Articles
Articles that I have written – not necessarily gaming related.
Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20 Beta Test
I will begin running beta tests of Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20 edition from February onward, as part of ORC Edinburgh, or at [ELG]. It’s one of several systems and worlds I work on, along with Infinity and the Mutant Chronicles. Most likely, they will be a series of one-off games. The venue(s) is/are to be confirmed, on a Saturday afternoon and/or evening or other club night as I’m planning to give the system a serious going over! I also will run some demos of Achtung! Cthulhu: Skirmish. It uses a bespoke Dystopian Wars rules set from the former Spartan Games, and is now part of Warcradle. Might be a good idea for me to paint those miniatures…
Here’s the pitch for Achtung! Cthulhu 2d20:
Set against a backdrop of WWII, a band of Allied heroes fight the Secret War against the Nazi occult. Powered with ancient secrets and otherworldly allies, these dark factions seek to unleash horrific monsters and alien weaponry upon the world. Join the investigators of the British Section M, or the American-led Majestic, to uncover these dangerous cults and destroy the Nazis behind their lines.
The upcoming new edition is designed to run with Modiphius’ 2d20 System to enhance the terrifying, pulp-action of the WWII setting, which promises stories of audacious Allied heroes, evil Nazi villains, super secret bunkers, and inhuman conspiracies from beyond the depths of time and space!
The 2d20 System has been developed by Nathan Dowdell (Conan: Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of, Star Trek Adventures), from the original design by Jay Little for the Mutant Chronicles RPG (Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, X-Wing Miniatures).
For more information on Achtung! Cthulhu, see the Modiphius website at https://www.modiphius.com/achtung-cthulhu.html
Demo Games and demonstrations of RPGs
It’s no secret that I’ve been running a lot of demo (demonstration) games over the year. Over at ORC Edinburgh we’re planning to try out a “Games Day” of demo games to allow those new to RPGs to have a shot at them.
So what makes for a good demo? I’ve written some basic stuff here on how to run a good demo game.
Pre-generated characters
Pretty much a given: you want your players to pick up the game quickly, but don’t need them to spend an age building their characters. Have 4-6 characters ready for demo game: they needn’t all be the same, but it should be a well-rounded group of PCs.
Business Cards
I always hand out a business card with my email and social media details to my players at the start of the demo. You may not need your address or mobile on it, but someone knowing your name is useful at least.
Be on time for your demo games
If you’re running in a pre-booked time slot, be there for the players when they arrive. There’s nothing worse than not having a GM turn up. Also, try to avoid over-running into someone else’s slot.
Accessible system
Try to keep the game mechanics as simple as possible – your players should be able to get a feel for the system, without being overwhelmed by rules or jargon.
Buckets of Dice
Make sure you’ve enough dice for the players – preferably several sets (especially if they are customised like FFG’s Age of Rebellion dice). Having just one set for both GMs and players is an utter pain, plus one player always bogarts them.
Paper and Pencils
Scrap paper and pencils is a must – doesn’t matter if they’re using it on a character sheet, mapping, or just doodling. Always required.
Plenty of action
There’s a good chance that your players don’t know each other, so dropping them straight into the action is a great way to get them to work together.
Teamwork
There’s a temptation for GMs to ignore quieter players. The GM needs to make sure everyone has their chance – not just the one player with the loudest voice.
Keep it short
Depending on the length of game slots available, assume a three-hour session is best. That should have enough time for a few encounters. It’s worth a practice run of the game with a regular group just in case.
Demo Games Rulebook
Have a physical copy of the book(s) available for players to look at and read – as GM, don’t hang on to it all the time.
Know the system
There’s nothing worse than a GM who runs a demo game, but hasn’t learned the system. The idea of a demo game is to demonstrate how a system works.
Looking back at RPG Convention Season 2015
So I’ve been following the “Grand Tour” of RPG convention season this year. I started off with Dragonmeet 2014 in December, a one-day con in London at Earls Court.
I followed this up with Conpulsion. The review of this here on this blog has apparently lead to some changes, and I’ve been interrogated quite thoroughly about it at an ORC Edinburgh pub meet:).
I took myself down to the UK Games Expo, and managed to miss being in every Modiphius Entertainment pic as detailed by Marc Langworthy at in his Post Expo Debrief over at http://kplangers.com/. I was elsewhere running games in the building for about half the time, including Mutant: Year 0 when it won Best RPG. I also helped flog some stuff on the stall and ran some demo games there.
