I want to try this but it feels so overwhelming and i dont want to leave a bad first impression

I am a shy kind of guy so a good first impression is hard for me to give due to I ramble or sometimes stay very quite depends on the topic how do I get around this and if I did join a game would they mind a person who is 100% new to this format of play?

Hi Kaligoth! First, Welcome to Roll20! We hope you enjoy your stay here. Most GM's are happy to help educate new players, there are even games ran by kind members of the community aimed at introducing newcomers to the various systems available. We have two video series that are at your disposal for help getting started. 1) If you're absolutely brand new to RPGs and want to know the general idea of how they are played, which game to choose and then find a group of fellow gamers: Check out our Introduction to Tabletop RPGs series . 2) If you've played tabletop RPGs before and just want to get a understanding of how Roll20 can be used: Check out our Roll20 Crash Course . This is a step-by-step overview for creating your very first Roll20 campaign. This tutorial uses the Pathfinder RPG to frame itself, but it's not a system specific tutorial and you should be able to follow along without knowing one single thing about Pathfinder. You can also review the last New to Roll20 thread to see what other new users have been asking. Hopefully this will make acclimating to RPGs and Roll20 a lot easier. Happy Gaming!

I tried and had an awful first session. So I did another. And then another. ... You're only 100% new for about two hours.

Thanks for the replys its made me feel a little reassured and yes I did watch the two videos very insightful :)

Great stuff, now your best bet is to peruse the forums, the  wiki and other areas of interest to get a 'feel for the place'. Learn the lingo, research systems on the internet to find one that interests you, acquire the source material (there are free systems out there for those not looking to invest in books etc yet. D&D 3.5, Pathfinder, Risus etc) and start learning the rules. While most games will welcome and train new players there is never anything wrong with being prepared. Most importantly, listen to Thanshin :)

Thanks I have been doing loads of research on D&D because it seems to be the most popular format of today and its iconic :)

In the LFG (looking for group) page, there is a checkbox that will limit the games show to those looking for new players.  These games should be your best bet when starting out (other than a buddy starting a game in their living room).  Since roleplaying games tend to the cooperative type, us players tend to be really accepting of folks new to the games.  Exceptions exist.   Not everyone here was born an experienced roleplayer.  Most of the those other, lesser people had to learn it...

So far for the person I came up with for D&D 5e Using the D&D 5E wiki and templates from the people in this thread so please bare with me and please comment if this is okey. Name : Kaligoth Draklore Race : Human Sex : Male Class : Fighter (Rune Blade) I picked this class because it resembles the curse the hag left that every time he invokes the power he looses a bit of his sanity. Level Increase : The more the level means the more the curse takes hold the wound becoming more apparent to the group and his sanity slowly slipping showing signs of insanity. Alignment: Because of the class every time he use's his ability it can effect his sanity giving him a sort of impression that if gone to far will become insane and unstable to the group. Abilities: Unsure Abilities after racial adjustments: Unsure Background : By oath to protect his village when he was at the age of 16 the village was cursed by a hag for unknown reason in his youth as he was headstrong and too hasty for his own good went to destroy the hag with two fellow oath swan brothers one being Kaligoths best friend. As they arrived to the hag's hut just outside the village they was attacked by unknown demons not knowing how to beat them they was overwhelmed and knocked out as they captured the three boys and brought to the hag she experimented them. First one as she did some hand gestures and chanting wile using her knife to cut into the wrist of one of the boys he started to scream in pain as his skin slowly melted around the cut in a gory fashion after what felt like a eternity when the screams died down and nothing but a pile of gore and bones. Kaligoth and his best friend was next the hag chuckled to herself with a horrible smirk on her face force fed a vile of greenish blue liquid to Kaligoths best friend then all of a sudden bones bursting from his arms and chests turning him into something horrible the demons picked them both up and throw Kaligoth and his best friend into a trapdoor on the floor of the hut inside the room under the hut it looked to be a big room some what a small fighting pit and as Kaligoth got up from landing face first into the mud he did not see his friend anymore but rather a mangled human riving in pain turned to Kaligoth with a bloodshot glare that looked like the intent to murder so Kaligoth looking around quickly in the pit Kaligoth found a sharpened peace of bone due to his skill as one of the best ducked out of the way of the charge and jammed the bone into his best friends back of his neck killing him instantly after that one of the demons climbed down and knocked out Kaligoth. As kaligoth woke up he found himself oddly dressed in the wilds next to a campfire wondering if this was a dream but as he was thinking this his chest felt like it was ice cold but on fire at the same time he tore open his shirt riving in pain at a mark it looked small unsure to what to do so his quest begins to find the cure to this aliment. Sorry about spelling and punctuation I am not very good at it :( hope I did not go overboard on the background story.

Whilst everyone is different what helped me with my learning curve was opening my own campaign. Not to run a campaign but just to learn the interface and roll a test character. If you join a group understanding the online character sheet and how to complete it and a degree of familiarity with the interface I would say your golden!

Steve H said: Whilst everyone is different what helped me with my learning curve was opening my own campaign. Not to run a campaign but just to learn the interface and roll a test character. If you join a group understanding the online character sheet and how to complete it and a degree of familiarity with the interface I would say your golden! A thousand times yes, I can't recommend enough how helpful a personal playground can be! Your character idea sounds great to me, nothing like a curse to make a campaign interesting... but bear in mind that not all GM's will allow pre-made characters, however, that being said it never hurts to have a few in the locker and you can always liaise with your GM before hand to see if they like the sound of the character you'd 'like' to play. And you can never have too much backstory!

