I want to run an online game. Can I just do it through a text IRC, or is voice chat an absolute must when running an RPG?
>>44689228
Voice is superior to text because it is much, much faster to talk, than to type.
>>44689248
Make sure the program you use can handle multiple participants though. Group video conference in gchat is a must
>>44689308
>Make sure the program you use can handle multiple participants though.
That's a given.
>Group video conference in gchat is a must
Not at all. We only use voice chat, without video.
They both have their benefits. As >>44689248 said voice chat is much faster. However some people find it easier to act in character when playing a game through text.
There is no correct answer to which is better, it all comes down to what you and the group feel most comfortable with.
>>44689228
Most players in the /tg/ community, I've found, prefer text.
In addition, when I did voice in the past, as a GM I sometimes found it difficult to keep people on track. We moved through things pretty quickly, but those things were rarely relevant to the game at hand, and we were all a bunch of nerds so we went off on tangents really easily. In person, I could stand up and use body language to get things on track easily, but in voice chat, I found myself having to shout constantly to get people on track if there was an avid conversation going on and it wasn't very fun. It made me feel a bit ineffectual, since there wasn't really another method of getting people under control and in terms of social control, shouting is about the last thing you want to resort to.
For online games I would recommend text over voice. If you have a group of players that will not go off on conversational tangents very easily, voice might work fine though.
>>44689359
Remember not to put me in with those that love text, anon.
I hate it.
>>44689228
Players do voice, GM (me) does text. Or, rather, I do text whenever conveying scenes, dialogue, rolls, etc., and just talk normally otherwise. Writing things out helps in keeping you consistent, circumvents the often shoddy quality of typical GM narration by letting you do a quick read-over and edit before you release the message, and gives you a log of all the actions and rolls for later reference as you write out the reaction of the scene/enemies/whatever to the players' decisions.
>>44689377
He said most, ANon, not all.
>>44689641
I know.
>>44689228
I'm sure there are many anons like me who'd rather cut off their pinky finger than spend a single second of their life interacting with a bunch of random foreign nerds without a comfortable internet text wall to separate us.
I much prefer text for the reasons stated in >>44689359
While voice for OOC and text for IC may be ideal for most people, as I can type faster than I can talk, am a little self conscious about my own voice, and don't have a microphone, I usually do everything through text on Roll20 without problems. The games still go at a decent clip, as every has macros, making combat pretty automatic unless rulings need to be looked up.
>>44689228
Depends on game. If it's really involved mechanically it's probably good to run via voice for speed reasons.
>>44689228
Roll20 + Teamspeak/Skype is the best way.
>>44690532
>>44689377
You and me both. Voice or video is the way to go. Our online guy turns his cam off when he eats and he started off as just voice.
I prefer text since I can go at my own pace and also have an easy to access log of everything that happens in the game. Voice players prefer to play games online the same way they would play games at the table. Both choices are fine and nobody is wrong in their opinion to prefer one over the other, but combining voice players with text players and text players with voice players rarely works well and you get the disadvantages of both with neither of the benefits.
You have to decide on one whether or not you want the speed of voice, or the easy to keep track of nature of text. This is the reason why we get skub style wars over the two choices.
>>44689228
Long time online DM here who's actually enjoying myself and running two groups since forever.
Voice: Awesome if the group is nice and friendly and not socially retarded levels of shy etc. Watch out for one person taking up way more space than the rest. My preferred option, always. Voice also feels more personal, I have had way less players randomly disappearing in voice groups than I've had in text groups. Text feels an extra step removed from everyone else somehow.
Chat: Slow as fuck compared to voice, you really NEED to police your group and make sure they're not hammering out paragraphs of blah, but sticking to describing relevant things and adding details the other players know. They can't see your internal monologue, so keep it to yourself and let them figure out your thoughts through your actions, that sort of stuff.
Chat does have the sometimes benefits that really shy people who won't really do well in voice chat can be amazing through text chat, and that you never lose immersion because someone stuttering squeaky-voiced geek is playing Conan the Barbarian.
>>44689228
It comes down to preference really.
I like text only because I have some what bad hearing and it's annoying for all parties involved for me to keep doing sorry what did you say? also with voice only it's get confusing is more the one person is talking at a time.
Discord anyone?
>>44689228
Voice chat makes things run easier.
>video
red flag. if I've learned anything from image boards, it's the Law of Who You're Really Talking To On Here All The Time
>browse image board
>general cavalcade of shitposters, edgelords, and faggots but generally okay enough that you come back
>join some sort of image board related chat group
>turn on video
>suddenly realize the people you regularly communicate with on this website are insufferably, quintessentially generation X/Y fuckstains
>cue girl coming on cam and everything getting derailed because 20 year olds can't handle not slathering attention on a gurl
>cue bunch of faggots staring at each other and blasting music and saying nothing
>cue that attention whore in every group who plays a musical instrument
>cue a million other fucking shitty things
>cue the game completing falling apart and being aborted because these niggers want to talk about their day and share memes
The point is, video is garbage. Voice is optimal. Have not tried text, but curious to go this route so as to make interactions a bit more polished as we have a few seconds to think before we act, GM and player alike.
>sounds like your group was just garbage
No, I've been in several for nearly a decade and 99% of them are this, if you can't realize that it's because you're part of what I'm describing.
>>44695442
To be fair, most anons are pretty shitty once you pick them out of a crowd and learn more about them. The camaraderie of sharing a site and interest fades quickly once you learn that doesn't mean they're exactly like you and might just be really annoying.
You really just have to find some good people and keep everyone at an arm's length until you're sure you can stand them.
