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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chainsaw" data-source="post: 4985040" data-attributes="member: 70196">I played in a 4E Living Forgotten Realms (LFR) pick-up game a while back. We played once a week for about four hours. Attendance ranged from one table of four people to two tables of six people. Skill level ranged from 'friend of a friend' who'd never played before to guys who'd DM'd every edition. Regular players were encouraged to take a turn DM'ing. Here's how the host kept it organized. 1. Reservations requested, but not necessary. Try to encourage 'reserving a spot' from session to session by posting a flier with your contact information somewhere in the store. When we played, anyone interested was asked to sign up a few days ahead of time (e-mail distribution list format) with the level/type of character they intended to play. Naturally we had some unexpected guests (friends of friends, etc) or some folks drop out at the last minute, but usually this wasn't a problem. Most people know by 1-2 days ahead of time whether they can make it.  2. Keep it simple. The sessions were all self-contained adventures - rarely contuinuing from one session to the next (as this would require longer-term commitment that didn't jibe with 'pick-up' style). This eliminates the problem of no-shows screwing up your climactic battle scene.  3. Set a firm start/end time. The sessions had pretty strict start/end times. If you're late, you don't get to play. Thirty minutes before end-time, all the bad guys roll d12s to attack (haha). We also played at a guy's house though (he was a saint).  4. Be nice, but firm on rules. Get comfortable explaining the rules over and over for new people, but also get comfortable telling people "No, we don't do it that way." 5. Character creation. Be prepared to help newbies create characters (tell them to come ahead of time). Pick a standard system for ability scores.. don't let people show up with scores they rolled themselves at home (they always tend to roll 16-18s when no one's looking). 6. No evil. No one was allowed to play evil characters.. so no stabbing the shop keeper, the guards or your buddy in the back. No stealing, etc. Can be very disruptive with a group of people that might not know each other. I'm sure there are some more things we did that made it run smoothly. I'll post them as I think of them.  Honestly, it CAN work really well, but you have to lay some groundrules and be prepared to enforce them.. otherwise random strangers will be trying to WIN every session with godlike characters.</blockquote>

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