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Forum roleplay has several advantages over playing a tabletop game. It can be freeform, with characters interacting without having to worry about how many hit points they have or when they level up next. The game doesn’t have to be played in the home with close friends and a whole case of soda that everyone drinks before you can sit down. There is the chance to meet more people without having to invite strangers into your home.

On the other hand, though, sometimes all you want to do is play your favourite tabletop game, but of course things don’t line up for you. Someone cancels last minute; you can’t get enough people interested; there isn’t a regular day to play. So many things can come up.

What if you could just play a tabletop on a forum? RPR has two strong advantages over playing on a regular chat or forum. The first of course being the community; the people who play on RPR are always looking to play and most of them love to play something new and exciting. The second reason, of course is the beautiful dice system that Kim has implemented. With the regular range of dice there are few games you can’t work out with the dice.

There are several steps to making a good tabletop chronicle for players on a forum or chat. There are eight and a half steps and each step is fairly easy, but overall the process gets quite involved.

1. Pick Your Game! – this is an important step. If you don’t have a game in mind, then you might as well pack up and find a free form game because otherwise the rest of the steps are going to be hard to follow along with. There are all sorts of tabletop RPG games: Dungeons and Dragons, World of Darkness (which includes the ever popular Vampire: the Masquerade), Little Fears, Savage Worlds and even things like Serenity: Role Playing Game. Almost all systems will even expand past the typical Player’s Handbook or Core Book (CB from here on.)

If you are interested, there are games for you to play. They cover so many genres that it is impossible to name something that won’t have a game for it (and if there isn’t, please write it!)

Once you pick your game, you’re ready to move onto the next step. I’ll be using World of Darkness (WoD) as my base for examples.

2. Know Your Game! – It’s hard to run a game if you just see the cover of the book and decide to run a game off of it! You don’t have to read the whole book cover to cover, but it certainly helps.

It is good to know what is important in the game and what is important to you. There are always rules that either don’t make sense to you or won’t make sense for this chronicle. It’s up to you as the Story Teller (ST from here on) to know what you need to know. You should never rely on your players to know the rules for you. Not only is it annoying for you and all players, but it also might lead to rules changing in the middle of the game.

Even if you don’t know all the rules or all things about the game, be like a Boy Scout: always prepared.

2.1. Dice or No Dice? – Do you have to use dice in your game? Are they a key point in almost all posts? I personally play my games with the skills used in WoD, but as an ST, I aim to have a justification system in place.

Example 1: Sanne’s character Beth has three points in the Hacking skill. The computer that Beth is about to use is owned by a middle-age high school principal who knows very little about computers. Beth is able to hack into the computer with clues found around the room – it turns out he used his wife’s name as his password.

Example 2: Strangedisease’s character Jo has only one point in the craft Sewing. In order for the party to escape the monster coming for them, she has to use an ancient sewing machine to sew together fifteen bed sheets into a rope in five minutes. Unfortunately for the party, it looks like they’re going to have to face the monster head on because after five minutes, Jo is still on the first two sheets.

There are merits to using the dice because they can surprise you. Even if you do use them, make sure that they don’t clutter every action the players make. It’s good to have a blend of both justification and dice rolling. There is nothing wrong with using both systems or one over the other. Decide what is best for you and your game!

3. Storyteller or Player? – Once you know the rules and you’re getting a feel for the gaming system, now is a good time to think about one big questions: Will you play in your own game? You have to ask two major questions to know this. The first being Can I run this game while playing a character in it? the second is Do I have to play in this game to be fun? If it is essential to your game that you can’t play a regular character but you want to, then maybe it’s time to step down and find a freeform game. It’ll be easier on your head if you do.

Of course there is a way to play without playing an official “character”; the dreaded Non-Player Character (NPC from here on). Everyone knows the annoying NPC that just repeats the same phrase in every RPG video game ever made. This is not at all true in Tabletop RPG games! You can have fun coming up with lots of different characters for your players to meet, interact with and even adventure with. Most NPC’s won’t even need their own official character sheet, just a quick description for your own use. You can play long term NPC’s and feel like you’re playing a character while still leading the game.

Being an ST is very important because you guide the players to guide the story. You don’t want to just say “Now go here.” You get to own the world while still letting your players decide where to go. It can be very empowering to know that you know more than your players!

