Our group has stumbled across a simple, effective tool for generating excitement about a new campaign. It is this:
When starting a new game, try to get in two quick back-to-back sessions before settling into a comfortable gaming schedule.
For Autumn Frontiers, we managed (by pure luck, it seems) to play on a Thursday and then again the following Saturday. Two sessions in less than five days -- that was a herculean scheduling feat. But it managed to stoke the imaginations of both the players and the GM, thereby giving legs to a campaign that might otherwise have muddled along. I had to plan for two separate sessions, and the players got a chance to fine-tune their character concept with the followup session on Saturday.
It's a simple thing, but I'm glad our busy lives allowed for a quick burst of gaming to start off a new campaign.
Showing posts with label play. Show all posts
Showing posts with label play. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
Last Weekend's Old-School Gaming Moment
Yep, we had our first great old-school gaming moment last weekend. The first of many, I hope, from Autumn Frontiers, my Savage Worlds/Points of Light sandbox mashup.
The players were exploring a ruined holdfast situated in some forested hills. As near as the PCs could tell, the crumbling, three-story tower and half-collapsed curtain wall had been built — and then abandoned? — centuries ago by a dwarven culture. The drum tower itself was in particularly bad shape, with heaps of rubble and collapsed masonry everywhere, not to mention gaping holes in the floor and ceiling.
The dwarves had stashed several sealed cauldrons of tar in various places around the holdfast, perhaps intended to be used to defend against invaders at some unknowable point in the past. The players found these cauldrons and deduced their contents after a little experimenting. (“I sprinkle some of our magic ice powder into the black liquid. It turns into a crystal? OK, I use my sword to spill a little bit on the floor and light it on fire. Cool, it burns! Must be tar or pitch.”)
Using ropes, the players were able to work their way into the squat tower. They explored the top level (replete with battlements and a commanding view of the surrounding countryside) and headed on down to the first floor, which was partially built into the hillside. Over the years, a small stream had pushed through the tower’s thick stone wall and now flowed slowly through this chamber. Roots hung from the ceiling and moss grew on the heaps of broken masonry piled everywhere. It was dark and dank.
So it was no surprise that this fetid chamber should be home to a colony of oil beetles, huge and black with glistening carapaces. The players locked swords with these beasts for a few rounds, but common sense quickly won out. They darted back upstairs, whereupon the paladin and the druid began dragging one of the heavy cauldrons to the edge of a large hole in the floor...that led down to the beetle-infested first level. While they were doing this, the thief and the wizard mounted a determined defense against the enraged beetles, which were now swarming up a crumbling spiral staircase onto the second level.
After a few close calls, the characters managed to tilt the cauldron over the lip of the maw, sending a hundred or so gallons of black tar spilling down into the depths of the beetle hive. The druid tossed in a torch, and the rest is history. I didn’t even roll — those beetles didn’t have a chance. They squealed and hissed and burst from the heat as their innards boiled.
It was a elegant solution that I didn’t really see coming — and it’s also a strong argument in favor of logical dungeons built for particular purposes, with lots of options for enterprising players. In this case, the dwarven holdfast was meant to defend against something, so it was only logical that the battlements should have cauldrons of tar ready to be dumped on invaders at a moment’s notice. Turns out the “invaders” were inside the tower itself.
The players were exploring a ruined holdfast situated in some forested hills. As near as the PCs could tell, the crumbling, three-story tower and half-collapsed curtain wall had been built — and then abandoned? — centuries ago by a dwarven culture. The drum tower itself was in particularly bad shape, with heaps of rubble and collapsed masonry everywhere, not to mention gaping holes in the floor and ceiling.
The dwarves had stashed several sealed cauldrons of tar in various places around the holdfast, perhaps intended to be used to defend against invaders at some unknowable point in the past. The players found these cauldrons and deduced their contents after a little experimenting. (“I sprinkle some of our magic ice powder into the black liquid. It turns into a crystal? OK, I use my sword to spill a little bit on the floor and light it on fire. Cool, it burns! Must be tar or pitch.”)
Using ropes, the players were able to work their way into the squat tower. They explored the top level (replete with battlements and a commanding view of the surrounding countryside) and headed on down to the first floor, which was partially built into the hillside. Over the years, a small stream had pushed through the tower’s thick stone wall and now flowed slowly through this chamber. Roots hung from the ceiling and moss grew on the heaps of broken masonry piled everywhere. It was dark and dank.
So it was no surprise that this fetid chamber should be home to a colony of oil beetles, huge and black with glistening carapaces. The players locked swords with these beasts for a few rounds, but common sense quickly won out. They darted back upstairs, whereupon the paladin and the druid began dragging one of the heavy cauldrons to the edge of a large hole in the floor...that led down to the beetle-infested first level. While they were doing this, the thief and the wizard mounted a determined defense against the enraged beetles, which were now swarming up a crumbling spiral staircase onto the second level.
