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Nerdarchy > Film, TV and Video  > Joining Call Sums Up Our Worst Online TTRPG Experiences Perfectly
Joining Call online TTRPG

Joining Call Sums Up Our Worst Online TTRPG Experiences Perfectly

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Ah, digital gaming. This glorious dumpster fire of a year has shifted many tables into online platforms from the comfort of gamer pads. While online tabletop roleplaying games are a boon to some they can also magnify the problems so many TTRPGs run into. Scheduling and herding players onto a single day — and then getting them to actually show up — is already an epic quest. Add in online elements, lost dice, children, drunk players and bad internet connections and we’ve got Joining Call.

Joining Call celebrates fun fiasco of online TTRPG play

Joining Call is a short film about a group of friends trying to play Dungeons & Dragons online but stuck facing the realities of quarantine related obstacles. At 12 minutes long it’s an adorable story most of us can find some relation to. Interestingly the film was also made in quarantine remotely — with every actor having to set dress, light and record themselves. So basically it’s a meta short film that’s realistic about the times and reminds me of one house rule I always keep: If you lose your d20 or drop it you get disadvantage. I can’t count the number of times online games have gone sideways while we all sit and wait for a player to figure out how to roll dice. It is the single most maddening aspect I find running games online. So when the character Kaden spends the film tearing apart his apartment in search of his lucky d20 I could feel the barbarian rage taking hold. Like a sharp needle in the back of my eye.

Have you run into any of the characters in your online runs?

Like, comment, subscribe and all that jazz if you like to support content creators. I was actually shocked about how many people are involved with putting together a small film. Patrick Edwards (writer of Space Tripping and The Red Opera) and Ash Blodgett created the story and Ash did all the amazing direction and editing to pull this film together during the quarantine. But over twenty other people helped bring this to life. All from friggin’ home! Check it out and laugh at the sad attempts of trying to game online.

Do you have any RPG parody videos worth checking out? Post them in the comments below and let’s get a mini-watch party going!

Rick Heinz
Owner

Freelance writer and blogger Rick Heinz is the author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Seventh-Age-Dawn-Rick-Heinz/dp/1941758894" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Seventh Age novel series</a> (a post-apocalyptic sarcastic urban fantasy) and <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/stonejamison/the-red-opera-rpg?ref=9qe4d2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Red Opera: Last Days of the Warlock</a> You can follow the game or urban fantasy related thingies on <a href="https://twitter.com/crankybolt" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Twitter</a> or reach out for writing at RickHeinzWrites@gmail.com. Let us just mention that I've logged countless caffeine-driven hours spent playing Diablo. From this I've gotten hooked into writing and storytelling and have now replaced my hours slaying digital demons. My work primarily features around tabletop roleplaying games such as Dungeons & Dragons, Dread, Eclipse Phase, and Vampire: The Masquerade. In terms of writing fiction content and game systems, along with speaking at conventions about How to (Not) suck at Storytelling. Reach out and contact me at <a href="mailto:RickHeinzWrites@gmail.com" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">RickHeinzWrites@gmail.com</a> if you've a question.

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