Help - Search - Members - Calendar
Full Version: Recent Update On Shadowrun4.com
Dumpshock Forums > Discussion > Shadowrun
Pages: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Adam @ Jun 17 2010, 10:47 PM) *
It does a great job of explaining it, Cain. You might not like the answer, but it's a clear and factual (as well as I know the facts, based on previous years of convention events) one. BattleTech runs more events because the events are shorter, some long events are counted as multiple events within the framework of how conventions designate an event, and BattleTech events can have one person overseeing multiple games, which is not possible with Shadowrun.


To build a bit more off Adam's answer and based on my two prior GenCons:

Grinders/BootCamps are literally one ongoing game of battletech. It never stops, so long as players are at the table. Because you're talking about a non-mission based scenario for a wargame (and they often use much simplified Introductory rules from the boxsets/Intro rules), you just have people show up, learn the basics of the game, slowly increasing the weight class of Mechs assigned. Rinse and repeat. No RP required, hence more time to play. There's the first point.

The "storyline" events have previously been broken up into two hour blocks. They tend to span six or more hours, but each two hour listing (while being the same battle/event overall) counts as its own listing. I'd imagine the Grinders mentioned above are listed the same way, in two hour blocks. Hence, it shows much more games available. Also, as Adam mentioned, there's no real RP here, hence no GM required for each table/game/demo. That means one ref can handle multiple small tables (or in the case of storyline events, one large table with 30 or more folks). Additionally, at the storyline events, you tend to have a much higher proliferation of BT vets, so rules are often handled amongst the very knowledgeable players, and GMs are needed only for rule conflict resolution. And not, you know, GMing an actual RP based Shadowrun session.

You're comparing apples and oranges (an RP game to a minis/wargame), with what sounds like the express purpose of showing lack of CGL support for Shadowrun. While that could potentially be the case, depending on your opinions of CGL, it isn't the case due to what you're suggesting. Meaning, simply because there are less SR games listed (which take more time, and a lot more intensive resources), that isn't the deciding fact on whether or not CGL is giving proper SR support at GenCon.
Cain
I can deal with the fact that the events are shorter, thereby allowing more of them. That makes sense, and not something Jason Hardy mentioned. That still doesn't fully add up, unless each BT game is one-seventh as resource intensive as a Shadowrun game. I've played a fair share of con games, and they can still be pretty grueling on the organizers. D.M. says that grinders are broken into two-hour blocks, but IIRC RPG's are allocated in four-hour blocks. So, there should be twice as many BT games as Shadowrun, if time and resources is the limiting factor.

BT is less intensive, I get that. But seven times less intensive? I don't get it.

Edit: I also get it that Shadowrun demos, for some reason, aren't counted. But why is that? Every other company puts all its demos on the schedule, AFAIK.
JM Hardy
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 18 2010, 12:06 AM) *
I can deal with the fact that the events are shorter, thereby allowing more of them. That makes sense, and not something Jason Hardy mentioned. That still doesn't fully add up, unless each BT game is one-seventh as resource intensive as a Shadowrun game. I've played a fair share of con games, and they can still be pretty grueling on the organizers. Dreadlocks says that grinders are broken into two-hour blocks, but IIRC RPG's are allocated in four-hour blocks. So, there should be twice as many BT games as Shadowrun, if time and resources is the limiting factor.

BT is less intensive, I get that. But seven times less intensive? I don't get it.

Edit: I also get it that Shadowrun demos, for some reason, aren't counted. But why is that? Every other company puts all its demos on the schedule, AFAIK.


Because the plan for demos at the moment is to do them more on the fly, not necessarily scheduled. And demoing an RPG, as has been pointed out, is different than demoing mini games.

Jason H.
BlueMax
Cain,
How many sessions of "A Time of War" the Battletech RPG are they running?

I freely admit I have an ulterior motive. It may hint as to when its going to be in print. Fantastic game BTW, I recommend it.

BlueMax
Bull
As someone who used to play Event Coordinator for Shadowrun for the cons for FASA and FanPro, I think I can address this a little...

First and foremost, the problem is manpower. It's always been a struggle to find enough GMs to run events at the cons, and Origins is much harder to get people for than Gen Con, for various reasons. When I was organizing, I as lucky enough that I was able to tap some local friends (and folks from IRC and ShdowRN), and then later we started recruiting some of the local players that had won the tournament several years in a row, and that I'd made friends with.

However, running events at a con is very time consuming, especially when you're doing it as a job for a game company. It's fatiguing, and you end up with a fair amount of turnover. It's rare that GMs come back more than 2 years in a row unless they really, really enjoy GMing, or they need to work the con to be able to afford to attend the con. And for most folks, it's less fun to GM than it is to play.

