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14:55, 29th March 2024 (GMT+0)

Play by shared document instead of play by post.

Posted by eldarin42
eldarin42
member, 2 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 08:45
  • msg #1

Play by shared document instead of play by post

Hi,

Did anyone ever thought about, or even tried, running a game by writing a shared document together instead of posting to a forum?

I could imagine that interaction gets more lively if you can easily intersperse your contribution to a conversation in place instead of either quoting and quoting quotes or answering very specific so people know when exactly you might be interrupting or using a natural pause to through a sentence in between what others say.

Technically, Google Docs could work as a platform. The Storyteller would add directly to the text and control where and which changes from players would be included. I.e. he could maintain a "barrier" saying no further changes before this point in time, players would work with "suggestions" that have to be accepted by the storyteller, ooc and dice rolls could be done in comments.

An alternative could be Github, though I am not sure I am not sure the user experience of this software development tool would be appreciated by non software developers.

Any experience or willingness to gain experience with such an approach?

The systems I think would benefit are mainly conversation, intrigue, politics focused - I suppose combat heavy doesn't benefit as much. In particular I have the World of Darkness in mind (so Vampire, Demon,...) and Scion (which even has rules to adapt the past).

Best
Jan
This message had punctuation tweaked by a moderator, as it was the wrong forum, at 17:26, Wed 17 July 2019.
horus
member, 815 posts
Wayfarer of the
Western Wastes
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 17:27
  • msg #2

Play by shared document instead of play by post

In reply to eldarin42 (msg # 1):

I think it might prove illuminating for you to search on the phrase "exquisite corpse".  This kind of writing is a time-honored tradition, and one that RPoL just extends with technology.  If one thinks of an RPoL game as a single website document, and applies the rules for writing an exquisite corpse, voila, it is done.
donsr
member, 1651 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 17:47
  • msg #3

Play by shared document instead of play by post

 I have  found from both GM  and player,  'activity'  is  what   makes game fun... Slow game s die.. active  games    live...

  our  RP  always seemed  to carry itself  well  though reactions   and   all such things.
eldarin42
member, 3 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:25
  • msg #4

Play by shared document instead of play by post

In reply to horus (msg # 2):

Didn't know that term yet, thanks, will run a search on it.

I am not sure I would agree that rpol already offers what I mentioned. For one posts add a lot of clutter and for a second you can only use quotes to intersperse an ongoing conversation or sequence of actions and the resulting sequence will not actually show up explicitly. The reader has to construct it herself by following the quotes and figuring out how the posts exactly relate to each other chronologically.
eldarin42
member, 4 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:28
  • msg #5

Play by shared document instead of play by post

In reply to donsr (msg # 3):

Not sure if I get what you are trying to say? I agree that activity drives a game. Probably an agreed upon pace (that satisfies all participants) is more important than a fast pace.
donsr
member, 1652 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:30
  • msg #6

Play by shared document instead of play by post

  it sounds like   something you would be tethered to?...maybe  good  for  a   time shared   once a week game"

 but Play by post allows  folks to play when they are  able.
seraphmoon
member, 76 posts
I've Been Touched By
His Noodly Appendage
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:37
  • msg #7

Play by shared document instead of play by post

Interesting idea, hadn't thought about it before. It'd also give people the opportunity to add things about their characters that other characters would have noticed but the player didn't know details about, like their clothing or artwork in the house. Not that you can't edit forum posts (most places), but it would take more steps than a shared file. That was one of the things I really liked switching from forum games to email, being able to edit things I'd gotten wrong or misunderstood. It would probably be harder to figure out if some previous part of the story had been deleted, though, and I agree that it would be better suited to conversation and description than combat. Just being turn-based shouldn't be a problem, since you're waiting for the other players no matter what medium you're using.

I'd be willing to try, depending on setting and speed requirements. I would suggest google over github, mainly because I think github requires markdown for formatting, or at least it did last time I used it (which was a while ago), and google uses the highlight-and-click method. I also recall viewing the edit history to be more of a pain in github.

One concern that I can see people having is that neither of them support anonymous editing as far as I'm aware. At least on google, the version history and activity features display whatever name you have on that account. It's only visible to the file's owner and whoever has edit access, but some folks still might not be comfortable with that and won't want to change their info or make a new account just for the game.
eldarin42
member, 5 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:49
  • msg #8

Play by shared document instead of play by post

In reply to donsr (msg # 6):

I don't think the medium would require coordinating any more than forum posts do. Consider a change request, if you edit in suggestion mode, as a public draft forum post. People can discuss it and react to it with their own drafts, the major difference being that in the end, after the storyteller has accepted the edits you have a cohesive text that is easy to read.
eldarin42
member, 6 posts
Wed 17 Jul 2019
at 18:54
  • msg #9

Play by shared document instead of play by post

In reply to seraphmoon (msg # 7):

I think that Google allows anonymous edits, though I never really checked.

I'd run all changes by the storyteller, who should be the only one with edit permissions. Drastically reduces the chance of deletions going unnoticed.
Probably a marker would make sense, kind of a demarcation line saying "no edits will happen above this line" (at least not without announcement).
scord
member, 27 posts
Sun 29 Sep 2019
at 07:32
  • [deleted]
  • msg #10

Play by shared document instead of play by post

This message was deleted by a moderator, as it was the wrong forum, at 07:47, Sun 29 Sept 2019.
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