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6/25/2014 6:23 pm  #12


Re: BoL convention game

Wow, these are all great.
I'll have to go back to those as a resource.

At the moment, I have a mish mash of ideas and elements in mind, but I haven't put them in a cohesive whole yet. I'm in the process of taking an inventory of the minis I have that I can carry to the con without too much trouble. I figure I'll use these as a basis for the adventure.
So far I have:
- 5 female and 5 male minis that are all S&S themed (and no chainmail bikinis in the bunch : ) to be used by players.

- 30 unpainted minis that I'll be turning into barbaric cannibal tribesmen.

- 3 unpainted marsh trolls that I can paint as generic reptilian giant warriors.

- 2 tentacled worms

- 1 or 2 shoggoths (can't recall)

- 2 eldrich demons (mini cthulhus)

- 1 big ass Cthulhu mini.

- A bunch of cultist minis.

Not quite sure if I'll use them all, but at least I have some options I guess...

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7/06/2014 10:49 pm  #13


Re: BoL convention game

While I have no meaningful experience with convention gaming, here's my two cents. No matter how quick you think a game's character gen is, it will always take an hour or more. My group is made up mostly of experienced gamers, totally at times 8 players. Any time we try a new game, no matter what it is, no matter how simple the game, character gen takes 8 hours. FFG Star Wars took all night and there is basically nothing to do except pick your species and career. Numenera, which looked pretty quick, also took the better part of a day as players had to paw over lists of options. Even Golden Sky Stories, a game with practically no rules and almost no options outside of choosing character type, took hours. HOURS! I have no idea how they did that.

From my understanding, convention games are supposed to be demos, unless you are doing organized play like Shadowrun Missions or Pathfinder Society. You'd probably be best off keeping it simply and handing out pregens. Remember that an hour or introductions and character gen is an hour where you aren't killing snakes.

For your thoughts on in medias res, I've really liked when games do this. I've played in far too many games that stop dead when the GM spends days trying to assemble the group and get the story going. While it doesn't always work for every game or story, starting off in the action gets things going, gets the dice rolling, and gets the blood flowing (in more ways than one). If you can start with a good opening action scene, that should help speed things up, especially in a limited time frame with zero chance of continuation with that particular group. For specifics, this could be a very simple fight or perhaps the end of a fight (where many foes have already been dispatched or softened up already), since rules explanation will drag this out to longer than expected.

Hope that helps.
 

 

8/02/2014 7:37 am  #14


Re: BoL convention game

I will definitely second the idea for using pregens at a convention if you want to concentrate on playing the game instead of just building characters. Convention games usually have a strict time allotment. Using pregenerated characters also allows the players to be involved in the scenario right from the start with prebuilt hooks...
"Those rotten bandits stole my sister's ring!" "And my horse!" "They are also led by an old enemy of mine." "I recognized one of them from the long scar on his face, he is an evil man who has cheated many."

"Let's GET THEM!"

There you are, off to a roaring start in less than a minute!

 

8/03/2014 9:33 am  #15


Re: BoL convention game

The first time I played BoL was at a samll convention (Albany Game Day)...and it was a fluke.  We were supposed to be playing Savage Worlds (which I also had never played) when the GM came down with some sort of illness that hospitalized him.

So, one of the other players pulled out his BoL and a stack of 12 pre-made characters and we were off.   And I was hooked.   Bought the PDF that night.

But part of why it worked so well is that he had LOTS of pregens.  So, we were able to jump into the game quickly, and there was enough variety so that we could have more than one mage or alchemist or barbarian or sneaky git.

All the pregens were on 3x5 cards, which kept it quick and easy to reference.  I'd recommend pregens all the way.

 

8/03/2014 2:41 pm  #16


Re: BoL convention game

 20 pre-gens is roughly what I was thinking of writing up.
I figure half male characters and the other half female characters should cover all my bases while giving a nice variety of character types.

Say, 2 barbarians per gender, 2 assassin/theif characters, 2 soldier types, 2 ranger/archer types and 2 sorcerer/mage types per gender.
 

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8/04/2014 12:31 pm  #17


Re: BoL convention game

As a followup to my earlier comment, I sat down with my group last night to make characters. Hours. Literally hours. One player spent almost 2 hours going over boons and flaws, and that was just giving him the ones from his regional origins and one career, not giving him the list to go over.

So yeah. Pregens.

half male and half female seems to be a good mix. Of course, you could leave the genders ambiguous to same yourself some work (let the player decide) and just focus on making a bunch of different characters.

 

8/05/2014 8:33 am  #18


Re: BoL convention game

"Hours. Literally hours." - Wow! Really?
If someone spends almost 2 hours going over a limited list of boons and flaws, that's a player choice. CharGen in BoL is quick and simple. I can't imagine anyone taking that long, but hopefully he or she ended up with a character they liked!
That being said (and that's just my stunned reaction - if that's the way your table rocks and it works for your group, more power to your elbow) I think a selection of pregens if definitely the way to go. If you have a 4 hour slot or something you want to get people playing asap. Nerosfiddle's list seems a good way to go. If you are aiming to 'sell the game' and get people enthused about BoL, then a picture of each pregen would be nice, if you can find enough appropriate pictures. Good luck!


My real name is Steve Hall
 

8/05/2014 8:41 am  #19


Re: BoL convention game

Gruntfuttock wrote:

"Hours. Literally hours." - Wow! Really?
If someone spends almost 2 hours going over a limited list of boons and flaws, that's a player choice. CharGen in BoL is quick and simple. I can't imagine anyone taking that long, but hopefully he or she ended up with a character they liked!
That being said (and that's just my stunned reaction - if that's the way your table rocks and it works for your group, more power to your elbow) I think a selection of pregens if definitely the way to go. If you have a 4 hour slot or something you want to get people playing asap. Nerosfiddle's list seems a good way to go. If you are aiming to 'sell the game' and get people enthused about BoL, then a picture of each pregen would be nice, if you can find enough appropriate pictures. Good luck!

You can always start with the ones from the book!
(And yes, 2 hours is far too long - I designed BoL so that chargen shouldn't take more than 20 minutes, maybe 30 at most).

 

Last edited by Simon W (8/05/2014 8:44 am)

 

8/05/2014 11:42 am  #20


Re: BoL convention game

I love BoL as written, but as a means of speeding up character creation even further when I'm introducing new people, I forgo the region specific boons and flaws. I simply have them select 1 free boon from the master list, and explain that for additional boons they either take a flaw or pay 2 hero points. References to regional boons and flaws remain mere suggestions. Nice and simple and rarely takes more than 10 minutes.
As we play more often and they get to know the setting, I then slowly introduce the rest for extra flavour.
By that time it's no longer an issue.

As for images of characters, this is what I use:
http://www.ageofgames.net/en/fantasyavatar/fantasy-avatar.html

I used to use Heromachine, but as it turns out, I suck at it...
 

Last edited by nerosfiddle (8/05/2014 11:47 am)

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