With Miniatures games, as has been said, there's a LOT less for the person running the event to do, so they're less taxing, on the whole. They set things up, they handle rules arbitration, but beyond that, they're passive. They can sit back and relax until something comes up. (I'm assuming a few things here, I'm not entirely certain this is how it goes). There's also generally a lot less prep work to do, since generally at best the BT games are scenarios... You set up the board, lay out the objectives, and you're done. You're not actively progressing and maintaining a story throughout. And for those times that the guys running do actively get involved, hey, they're getting to play Battletech too, so likely it's a bit more fun for them.

That said, I also know that currently the guy heading up the conventions on the Battletech Side is Southpaw, and he's a local. Originally from teh Dayton area, and now up in Cleveland, he draws a LOT of local BT players to run events for him. Chuck, who heads up Shadowrun, is also local, but I don't think he's nearly as active anymore, and only has a couple friends he's able to pull in to GM for him.

As has been stated abover, you can do a lot more "events" for Battletech with fewer personnel, and it's less work for that personnel.

All of that factors in. I know I wouldn;t be GMing events this year if I wasn;t strapped for cash. I'd much rather go and hang out. I enjoy GMing, but I enjoy slacking off more. smile.gif

As for Missions and what we're doing... Adventures take time to write, and we're behind schedule on things, badly. Two coordinator changeovers in the last year, plus a lot of chaos with the license situation, has wrecked havoc with what we can do. There are a total of 5 new Missions being run at Origins for the first time (03-12 Hell in a Handbasket, and the first four CMPs). We'll have four more CMPs at Gen Con, and all 8 of those and all of Season 3 will be available for the Dragon Con coordinator.

Oh, that same GM pool was (and still is, so far as I know) handling the Ctrhulhutech and Eclipse Phase events. So that divides things up a bit as well.

Chuck put out a call for GMs back in Janurary. We had a post here in the convention section, and a post on DUmpshock's front news section. We currently have a whopping 8 GMs running at least 50 events. Most of us are running 5-6 events. I'll also probably be doing extra duty on top of that helping out at the booth, the seminars, etc. Some of the others will be doing that as well.

All I can say is, if you're not happy with the number of events being run? Then step up next year, and when the call for volunteers goes out, put your name down. Because we can schedule 400 events, but if we only have 8 GMs... THere's gonna be some unhappy people at those events.

Bull

Bull
QUOTE (BlueMax @ Jun 18 2010, 01:55 AM) *
Cain,
How many sessions of "A Time of War" the Battletech RPG are they running?

I freely admit I have an ulterior motive. It may hint as to when its going to be in print. Fantastic game BTW, I recommend it.

BlueMax


AToW is the only RPG that's being handled by someone other than our GM team, so far as I know, and there are only 5 of those events scheduled... Looks like probably one each day.
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 18 2010, 01:06 AM) *
Dreadlocks says that grinders are broken into two-hour blocks


Have you tried stand-up comedy? The name game is pretty funny. Somebody should have told me that I had locks in my name. Could you maybe at least use my actual name out of common respect?

Like has already been mentioned, though you seem to enjoy ignoring it more. There's a world of difference between a wargame and an RPG, most especially in demoing it. I claim no knowledge of how SR Missions works out, but this is nothing new for Shadowrun and Battletech. I realize that's only going to feed your point more, because you'll say it shows continued favoring of BT. But there's another side that's not being considered here (mostly by you, and I'm really not sure why I'm trying to convince you, but hey, I'll keep trying!). BT has had a very strong con support team and the CGL Agents (formerly Commandos) for BT have been a very, very active (and surprisingly large) group. This stretches back into the FanPro days. As Bull mentioned, the bottom line is that you need GMs to run an SR demo. And that's a lot more time and resource intensive work. And less GMs turn up for SR. Each of the times I've attended GenCon (and the times I've spoken to MooCow about it, one of the previous folks involved in the GenCon SR tourney for a number of years) there's always been a chronic shortage of SR GMs for GenCon. On the flip side, BT has not often had to go asking for extra help in that regard.

When there's a bigger turn out of support for BT from the Agent Team and the fanbase (who are not company folks, mind you), you can expect bigger (and more) games being run. That's not some kind of company conspiracy, that's just pure numbers at play.

I do like how you're continuing to ignore the difference between RPGs and mini games though. That's impressive!

Edit: Unnecessary aggression removed.
fistandantilus4.0
QUOTE (Bull)
Chuck put out a call for GMs back in Janurary. We had a post here in the convention section, and a post on DUmpshock's front news section. We currently have a whopping 8 GMs running at least 50 events. Most of us are running 5-6 events. I'll also probably be doing extra duty on top of that helping out at the booth, the seminars, etc. Some of the others will be doing that as well.

