GMing Convention Demos, Running a game with strangers Options

[Abstruse]

There's apparently a weekend-long con coming up in Houston in about 9 months or so and I'm very lightly considering signing up for a Shadowrun demo for beginners. Has anyone tried running a game at a convention and have any suggestions (even if that suggestions is to run away very fast)? It seems like it might be something fun to do, and I get into the con for free.

The Abstruse One

[TinkerGnome]

Considered running Shadow Run: Missions (the campaign)?

[Crusher Bob]

You can try asking Fanpro. Quite often the developers will have tips, provide handouts, prizes, and other stuff to people who want to run convention Demos.

[Abstruse]

I was thinking of running Food Fight for beginners and this self-written adventure for Intermediate players.

If you're going to be attending a convention in the Houston, TX area or playing a game I'm running, do not read the spoilered area :P

[ Spoiler ]

The adventure's pretty straight-forward. The son of a mafia don has been killed in an apparent street fight outside a bar. The don sends his consilaire <sp> to hire a team of shadowrunners to track down the parties responsible (since his own assets are busy in a growing conflict with the local yakuza). The security cameras of the club recorded the incident, but the chips were confiscated by Lone Star in their investigation (Of course the backups are stored on their computer system accessible via the Matrix to a decent decker, as well as available via a bribe to the head of security at the club).

The story behind the story is that an up-and-comer in the Halloweeners shot the budding mafioso outside a club after an exchange of words escalated to an exchange of blows which escalated into an exchange of gunfire. He has since gone into hiding, protected by a few of his gangers and the knowlege that the secret of his location is well kept with only most of the gang, his waitress girlfriend, and the bartender and bouncer at the bar she works for knowing. Needless to say, not too secret for the PCs to not find him. Shootout, catch the guy.

The story behind the story behind the story is that the Don's son happened to be getting into the family business himself, working out a deal with the Ancients to smuggle some BTLs into Tir. The Yaks provided the chips, the Ancients were the buyers, and the Don's son and his crew were the bagmen. They skipped out with the cash, so the yakuza member whose deal it was wanted payback. He put a price on the kid's head, and the Halloweener took him up on it after coming up with a "foolproof" plan to make it look like self-defense. Only afterwards did he find out the guy he killed was the Don's son and went into hiding.

The yakuza member, however, also hit the Don's business in retaliation, and the Don saw it as the yaks attacking out of nowhere, so he retaliated. Things kept escalating, and a mob war is on the verge of breaking out. If the PCs can figure out how the whole thing started, they can put an end to it by fingering the attacker and providing proof, as neither side really wants a war if they can pin it on someone else without losing face.

I figure it's pretty good for an intermediate game, as it's not too complicated, has a pretty good plot with multiple layers to get through, and has consequences if the PCs fail.

Any comments on the adventure I have? Too much for intermediate players? Too easy? Not long enough to fill a con slot? Too long?

The Abstruse One

[Dashifen]

I've run at conventions. My advice wold be this:

1) Premake characters with backgrounds. Give the players the backgrounds and let them choose someone they like. Then, give them the sheet.

2) With the background, give a quick description of all spells, cyberware, gear, etc. that the character has.

3) Practice a short no-more-than-fifteen-minute "speech" about Shadowrun including anything that you feel will be important for beginners to know. Some advocate making handouts for this information. I would say the speech is better because it allows for a little more Q&A to take place. YMMV

4) Don't be afraid to explain yourself to the new players. Tell them, after the fact when necessary, how you developed that target number. If they're standing still shooting at the opposition without cover in good lighting, don't pull you punches but after the punch lands, tell them why it landed so easily.

I think that's about all I have at the moment. Good luck!

Edit: And I really like the campaign. Good opportunities for an on going campaign in a mob war style, too, if any of the players end up to be locals to your area :)

This post has been edited by Dashifen: Apr 27 2004, 01:33 PM

[Abstruse]

Yeah, I was going to run Food Fight with pre-gen characters (about 8 or so different options for a group of 4-6 to choose from with half-page or so backgrounds so it's detailed enough to give them an idea, but general and brief enough they can read and digest it quickly as well as add their own personal style to it), then have different, slightly more advanced characters and also allow player-made characters for the intermediate game (Priority system, nothing over Rating 6, nothing over Avail 8, nothing out of anything but the core book).