I would save your character description for when you apply to a game. Many DMs may set out certain requirements for their game, and every game is different, so those requirements can vary quite a bit. It wouldn't hurt to download the free basic rules and look it over, especially skill checks and combat, and spells too if you want to play a spellcaster. DMs (most of them anyway) invest a lot of energy and effort into their games, and it doesn't hurt for players to show some effort as well. When the applicant pool is a faceless mob of, "pick me!" and, "can I join?" you need to do whatever you can to distinguish yourself. Don't get too discouraged if it takes a while to find your first game. DMs can be picky, as the number of players outnumber those willing to DM. Look for the "Welcomes New Players," tag and read any instructions carefully. People that cannot follow simple instructions don't get invited to many games because there are 5 others behind you that can easily do so. I actually take it as a good sign when a DM has an application process. It means they've thought about who they want in their game, and the result is usually a more cohesive gaming group. As for being new to this, you will find you are not alone here. There are a lot of new people coming to Roll20 every day. In a few weeks or months, you can probably be the one showing somebody else around Roll20, and inviting them to a game! Ask any experienced DM, and I would be surprised if they say they didn't like a gaming virgin to join their games once in a while. I could say newbie, but that doesn't really express it as accurately. :) The good thing is that newbies don't carry some of the baggage that veteran players do. They can really surprise the DM...and that's not easy to do if you've been gaming for 10+, 20+, or 30+ years. [Wow, I just felt a little older all of a sudden--it was like a disturbance in the force.] Anyway, don't think of your newbiness as a detriment--it's not. Now get out there and kick some dragon butt! And watch out for those tails!

Ziechael said: Steve H said: Whilst everyone is different what helped me with my learning curve was opening my own campaign. Not to run a campaign but just to learn the interface and roll a test character. If you join a group understanding the online character sheet and how to complete it and a degree of familiarity with the interface I would say your golden! A thousand times yes, I can't recommend enough how helpful a personal playground can be! I second this 100%! Create a game for yourself to head on into and tinker with the ins and outs of the system. That's what I do anytime a new edition of D&D comes out. Instantly create a character or two. Learn the mechanics and mess around. Welcome aboard!

Hey Kali! Just putting this out there, if you're interested in a sandbox campaign/playground to come in and play and try out DnD 5E, I have a post up right here if you're interested! <a href="https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/2216726/lfp-5e-k" rel="nofollow">https://app.roll20.net/forum/post/2216726/lfp-5e-k</a>... We use text + voice (GM-sided voice), so don't be shy! It's gonna be a ton of fun, and we're playing very shortly. Come stop by!

I know not everyone is willing to go about it this way, but would i would recommend is finding one of the D&D Starter Sets (they've had one for almost every single version since the late 70's!) and just running a game yourself! If after about the third week, you don't enjoy it then stop. But even if GM'ing isn't for you, a few weeks spent having to either know or make up the answers will help you so much &nbsp;when playing any tabletop!

As a GM for the last 30 yrs I highly recommend what the others have mentioned. Create a test campaign board, get a simple module (you can find free ones in your preferred system on many sites and I'm not saying pirated ones but free ones), set it up in the campaign (this will allow you to learn the various in and outs of roll20 without the pressure of having to get it up and running for a group. It will also allow you to hop in the main forums here and ask questions about how to do this or that), run through it privately aka by yourself with a few characters created (it wont be a rp but mostly just learning how the tokens and macros work along with any subscriber features if you go that route), change what you think needs to be changed and run through it again. By this time you will be very comfortable with roll20 and your preferred system so you can either run that module as a one shot (you already have characters created for it) or find a group that will invite you in. This is what I did for years for face to face games, build the session (module aka adventure) then test then run it for the group. Roll20 makes it much easier with all the digital tools once you get familiar and comfortable with them.

Kaligoth said: I am a shy kind of guy so a good first impression is hard for me to give due to I ramble or sometimes stay very quite depends on the topic how do I get around this and if I did join a game would they mind a person who is 100% new to this format of play? There are a lot of ways that GM's will "Use" the vtt (virtual table top) depending on the game system being used & gm style. &nbsp;As a general rule of thumb, games made for play on a grid with miniatures as an optimal clarity setup (i.e. d&d, shadowrun, etc) are more likely to use the vtt in that way with a top down view something like a video game's in game map. While a more narrative game system&nbsp;( like Fate ) &nbsp; that becomes awkward when tracked down to that level you might see something more like this (or blank) While d&d is a good system with a zillion players/games, that is something both positive and potentially difficult for new players having to compete for slots in games against much more experienced players the gm won't need to handhold/guide/help as much, a game with a smaller community (i.e. fate) where there are less players and GM's are more likely to be willing to get a newbie going might not be a bad option either. &nbsp;really it comes down to preference, grab the rules for something & at least skim them before reaching out to a gm with an interesting looking game. &nbsp; I suggest skimming the rules for the same reason student drivers are expected to have a certain level of familiarity with cars before they start driving rather than asking questions like "what's a steering wheel?", "why would I want to turn the car?", "there are speed limits?", or even "what is a car?" (aka learners permit in the US). &nbsp;Without that foundational starting point, it becomes difficult to ask useful questions that will help you play on your own eventually without a GM metaphorically driving your character for you