If you paid for my flight out too, you might actually get me to one of these things. biggrin.gif

Otherwise, see you at ComicCon.

BTW, I'm surprised to see no one hating on the original SR4 cover. I love SR4A simply for the redone cover, by which I will judge the interior, thank you very much. Awesome book. I just wish the SR4 covers weren't so hit and miss. Need some consitency here. Make 'em all suck, that's fine. At least then I won't get my hopes up (looking at you Arsenal).
fistandantilus4.0
QUOTE (Dread Moores)
I do like how you're continuing to ignore the difference between RPGs and mini games though. That's impressive! Of course, it's just some "less intensive" game we should point our nose up at.


And that was petty. Simmer down please.
Dread Moores
Already edited: You grabbed it as I was. Apologies.
KarmaInferno
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 18 2010, 01:06 AM) *
I can deal with the fact that the events are shorter, thereby allowing more of them. That makes sense, and not something Jason Hardy mentioned. That still doesn't fully add up, unless each BT game is one-seventh as resource intensive as a Shadowrun game. I've played a fair share of con games, and they can still be pretty grueling on the organizers. Dreadlocks says that grinders are broken into two-hour blocks, but IIRC RPG's are allocated in four-hour blocks. So, there should be twice as many BT games as Shadowrun, if time and resources is the limiting factor.

BT is less intensive, I get that. But seven times less intensive? I don't get it.


Well, if a BT gamemaster is overseeing four tables at a time, and he's running two hour blocks, he is handling EIGHT times as many tables as the SR gamemaster overseeing one table across a four hour block.

The local Battletech conventions I used to go to often had anywhere from 4-6 tables being monitored by a single gamemaster. It's not uncommon.



-karma
tete
QUOTE (Bull @ Jun 18 2010, 07:00 AM) *
And for most folks, it's less fun to GM than it is to play.


For the two cons I have GMed at I would have to say that the company made it less fun because I had to run their crappy adventure and run it per RAW. Part of the fun as a GM for me is completely winging it and seeing where we end up. If I were to ever do it again I would insist on either running my own story or just give me a paragraph about the BBEG and what he hopes to accomplish.
Platinum
QUOTE (Adam @ Jun 17 2010, 10:41 PM) *
It's similar. The differences, to my eyes, are:

a) It's time-consuming to do such a thing. Scouting for new artists or for pieces of work to re-use _is_ time consuming -- that's why spec work is a shortcut!
b) You're looking at stuff that the artist has already intended to distribute (to a certain degree) for free, as opposed to telling artists that you're planning on paying for the work. They've already finished all the work; it's not taking an instant of their time or energy to merely look at the existing work.

also: If you hire another artist to re-draw a piece of existing original art that you didn't own the rights for, it would still be legally dodgy.


It isn't legally dodgy in Canada. If you create a rendition of the Mona Lisa or other work, you own it. There is nothing that can be done about. The area that is dodgy is reproducing a trademarked item.
Platinum
QUOTE (The Dragon Girl @ Jun 17 2010, 10:42 PM) *
No. Its not. People bilk young artists into doing this. You make your portfolio to make your portfolio, and you can add commissioned pieces to it, or sell some of the portfolio work, but you never let someone talk you into doing many hours of labor for no pay. :/


It worked for me. And although I am not an illustrator, I do have my graphic design diploma.
tete
QUOTE (The Dragon Girl @ Jun 18 2010, 03:42 AM) *
Artists who 'refuse to compromise their art for the client' don't get work. Period. Pretentiousness like this does not pay the bills.

X-box 360 is an example where the artist refused to add more internal space for heat sinks. Thus you have 1/3rd failure rate do to overheating. The engineers were told to make it work despite the physics being impossible. Now in this case the client ie management supported the artist foolishness and I have see that happen in more than this case. Look at coffee shop art sales and other places artist find buyers. Granted this is a lot like freelancing only they are searching for a client who will buy.

And I'm not talking about commissioning work for no pay. I'm talking about basically holding a contest where the prize is your picture in a book and some cash. Most "art" be it music, paintings, or drama is all about convincing people to buy your art not making your art for someone else. That would be the difference between a rock band and the guy doing a jingle for jack n the box. Most people don't listen to the jingle on their own.

[edit] Lets say however CGL was going to commission art for a project by an artist they like. I would rather have them say "we need a cover for a book about X" rather than get in the way of the artists vision. Maybe it already happens that way.
Samoth
QUOTE (Adam @ Jun 18 2010, 01:54 AM) *
There are times when spec work can work out for both sides, of course. But let's put it this way -- Runner's Companion is widely accepted as one of the best SR4-era covers, yes? You aren't going to get John Zeleznik sending you work on-spec.