The Abstruse One

[Crusher Bob]

That might be a bit too long for a con game, since you have to dictribute character sheets, develop a party dynamic and get every thing moving in a 4 hour time slot. If you plan to run with that make sure that each layer of the story has a satisfactory ending, and you judge carefully wether you have time to intro the next layer of the adventure. If your local gameing store has tables, you can try test flying your demo game there.

Another thing to 'watch out for' in con games is if a group that regularyly games together comes to the game in a block, this can relly screw things up. WE did this accidentally at a con game one time. My SR group which played SR mostly as a SWAT action style game went to a con game en masse. Since the con GM wasn't ready for this level of coordination, tactics, and sheer meanness we ran right over his adventure, and spent the rest of the time slot just shooting the breeze.

[Lindt]

Woo! Suck them all in.
While I am by no means a Con veteran, I have done that before. Its all based (espesally if its an intro game) on the KISS principle. No overly complex gear, magic, cyber, ect. Trying to explain to someone who has brought they own d20s how something like ECD works is just impossible. But making GOOD characters, with flavor that your presenting (a group of gang hoods turned amateur Runners for example) is wicked important. It keeps people interested in what they have.
As for the ByoC idea, its a mongolian cluster frag waiting to happen. Now don't get me wrong, it might work like a charm, MooCow has been doing them at Origins and GenCon for a few years now, but I have no idea how they turn out. The real problem is logistics. But be warned, you might want to call this a more 'Advanced' game...

[RedmondLarry]

Abstruse, I'm glad to see your question. I run Con games all the time, trying to raise interest in Shadowrun in the region. So far I've collected a list of 75 local people who I send E-mail to about upcoming Shadowrun events in the Seattle area.

As other's have said, interesting pre-made characters can make or break a demo game. Players are willing to take a few minutes to read in detail information about their character, and you can introduce the world of Shadowrun in the description of the character's background. E.g. where was the character when magic returned ("I hadn't yet been born when ...")

Your plot is a great one -- for an adventure that runs in 15 to 30 hours. I like it. For a demo game, however, the following plot outline works better because you're not challenged on time for the adventure, and you can concentrate on your introduction and teaching.
A. Talking scene 1
B. First combat
C. Talking/investigation scene 2
D. Second combat
E. Wrapup scene, award Karma

First combat can simply be a bunch of gangers interfering with the character's ability to get from point A to point C. It serves as a great introduction to how combat is run (Combat Turn, Initiative, Movement, penalties, etc.). Second combat serves as reinforcement to their learning, and they get to show their stuff. Through it all you have time for two solid 45-minute roleplay scenes.

Even if all the characters die in the second combat, they're likely to say when the last body drops: "Cool, can we do that again?"

One of the things that determines whether someone comes back to Shadowrun after a demo game is whether they feel the game is incomprehensible, or whether they could master it. I try to make sure they learn some concrete things that gives them a sense of being able to master the game. For example, if a player learns the formula for determining Reaction, "(Q+I)/2 round down", and what "9M" damage means, and what "5/3" armor means, and what "5+2D6" Initiative means, and how to determine their penalties based on their wound level, then they feel the game is something they could learn.

If you find you like introducing people to Shadowrun, you may want to check out the Commando program. That's the whole goal of the Commandos, and they've got some resources to help you. In particular, Digital Mage has built a couple of Introductory adventures with this just in mind.

[Large Mike]

Food fight is a good intro, which is why it's still around. And with first time newbs, there's no need for a backround. Especially for Food Fight. Have fun.

[Fu-Man Chu]

I'm going to be going to Origins for the first time this year - is there usually a large Shadowrun turnout there? (Ie. could I find a game to play in easily?)

[Large Mike]

I've never been, but I've worked with some of the GMs that do that gig, and the awnser is a difinitive yes. There will game there.

[Nath]

Might be interesting regardint to this thread, the first of Shadowrun Missions adventure, titled "Mission Briefing", have been released. I only took a quick look at it so I can't yet tell if it's good, simple and fast enough for a convention demo.

