Sunday, August 22, 2021

#RPGaDay2021 - Day 22 - Online Rent-A-Players Are Right Around the Corner... or Down the Hallway

Day 22 of #RPGaDay2021 and the only word provided is "SUBSTITUTE".

I was going to go on a rant about how online dice rollers are a poor substitute for real dice (especially when a hold-out blaster erroneously rolls for 542d6 damage), but I think I would prefer to cover the time my daughter bailed us out recently. 

Our Star Wars d6 online game is the dominate RPG for this year, so I may have already mentioned it once or twice.  I may have also mentioned to the side campaign I run when we're short players, Bo'Non'as and Oopsa.  

As that campaign progressed, the available players have been rotating the roles of Bon'Non'as and Oopsa.  By the sixth session, the NPC guy who carries water and plantains, Uha'ul, rose up to player character level, so with all three characters necessary for that episode, and knowing only two were showing up at gametime, I called for back-up... from ten feet down the hall.  

Knowing the my 12-year old, Maja, had the only other working laptop in the house, I quickly got her set up for Roll20 and Skype, and by 9:15, she was playing the ever-wise Oopsa in what would be the penultimate episode of the mini-campaign.

Two things I learned from that night, First, Maja's been jumping in random games here and there for the last 5 years or so.  Her style of role-playing and meta-processing is very close to my friend Jim, whose in his mid-50's and this is his first-ever role-playing game.  Second, it is rather peculiar having an online player just two doors down the hallway.  It's a different type of feedback/echo that you get in the Teams/Zoom meeting.  

Hopefully one day, when schedules clear up, we'll have another go at it, together. 

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