No, but you could go with someone like Zeleznik or other fabled SR artists of yore who have proven bodies of work and contract them to do all of your books covers, creating a common style and recognizable theme. I'd rather have one person who does pretty good work do every cover than risk ending up with trash like Arsenal, Shadowbeat or the 3rd ED RC with the chick with the magic arrow.
Cain
QUOTE
All I can say is, if you're not happy with the number of events being run? Then step up next year, and when the call for volunteers goes out, put your name down. Because we can schedule 400 events, but if we only have 8 GMs... THere's gonna be some unhappy people at those events.

I would, but no one seems to want to fund my plane tickets this year. frown.gif If you find someone to volunteer, I'll gladly run eight to twelve hours of Shadowrun a day.

On the other hand, I'm currently involved in running a RPGA living Forgotten Realms campaign. That usually amounts to cycling through four GM's a month, two tables a week, every week, while avoiding GM burnout. Not as easy as it sounds. Me and one other GM have gotten to game once in the last month, because of the way the schedule has worked out. This isn;t on the same scale as what you're doing, but the point is that the impossible can be done, if you love the game enough.
Adam
QUOTE (Samoth @ Jun 18 2010, 02:59 PM) *
No, but you could go with someone like Zeleznik or other fabled SR artists of yore who have proven bodies of work and contract them to do all of your books covers, creating a common style and recognizable theme. I'd rather have one person who does pretty good work do every cover than risk ending up with trash like Arsenal, Shadowbeat or the 3rd ED RC with the chick with the magic arrow.

I wasn't discussing ways which the Shadowrun art direction could be handled; I was discussing why doing it with spec work is not the way to go.

PS: fabled SR artist Zeleznik did the "trash" that was the SR3 Companion cover. wink.gif
tete
huh I'm trying to think of covers I actually liked

So far I got SR1, Sprawl Sites, Lone Star, Shadows of Europe, and SR4A... There have to be more but I can't think of any.

[edit] shadowtech, seattle 2072, seattle sourcebook, magic in the shadows
Wandering One
Quick note regarding # of gm's available, ie: non-company people. I used to run BTech at I-Con in NY, just a few tables, but I was pretty much only one of two at the time for the couple of years I was there.

It's much, MUCH easier to ref a BTech game then GM a Mechwarrior/Shadowrun RPG. I haven't kept up with BTech since they went to the new dark ages or whatever they're called, I was only around from the first boxed set until near the end of the clan era. Simply put, Battletech has less rules. A LOT less rules. You've got gear lists, movement rates, and terrain issues. That's pretty much it. Yeah, they can interact in fun ways, and sensor rules changed some modifiers, but in general, that was it. Shoot mech, hit 'area', remove armor. If it's inside the armor, roll to see if something blew up. Simple, easy.

There are still people trying to understand when bullets stun and when stun bleeds for SR, and that's just the core rulebook.

I could easily trust regular players to know 99% of the rules, and since they're competing with each other, the only time something would come up is usually with some esoteric equipment, like "When do I decide the hex the Thumper round I fired 5 turns ago lands in?"

So, no matter what CGL did, it's incredibly easier to have trusted refs who know most of the things and worst case, have one 'primary' ref for the things the other 4 or 5 don't. In each GM'd Shadowrun, that GM is god, and has to know everything. Much harder job, just from the simple ruleset, nevermind everything else.
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 18 2010, 03:32 PM) *
On the other hand, I'm currently involved in running a RPGA living Forgotten Realms campaign. That usually amounts to cycling through four GM's a month, two tables a week, every week, while avoiding GM burnout. Not as easy as it sounds. Me and one other GM have gotten to game once in the last month, because of the way the schedule has worked out. This isn;t on the same scale as what you're doing, but the point is that the impossible can be done, if you love the game enough.


So the only way it is satisfactory in your mind is if there is an exact number of equal games/demos of BT and SR being run? Ignoring the fact that the average BT game will be resolved much faster (don't mistake it for an actual fast pace though) than an average SR game, ignoring the huge differences in the actual games themselves, and mostly ignoring everything said to to this point? Again?

So let me ask this. If Magic the Gathering and SR are both being run by CGL, and there are more Magic demos...that means it isn't equitable support? Even though the Magic games will be done much faster? Let's take Battletech and minis out of the equation, since you seem to be zeroed in on it while ignoring the rest of the information presented.
Deadmannumberone
QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Jun 17 2010, 11:33 PM) *
Well, if a BT gamemaster is overseeing four tables at a time, and he's running two hour blocks, he is handling EIGHT times as many tables as the SR gamemaster overseeing one table across a four hour block.

The local Battletech conventions I used to go to often had anywhere from 4-6 tables being monitored by a single gamemaster. It's not uncommon.


