Game Day re-hash

[haakon1]

So, was it good?

I did my first game day, accidentally, when I walked into my FLGS and got asked to join in a game that had just started. I played with the FLGS owner, his one employee (DMing), his teenage daughter, and one other customer (also a teenage girl). I'm a late 30's grizzled veteran. It was fairly fun. We won, but it seems it was designed for us to overmatch the adventure pretty easily.

The two things I learned:
1) How the Run rule actually works. We forgot about the straight line rule long ago in my campaign and others I've played in.
2) That other DM's are not necessarily as strict about controlling actions in a single round, particularly switching weapons.
3) That you don't need to have the rule books there at all, if most of the the players know the game.
4) That new, goofy players are not so bad, if you give them some room to have fun their own way. They do tend to forget that it's them when called on by character name, though!
5) That I have a more bust-in-the-doors, charge, and kill it mentality than my local FLGS staff. I'm like a Patton to their Montgomery.

 

[Pseudopsyche]

I had a great time. The DM for our game kept things moving, and half of the players have also DMed, so the adventure ran pretty smoothly. I agree that we encountered relatively light resistance. Playing the sorceress, I tried to save my scorching rays for when we were in danger and only ended up using one (and rolled a 2, sigh). The duergar did get away, despite the fighter's insane, suicidal leap into the Underdark after him.

One thing I learned: that precise shot and point-blank shot apply to spells with ranged touch attacks.

 

[Nine Hands]

I went with my son to the local game store so he could play and I planned on running a table if there were enough people (last year we had like 6+ sessions throughout the day). Sadly only 4 people showed up to play but it was a fun session to watch.

We had an inept half of the party that couldn't roll above an 8 to save their lives. The other half of the party was whomping stuff left and right.

Some things I remember was them smoking one of the ice mephits and the GM having another show up as "summoned" because it was just too easy. My son used some sonic spell to stun the drow, then ran over to clobber the duergar (he was the Dwarven Cleric). Afterwards he returned to the darkness to kill the drow. He also mopped up three goblins and healed people too. They also didn't mess with sarcophagus, which was pretty cool.

All in all it was a great game to watch. Sadly there were only 5 characters or I would have played. The characters were well done (except for a missing feat here and there) and they had pretty decent backstories. The adverture was pretty cool as well.

Things I learned: You can be stunned when using Detect Evil against a source twice your Hit Dice.

 

[BaldHero]

i had the most terrible time this year.

I was hard pressed to not just get up and leave in the middle of the session, and after i suffered though it, i was pretty ticked off.

The guys running the game had never played, had no idea what anything meant, and when they came to a part of the scenario that they didn't like, they simply ignored, it, and moved on. One guy told me that dodge meant the monsters could not hit him, ever.

I am a firm believer in the "if you are having fun you aren't doing it wrong" concept.

These guys were complaining about how bad the scenario was, how lame it was and how badly they wanted to get it over with to get back to their collectible card game.

The entire process was repeated through out the day, several times, as they took turns busting open the goodie bags, stuffiing them into their pockets and then saying "The dwarf jumps down the hole" as soon as they got bored with whatever players showed up.

I offered to run a session, so that new players could get a better idea of what was up, but since i wasn't one of "the guys" i got a d20 and a thanks, maybe next year man. That was it.
No kool stuff for playing, no new friends, and no good game time.

Next year, i will be doing business in another flgs, bypassing the one that hosted the event this year.

Hope everyone else had a better time.

 

[theredrobedwizard]

I'm usually a tactical, careful, meticulous player. So, obviously when WWDDGD comes around, I play the biggest, dumbest, fighterest character there is. This year, her name was Tara, and she kicked in every door in the place.

I rolled Natural 20s on every single door breaking check, save one, which was an 18. I never rolled higher than a 9 on any attack roll, though. I guess that balances.

The scenario was simplistic enough that the 7 year old that accompanied us to the game store could pick up the rudiments of the game system; though there was one of those CCG kids there as well. *shudder*

I play CCGs, I don't act like a tool. Why do they feel it is their mission in life to act like the name of their favorite band?

-TRRW

 

[Hypersmurf]

Things I learned: You can be stunned when using Detect Evil against a source twice your Hit Dice.

Only if it's an Overwhelming aura, though.

If you're 4th level, and you Detect Evil on an 8HD hobgoblin, it registers as 'Faint Evil'. If you Detect Evil on an 8HD evil cleric, it registers as 'Strong Evil'.

If you're 6th level, and you Detect Evil on an 12HD hobgoblin, it registers as 'Moderate Evil'. If you Detect Evil on an 12HD evil cleric, it registers as 'Overwhelming Evil' and stuns you.

-Hyp.

 

[Teflon Billy]

(reposted form the other thread)

I held out to assemble a group of folks who had never played D&D before...just asked people if they were already D&D players. Anyone who said yes got sent off to another table.

It went pretty well with the noobs all things considered. I mean, they were dumb about things like AoO and kept asking which dice to roll...but what noob doesn't do that?

What seemed good was that the group--following othe lead of a dude named Sean who had played a lot of HERO system supers--made efforts to actually treat their characters as more than "Pieces on the Board"...they talked in character and referred to the characters as "I" etc. Tactically, they started playing it safe pretty quick...and it worked. Readied actions to defend the spellcasters, charge as necessary.

It's standard but it worked for them.

They made it through without dying, yelled a lot, argued over treasure and highfived each other after kills.

I gave everyone their mini and copy of the 3.0 Player's Handbook (I picked up a few for basically nothing at a used book store where I was trading in a pile of stuff).

I have no idea if I brought anyone into the game, but the seemed to enjoy themselves a lot...that's always seemed to be the first step to me.

 

[blargney the second]

I had a fun time this year. I realized after I left that I was older than all the other players combined.

My job in the party was to keep the players from all killing each other. It was a hoot.
-blarg

 

[haakon1]

One thing I learned: that precise shot and point-blank shot apply to spells with ranged touch attacks.

That was a learning for our FLGS owner too. It's funny the minor rules you don't learn after years of playing . . .

 

[BlueBlackRed]

My gameday was fun, but the module itself was "eh".

A friend of mine played with me who I think wasn't very impressed with the module, plus a kid (13) who I hope gives D&D another try, another somewhat ADD friend who has trouble getting into games for more than 30 seconds and hated that his alignment was good, a spastic fellow with a charisma of 4 and a need to roleplay (which by the end I wanted to yell out "Shut up and roll the d20! You're gonna miss anyway."), and the DM was running his 3rd session of the module and made it obvious he was bored with it.

After about 10 minutes of floundering, I had to "take charge" of the group or we'd never get out of the first two rooms.

The rest of the day I played Red Dragon Inn, and that was fun.

If anything the game encouraged my continued use of player interviews.