After a few close calls, the characters managed to tilt the cauldron over the lip of the maw, sending a hundred or so gallons of black tar spilling down into the depths of the beetle hive. The druid tossed in a torch, and the rest is history. I didn’t even roll — those beetles didn’t have a chance. They squealed and hissed and burst from the heat as their innards boiled.
It was a elegant solution that I didn’t really see coming — and it’s also a strong argument in favor of logical dungeons built for particular purposes, with lots of options for enterprising players. In this case, the dwarven holdfast was meant to defend against something, so it was only logical that the battlements should have cauldrons of tar ready to be dumped on invaders at a moment’s notice. Turns out the “invaders” were inside the tower itself.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Post-auction writeup: Loot, glorious loot
Yesterday was the fall gaming auction at Games Plus in Mt. Prospect, IL. I attended with an eye toward snatching up some useful and/or nostalgic items for cheap. In that respect, I was thoroughly successful. Here's what ended up in my adventurer's backpack at the end of the day:
And I didn't even hit my carry limit.
- Savage Worlds Explorer's Edition- $6
- Dungeon Worlds: Catacombs - $1 (didn't really need it, but the price was right)
- Wondrous Items of Power - $3 (terrible editing, but if I can rip even one good campaign idea out of this book, then it was worth the price)
- Wreckage - $8 (small, quick board game of Mad Max-style vehicular combat; I've coveted this sucker for a long time)
- Zombies!!! - $5 (waited and waited to snag this game for a decent price...success!)
- Agone core book - $5 (OK, I thought I was bidding on Agon, and I didn't realize it until I'd already won the auction for this game. Eh.)
- AD&D trading cards - $2 (couldn't say no, plus they'll be great for Everway)
- Cracken's Threat Dossier - 50 cents (again, couldn't pass it up. I'll play d6 Star Wars again...I swear it)
And I didn't even hit my carry limit.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Of game stores I've known: Valhalla's Gate in Columbia, MO
Most gamers, if they’re lucky, can relate stories of the local gaming store that helped foster their participation in the hobby. I’m no different, and Sir Larkins’ recent post bemoaning the slow decline of brick-and-mortar retail shops has inspired me to write about my first (gaming) love.
For the first four years of this decade, I lived in Columbia, MO while attending the University of Missouri. College helped rejuvenate my gaming appetite, but it wasn’t until the end of my tenure that I discovered Valhalla’s Gate, then a newcomer to the Columbia gaming scene (which is actually quite vibrant, having birthed several game publishing companies and nurtured many burgeoning designers).
The Gate, as it’s affectionately known, was then an upstart competing with the Danger Room, which occupied an enviable spot in downtown Columbia just across the street from MU’s campus. Despite all that, neither the Danger Room nor its successor entity could gain any real traction, and the downtown storefront closed around 2003 or so. From then on, Valhalla’s Gate was the only game in town, if you’ll pardon the pun.
The Gate had a lot going for it, starting with a huge retail footprint. This was key in a lot of ways. It let the owners take advantage of the store’s high ceiling heights to craft a well-lit, clean interior setup stuffed to the gills with merchandise. Every major element of the hobby got attention, some more than others. RPGs were huge, as were Games Workshop games. Clix-based games had their boomtime too, but they took up far less shelf space. Hobby supplies were next to terrain racks, and even less-popular miniatures games usually had a shelf or two.
What all of this meant was that the store offered a bewildering array of products distributed in a logical, well-organized store setup — as opposed to the pile-it-everywhere approach that smaller stores are sometimes stuck with. It didn’t hurt that the owners were fastidious about cleaning the place, which no doubt contributed to any number of impulse buys from impressed parents of young gamers.
And talk about game space: at any given time, the Gate had at least four fully prepped 8’ by 4’ wargame tables ready to go at a moment’s notice. Another three could be pressed into duty in 10 minutes. RPG and card gamers could pull up a chair to any of the dozen folding tables that populated the dedicated gaming room, which was separated from the retail salesfloor by a short hallway. Add in a (always clean) restroom and a couple vending machines, and it’s easy to see how this place was designed with the gamer in mind.
Anyway, I was lucky enough to land a job at Valhalla’s Gate as one of three part-time employees in the summer of 2003. In doing so, I had the opportunity to understand the store from the other side of counter. I saw how the owners made buying decisions, set up the monthly tournament schedules, organized the special orders and balanced their own personal/family lives in the process. The owners were/are all married couples with children and full-time jobs elsewhere, so life was hectic and they came to rely on the small staff of part-timers who crewed the place.