Because Cain decided to ignore this post.
Samoth
QUOTE (Adam @ Jun 18 2010, 08:13 PM) *
I wasn't discussing ways which the Shadowrun art direction could be handled; I was discussing why doing it with spec work is not the way to go.

PS: fabled SR artist Zeleznik did the "trash" that was the SR3 Companion cover. wink.gif

Well you're the one who threw his name out there, I was just making a suggestion.
Congzilla
QUOTE (Samoth @ Jun 18 2010, 08:04 PM) *
Well you're the one who threw his name out there, I was just making a suggestion.


I happen to like the SR3 Companion cover art.
hobgoblin
QUOTE (Platinum @ Jun 18 2010, 07:30 PM) *
It isn't legally dodgy in Canada. If you create a rendition of the Mona Lisa or other work, you own it. There is nothing that can be done about. The area that is dodgy is reproducing a trademarked item.

well, reproduction of the mona lisa is legal because the artist have been dead so long that any kind of retroactive copyright extension to make it illegal would get even the most uncaring people sit up and take notice. However, trying to sell the rendition as the genuine article would get you for fraud, iirc.

thing is, there is a section in copyright related to plagiarism. So if something is under copyright (and anything video, image, audio or written by default is in most places that have some variant on the bern convention as law) you cant create something that can be confused with what someone else have created without getting the consent of the other creator.

trademarks are similar, but have to do with the likeness of brands, not content.

but this is me not being a lawyer.
Kid Chameleon
QUOTE (hobgoblin @ Jun 18 2010, 08:30 PM) *
well, reproduction of the mona lisa is legal because the artist have been dead so long that any kind of retroactive copyright extension to make it illegal would get even the most uncaring people sit up and take notice.


That's just what Michelangelo wants you to think.
Cain
QUOTE (Dread Moores @ Jun 18 2010, 02:52 PM) *
So the only way it is satisfactory in your mind is if there is an exact number of equal games/demos of BT and SR being run?


No, the only way it is satisfactory in my mind is if there's *more* Shadowrun games that BT. And only if I can play in every one. wink.gif

Seriously, they don't have to be equal, just not this inequal, to make me feel like they're supporting the game lines equally.

QUOTE
Ignoring the fact that the average BT game will be resolved much faster (don't mistake it for an actual fast pace though) than an average SR game, ignoring the huge differences in the actual games themselves, and mostly ignoring everything said to to this point? Again?

So let me ask this. If Magic the Gathering and SR are both being run by CGL, and there are more Magic demos...that means it isn't equitable support? Even though the Magic games will be done much faster? Let's take Battletech and minis out of the equation, since you seem to be zeroed in on it while ignoring the rest of the information presented.

I've played a lot of BattleTech. A lot of four-hour games of Battletech, in fact.

But let's use your MtG example. One round of MtG doesn't take that long. However, a tournament takes hours-- and a tournament is equal to an event. Right now, down the street from where I play D&D LFR, there's a MtG tournament that goes on at the same time. It starts earlier, ends later, and has about the same number of players. But the fact is, there's an equal number of events: one per week. That's not what we see in the CGL Origins schedule.
Deadmannumberone
QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Jun 18 2010, 12:33 AM) *
Well, if a BT gamemaster is overseeing four tables at a time, and he's running two hour blocks, he is handling EIGHT times as many tables as the SR gamemaster overseeing one table across a four hour block.

The local Battletech conventions I used to go to often had anywhere from 4-6 tables being monitored by a single gamemaster. It's not uncommon.


If you could respond to this comment please, Cain.
Adam
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 19 2010, 02:29 AM) *
But the fact is, there's an equal number of events: one per week. That's not what we see in the CGL Origins schedule.

Because, the way that schedule works, long events are broken into multiple events, for purposes of ticket-taking, bookkeeping, etc. This has already been explained.
Cain
[Post deleted for excessive snarkiness]
Cain
QUOTE (Adam @ Jun 18 2010, 11:47 PM) *
Because, the way that schedule works, long events are broken into multiple events, for purposes of ticket-taking, bookkeeping, etc. This has already been explained.

I could see two-to one, maybe even three-to-one worth of events explained that way. Seven to one? Sorry, maybe it's just me, but I'm not seeing it.
Adam
If you are looking to find reasons that show CGL favouring BT over SR, you are barking up the wrong tree, and everyone else is just watching you get further lost in your forest of madness.
KarmaInferno
What is so hard to understand?

Battletech games are played against other players. The only time you need a gamemaster is in a rules dispute. You can actually have entire games go off with almost no GM participation. As such, a single GM can oversee multiple tables. The events are often short as well, increasing the number of tables a single GM can oversee in a game day.

