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Show HN: Roll20, a new virtual tabletop for playing RPGs online
This is a project that I have been working on in my spare time for a while now. It's a new virtual tabletop for playing pen and paper role playing games online, but it takes an entirely different approach than anything out there right now. Rather than trying to turn pen and paper games into video games, with features centered around one-click damage calculations and detailed stats tracking, Roll20 focuses on storytelling. It has completely new features like background music, player journals, and an expansive art library with a built-in web search.
The entire system runs on NodeJS, Padrino, Backbone JS, Raphael, ShareJS, and a few dozen other "HTML5" technologies. OpenTok/TokBox powers the built-in video chat.
We're trying to raise some money on Kickstarter to fund further development and get us to the finish line. If you enjoy playing pen and paper games and think this is a good idea, we'd love your support -- help us spread the word!
- silverlight 15y agoThis is a project that I have been working on in my spare time for a while now. It's a new virtual tabletop for playing pen and paper role playing games online, but it takes an entirely different approach than anything out there right now. Rather than trying to turn pen and paper games into video games, with features centered around one-click damage calculations and detailed stats tracking, Roll20 focuses on storytelling. It has completely new features like background music, player journals, and an expansive art library with a built-in web search. The entire system runs on NodeJS, Padrino, Backbone JS, Raphael, ShareJS, and a few dozen other "HTML5" technologies. OpenTok/TokBox powers the built-in video chat. We're trying to raise some money on Kickstarter to fund further development and get us to the finish line. If you enjoy playing pen and paper games and think this is a good idea, we'd love your support -- help us spread the word! You can also check out a little more info on the site: http://roll20.net http://roll20.net
- rollypolly 15y agoVery original, I hope this gets funded. 5k isn't much either!
- silverlight 15y agoThanks!
- singingwolfboy 15y agoI love tabletop RPGs, and I wish there were better options for playing with friends online. I chipped in -- hope you get funded!
- silverlight 15y agoThanks for your support!
- e1ven 15y agoOK, Backed. I like tools like this. I think too often they get cluttered down trying to implement the rules system in the game. I don't want that, I don't need that. That's what the GM is for, and trying to implement the rules themselves mean I need to program, in order to run my game. I just want an extension of my minis map, on the web. I'd like to click-and-drag to move figures around, scribble on stuff, and maybe import some PNGs if I feel motivated. Or not. My scribbles are good enough, since you have VIDEO of me, right there, describing it. Again, this is where people get lost. Things don't need to stand alone, like they would in Diablo, or Baulder's gate. I don't want to spend a long time mapping out a dungeon before we play, I want to fire up a game, and wing it as we all play together. That's what I love about Tabletop games. As a GM, I can just use my marker, and my voice, and GO! Make that easy, and I'll get all my friends to get their friends to sign up ;)
- silverlight 15y agoI'd say you just gave a pretty good summary if our core philosophy. Here's a comment I made on Reddit along those lines: http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/rcw9t/can_we_have_a_discussion_on_virtual_tables/c44vcse http://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/comments/rcw9t/can_we_have_a_dis...
- johrn 15y agoThis looks really interesting. I've also looked at a few of the other virtual tabletop products out there and not been super happy with what I've seen. Making a note to myself to make a pledge later tonight. Have you posted a link to this kickstarter anywhere else? A cursory search on reddit didn't pull up any results, and I think there are a few subreddits over there that might have some interest as well.
- silverlight 15y agoWe've posted to /r/rpg and /r/dnd, but linked directly to the site (http://roll20.net http://roll20.net) instead...just as a sort of mini A/B test to see if it made a difference :-). If you know of any other subreddits feel free to spread the word!
- binarysolo 15y agoWhat about /r/games, /r/kickstarter?
- NolanT 15y agoGood suggestions. I'm on it. Thanks.
- silverlight 15y agoGreat, added there as well, thanks!
- JayNeely 15y agoI'd also try posting on 4chan's /tg/ (traditional games) board. Lots of table-top gamers there.
- troygoode 15y agostrangely enough, I own roll20.com and am working on something similar...
- silverlight 15y agoI was wondering who had that :-). We were originally going to go with d20.io but couldn't figure out if it sounded good or not, and so now that is our shortening URL instead. I checked before using roll20.net and nothing was set up on roll20.com, so we moved forward.
- troygoode 15y agoNo need to justify it - you didn't do anything wrong. :-) Contact me at troygoode AT gmail DOT com. Maybe I could trade the .com over to you for a domain you have laying around?