Most recently I went to Q-CON. It felt less like a RPG Convention this year. I didn’t enjoy it quite as might as I could have thanks to my insomnia, so that’s on me. The accommodation was pretty basic and I didn’t get much sleep thanks to the noise. I also lost my voice on the Saturday night!
Things I’ve learned – although I covered some of this before in my Surviving the UK Games Expo post, it works for any Convention (plus I’ve updated some of the things):
- If you’re staying in a hotel, find somewhere cheap (the Hilton was brutally expensive), and there’s often cheaper accommodation to be found nearby online. Find somewhere close though.
- At the Games Expo, get breakfast early! You’ll not be able to enter the main trade/event halls before 9am but at least you won’t be hungry.
- If you’re planning on buying stuff, make sure you’ve some ready cash – in case the cash machine(s) on site run out.
- Don’t bank on eating healthily – food trucks are popular now, but some venues will have a pub. Hotel restaurants are often pricey too. Leave yourself some time though. They get busy and are usually not prepared to deal with the numbers! Or find a place to eat nearby. Take business/contact cards with you. I gave them to nearly all my players – and all were happy to take them (bar one). See below!
- While running a game one of my players was almost constantly playing some game on his phone, and wasn’t paying attention (to me or the players). At the end of it, not only did he discard my card but he said he found the game “confusing”. The rest of the players had enjoyed themselves immensely. Bloody ignorant. He’d done it in another GMs game too. GMs should call a player out on this kind of thing if the rest of the group are becoming exasperated with it.
- By respectful of other GMs, it’s not a shouting match where the loudest group have the most fun. Unless they’re playing a WH40K Ork game called Waargh Trek.
- On the other hand, speak up as a GM. Many shared games rooms are loud.
- Be on time (players and GMs!), and be ready to move to another location if there’s an accessibility problem for players.
- Have a chillout place available if it gets crowded, and take an hour to “decompress”.
- If you’re staying in student halls, expect basic facilities and noise. They’re cheap for a reason.
- Bathe daily. You’ll need to: it gets very warm and everyone sweats.
- Get a convention T-shirt or two. Not only is it a reminder, but you can use as a standby if you’re short of shirts (see above)!
- Drink plenty of water, especially if you’re running a game.
- If you’re planning on collecting Kickstarter rewards or buying games, take a big case or drive (beware of parking costs). Alternatively post your games back separately from a nearby Post Office (cheaper than £20 for an extra Easyjet baggage allowance).
- Don’t schedule yourself to run games the entire con. Take some time to walk around, play, and network.
- Be enthusiastic about a demo game, but don’t be offended if someone criticizes it or isn’t interested in it.
- Venue staff, not just stewards, need to be polite and respectful – you’re still customers.
- Cosplay is not consent (I’ve never seen harassment but it does exist).
- Don’t badger gaming personalities in the bar if they’re in there for a quiet drink.
- If you’re an organiser of a convention, expect and act upon criticism.
I’m not sure how many conventions I’ll get to next year: the accommodation and travel cost does mount up. Plus I’m not sure how much time I’ll have to attend and prepare for them. Still, I may get some time away. I’ve been offered a press pass for Conpulsion, and I’ll be at Dragonmeet this year though. I think I’ve covered everything and everywhere in individual reviews and posts elsewhere under Conventions.
Feel free to make any suggestions for other “Survival Tips”in the Comments!
Edinburgh Geekdom Web Portal
Edinburgh Geekdom is an idea I’ve had but will probably never implement. There’s a huge amount of work required and to keep on top of things requires more time and resources than I can deal with. I already maintain the Edinburgh Gaming page, and for now it’s a project placed on the back-burner.
What is/was the idea of “Edinburgh Geekdom”?
Edinburgh Geekdom was originally inspired by the fact that Edinburgh has a huge population, but each gaming community largely does their own thing. There’s very little communication between them which is a bit of a shame, as a “cross-pollination” works for the entire community. It’d be nice to have everything in one place. It was a germ of an idea when we started planning the Bleak Midwinter campaign a few years back (see the Archive and Ideas Dumpster).