Shadowrun games in contrast are played 'against' an adventure scenario run by a GM. The GM cannot leave the table, so can only oversee a single table at a time. The evebts are longer, further reducing the tables per day a single GM can oversee.

The GMs are the primary "resource" used at a convention. Given the same amount of resources, of COURSE the Battletech games will get a lot more tables off than Shadowrun.


-karma
Saint Sithney
Shadowrun is getting the lowest billing in that lineup. That may not be how it truly is, but that is how it is presented, regardless of reason.

I could see how that might ruffle some feathers on the part of long time fans of Shadowrun.
Cain
QUOTE (KarmaInferno @ Jun 19 2010, 12:31 AM) *
What is so hard to understand?

Battletech games are played against other players. The only time you need a gamemaster is in a rules dispute. You can actually have entire games go off with almost no GM participation. As such, a single GM can oversee multiple tables. The events are often short as well, increasing the number of tables a single GM can oversee in a game day.

Shadowrun games in contrast are played 'against' an adventure scenario run by a GM. The GM cannot leave the table, so can only oversee a single table at a time. The evebts are longer, further reducing the tables per day a single GM can oversee.

The GMs are the primary "resource" used at a convention. Given the same amount of resources, of COURSE the Battletech games will get a lot more tables off than Shadowrun.


-karma

I see that, I really do. But I don't see that explaining a seven-to-one differential.

Now, I'm not the one who suggested that the folks at IMR/CGL favor Battletech. However, they were founded *for* BT, and apparently Shadowrun was an afterthought. But as Adam pointed out, that way lies madness.

I live in a small town, and I know that if I were running a major convention, I could lay hands on four Shadowrun GM's in a pinch. I could probably find more, if I promised them swag and loot. Assuming two games a day, times three days per convention, that's 24 events-- roughly the same number as the events listed at Origins. BattleTech lists about 149 events in that same time frame. I can't see any way of finessing the numbers so that four BT refs can run 150 events in a weekend. They'd need to run 12.5 events per day to keep up; which at two hours an event, means they're running 25 hours a day.

The only way to make the math work is if there's a lot more than 4 BT refs running tables. And that's fine. But it does make me wonder about which game is getting more resources.
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 19 2010, 03:45 AM) *
The only way to make the math work is if there's a lot more than 4 BT refs running tables. And that's fine. But it does make me wonder about which game is getting more resources.


Or maybe it could just make you wonder why the SR community isn't stepping up with more volunteers. A point from Bull, Adam, and a number of others you chose to ignore. Again.
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 19 2010, 02:29 AM) *
But let's use your MtG example. One round of MtG doesn't take that long. However, a tournament takes hours-- and a tournament is equal to an event. Right now, down the street from where I play D&D LFR, there's a MtG tournament that goes on at the same time. It starts earlier, ends later, and has about the same number of players. But the fact is, there's an equal number of events: one per week. That's not what we see in the CGL Origins schedule.


Wait, what? A tournament is one event? So even though every single of those win/loss scenarios corresponds to a complete game of MtG, it's not actually a complete game of MtG? Heck, if we're going that simple to say a single tournament is one event, then problem solved. There's one Battletech event that weeked. There's one SR event that weekend. Equal. Yay!
Congzilla
QUOTE (Dread Moores @ Jun 19 2010, 11:20 AM) *
Wait, what? A tournament is one event? So even though every single of those win/loss scenarios corresponds to a complete game of MtG, it's not actually a complete game of MtG? Heck, if we're going that simple to say a single tournament is one event, then problem solved. There's one Battletech event that weeked. There's one SR event that weekend. Equal. Yay!


Sounds correct to me. It is a complete game but a single game doesn't equal an event, the tournament is the event.
Dread Moores
Edit: Nevermind. Data points will continue to be ignored selectively. Sorry for the thread-jack folks.
Bull
Cain: Just to reiterate, the only reason there are so few events, is that there are so few GMs.

I actually had a longish post about this yesterday, but my Computer crashed about 3/4 of the way through it, and I decided against posting, as I was a bit snarky and cranky when I typed it...

The long and short of it is... We have 8 GMs for Origins. Those GMs are responsible for not only 40 Shadowrun events, but 8 Cthulhutech games and 6 Eclipse Phase games. Everyone's doing at least 5 to 6 games, on top of possibly filling in to do pick up demos and the like. We have between 4 and 6 events running at any given time as it is.

If we had more volunteers for the convention, we would have more events.

Southpaw is lucky enough that he's got a pretty good pool of local Battletech players that can go up and run events. And, as has been pointed out, they can run more events in a shorter amount of time, with less prepwork and effort.

