Player Replacement a bad sign?

I am GMing for the first time on Roll20, but it isn't my first time GMing. All my previous experience is with in person gaming, so still getting used to the change in mind sets. I am past my second session and my core players are great and I think things are going well. However, due to purging players that are no shows I have had to re-post LFG each week. I am concerned that this will look bad to prospective new players who are looking for a game. Or is it the norm to be consistently rotating out players? A follow up question, how long does it take to get a consistent group formed?

You really have to screen players to find a good consistent group, personally I never post on LFG and would rather post on the LFG forums so that I can screen my players rather then just letting randoms in. It's the internet there are a lot of flaky gamer's out there dont be discouraged you will eventually find the perfect group. I find that if you make a indepth post about your game, home brew rules, what you expect etc etc. you can weed out a lot of future no shows.

Oh I screen them, all the ones I have let in have shown enthusiasm, solid character concepts, and the ability to read my posts about my game prior to applying. A few still ended up being no shows. I am just wondering how long it will take to estabilish 4 concistent players for a game and if it is a bad sign that players aren't sticking it out.

I know this might sound strange but how about asking your no-shows why the left. I personally wouldn't be too worried about how it looks that you have had people leaving the campaign in the past unless this keeps going for a looooong time. There are enough players looking for games that you should be getting a decent amount of potentially good "applicants".

Actually, I booted the players who were no shows. I sent them messages for why I removed them from the game, and one did respond (he over slept). They were removed because they failed to give me notice for their absence and it being the first session they had no established history yet. Thank you for the replies, I am feeling less worried now.

the group im in is having the same problem but hey they got really lucky in finding me cause im the type to always show up half an hour early an stick around for years its just luck of the draw sometimes u find great roleplayers that are faithful an sometimes u find people who just watched cryotic play a game of dnd4 and though that looks fun and plays once an doesnt like it

Took me what, 2 months or so until I have the core group of players that I have now? All of the people who left just didn't have fun with the heavy story and characterdriven focus of my campaign - and thats fine. New players don't know any better and old players make mistakes *shrug* Still, I think all in all we had to replace like 8 people... So yeah, I feel for you, Way, it does seem really awkward to post thread after thread... :-/

I do consider it a warning sign when I see a GM frequently advertising for players for an ongoing game. It suggests to me the GM is not hosting an engaging game. That might be due to game system, GM style, organizational or interpersonal skills. I likely wouldn't notice repeated adverts in the LFG listing, but I notice it when it's on the LFG forums and steer clear. But that's me and I'm picky. Really picky. Consistent groups have been easy to form in my experience. It's really about taking the time to collaborate on expectations prior to play and adjusting as needed based on feedback.

That is one thing you will encounter with online RPGing. Quite often it seems. For some reason, people seem to be more likely to flake out when it comes to playing tabletop rpgs over the internet, compared to in person. I am one of the (seemingly) rare people who actually stick around, as this is the only way that I am able to play. So, I don't feel it reflects badly on you that you have to replace players every week. It reflects badly on those players. I do have a question for you. Do you boot them immediately? Or do you give them another chance? I typically give people 2 strikes before they are removed. First time it happens, contact them asking what happened. Second time, they get the boot.

I did punt them on the first time. But that was after a clear laid list of expectations and policies. So they were well aware of it. I wrote out a lond disclaimer to try and make sure everyone knew how I approach gming.

In my experience, it's less a flaky player problem and more a GM whose approach isn't appealing to a broad base of players. I can see it in the games I myself join. The issue as I see it is those "flakes" don't generally offer any constructive feedback for the GM before leaving, so the GM doesn't look inward to understand the situation - he or she instead looks outward and blames the player for being unreliable. Flakes exist, sure. But if you're hosting an engaging game, people tend to go out of their way to show up in my experience. Some players will stick with terrible games simply because they click with the GM's personality or that of other players. To me that is secondary to a compelling game experience in an online game (though really the two go hand-in-hand). To answer Oreo's question, anyone who no-shows or shows up more than 5 minutes late to a game without prior notification is dropped. I make this policy known and have rarely had to enforce it. It's 2013 and connectivity is everywhere. It's not acceptable to not give the group a heads up if you aren't going to make it and I have too long a waiting list to consider anyone's excuses.