Roll Call builds a list of every time a campaign could meet and removes the ones that break its rules. It ranks the rest and offers each session its best few.
1. Build the options
Roll Call starts from the campaign's session schedule windows and cadence. Every day marked preferred or if need be produces a possible time, as long as its window can hold a whole session.
Blackout dates are skipped here, and so are major holidays when that option is on.
Your time comes first
Before the poll goes out, Roll Call leaves out your time off, busy times on your calendar, and games you are already booked into. A poll that is already open drops those times too.
This draws on the time off and connected calendar you manage on My Availability. Keep them current so the poll reflects when you can actually play.
2. Check availability
For each player and each possible time, Roll Call uses the player's answer from the session poll. Their recurring availability, time off and connected calendar pre-fill it.
3. Apply quorum
Any time too few players can make is removed. See quorum.
4. Rank what is left
Roll Call puts the remaining times in order, weighing four things:
- Attendance carries the most weight.
- Preference. Preferred days and "I'm in" answers count for more than if-need-be ones.
- Time of day. Starts from about 7 to 10 PM count for the most, in each player's own time zone.
- Fairness. On the Fair style, a time that leaves out players who have been missing sessions ranks lower, so the same player is not always the one missing out.
Time of day and fairness only reorder close times.
5. Offer the proposals
Roll Call groups the remaining times by session, and each session starts with the best time open to it. Round size sets how many sessions the round starts with.
Attendance or schedule
The Priority setting decides how closely sessions follow the cadence:
- Attendance offers every week on or after the cadence. A first session can land in any week from the start date on. Each later session is proposed at least one cadence after every option offered for the session before it, so the sessions Roll Call proposes can drift later but never closer together. The one exception is a rescheduled session, which can land closer to the sessions you kept around it. See Re-polling a session.
- Schedule keeps the rhythm of the start date: the start week, then one every cadence after it, even if some players cannot make those weeks. A new round picks the rhythm up at the first rhythm week after the last session booked. In a round of several sessions, each session's options stay inside one week. Each later one is proposed at least 70% of a cadence after every option offered for the one before it. The one exception is a rescheduled session, which can land closer to the sessions you kept around it.
Attendance puts more dates in the poll, enough for every session in the round. With a weekly cadence the two settings behave the same. With either setting, a week where no date reaches quorum gets no session.
Scheduling styles
Style changes how step 4 weighs players:
- Fair spreads participation across the campaign. Everyone counts the same, and the fairness check from step 4 applies.
- Loyal favours the same core group each session. Players who make the most sessions count for more, so a time your regulars can make can rank above one with more occasional players.
- Custom uses a player order the GM sets by hand. The top three players count for more.
Fair and Loyal look at the last ten sessions each player could have made, counting a confirmed RSVP as attending. They take effect once some sessions have happened. Custom works from the first round.
Confirming a time
Above the sessions is a row of every time that reaches quorum, by week. A crown marks a time every player can make. The GM decides what gets booked:
- Drag a time into a session, or tap the time and press Place. The × on a session's time sends it back to the row.
- Click Add Session to book further ahead, up to the sessions a fixed-length campaign has left, or the bin icon to remove a session you don't need.
- Each session shows how long after the session before it lands. A gap more than 30% shorter or longer than the cadence turns amber, but you can still book it.
- Sessions stay in date order. A session can't start before the one numbered ahead of it.
Click Confirm when every session has a time. Players who said they could make that time are marked Attend and notified. On plans with calendar write-back, the session is added to their calendar.
With auto-scheduling on, Roll Call takes each session's best time itself.
The Scheduling page tells you when times are ready: "Sessions need your review", or with auto-scheduling on, that Roll Call will confirm them within 24 hours. See Where a round stands.
When nothing comes back
Any step above can come up empty, and the fix depends on which. See Roll Call could not find any times.