I take a LOT of offense at you bitching about a "lack of SHadowrun games" going on, and insinuation you made that we weren't running more games because we "didn't care about the game enough". I've damn near killed myself at the conventions over the years doing this (and I mean that literally and figuratively). And I do this for a free 4-day badge, partial room comp, a T-SHirt that rarely fits, and a free book or two. I still have to make my own way to the con. I still have to cover my own food. And I come away from the con exhausted, aching, sleep deprived, malnourished, unable to speak any longer, ad usually sick because I've spent the last week destroying my immune system.

So, yeah. You want to keep complaining?
Dread Moores
QUOTE (Bull @ Jun 19 2010, 11:36 AM) *
The long and short of it is... We have 8 GMs for Origins. Those GMs are responsible for not only 40 Shadowrun events, but 8 Cthulhutech games and 6 Eclipse Phase games. Everyone's doing at least 5 to 6 games, on top of possibly filling in to do pick up demos and the like. We have between 4 and 6 events running at any given time as it is.


That's curious to me. Wildfire seemed to be looking for GMs for Ctech on their own. How is it that you're running events for two games that CGL no longer has?
Bull
QUOTE (Dread Moores @ Jun 19 2010, 10:39 AM) *
That's curious to me. Wildfire seemed to be looking for GMs for Ctech on their own. How is it that you're running events for two games that CGL no longer has?


Because the GMs are, by and large, volunteers who signed up to run events months ago, and because Chuck, the Shadowrun (And general RPG) event coordinator scheduled those games months and months ago, before any of this crap started. Because by the time things shook down for CT and EP, it was too late for them to get events in the pre-reg book. So, as far as I know (and from what Chuck's said), we're still running those events. We still like Rob and Adam and Matt Grau, so we wouldn't leave them hanging for events or GMs regardless.

I imagine they're looking for folks to run booth demos or additional events though, as is obvious we're badly understaffed this year.

(For reference, last year we had a couple more GMs, and ran 54 events).
KarmaInferno
QUOTE (Cain @ Jun 19 2010, 03:45 AM) *
Assuming two games a day, times three days per convention, that's 24 events-- roughly the same number as the events listed at Origins. BattleTech lists about 149 events in that same time frame. I can't see any way of finessing the numbers so that four BT refs can run 150 events in a weekend. They'd need to run 12.5 events per day to keep up; which at two hours an event, means they're running 25 hours a day.


Um. Three days. 150 Battletech tables. 4 GMs.

BT events last a couple of hours. You can probably run five slots or so a day comfortably. That works out to 10 tables per slot. Divided up among four GMs, each GM oversees two-three tables each slot. Each GM is running 10 hours a day, 8 hours if you have three judges run the ten tables in each slot and give each judge one slot off, rotating the "off" judge.

It's basic math.

You seem to be missing the point that a Battletech judge can oversee multiple tables AT THE SAME TIME, whereas a Shadowrun judge cannot.

In order to run that same number of tables for Shadowrun, you need literally FOUR TIMES the number of GMs. 150 tables, at most four 4-hour slots a day if you cram. That means 12 tables per time slot, each needing it's own GM. 12 GMs total.

And that's cramming, each judge will be running events for 16 hours a day and likely be exhausted because GMing Shadowrun requires a LOT more personal involvement every minute of the game than even running 3-4 tables of Battletech does. Additionally, there's a TON of setup that Shadowrun needs that Battletech does not, namely the writing of adventures.

A single Battletech GM can oversee 6-8 tables in a four hour space if he's good, 3-4 tables a slot in two hour slots. A single Shadowrun GM can oversee just ONE table in that same time. There's your seven-to-one difference.

What you run at a convention isn't based on the number of tables you have, it's based of the number of judges.

If you split your judge pool in half, the Battletech judges will ALWAYS run vastly more tables than the Shadowrun judges. Even if you give the Shadowrun tables TWICE as many judges as the Battletech tables, the Battletech judges will STILL run twice the number of tables than the Shadowrun judges.

This isn't even hard math. Is Dread Moores right? Are you just selectively ignoring stuff?


-karma
Dread Moores
Link

Here's what made me ask that Bull. I'll quote the relevant section from Matt.

QUOTE
Oh my goodness. The situation with Catalyst has left us with, surprise, more fallout!

We are running a boatload of events at Gen Con this year, for both CthulhuTech and our new Lovecraftian Traveller setting, Chthonian Stars.

The problem is, we are now without enough GM's to run all the events we have scheduled – and all of our events are already sold out!


I realize that is for GenCon, so that could be a completely different story. Makes sense about the time constraints though.
Bull
Yeah, I'm not entirely certain about Gen Con and how things are being handled there. Chuck's just not getting the GM schedule in order, so I don;t know yet what all we're actually running, but for GC, we usually have a bigger GM crew to play with. I imagine though that for GC, both companies are going to watch to try and make a bigger splash, and will be more likely to handle their own events. Like I said though, I don't know...

