvious. Old age or something I guess.

Anyway thanks for the prompt answer and apologies for my not so prompt reply.

Spence
 
Very impressed with what I have seen thus far on the kickstarter page. I have 2 players out of state, and the rest local. I generate monsters within herolab (for 3.5e) and import them into d20pro. But I usually fumble/juggle and basically am clumsy going back and forth between my notes, pdfs, books and spreadsheets.

I look forward to incorporating RW into my campaigns. I have been searching high and low for a product such as this to streamline my campaigns.
 
Hello,

The way I have things set up, I use a laptop while I GM, and another PC connected to a TV to show things to the players. Would it be possible to have Realm Works on both, make 'player view' updates on the 'GM machine' and have those updates appear on the other PC easily (real time) without using a cloud server?
 
@JTStorm: That's exactly how it works now. :) The cloud allows your players to have access to everything outside of the game session. During the session, you'll utilize Realm Works exactly the way you've outlined. You can see how this looks within the product in the KS video. I believe the pertinent section starts at around the 5-minute mark or a little after.
 
I watched the video, and I will be signing up soon! I am not planning on using cloud access at all, which is where my questions are coming from.

So, I would just need to open the same file on both machines? As I make changes on my GM machine, it would be available on my PC machine? Sorry, I'm just trying to make sure I am understanding this part correctly. I'm old and don't understand all of this new fangled technology. :-)
 
Oops! Thanks for double-checking on this, since I glossed over an important couple of words in your previous post. [Sorry, I'm exhausted from the Kickstarter.]

The way Realm Works is setup is that you can use a second *monitor* attached to the same computer for display to the players. In your environment, it's a completely separate computer. I'm not sure what is driving you to use a separate computer, but it's a critical distinction. If the monitor can instead be attached to your GM computer, you're all set with Realm Works. If it has to remain separate machines, I'm pretty sure one of our developers said that can be made to work, but I can't say that with absolute certainty. The second computer could probably be setup as a slave to the GM machine and then could be used for display, but please don't quote me on that.

I'll see if I can reach the developer to check, but it's Saturday, so I don't know if he's reachable. And if you can eliminate the separate computer from the equation, it's a moot issue, since Realm Works will handle that beautifully already.
 
I run Hero Lab on both machines. The 'Player' machine has just the group info which they can use. It makes it easier for them to make adjustments while we play without slowing things down on my end. The 'GM' machine has the group and encounters.

Either way, it's not a deal breaker. I have an old monitor I may be able to use if needed. I'll be signing up for the Kickstarter tonight. Thanks for taking the time to answer!
 
Am I hearing you right Rob, that the only way the "players" can connect to RealmsWork is via the cloud? Im asking because every player brings a laptop over to my house and we do things around the table, but also via a network in my house.

I was under the impression that as long as everyone shared the same file, (ie: its on a shared network somewhere) the DM would get full access, and the players would see what ive revealed. Is this doable without the cloud? or is this feature only with the cloud?
 
mirtos said:
Am I hearing you right Rob, that the only way the "players" can connect to RealmsWork is via the cloud? Im asking because every player brings a laptop over to my house and we do things around the table, but also via a network in my house.

I was under the impression that as long as everyone shared the same file, (ie: its on a shared network somewhere) the DM would get full access, and the players would see what ive revealed. Is this doable without the cloud? or is this feature only with the cloud?
Click to expand...

There is no "sharing the same file" with Realm Works. The product works completely different from Hero Lab.

The details on this are pretty well summed up in FAQ entries #22 and #30 on the main page of the Kickstarter. Please start by taking a look at those and then let me know if you have further questions about how it all will work. If you do, I'll be happy answer them as best I can.
 
ok, so until you have the DM webserver running if we arent at the same location, the only way to really do this, is to use the cloud, is that correct? I guess i was imagining a server running on the DMs side if they didnt use the cloud. Or some form of shared file, and not assuming a second monitor. It seems to me that since a big portion of realms works is exposing content, not just organizing content, then the cloud becomes essential, not just optional.
 
So the only way to synch databases is from the cloud? There is no way to synch with a non cloud connection?
 
mirtos said:
ok, so until you have the DM webserver running if we arent at the same location, the only way to really do this, is to use the cloud, is that correct?
Click to expand...

Correct.

mirtos said:
I guess i was imagining a server running on the DMs side if they didnt use the cloud. Or some form of shared file, and not assuming a second monitor.
Click to expand...

If I'm understanding correctly, you're basically thinking that we would implement a complete, standalone server to run on the GM's machine that includes all the logic for doing everything within Realm Works. This is a capability that few GMs would have the technical know-how to setup in the first place. And if we did that for only $35, the support costs alone would consume at least $35 per installation, on average, leaving us with no way to recover the initial investment in the product or even continue development from here. That's an untenable model, since everyone working on the project expects us to pay their salary every month. :(

mirtos said:
It seems to me that since a big portion of realms works is exposing content, not just organizing content, then the cloud becomes essential, not just optional.
Click to expand...

That really depends. Based on a variety of comments on the Kickstarter, many GMs only care about organizing and managing the material for themselves. The sharing of content is only of concern to them during the game session, in which case the existing Player View mechanisms are all they need or want. Roughly one-third of the Kickstarter backers have opted for no cloud, which seems to support this assertion.

If, however, the GM wants to empower the players to have access to the revealed content independently and/or outside of the game session, the cloud does become essential. So it really boils down to the style of play for the gaming group and what the GM wants to provide to his players. We've tried to provide a solid framework in Realm Works that supports the full spectrum of GM needs and play styles, making the product valuable to everyone instead of a small, targeted subset.

Hope this helps!
 
rob said:
Correct.
If I'm understanding correctly, you're basically thinking that we would implement a complete, standalone server to run on the GM's machine that includes all the logic for doing everything within Realm Works. This is a capability that few GMs would have the technical know-how to setup in the first place. And if we did that for only $35, the support costs alone would consume at least $35 per installation, on average, leaving us with no way to recover the initial investment in the product or even continue development from here. That's an untenable model, since everyone working on the project expects us to pay their salary every month. :(
Click to expand...

I respectfully disagree that it would be untenable and that there would even be support needed for local servers. Or that it would take away from what you provide with the cloud. The cloud as you've pointed out offers a lot more than just storage. Im simply pointing out that there should be a way of synching data between DMs and Players if not using a cloud. The server/client was just a simple approach. The cloud offers a lot more (including backing up of data). As far as support, a simple server wouldnt require much at all. Sorry, but I have to bring up Maptools as an example. Every DM that uses Maptools starts it in server mode.

I just wasnt aware of the fact that some features are dependent on the cloud and internet connections.

From what I've read the product wont have cloud until around April, is that correct?

Thanks for the info.
 
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