Ideally, Edinburgh Geekdom would be a web front-end (or even App) allowing the parsing of RSS feeds, submission of events and postings of news relating to every aspect of everything geeky in Edinburgh. It would appear in a form of a searchable calendar that would be a one-stop shop for anyone considering themselves a geek in Edinburgh to find out what’s happening. A bit like the List, but with dice. Much like the late RPG Bloggers Alliance and combined with Geek Native as it were, but purely for Edinburgh and the Lothians. In fact, a very Edinburgh-specific version of something similar to the UK Gaming Media Network.
It’d consist of the following:
- Wargames: posts of club nights, events, reviews, tournaments etc. from the Edinburgh clubs (SESWC, ELG etc.), including University societies. Also news from 6s2Hit or the Games Hub.
- Shops: listings – and possibly adverts – for book shops, comic shops, games shops, model shops, book shops etc. Also art/handicraft shops and shops that may be useful for cosplay/LARP.
- Boardgames & CCG: boardgame launches/meet-ups/events and CCG tournaments. Plus news from EGH, Black Lion, Edinburgh Board Game Geek Guild, etc.
- RPGs. News of games from ORC, GEAS, Watt gamers, etc.
- Crowdfunding – local Kickstarter, IndieGoG, Patreon campaigns etc. relating to Edinburgh.
- Mega games. Edinburgh has hosted a few of these over the years – Portal of Geekdom would link to the event (see http://www.megagame-makers.org.uk/)
- Sci-fi/fantasy/horror news of events from sites like 2.8 Hours later, e.g. zombie walks, casting calls, plays, filming, stand-up comedy.
- Local authors & writers, book signings, publications, readings etc.
- Movies. News of special screenings, talks, filming.
- News from fan groups or related clubs like the Dawn Duellists, Edinburgh Fortean Society, and Edinburgh Browncoats.
- News of Edinburgh LARP events from Camarilla UK, Embraced, No Rest for the Wicked, and others.
- Pokemon league events and news.
- Cosplay events, news links to useful suppliers/stores.
- Comics – news and reviews from Deadhead and Forbidden Planet, plus also news of Edinburgh ComicCon.
- Historical event news like renaissance fairs, jousting, enactments, etc.
- Retro gamers and online gaming – news of the retro gamers events, such as charity events or tournaments.
- Software & technologies – news of developing local technology research and development, including computer games.
- Local convention news and reviews e.g. Conpulsion, Claymore, Edinburgh Comicon, etc.
- Lectures & Tours – news of events that may be of interest to the Geek community, including “open door” events.
- Companies and careers. Adverts for proof-reading services, beta testers, artwork, call for submissions etc.
Quite a list really. So, how to go about implementing such a thing?
Implementation
I’m no programmer, so a bespoke solution was pretty much a non-starter. If anything, I’d also learned from the problems of RPG Bloggers Alliance: multiple hacking attacks, constant rewriting of code needed due to social media APIs changing, etc. Plus the time involved would be costly for me, not to mention possible stress. Unfortunately it’d be the way forward.
Edinburgh Geekdom would need to be largely automated – perhaps pulling RSS feeds from a site, two-factor authentication etc. There’d still need to be the option to manually submit an entry to Edinburgh Geekdom though. Both feeds and user submissions would need to be validated and checked. Perhaps registered users could submit events without moderation – although checks and balances would need to be in place to prevent excessive over-use/self-promotion. Event Submitters without a login would need to either subscribe to the site or be moderated. Either way, there’s a minimal time overhead from that.
So, why not use Facebook, Google+, Twitter, etc. as a solution? Easy: not everyone has access to these. Nor are they automated enough. Software like Twitter is best used to share links due to the character limit. Facebook and Google+ are notorious for clunky interfaces. Warhorn.net is more for organising games, and not really a news delivery medium. What about paper.li? Well, it works, but not for manual submissions. They all have their uses, though. “The ability to access social media is insignificant to… the power of the Force”. Um. Sorry. The ability to publish to social media is far superior, and a much better way of reaching multiple target audiences across multiple media.
Risks
Basically, what would be the risks of Edinburgh Geekdom?
Lack of engagement is the biggest one. Edinburgh Geekdom would rely on a lot of community input early on, plus regular updates. The site would need to establish itself very swiftly, with no margin for error. If there’s no ability to set up recurring events, submitters will become swiftly disassociated, for example. Many of the communities already have their own internal communications and ways of informing members. What’s in it for them?