During my time there, we routinely hosted tournaments that drew gamers from as far away as St. Louis, Kansas City and Des Moines. We even had a father-and-son duo that made a weekly 180-mile round trip to play in the our Lord of the Rings CCG league.
I’ve not been back to the Gate in about three years, but it remains (in my mind, at least) the ideal model for game store retail operation.
For the first four years of this decade, I lived in Columbia, MO while attending the University of Missouri. College helped rejuvenate my gaming appetite, but it wasn’t until the end of my tenure that I discovered Valhalla’s Gate, then a newcomer to the Columbia gaming scene (which is actually quite vibrant, having birthed several game publishing companies and nurtured many burgeoning designers).
The Gate, as it’s affectionately known, was then an upstart competing with the Danger Room, which occupied an enviable spot in downtown Columbia just across the street from MU’s campus. Despite all that, neither the Danger Room nor its successor entity could gain any real traction, and the downtown storefront closed around 2003 or so. From then on, Valhalla’s Gate was the only game in town, if you’ll pardon the pun.
The Gate had a lot going for it, starting with a huge retail footprint. This was key in a lot of ways. It let the owners take advantage of the store’s high ceiling heights to craft a well-lit, clean interior setup stuffed to the gills with merchandise. Every major element of the hobby got attention, some more than others. RPGs were huge, as were Games Workshop games. Clix-based games had their boomtime too, but they took up far less shelf space. Hobby supplies were next to terrain racks, and even less-popular miniatures games usually had a shelf or two.
What all of this meant was that the store offered a bewildering array of products distributed in a logical, well-organized store setup — as opposed to the pile-it-everywhere approach that smaller stores are sometimes stuck with. It didn’t hurt that the owners were fastidious about cleaning the place, which no doubt contributed to any number of impulse buys from impressed parents of young gamers.
And talk about game space: at any given time, the Gate had at least four fully prepped 8’ by 4’ wargame tables ready to go at a moment’s notice. Another three could be pressed into duty in 10 minutes. RPG and card gamers could pull up a chair to any of the dozen folding tables that populated the dedicated gaming room, which was separated from the retail salesfloor by a short hallway. Add in a (always clean) restroom and a couple vending machines, and it’s easy to see how this place was designed with the gamer in mind.
Anyway, I was lucky enough to land a job at Valhalla’s Gate as one of three part-time employees in the summer of 2003. In doing so, I had the opportunity to understand the store from the other side of counter. I saw how the owners made buying decisions, set up the monthly tournament schedules, organized the special orders and balanced their own personal/family lives in the process. The owners were/are all married couples with children and full-time jobs elsewhere, so life was hectic and they came to rely on the small staff of part-timers who crewed the place.
During my time there, we routinely hosted tournaments that drew gamers from as far away as St. Louis, Kansas City and Des Moines. We even had a father-and-son duo that made a weekly 180-mile round trip to play in the our Lord of the Rings CCG league.
I’ve not been back to the Gate in about three years, but it remains (in my mind, at least) the ideal model for game store retail operation.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Breaking up is hard to do
I quit my Mutants & Masterminds game this past July after more than a year of reliable, bimonthly campaign play. I just wasn’t jazzed to play a superhero game any longer — and this ran contrary to the rest of the group’s members, who all wanted to continue M&M for the forseeable future.
So I quit — nicely, of course, but I still shocked the GM and a few players who didn’t know me quite so well. The rhetorical question I didn’t pose to them at the time was: What alternative would you have me do?
Do I stick with a game that’s just not my cup of tea right now, hoping that enthusiasm grabs me again? Do I bumble my way through the next few months of play, waiting for the GM to get the hint and start catering to me? In my opinion, that’s doing a disservice to the rest of the players — especially when they’ve expressed satisfaction with the direction the campaign is going and I’m the odd man out.
Luckily this wasn’t my only gaming group at the time, and I’ve since been able to play a bunch of new, cool games with friends new and old, to say nothing of my own impending fantasy campaign.
But what do you think? Is there some sort of unspoken gamer etiquette I trampled when I departed so precipitously? Would you have stayed?
So I quit — nicely, of course, but I still shocked the GM and a few players who didn’t know me quite so well. The rhetorical question I didn’t pose to them at the time was: What alternative would you have me do?
Do I stick with a game that’s just not my cup of tea right now, hoping that enthusiasm grabs me again? Do I bumble my way through the next few months of play, waiting for the GM to get the hint and start catering to me? In my opinion, that’s doing a disservice to the rest of the players — especially when they’ve expressed satisfaction with the direction the campaign is going and I’m the odd man out.
Luckily this wasn’t my only gaming group at the time, and I’ve since been able to play a bunch of new, cool games with friends new and old, to say nothing of my own impending fantasy campaign.
But what do you think? Is there some sort of unspoken gamer etiquette I trampled when I departed so precipitously? Would you have stayed?