[Abstruse]

I'm checking out the Missions stuff right now (more for my own game than for the con idea). I didn't think that run was too long for a 4 hour slot, but I've also never played at a convention before either. I figure Food Fight would be perfect for a Beginner game because A) It's been the traditional First Run for 15 years so why stop now? and B) It's quick, it's easy, it's fun, and you can get some a little roleplaying in before combat starts.

I don't even know if I want to do the Intermediate table (then again, I'm still not sure if I want to do it at all, just toying with the idea as the con's not until early next year), but it just seemed like a pretty fun idea to be able to introduce people to Shadowrun and to find people near me I probably haven't met before into the game (I live near Beaumont, which is 70 miles from Houston, so it's close but not THAT close).

In the Intermediate adventure, I wanted to make sure all the elements of a traditional Shadowrun game were there: The Meet, Legwork, The Twist, and The Set-Up/Doublecross. I think I covered all the bases, but I'm also not sure how long it'd take to run at a con either.

The Abstruse One

[Bull]

Yeah, there will be a Shadowrun presence at Origins. And for the first time in like 7 years, I'm not going to be running the show. Yay for sucker... Err... Others willing to take on the humongous chore of running things ;)

Seriously though there will be a number of people from around the SR community at the show, hanging out and partying, and the GM crew will be running a bumber of events, both demos for newbies and one shot adventures for seasoned shadow vets.

Bull

[Fu-Man Chu]

Swweeet. . . should I bring my list of premade characters? Do GM's usually like that for the experienced SR games?

[BIG BAD BEESTE]

Hi there Guys. Convention gaming huh? Well, I've run a few and attended several more over here in the UK. Here's some tips.

1> Know your scenario and know the characters.
This pretty much means you'll be running pre-generated characters who have some kind of link to one another. The scenario will usually be a themed run that ties the characters and some particular part of the Sixth World together. If you don't know the characters all sorts of problems can blindside your game in a nasty way. Using pregens is generally the safest bet. If you haven't designed them yourself read through them carefully before the session and even tweak them if you feel they're unbalanced. if you design them yourself, try to make them different from one another, each with their own specialisation and add the opportunity for each to shine in the scenario. Besides that a colourful description, personality profile and basic history is essential as a handout for the player. Oh yeah, and best bet is to limit the group to six players, but be aware of lesser group numbers - you might not always get the desired number of players attending so make contigency plans.

2> Timing & Pace.
Know how much time is allocated for the session. For most official slots this is about 4 hours. If you're just bringing along a game and running a grab-some-players-and-find-a-free-table sort of session, then its pretty much up to how long everyone has for it. You might find that you have to skip certain encounters or fudge things to keep the sceanario rolling along. Sometimes you even get to improvise a few additional scenes if the payes are cooking. Having ad lib skills/experience is definately an advantage.

3> Organisation.
OK, this is where it happens. Your game is under a time limit and your players want to get to grips with the system. Aside from knowing your scenario and the characters, know the rules and give a few minutes to a brief Q & A session to know your players. First Question should be "Has anyone here played SR before/know the rules?" Give a brief overview of the rule system - IE roll a load of D6 against a TN = # of successes speil, if they are newbies. Don't go too technical. Say a few words to describe the Sixth World to them in brief and then hand out characters. Make sure that there is an introduction to the scenario sheet along with the charaters - about two or three paragraphs of how they got where they are should do it. Yup- start in the run itself, otherwise you'll hit time out just when it gets interesting. Try to give advanced rules characters to experienced players (IE magicians and deckers/riggers). Otherwise just randomly distribute. Allow about half an hour for players to digest the info and ask questions then get stuck in.

4> Authority.
Be assertive and keep the game flowing. Be curtious in dealing with the players and don't devote more attention to one than another if you can avoid it. Make decisions quickly and fairly. Don't worry too much about the details, keep the game on track, keep the pace up and make sure the players are having fun. Don't let disruptive players spoil it for the others, be tough with them and let them know you're the boss. If a player queries your decision, make sure you can explain it logically but don't get sidetracked - keep the game running (I use the I'm using a few house rules in my game here for flavour, so don't be too surprised if they don't follow the letter of the rulebooks.) Never get angry or abusive with players, no matter how much you may want to.

Hope that helps Term.

[Fu-Man Chu]

Yup that helps; but i'll likely bring along my characters in case there are any of the GM's looking to just run a game with premade . . .