4. What Do Your Players Need to Know? – This is one of the hardest steps. As the ST, you know more about the world, but there is a lot to know about the game too! It’s up to you to decide if you can play with people who know little about the actual system, or if you need to have experienced players.

Take a look at the material and make a choice. Can you do most of this with them, step by step if you need to, or would you rather receive a character sheet that you only need to glance at to read? Make this choice before you look for players and more importantly: make the experience level needed to be clear! There is nothing worse than having to turn a player away because you aren’t clear enough about what you’re looking for. It will make you feel bad about turning them away and it might make a friendship with that person turn sour.

4.1. Decide What Info Needs to be Private – This is another question that directly affects your players and before they even start. You need to figure out what they need in their profiles that can be public.

Let’s say that Kreig_005 is playing Harold, a computer scientist from the Bronx. Should he make his whole profile including the skills he possesses? Should he include his numbers? Do you want your players to only know the absolute basics, the things everyone would know?

If you don’t want your players to put everything on their profile, make it clear before they make a profile and also make sure to list any information you need to be sent to you privately.

For example, on Harold’s profile, it lists what he looks like and his job. Anything that a person could know by asking around might be on there too. “Harold is 5’3” and almost three hundred pounds. His skin is the colour of turkey gravy and always has a sickly sheen. Everyone knows that Harold is a raging alcoholic computer scientist with a love of old cars. He owns two of them in fact and everyone sees him driving around town with the top down. Unfortunately, they also smell him driving around town.” Not in the profile, all the stats are jotted down in point form for the ST to have and use.

You might also ask them to fill out a character sheet and send it to you. There are a lot of websites to help with this. I will add some to the bottom of the guide for your use.

5. Plan Your Game! – This is a hard step. You know what game you’re using, you know what your players need. Certainly you’ve had an idea since the beginning, but now you need to flesh it out.

It is important to note that planning your game doesn’t mean planning the whole thing in minute detail. It means finding a beginning and a place to aim for. It is more fun for everyone if the players guide the story and find themselves working towards something together.

You should always have a story on hand, a place to go, but don’t underestimate your players. Often you’ll find yourself quickly revising so that Jo, Beth and Harold can go to the abandoned elementary school instead of the haunted office building or the spirit infested bus depot.

Planning the game should mean having an idea of what you need to do, where they need to go – but never be surprised if you have to make a few little revisions because your players can’t read your mind!

6. Find Players! – Adverts! Adverts galore! The new roleplay board is dying for your advert, but remember: make it specific. If you need four players, make sure that’s there! If you need one character to be a doctor, make sure that’s there. Don’t just throw up a one sentence request, because you’ll either get the wrong response or none at all!

Bad example: “running a WoD game.”

Good example: “I am looking to run a WoD game with 4 people, I would like one of them to be a doctor. Experience a plus, but not needed. Please, before you make your characters contact me. The game will be set in a small town in the middle of Maine and will start with the four characters exploring an abandoned café.”

Better example: “I am going to be running a World of Darkness game with 4 people. It will be set in the small town of Yellow Rose where there is an abandon café. I need four characters to come together on the same night to explore the café looking for the ghost of a former patron.

I am looking for players who might have some knowledge of the game, but it’s not required! I’m happy to teach you all about the game. I would like to have at least one character be a doctor, but if you’re interested, please contact me. I want to set up a few things before you make a character and I would like to make sure everyone is in line with what I have in mind.”

7. Play and Have Fun! – This is the most vital part! Role play is supposed to be fun, that’s why it’s called play!

Additional Resourses

Path Guy has a bunch of different generators to help you create characters sheets, including D&D, Pathfinder, Dark Sun. Many more are listed under the “fun” section.

D20 SRD has many different resources – think of it like a Player’s Handbook or a Dungeon Master’s Guide that you can search. It also has a section on homebrew!

White Wolf Wikia has resources on their systems; Old and New World of Darkness; Age of Sorrows; Trinity Universe; Scion; and Sword and Sorcery.

Drive Thru RPG is one of the best places to buy RPG books online. There are free items as well as the regular slew of RPG books. They are even divided into genres for people who aren’t sure what you’re looking for! Plus, it’s not just for PDFs, you can also order some physical copies as well.