Don't be this guy! (or am I wrong)?

I've never played a VTT game before but am eagerly looking forward to the experience. I'm a long time gamer (in my 40s and have been playing many different system since the red box D&D days) and found a game that I really wanted to play. I let the GM know all of this in my game application. I guess the game had played a few sessions and a couple of players had dropped and he brought me on board. I wasn't allowed to make my own character, instead I could take over an existing NPC, that I could 'tweak'. It wasn't a character concept that I wanted to play, but I really wanted to play in the system and try my hand at VTT gaming. I looked at is as a challenge and felt confident that my RP skills would allow me to have fun, even if it was a concept that I found 'meh'.  It was a bi-weekly game and I had to wait a week before I could start playing, so I wrote up a player intro and posted it to the Game's message board and checked back daily. A few days later the GM posted that some IRL issues would push the game back and he 'paused' the Game until he was ready to pick the Game back up. I was bummed but understood, we've all been there. My VTT debut would have to wait a little longer, but I was still raring to go. Again, diligently checking the Game's message board daily, I was waiting for further information. Then, one day, the Game just disappeared :( I assume the GM just gave up and deleted it with no explanation. Considering that I'm as green as they come with VTTs and I made sure that it was known, I feel that some sort of explanation or message should have been given. Alright, so IRL crap came up and you don't have time for the Game... it sucks, but whatever, I get it. Is this a common thing here? Am I wrong? Thanks for putting up with this, I'm just a little 'put off'.

It takes a little while to find & make friends among strangers over the internet. Different people have so many different interests, goals and schedules. It's normal to apply for several games, and try meeting a few groups, until you find one that's a good fit. The first meeting (or more) is usually kind of a trial-run, with a chance of proceeding or disbanding. I would say, keep trying to find a game to join and play, be patient and persistent, maintain your enthusiasm, however maybe don't write up anything too big in terms of a player intro that you mentioned unless it is requested from the GM or called-for amongst the customs of the group.

I unfortunately live in an area where playing D&D in person is an impossibility, so I rely on things like Roll20 to play D&D so i'm not sure if this is the normal experience for D&D in general or if it is exclusive to Roll20, however I find that most DMs  just aren't that great. 99% of the time they treat the game as if it's their own personal box of toys and that the other players are just there to occasionally play with some of it. I believe a good DM treats it as more of a cooperative experience and helps build and shape the world with the help of the players and give them enough freedom to create things (via their backstories) that could be incorporated into the game world and be used later. Most DMs won't do that, they just say "nope, doesnt work in this world. Its my world, my way, I can't have a single person that exists in it that I didn't make myself" and all that kind of thing. I try to avoid games where the description for it sounds like the DM has control issues. Then you have the guys who apparently aren't serious about being a DM. I was just invited to a game not long ago that was starting in 2 weeks, so we had a lot of time to build our characters, get to know each other, and so on. DM would pop on now and then to answer questions, talk a little bit about the world, etc. A day before our first session the DM told us he wasn't going to be able to play this week because he had the flu... We said "well, that's disappointing, but we understand, there's always next week". Then the next morning he said he was fine and we would be able to play that night, everyone was happy. An hour before the game started someone asked if it was starting in an hour, just to make sure there was no time zone confusion or anything like that. DM instantly responded to say he was in the hospital and wounded himself with an axe... Little hard to believe, but we gave him the benefit of the doubt. So he never really logged off skype after that, still chatting us up and other people, talking about the campaign and other things. About an hour before the session the next week, someone asked again to confirm we were starting in one hour, he instantly responds saying he is in the hospital again and apparently there is a piece of the axe stuck in his leg and he is about to go into surgery for it. At that point, I just left the group. It was already far too convenient that these little things happened to all take place right before game time, and the fact he never told anyone he was going to miss the game at all until someone asked an hour before it was supposed to start, it all smelled of horse manure to me, especially when the guy was on skype at all hours every day, it wasn't as if he didn't have a chance to say anything, he always responded to messages sent to him instantly about literally any topic, but he never had time to tell us he had yet another problem that prevented him from playing. I played another game on here as a player and enjoyed it a lot, played about 8 months straight without any problems. Group was fun, story was good, everything was enjoyable, then one day the DM apparently had a bad day at work or failed to take his meds or something and he TPK'd us. Now keep in mind, we had never come close to dying before, the campaign was set to have some risk but not too bad as long as we played smart, but he put us in an unwinnable situation and kept throwing encounter after encounter at us non-stop, told us straight up he was refusing to let us take any kind of rests, and so on. We fought about a dozen different encounters in one day, including two mythic bosses, and were just completely drained of all resources and still wouldn't let us rest. To finally kill us however, he created copies of our own characters with our same levels and abilities as well as additional abilities and powers we didn't have, and they went into the fight with full health and abilities while we were battered and out of everything. Then when we died, he said it was our fault. Then when we were making new characters, he brought in heaps and heaps of homebrew materials and rules that we had to suddenly use and turns out that was the whole point of killing us all off was just so he could literally change everything about the whole game into something else. He lost half his players and the other half didn't quit outright but were completely disgusted by the whole thing. Most DM's won't accept your application to a game despite giving them all the information they wanted and more, writing a compelling backstory, picking classes and/or races that help diversify the group composition, and so on. They just seem to pick people completely at random and it makes the whole thing feel arbitrary and pointless. I've almost given up on trying to be a player on Roll20, but my DM career is going strong. I'm hosting several games and my players are having heaps of fun. The best thing you can do is just keep trying until you get into a game full of people you actually like. Once you find a group that enjoys playing together, they tend to want to continue playing together. Sometimes one of them will even become DM for another campaign and include the same people in your original group. That has happened to me twice where one of the players made their own campaign and we played it with the same people. One you find such a group of friends, it gets a little easier because you can all sort of stick together and do stuff.

