NetRPG was written by me, Erich G Bratton (erich@kagi.com), in order
to keep playing games once everyone I gamed with in college moved
on to other cities.
1) What is NetRPG?
NetRPG is an internet server which lets a group of friends role-play
over the net. NetRPG is especially useful for playing D&D (copyright
by TSR). NetRPG allows players to talk with one another using a
mud-like interface, ready weapons, set an armor class, have hit
points, store online character sheets, calculate and run combats
using initiative rolls, resolve attacks and distribute damage between
players and monsters, store and retrieve ASCII maps to facilitate
showing exactly where the action is occuring, roll dice either in the
open or privately shown to only the player and DM, and allows the
DM to fudge attack rolls when a plot line necessitates a critical hit
or miss or whatever.
All of these features combine in NetRPG to make live internet
role-playing not only possible, but very enjoyable!
2) What machines does NetRPG run on?
The NetRPG server runs on any Macintosh which has MacTCP. Once the
server is running, the players can connect to the server using their
favorite MUD client from any type of machine. (ie, they could run
tinyfugue on a unix box, or Muddweller on a mac, or a telnet program
on a PC)
NOTE: a unix/DOS version is currently being worked on by another programmer...
So, as long as you have one person who has a mac someplace, you can
play using NetRPG. You don't even have to be sitting at the Mac to
play, you can just leave NetRPG running on a mac in an office
someplace.
3) Does it cost anything?
NetRPG is free. All I ask is that you send me email telling me what
you're doing with it, and whether or not you like it.
(erich@kagi.com)
4) What do you really do with it?
Well, once you have played for a while and start getting into more
complex adventures, you can add on Maven or other audio-conferencing
tools (assuming everyone has a fast connection) or an electronic
whiteboarding program such as "wb" for XWindows or NCSA's Collage. But, now that NetRPG supports movable icons on the maps, you can get some serious gaming done with just text connections!
5) How do I find someone to play games with?
The difficulty with NetRPG is that you never see/hear the other
people. For this reason, it seems to help to know the people you are
playing with. However, if you don't have anyone who'd like to play,
I think that advertising on rec.games.frp.dnd for a group to play
on a regular basis (once a week works for my group) should turn up
more than a few responses.
6) Where do I get a copy of NetRPG?
NetRPG is available on the info-mac and umich archives. Either pick
your favorite archive and go into the comm/tcp directory, or use
the following URL:
ftp://mirror.aol.com/pub/info-mac/comm/tcp/
Look for net-rpg-#.hqx, where # is the version number. If you don't
understand how FTP works, or how to unpack a file, please try to
have someone around you help you out. If not, email me and I'll