Funding is also another consideration. How do you keep a free website up and running? What happens when you’ve gone from three events a hour to three events a month? With ads. Banner ads. You sell space to Google Adsense (and possibly, indirectly, that toxic Evony crap) or try and get local businesses to advertise, which is something that could mess up everything you’ve worked for if it goes bad. Or you back it out of someone’s pocket – cf. Kickstarter, IndieGoGo, Ken Whitman (no, not really! I feel for those that got swindled!), or a venture capitalist… You’d have to shut it down, as soon as legally possible if things go wrong.
There’s also no real demand for a portal of this kind. It’d require a constant stream of information from all aspects and contributors to the Edinburgh Geekdom site. If there’s no actual reward involved you’re relying on a lot of goodwill and volunteers. As soon as that goodwill dries up, there’s nothing you can do apart from add the information yourself. That can take some considerable time, if you have to chase down news items.
Conclusion
Ultimately Edinburgh Geekdom was/is a nice idea – a fantastic resource that all aspects of the various hobbies could use. The main reasons I’ve never acted upon it is simply the time involved and money. I don’t have the time to develop the software, or the financial resources to keep it going. There’s also a serious amount of diplomacy required to keep the various “factions” of the hobby interested.
For me, that’s the biggest stumbling block – getting enough folk interested in Edinburgh Geekdom for it to be a useful resource. The investiture of time and money is a big issue too. My Edinburgh Gaming page remains popular, so that’s the closest I’ll get to creating an Edinburgh Geekdom site in the meantime.
Convention Games and Demos
Some of you may already know that I’m making the convention rounds this year! So far I’m appearing at Conpulsion, UK Games Expo, Q-CON, and hopefully Dragonmeet.
As I’m a Modiphius Silvershield I’ll be running a few demo games – with the exception of a Prayer for St. Nazaire and Cliché they are actually games recommended for first time play. I may change these later but so far there’s a nice bit of variety:
- Mutant: Year 0: For a mouthful of water. In a post apocalyptic future, a group of mutant PCs search for fresh water in the ruins of the Ancients., vital to their survival and those within the Ark.
- The Mutant Chronicles (3rd Ed): Straffar Gatan 39, a rundown tenement in the Nines – a particularly nasty part of the Perimeters. Dispatch has received multiple calls from residents reporting screaming on the third floor. Dispatch receives calls like this all the time and they mostly go unanswered, but after the sixth call a Patrol unit was dispatched….
- Achtung! Cthulhu (Savage Worlds): A Prayer for St Nazaire. March 1942: A small commando force are dropped behind enemy lines to silence a Nazi listening post in the Loire valley.
- Cliché: The Game of Making Movies. An as yet untitled adventure…
So I’ve been doing a bit of thinking about convention games in general as a result. As the games above are going to be demos, I thought I’d put some thoughts down, if only to clear my head.
Time: Convention games are usually allocated time slots. At Dragonmeet, these were one-hour slots. At Q-CON three-hour slots. If you’re running a demo make sure it’ll keep to the time slot and not overrun.
Playability: Keep it simple. Complicated rules, where both players and GMs keep having to look stuff up, isn’t going to help “sell” the game. Quick-start “lite” rules and pre-gnerated characters are a great place to start. Having a physical copy of the game rulebook(s) also helps (see below).
Setting: Try and keep the setting simple for new players – keep the background fluff for the plot. Let the game speak for itself and don’t bombard the players with a lot of information. Also relevant: consider where you are actually playing the game. If it’s going to be loud game – and players can get raucous! – consider the people nearby!
Potential Audience: Kids are often accompanying their parents to conventions these days, and often play too. Bear that in mind when you’re writing adventures – if the subject matter is potentially dark, be prepared to tone it down. Likewise any “adult” situations.
Organisation: Check the sign-up sheets beforehand. Make sure you’ve time to get food. Be prepared to keep to the time slot available – don’t be late. Don’t get stressed with the players either if they are late or don’t turn up. It happens.
Props: The more maps, play aids, flyers, handout’s and other possible swag the better. Make sure you’ve got physical product if you’re doing a demo. At the very least the players can leaf through the rulebook.