They just seem to pick people completely at random and it makes the whole thing feel arbitrary and pointless. As a GM, I imagine that this seems like a thing a lot of GMs, myself included, do. If you're being invited into a group with other people, chances are that the GM and players know what they're okay with better than you do. Good groups talk about applications. It might seem like being gossipy bitches and probably seems entirely arbitrary to the outside, but we're finding the people we want to play with. If you come off as short-tempered in an application, the group notices that. If they think that an age difference is going to be problematic, they know that. If they find a concept to be offputting, they say so. Often, it's not the GM choosing a player. It's the other players. An application doesn't get chosen because you have the longest backstory, or the most well-thought out character. An application gets chosen because that player meshes with the group, and because the player is flexible, or more willing to work with the GM. Also a lot of your gripes stem from things that come with playing in D&D, or homebrew settings. "They won't let this happen, so that makes them bad." Yeah, but at the same time, the GM's job is to make things fun for everyone. Just because you think playing an AI would be fun in Shadowrun doesn't make it so. It's clunky, kind of hard to understand, and if you don't know exactly what you're doing, you slow the game down for everyone else. If you want to play a Insane Wyld Mutant in the middle of a Realm Dragonblooded game in Exalted, it doesn't matter what your excuse is, a good GM is going to tell you no, because the setting dictates that you wouldn't survive session 1. Which isn't fun for you, or the other players who have to deal with that. The game is  a collaboration between players and GMs, and that's why if you dismiss someone because they tell you no, or don't let you play your zany concept, maybe ask why, instead of just assuming they're bad. Also, sometimes GMs just aren't ready - or they have other issues they need to sort out before they start seriously running games. My first game on Roll20 lasted one session, and then I quietly bailed on the group, because I felt a ton of pressure - I had circumstances outside of the game that led to this, and it wasn't my first time GMing. But that wasn't the problem - my confidence was shot, and the players weren't into what I had planned anyway, so it felt better to let it drop, wait until I was ready, and then start again a few months later. My second game on Roll20 lasted a year. That game turned into a group that now has it's own Discord server, with ~15 players, and 3 games currently running. Sometimes, it just takes the right spark to find a group that works well, and suits each other. Finally: Players are equally flakey, so putting it purely on GMs feels a lot like deflecting. I create an active wait time now for my games - update every few days, and see, after a week, how many players are truly serious about joining. I almost always see a 50 to 75% drop off. Why? Players are impatient. Even if the game is extremely limited on Roll20. It's not just GMs. Bad players exist on Roll20 too. I have more than a few stories about people I would never invite back to a game again.

I recently had a GM delete a game with no warning on me a few days before the first session. I was sad, because I was really hyped for the character I was gonna be playing. =(

Having just experienced this for a second time on Roll20, the question of having the balls and / or courtesy to relay their desire to pull out of GMing is in my mind. What's REALLY sad is that in both cases would-be GM's might've been lying; using medical issues or family tragedy to excuse the start of their game, then pull out the next day without a word. How hard is it to write; "Ladies and gentlemen, I've reconsidered doing my story or can't because of ~ reasons ~." Quite frankly I wonder if they get some moronic thrill jerking peoples chains. A small part of me wishes that Roll20 would have some way to express dissatisfaction of a GM / Player so others would learn of them and approach warily. If you know A rage quits 2 out of 4 games then that is a troubled player / GM imo.

It's hit or miss.  I've talked to some who expressed the same sort of situation.  They join a group and then the DM deletes it.  Or they join and then get kicked without a word and then blocked by the DM so they can't ask why.  Don't put too much thought into it.  Just try again until you get lucky. :)

Animus brought up an interesting point about the players actually having more of a say in who gets chosen.  Some of the better campaigns and groups that I have played with over the years had a similar approach, or invitations were extended from a stable group to people that the players had already vetted from playing with them in other groups.  I also think that Gold has a good point about initial games being a trial run for both the players and the GMs.  As far as outrageous excuses and sudden changes in the attitude of the GM, I have experienced my fair share as well.  I think that some of that unfortunately comes with the territory:  some of the best and most creative GMs might be amazingly creative but not so good at keeping track of things IRL and then things pile up, etc.  Compiling a gestalt psych profile of the dysfunctional GM isn't necessary - lol - you get the idea.  I am not bagging on GMs either - people have their long suits and their er... not-so-long suits, so realistically it is pretty rare to find a creative GM who is also good with players and who is also good with game mechanics and who has a stable outside life and a steady schedule for running his/her games.  It is a lot to ask!  It is a shame to have a GM go through problems and possibly take it out on his/her players, but at the same time, with a little compassion, we can realize that they are people too and need a little TLC now and again.  That is why we feed them pizza and chocolate chip cookies and ply them with lots of carbonated drinks.  ;)

Sorry you had a bad experience. :(  Talking about random choosings- I took on the first 4 people to respond that they were interested to my game. No character stuff or applications, just first come first serve. One person had to drop out because of a confusion about game time, but aside from that it was just random. Despite that though I think I have a pretty good group of people. 

Katie said: Sorry you had a bad experience. :(  Talking about random choosings- I took on the first 4 people to respond that they were interested to my game. No character stuff or applications, just first come first serve. One person had to drop out because of a confusion about game time, but aside from that it was just random. Despite that though I think I have a pretty good group of people.  That's awesome!  :)