142
votes
Accepted
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
Have Alice generate and publish an SHA-256 hash of her action.
SHA-256 is a computationally-secure (to reasonable approximation) algorithm that converts a given string into an unintelligible ...
- 2,165
21
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
Send the decisions to a trusted third party.
When the time comes to reveal the action, the third party will then do so.
This has the advantage of being simple and doesn't require any technological ...
- 6,363
21
votes
Can RPGs be played "offline" or "asynchronously"?
Look into Play By Post role playing games.
In order to find one that you like, do a search with that term and include the genre of game you are interested in. I know of some play by post games in ...
- 144k
20
votes
Accepted
Player abusing narrative freedom
As GM, you should be prepared to have some flexibility, of course. But ultimately, you are one of the players, and your fun matters, too. There are a number of reasons a player plays like you've ...
- 7,118
15
votes
Accepted
How were play-by-mail games played in the 1980s?
There was a fair bit of variation, but the basic idea was like this:
The individual or company running the game advertises.
People who want to play write to them, and get sent information on paper ...
- 17.6k
15
votes
Accepted
What is equivalent to an hour of "table time" in a play-by-post environment?
I would suggest using the Game Time enhancement found on page 108 of GURPS Powers. It's a +0% enhancement that converts powers like Luck, Serendipity, or Wild Talent to uses per game day, rather than ...
- 48.9k
14
votes
What to do with a fellow player who tries to control NPCs I introduce?
In typical freeform textplay it's relatively common to narrate basically everything except for the actions and reactions of other people's player characters. This applies more the longer and more ...
- 717
14
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
A simple resource for exactly this kind of thing is Onetime Secret. It allows you to create a "secret" and publish the link to it, but once the secret has been viewed once, it is deleted, ...
- 241
13
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
Use a communication system like facebook that allows you to set up visibility on each post.
Post a publicly visible post saying
Alice glances at her spell book then gestures, ready to begin ...
- 7,149
11
votes
Where did the writing-focused roleplaying forums go?
This is likely part of a general trend towards reduced use of words and increased use of other media (sound, visuals, etc.).
Before there were forums, there were BBS and FIDOnet and Usenet, which ...
- 2,945
10
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
I agree that some sort of cryptography is the best, but I also understand that this could be daunting for people who are not much into tech.
Here is a (hopefully) simpler way to accomplish the same.
I ...
- 3,310
9
votes
Accepted
Accidentally made player too powerful
In my experience, this type of problem arises from approaching something as if it was black and white and can be solved by instead treating it as a spectrum or more complex topic.
In this case, ...
- 281
9
votes
Where did the writing-focused roleplaying forums go?
They're there all right.
Now, this question surprises me, because I'm drowning in the things.
In general, I tend not to find them as stand-alone sites, but as adjuncts to something else - although in ...
- 872
6
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
Trust
This one isn't always appropriate - but if you play with a constant group of friends, then simply trusting that they are being honest is the way I usually play games. This works for me, because ...
- 951
6
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
An alternative to hash commitment that requires less technical knowhow: do what scientists used to do to establish priority for an idea until they were ready to publish. Instead of a SHA, publish a ...
- 183
6
votes
Handling Sleep in Competitive Play-by-Post RPG
It seems to me that you have a more fundamental problem here: what happens, in your competitive play-by-post RPG, if some people post more than other people?
What if one group has finished all their ...
- 90.6k
6
votes
How can I make initiative useful as a stat, when I'm removing it from combat?
Encourage them not to invest in abilities in that vein, that will be inappropriate for your play format
Come up with a one-off way for abilities they do have to give them a benefit despite the play ...
- 176k
5
votes
Accepted
How can I handle a maze in a play-by-post game?
I'm the author of Mipui, an online map editor where editing is collaborative and the maps are persistent, so I think it can be a great match for your scenario.
Create a map and share it to all your ...
- 644
5
votes
Accepted
Paranoia Play-by-Post GMing Techniques
I have played many PbPs, including those with Paranoia.
One of the downsides with text form, especially with Paranoia, is it's harder to get away with spelling based gotchas.
However, it's fairly easy ...
- 328
4
votes
What's the largest PBM RPG ever run?
The Dark Eye has in its motherland Germany a very old "Briefspiel" that started in 1988 and is run by the publisher. Nowadays it is exclusively play-by-email. At the hight of its life, it ...
- 46.9k
4
votes
Player abusing narrative freedom
I have never gone truly full open-world in any of my games; I am not built that way. But I have indulged in systems (Ars Magica, Nobilis, Amber) that in one way or another encourage strong player ...
- 45.7k
3
votes
How to certify a secret decision revealed on a delay in a play-by-post game?
This problem was already solved in the past. As exibit A, I would introduce the game "Diplomacy" which had a prolific history of play by post. In this game, 7 players needs to coordinate (and betray) ...
- 982
3
votes
Paranoia Play-by-Post GMing Techniques
I find that sending ominous private messages helps increase the tension. For example, during a play-by-post game in a separate system, I was a player and was sent an audio file for some horrific ...
- 297
2
votes
How do we attract playtesters for our online superhero game platform?
I'm not sure whether you want players for a specific game you're going to run on your platform, or just people who will run their own games on your platform and let you know how it went, but most of ...
- 2,748
2
votes
Meaningful Combat in Pathfinder Play-by-Post
We have 20 years of running genuine D&D 3.5 and Pathfinder combats in play-by-post settings. Here's how:
No initiative. Generally players go in the order they post, with tweaks by the DM as ...
- 21
2
votes
Running a play-by-post game over Facebook
I came across this on a google search and since it's an older post I wanted to add how I've worked with Facebook on stuff like this:
I create a simple group for people to join using their regular ...
- 21
2
votes
Method for playing an online text-based RPG that doesn't require everyone to be online at once?
I roleplay in play by post games, both syncronous (play by chat, everybody has to be there for the game to progress) and asyncronous (play by forum, play by e-mail).
The first thing you need to ...
- 35.5k
2
votes
Accidentally made player too powerful
This reminds me of the old times, playing The Dark Eye as elves. They don't have magic detecting abilities, but they had the part of ultra good senses, that made it absurdly difficult to hide things ...
- 505
2
votes
Accidentally made player too powerful
If you can, talk to the player outside of the game and try to work out a compromise I guess? If you can't come to an agreement then you might need to drastically change your plans.
- 29
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