PBP DMing Styles

[BigRedRod]

For the first time i had a shufty at some games of the other DMs
hmmmmmm

When i started to DM vodalian Special Forces i just made it up as i went along (i hadn't played a PBP or anything before so i just took a stab in the dark)
and so i broke the game up into chapters (i kinda do this in my normal games too, but its not as obvious) gave them names vaguely related to what would happen (sort of a semi-clue that might reveal a touch of the plot)
then i just posted my custom rules and stuff
this seems to work ok
i award exp at the end of each chapter and i think combat works ok, i attempt to get my players to give me a general strategy and then i'll zip through a couple of rounds (they lose a little control but we gain a lot of speed).

so i look at Druid20s games (mainly on the old board), they use a very different style with a thread for each location as it happens. Something like that had never occured to me before

LeeCHeSSS has broken his game up so that each character posts without being able to read the other player posts. That seems a nice idea

What style do you guys use/prefer? and what other styles are out there?

All the games that i play in (i'm playing in 3 which all started up recently) seem to follow the system i've used with a few small differences

[Cadogan Trahem]

I play in one of Danny's and one of Billy's games, I like both the styles, fairly simple and yet great. Danny's style was very new to me, I had never before thought of blocking a thread from sight of people who dont need to read it to prevent meta-gaming.

I like both, my style is generally 1 Game Thread, and characters post in that thread, characters who are split for an excessive ammount of time should get their own thread.

[BigRedRod]

one of the main things i was wondering about was combat

Some use a seperate thread from what i've seen, which is strange(IMO) i'll have to watch Critos game to see it in action. Others use that java map thingy (which i'm considering for the next time my group need a map). In some games combat seems to get very confused with no real sense of rounds, which is wlays a shame so i'm just trying to steer clear of that really :)

[Crito]

For me, I happen to like to keep a good, readable narrative thread going for the in-game portion. I really like the "interactive storytelling" feature of D&D, so I like to keep that thread flowing as much like a real narrative as possible. For that reason, I prefer my players to keep all OOC comments out of the IC thread and put them in the OOC thread. But I'm not a real stickler about that - I just suggest it.

I use the separate combat thread partly for the same reason, but mostly because I noticed the same problem with combat in other games I played or watched. Either they went very slowly, with everyone being careful about posting one turn at a time in initiative order, or they became extremely confused, with posts out of sequence, some describing multiple rounds, some not.

So I came up with my separate combat thread concept. Players can see quickly what round it is and who's done what on which initiative. And it doesn't matter what order people post, or how many rounds of action they post at a time. Once all actions for a round are in place, then I, as DM, can put it all together in a nice tight narrative package, minus all the technical OOC stuff that goes with combat, and pop it over to the IC thread.

It's been working well over in my Saltmarsh game on 3EBB. People got used to it pretty quickly and the combat encounters have all run quickly and smoothly.

[BigRedRod]

yeah i supose it lets you cut out alot of OOC chat from your IC thread
combat needs to be mainly in OOC though to avoid confusion over exactly what is happening
still i'll be watching your game to see it in action :)