TOPIC: 6/7 Update - Good Playtest - And I have a question

Jeff, in combat rooms will you need to have video feeds of each player to show the combat slides and other actions? It seems like golem control is more important in puzzle rooms than in combat rooms.

Mike Steele wrote: Jeff, in combat rooms will you need to have video feeds of each player to show the combat slides and other actions? It seems like golem control is more important in puzzle rooms than in combat rooms.

I’d recommend using a digital die roller rather than sliding at home to eliminate any need for player video. Audio only seems fine.

Fred

It depends on who else is on the run...

Audio is fine.

Beertram wrote: It depends on who else is on the run...

Audio is fine.

You raise a good point. A PUG could be utter chaos.

I wonder if this could morph at some point into a "choose your adventure" type of online True Dungeon game, where each possible choice was pre-recorded, with one or more new adventures to try each year. Maybe each run would only need one "Dungeon Master" to guide the group (or eventually no actual people at all). They would still use token builds (the DM could verify via video the token builds in the coaching room) to encourage token sales, and would still give participation tokens, treasure pulls, and survivor pins by mail.

Or - maybe like Magic the Gathering, Arena, make a True Dungeon Online game and make the token collection completely digital and separate from "real" token collections. It could have it's own XP system. That could spur a lot of new token digital token sales, and would allow TD to avoid or modify tokens that were problematic in the real world.

I feel like losing out on player video will lessen the experience for me. I like being able to see my teammates. But then again, I run on a dual screen machine where I can set the gallery of everyone's video on one screen and the golem or other stuff on the other screen.

Another concern I have with audio-only is that in my experience people are even more likely to talk over each other. Though it can help if you have some social agreements like "stay on mute when not talking. take yourself off mute to indicate that you want to talk" or something like that.

As I worry about communication no video makes me more worried. I think that can be bypassed like Fiddy said if the group has a plan to handle it. In a PUG if there is no guidance from TD on how to effectively communicate on audio only I fear alot of talking over each other without visble cue that someone else is talking/ about to talk. Again I think it can be bypassed just thought needs to be put into it. It would be great if one of the patron groups attempted to tackle is a pug with no pre-planning at all, but I also know that would not be fair to that group of patrons. I am not worried about the vets of TD. I am worried about the new, newish players, non-forumite and infrequent players that we continually need to fill our ranks.

I would prefer to be able to see rather than not, though if it cant be done, well, it cant be done.

I belong to a business networking group and although it’s quite large for the first 10 minutes of the meeting organizer breaks out into breakout rooms were 6-7 people get to interact. This is all done via Zoom and might be a good way to give some interaction between the players before getting into coaching or actually going into the dungeon especially with PUGs

I'm ok either way. I think people talking over each other could happen whether you have video or not. PUGs are always going to be an issue. I've been part of groups where 2-3 people take charge and are so vocal that you never hear from half the party, even though they're in the room. That's kind of my bigger fear.

is there an online chat that goes with the audio/video? The group could do a lot of communicating that way with fewer voices designated to actually instruct the golem on what to do.

As far as sliding, I'm hoping to get to play elf wizard/wizard, but if not I was planning to just to the dice role option anyway. I thought that was already mentioned as an option.

I prefer audio only. Played some D&D over my corona break and found it was easier if we just had the game table on everyone’s screen and just audio for everything else.

Like Fiddy, I run two monitors. And have a iPad that works quite well with any video conferencing apps I have had to use.

I could easily have a golem screen, a party screen, and use my iPad for sliding. But I know I'm an exception to the norm.

Maybe different parties could use different methods. Audio only as the default, but a pre organized group could do something more elaborate. Maybe even run our own zoom meeting for party interaction with pictures.