Friday, September 5, 2008
Social codes and caste systems: Looking back at L5R
Last fall, my group took a break from our current campaign and played through a three-game arc from Legend of the Five Rings. It was my first time dabbling in L5R, a game I’ve resisted mightily due to my general disinterest in Asian-themed gaming and pop culture.
It proved to be a terrific experience and a high-water mark for me in terms of game immersion. I was initially put off by the rigid structure of L5R’s playstyle, with its emphasis on clan traditions and social codes. About 20 minutes into the character generation, however, I realized that (after months spent playing a free-form superhero RPG) I actually craved a little direction for my character.
It’s fun to create a brand-new character with an innovative worldview, but sometimes you want to feel part of something more. That was L5R for me — I felt like my character instantly stepped into a complex society and became a part of it. I spent less than an hour flipping through the rulebook, but I got a solid handle on the game and setting. My samurai had an extended family and a ready-made place in Rokugan. I wasn’t being pigeonholed; rather, the game made me feel like I was stepping up, ready to draw upon a rich clan legacy and take my rightful place in history.
What’s more, the emphasis on custom and clan expectations really served to homogenize our group of players, who come from a fairly wide variety of gaming backgrounds. L5R’s clan setup ensured that no matter how we crafted our characters, they’d all be bound by the same sense of honor and duty that drove samurai of old.
Where’s this post going? Well, earlier this week I got my hands on a copy of Legend of the Five Rings — the second edition, I think, but the price was right. So although I’ve not played L5R since that three-session arc last year, there may yet be room for one more Rokugan visit in the future.
It proved to be a terrific experience and a high-water mark for me in terms of game immersion. I was initially put off by the rigid structure of L5R’s playstyle, with its emphasis on clan traditions and social codes. About 20 minutes into the character generation, however, I realized that (after months spent playing a free-form superhero RPG) I actually craved a little direction for my character.
It’s fun to create a brand-new character with an innovative worldview, but sometimes you want to feel part of something more. That was L5R for me — I felt like my character instantly stepped into a complex society and became a part of it. I spent less than an hour flipping through the rulebook, but I got a solid handle on the game and setting. My samurai had an extended family and a ready-made place in Rokugan. I wasn’t being pigeonholed; rather, the game made me feel like I was stepping up, ready to draw upon a rich clan legacy and take my rightful place in history.
What’s more, the emphasis on custom and clan expectations really served to homogenize our group of players, who come from a fairly wide variety of gaming backgrounds. L5R’s clan setup ensured that no matter how we crafted our characters, they’d all be bound by the same sense of honor and duty that drove samurai of old.
Where’s this post going? Well, earlier this week I got my hands on a copy of Legend of the Five Rings — the second edition, I think, but the price was right. So although I’ve not played L5R since that three-session arc last year, there may yet be room for one more Rokugan visit in the future.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Play by Post vs. Real Life
As I briefly noted below, I've just gotten involved with a play by post AD&D2e Planescape game. You can read about it here. With only a little more than a day under our belt, I think it's shaping up nicely. The other players are enthusiastic, and the DM (noisms from the monsters and manuals blog) is setting a wonderfully old school tone.
I'm really trying to play a type of character that I'm not sure I've ever played in an rpg before - someone who's very precise and bound by harsh cultural customs (you know, like duty, honor, and hierarchy). In other words, someone who's lawful neutral. It's fun but definitely challenging. Especially because I don't want to piss off the other players who I don't even know with an overabundance of inaccessibility and arrogance. (It's all in character - I swear it's not me!)
It's hard to say whether this type of game has the staying power of in person games (though who am I kidding about the staying power of these). But I'm definitely enjoying the writing aspect. I'm trying to look at my character as I've heard great comic book writers talk about their characters: It's all about distilling the character down to the handful of core elements that make that character cool and make that character tick. So, I made a list of some elements, and I'm going to try to keep them on the screen next to my browser as I post.
At the very least, the writing saves me from embarrassing voice acting.
I'm really trying to play a type of character that I'm not sure I've ever played in an rpg before - someone who's very precise and bound by harsh cultural customs (you know, like duty, honor, and hierarchy). In other words, someone who's lawful neutral. It's fun but definitely challenging. Especially because I don't want to piss off the other players who I don't even know with an overabundance of inaccessibility and arrogance. (It's all in character - I swear it's not me!)
It's hard to say whether this type of game has the staying power of in person games (though who am I kidding about the staying power of these). But I'm definitely enjoying the writing aspect. I'm trying to look at my character as I've heard great comic book writers talk about their characters: It's all about distilling the character down to the handful of core elements that make that character cool and make that character tick. So, I made a list of some elements, and I'm going to try to keep them on the screen next to my browser as I post.
At the very least, the writing saves me from embarrassing voice acting.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