And, just to head this off for when the Gen Con schedule gets posted... Keep in mind that there's a Tournament, which is a two day event. So while it's a single "event", it requires 12 GMs per night, for two nights. THere's also the SHadowrun Scramble, which is a combo Tabletop and LARP event that lasts for 8 hours, and requires 6-8 GMs. THere's also the "Who's RUn Is It Anyway?" event that involves a handful of GMs as well.

Dread Moores
I have doubts that will head anything off. But thanks for the info. smile.gif
Bull
Heh, yeah, me too. Which irritates the hell out of me, because I know how much work I've put in over the years, and I know how much work and effort everyone else who's GMed has put in.

If someone can show us a way we can run more than one table at a time for half the work, I'm sure we could easily double the number of events we run...

Bull
estradling
A theoretical question for Adam, Bull or anyone else with experience putting to together BT and SR events for Cons. If you had one GM for Shadowrun and one one GM for BattleTech who were willing to run as many 'events' as they could reasonably handle. How many 'events' could each one handle?

the_dunner
QUOTE (estradling @ Jun 19 2010, 02:02 PM) *
A theoretical question for Adam, Bull or anyone else with experience putting to together BT and SR events for Cons. If you had one GM for Shadowrun and one one GM for BattleTech who were willing to run as many 'events' as they could reasonably handle. How many 'events' could each one handle?

It depends upon your definition of "reasonable." It also depends upon the person's physical health and stamina.

The theoretical maximum for SR is four 4-hour slots of SR Th, Fri, Sat, plus two 4-hour slots on Sunday. So, a grand total of 14 slots. This ignores a number of important things, like still having a voice (con halls are loud, GMing loud enough to be heard over the con hall is tough on your throat). Then, most folks like to eat, and there usually isn't time between slots. Most folks also like to have at least a few hours to hit the dealers room, and time in the evening to relax and snatch at least a few hours of sleep.

When I was coordinator, I strongly recommended folks take no more than 20 hours of GMing, so five slots. A few folks insisted on doing more, but I'd never schedule for more than 24. (Some volunteers /did/ run extra tables, though, I don't think I remember anyone exceeding 32 hours, though, or 8 slots. I'm sure McQ will pipe in here about exceeding that, though.)

The theoretical maximum for BT is higher. One GM can usually run several tables, which need not be running the same scenarios. So, let's say 4 tables, each with a different scenario, per GM. Those events can also be two hour events rather than four hour events. So, you're talking about a theoretical maximum of 4 events * 8/day on Th/Fr/Sat plus 4 events * 4/day on Sun or 112 events. Again, that's a theoretical limit. The most I recall anybody actually running was about 60 hours, which was sufficiently excessive that I think he needed hospitalization for dehydration after the con. (not joking)

estradling
QUOTE (the_dunner @ Jun 19 2010, 11:14 AM) *
It depends upon your definition of "reasonable." It also depends upon the person's physical health and stamina.

The theoretical maximum for SR is four 4-hour slots of SR Th, Fri, Sat, plus two 4-hour slots on Sunday. So, a grand total of 14 slots. This ignores a number of important things, like still having a voice (con halls are loud, GMing loud enough to be heard over the con hall is tough on your throat). Then, most folks like to eat, and there usually isn't time between slots. Most folks also like to have at least a few hours to hit the dealers room, and time in the evening to relax and snatch at least a few hours of sleep.

When I was coordinator, I strongly recommended folks take no more than 20 hours of GMing, so five slots. A few folks insisted on doing more, but I'd never schedule for more than 24. (Some volunteers /did/ run extra tables, though, I don't think I remember anyone exceeding 32 hours, though, or 8 slots. I'm sure McQ will pipe in here about exceeding that, though.)

The theoretical maximum for BT is higher. One GM can usually run several tables, which need not be running the same scenarios. So, let's say 4 tables, each with a different scenario, per GM. Those events can also be two hour events rather than four hour events. So, you're talking about a theoretical maximum of 4 events * 8/day on Th/Fr/Sat plus 4 events * 4/day on Sun or 112 events. Again, that's a theoretical limit. The most I recall anybody actually running was about 60 hours, which was sufficiently excessive that I think he needed hospitalization for dehydration after the con. (not joking)


I am unfamiliar with how con 'events' are set up (total newbie). You've used hours, slots and events apparently interchangeably. Could you please clarify?

As for the GM I'd like to assume equal physical and mental stamina. (I know this is not the case... but then this is a theoretical question)
This is a "lo-fi" version of our main content. To view the full version with more information, formatting and images, please click here.
Dumpshock Forums © 2001-2012