Do you run at cons, nudge nudge, knowwhatImean? What's it like?

[Pielorinho]

I'm hoping to run some games at Gen Con; I'm also hoping to convince some of my local gaming buddies to do the same. Last night I talked with one of them about it, and he raised some good questions. Specifically:

1) They give you adventures to run, right?
2) Do you run the same adventure over and over, or do you run different ones? Or do you get to choose?
3) Do you get to choose from several adventures to run, or do you just take whichever one they give you, and too bad for you if it sucks?
4) If you get an adventure that's putrid and awful to run, do you have some leeway in changing it around? How much leeway?
5) Do games generally run the full 4.5 hour slot, or do they usually end early? I've played three games at DragonCon; only one lasted most of the allotted time, but I dunno if this is typical.
6) What else should we know about running con games?

Daniel

 

[Piratecat]

I'm headed to ConnCon right now! I'm running two adventures, one D&D game three times and a CoC game 2 times. I prefer to run "Classic" RPGA games with re-generated characters, because they often have good roleplaying hooks built in.

Generally, you tell the con coordinator what type of games you want to run, and when you're free; they then give you games. If one really sucks, most people won't mind trying to reschedule you into something else, depending on their needs and flexibility. I find it's easier to run a few adventures multiple times than many adventures only once.

"Living" events shouldn't be appreciably changed even if they stink (especially regarding items that NPCs have), but Classic events have more flexibility. Even then, there are a lot of things you can do to lessen suckiness and leave the plot intact. Team events - where multiple teams compete - have no flexibility at all.

I find that most slots are 4 hours, of which 45 minutes are taken up in administrivia. Many games are too long and have trouble fitting into that time, requiring the DM to cut scenes if he wants it to fit.

The most important thing to know about running con games is that it's GREAT for your DMing skills. In the same way that driving multiple cars improves your driving, getting to run games for strangers has made me a much, much better DM.

 

[Pielorinho]

Thanks, Kevin -- this is good information!

I'm torn about what I'd want to run. On the one hand, far and away the most fun I've had at a convention was in a team-competition game (the first of three rounds; I had to leave for home before the second round began). On the other hand, I'm kinda thinking that the non-competition games would be a better choice for a beginning con-DM.

So what I'm thinking is requesting maybe two games, preferably pre-gen, low- to mid-level games, preferably not living-world games (since I don't know enough about the LW milieux) and ideally with mystery or political elements to them.

I'm getting excited!
Daniel

 

[Bagpuss]

1) They give you adventures to run, right?

Usually, and the sooner you tell them you will run a game the sooner they send the adventure out to you. Although from past experience they haven't always had the adventure ready to give out until the day/hour before the game.

2) Do you run the same adventure over and over, or do you run different ones? Or do you get to choose?

Usually you'll run different ones as each round (adventure) is run simulatiously. Only if they didn't have enough DM's to run all the groups at the same time will they have to repeat a round.

3) Do you get to choose from several adventures to run, or do you just take whichever one they give you, and too bad for you if it sucks?

Usually you get what your given just the one adventure per slot you vounteered to run.

4) If you get an adventure that's putrid and awful to run, do you have some leeway in changing it around? How much leeway?

Usually if its well organised the DM's that are going to run the adventure meet about 30 minutes to an hour before to discuss any issues they have with it and agree on a solution. But sometimes you only get the adventure an hour before and then in that case you are on your own. Obviously if the PC's do something outside the bounds of the adventure you have to use your DM adlib skills.

5) Do games generally run the full 4.5 hour slot, or do they usually end early? I've played three games at DragonCon; only one lasted most of the allotted time, but I dunno if this is typical.

I tend to find I can run them to time, helps to have a watch handy to check against, so you know when to encourage them to get on with it, or stall by hamming up a NPC's roll. More often than not I've found with good players they overrun. As players spend longer roleplaying among themselves than the writer allowed for. I remember an excellent quote from a DM in the AD&D Open Fun game, where he turned to us after 3 hours where we had achieved exactly zero objectives and not had a single battle.

"Can you all stop roleplaying so we can get on with the adventure!"

If your having fun thats all the matters really, time isn't two much of an issue.

6) What else should we know about running con games?

Just enjoy it. I find that there is considerably less OOC chatter in convention games since nobody knows each other, and they probably didn't get to watch the telly the night before, etc. So players can get really into character.

Make rulings quicky (except no arguements at the table) and keep the pace and energy high.

 

[Kugar]

Hi

Last year was the first year I DMed at GenCon and I did 4 rounds of the Open Tournament. The game mastering was much different from a home game, but the groups of people running it were great. I highly recommend GM in the "Big One" It really improved my DMing and motivated me. Depending on how much Con experience you have, I wouldn't shy away from events like the Open because it is a little more structured and there would be a lot of people able to help a newbie.

Kugar

 

[Pielorinho]

Kugar, is "The Big One" a specific adventure, or just a name for the featured adventure at the Con? At DragonCon, I played an adventure called The Big One, involving some battle between the Sueloise and their enemies. When I wrote about putrid adventure design, that's what I was thinking of.

Although, to be fair, the DM didn't really help. He swore in disgust when he saw that enough players were showing up that he couldn't cancel the session. He was exhausted and probably drunk. He didn't know the rules whatsoever. He ended the session as soon as he possibly could. Worst! DM! Evar! It's possible that a good DM could have made the adventure a blast to play.

Bagpuss, are you describing a specific category of Con adventure, or are all GenCon adventures run the same way (i.e., all rounds of one adventure are run simultaneously)? At DragonCon, each adventure is run in about half a dozen different time slots, and I'm wondering if this is atypical.

Daniel

 

[Kugar]

I meant GenCon as "The Big One"
No where else can you see such a diversity of players. The opportunity to meet and DM for gamers from all walks of life is amazingly cool.

Kugar

 

[Nine Hands]

I usually pack a couple of my tournament (4-6 hour slot) adventures that I wrote and a handful of appropriate PCs in my bag. They are good for a quick pick up game.

At GenCon this year, I plan on writting a couple of adventures just for GenCon (Star Wars and Star Gate SG-1). I may even run a Spycraft adventure that my gaming group went through several months ago.

RPGA events are easy to run (some even have pregenerated characters). My suggestion if you are planning on running pickup games is to have a small selection of adventures and a bunch of pregenned characters. This way you can stand on a table, yell "I'm going to run a blah game.....who wants some!!!" You should be able to get players that way. IMHO Pickup games are great, you never know what type of player you will get and the experience is usually positive.

 

[Nail]

When I wrote about putrid adventure design, that's what I was thinking of.
Daniel

Could you point me in the direction of this "write up"? Is it online? I'd like to read it.

 

[Pielorinho]

Could you point me in the direction of this "write up"? Is it online? I'd like to read it.

D'oh! I don't know if it's online, and really I probably shouldn't go into details on it. I mentioned it only because I misunderstood something Krug said to me about running "The Big One," and I'd been talking about an adventure with just this name last night. I realized after posting that the adventure's author is conceivably hanging around here, and since I don't know whether the adventure was intrinsically bad or simply screwed up by our drunken baboon of a DM, I don't want to go insulting it further.

Insulting the drunken baboon, however, I got no problems with .

Daniel