How much time do you spend actually playing?

[Baby Samurai]

We get together every Sunday, fortnightly, from about 12:00 pm to 8:00pm and I would say that in that time we get a solid 6 hours of juice.

The other time is spent waiting for others to show up, re-checking everyone's character sheets (changes etc), idle banter, wrapping up the session – awarding xp etc.

 

[DarkJester]

My home game ends up talking more than playing for the most part. We all went to high school together and the game sessions are catch up time for the most part. I''d say we play 2/3 of the time on a good day. We have arguments, but they are more often of a non rules sort.

The other game I'm in, up at the local gaming store is much better on time. We play about 4 hour sessions depending on when we start. A couple minutes are taken for ordering food, but we continue to play while eating. Rules arguments haven't been an issue, we just roll with it and look up stuff later.

 

[Doug McCrae]

A wise person once said that D&D seemed like 20 minutes of fun packed into four hours.

 

[isoChron]

First we chat while waiting for the dinner (provided by the host) then we eat. That's about 1 hour.
After that we start gaming and there are few arguments about rules, but some players can't stop chatting. So in average there is 10% game time loss for the male and 20%-30% loss for the female players. No joke.

 

[Flynn]

It's my experience that in a game scheduled to run from 6:30 PM to 10PM, we spend probably 2.5 hours playing, and an hour on non-gaming stuff, such as catching up over the week, waiting for people to arrive, the occasional in-game discussion, and the basic wrap-up stuff. I don't mind it, so long as I feel like we've made progress in the session. Otherwise, I have to admit that it can be frustrating.

With Regards,
Flynn

 

[BlackMoria]

In a typical session, our group spends about 90-95% of the time roleplaying.

 

[Rafael Ceurdepyr]

Our sessions are on Saturdays from about 2-6 pm, with occasional finishing-up after dinner. Out of that time, we play pretty solidly with about a half hour (sometimes an hour, but not usually) with chatting. We don't tend to argue rules. But then again, we usually see each other the night before to get comics and church the next day and lunch together most days, so not a lot of need for catching up. (In case you're curious, we're a gaming group of a married couple and me, another girl. My husband used to play, but now hangs out in the room or house and then goes to dinner with us.)

 

[Jeysie]

Usually our scheduled 9PM-1AM RP window involves 2-3 hours or better of actual play time, with the rest taken up by lulls in responses, planning, rules discussions, OT quips, and similar things. Generally it's closer to 3 hours, though, unless we have a very bad or very good night.

But, we also generally get our chatter out of the way as people drift in between 7PM and 9PM, and we do our wrap-up stuff between 1AM and 2AM, so it depends on what you would consider to be the "full session".

Peace & Luv, Liz

 

[Mystaros]

Not nearly enough lately...

Our group plays on Monday nights. If I'm lucky I get off work in time and get there ~6:00. As the afternoon Living Greyhawk game usually ends at the same time I get there, we all get together and grab a quick bite at a fast food joint down the street. So if we're lucky, we start at 6:30... usually ends up being 7:00.

The other game at the store Monday nights, in which the manager plays, usually ends at 10:00 to 10:30, rarely 11:00. When the manager's done playing, it is time to leave. So at best we're looking at ~4.5 hours, at worst 3.0 hours. We try to keep the jabbering, yakking, and reminiscing to a minimum, but that still soaks up more time than I'd like... but that's the nature of the game. It's far less a problem when we play a board game, as you can roll, move, and gab all at once...

So, on average, call it 2 to 3 hours of actual, honest gaming each Monday night.

And to top it off, we are alternating sessions, one session Rifts, the other Castles & Crusades... so story and character advancement is slooooow...

 

[blargney the second]

We spend 0% of the time arguing about rules.

How do you accomplish that?
-blarg