- silverlight 15y agoI'll drop you a line! Thanks :-)
- ajross 15y agoHeh. Does kickstarter take donations in kind?
- aidenn0 15y agoI've wanted to make something like this for years but never had the time. I remember about a decade ago I tried something called OpenRPG (and even submitted a bunch of patches to it) but it was fairly clunky to use and didn't include voice-chat so we had to use roger-wilco on top of it. Really interface is key, computer interfaces tend to get in your way and that is really damaging to the flow of the game. I'm definitely going to check this out, and if it's any good, I'll be a bit jealous that I'm not working on it.
- binarysolo 15y agoAs an avid tabletopper I really resonate with your prioritization on social. Chipping in and spreading the word to my gaming group as well. :)
- silverlight 15y agoThanks! I'm glad to know there are so many others out there who share that perspective.
- jlesk 15y agoNice work so far. There seems to be growing interest in online roleplaying, but most of the current offerings are lacking right now. I personally launched Fabletop.com a couple of months ago, but the approach is a bit different, focusing more on a robust chat system, and less on the battlemat. Good luck to you guys!
- MicahWedemeyer 15y agoI run http://obsidianportal.com http://obsidianportal.com From the beginning we focused on the story aspect of tabletop games and avoided the gamey crunch. That decision has paid off time and time again. If you guys want to bypass some of the journal features and instead focus on the tabletop, check out our API: http://help.obsidianportal.com/kb/api/api-overview http://help.obsidianportal.com/kb/api/api-overview You could use Obsidian Portal as the backend to store characters, notes, journal, etc. Allow people to import their Obsidian Portal campaigns into Roll20, and you can focus on the tabletop. We've got around 40,000 campaigns in our system, so it's not a fool's errand. Contact me at micah@obsidianportal.com if you're interested.
- NolanT 15y agoMicah, no joke, you are on a list of folks we wrote down to contact about this. Really excited to see you're interested and we will ABSOLUTELY be in touch. Funny what a small place the internet is sometimes.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- ceol 15y agoThis is such a cool implementation. Would you be willing to do a write up about how you got the basic tabletop functionality working? I see on your acknowledgements page[0] you use NodeJS and ShareJS. I assume you do JSON object editing like the Hex example[1]? [0]: http://roll20.net/policies/acknowledgements.html http://roll20.net/policies/acknowledgements.html [1]: http://sharejs.org/hex.html http://sharejs.org/hex.html
- silverlight 15y agoI will try and put together a writeup when I get a spare moment. Yes, we are using the JSON object syncing functionality.
- quickpost 15y agoAt first I thought you were talking about a touch table interface for RPG / Board Games. A couple of my friends are doing a bunch of development in that vein: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGMjnmdwC8s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGMjnmdwC8s
- colomon 15y agoA very cool project, I've passed word on to the gaming friends I thought might be interested. Heck, I'd be completely geeked about playing D&D or d20 Star Wars using it, particularly with the vast majority of my gaming friends living at least two hours drive away. It doesn't seem like it would suit my style of GMing at all, though. It's been decades since I used a battle mat or dice. My basic style is just to tell the players what they see, and ask them what they do. Even just trying to come up with pictures for the NPCs the players encounter would seriously slow me down -- in a normal session, probably half of the NPCs and settings are generated on the fly. On the other hand, the video chat, the text chat, the logging, and the idea of mood music all sound like they'd be great tools. Would it be reasonable to run the system with just those features going? Is there something else out there which will already do this?
- intended 15y agoCome to think of it - thats probably a good simple feature for them to add: An 8 bit mode or a simplified mode - A lot of the genre is related to imagination - the GM comes up with his description of frightening beasts, and people fill in the gaps with their own take on it. At the same time the case should also be made that a good market place will also create good art that inspires people to come up with scenarios. Hmm. Heck if the market place even takes inspiration from deviant art landscapes and the likes, it could be an impressive force.
- NolanT 15y agoHad a guy on Something Awful today ask if he could play on a white background with just color blocks as tokens. Yes. Play checkers if you'd like. Honestly, at it's base this is a system of layers in a browser. You can put one thing on top of another thing. You put a token on a table. That's why this thing is cool, I think. Yeah, I'm using it to play D&D... but Riley and I were both pretty intent on making sure this was a blank slate. We both love video games-- but we also both loved that tabletop games can be so, so much more because it's whatever you bring (or don't bring) to the table.
- NolanT 15y ago