Kubla Con
Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2017 2:46 pm
by Loba
I was just wondering if anyone is running an EarthDawn game at Kubla Con? I didn't see any and was surprised. I was thinking of maybe running one though I haven't run a game myself at a CON and I always stress over the timing. It seems that the stories at a CON have to be so very short or you will never finish. Even the long slots don't offer much for story build up.
~ Loba
Re: Kubla Con
Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2017 6:13 pm
by Mataxes
Con games aren't generally so much about story. I mean, they are, but that story is, generally, much shorter and more basic because you want the opportunity to finish it in a single (suually 4-hour) session.
I look at convention games as demos and hooks. I've got... half a dozen now, usually Novice tier, focused on a single task or exploring a limited area that relies on environmental storytelling. For example, one of my con games involves the group exploring a lost kaer uncovered by miners. There are multiple 'encounter' locations (which doesn't necessarily mean combat):
* Tunnel approach: As they travel, find the body of a large, worm-like Horror impaled by several large spikes from a trap. Group needs to deal with a pit trap to get to the next area.
* Main kaer chamber, residential area: Houses look like people up and left, few signs of violence, personal items and stuff still around as though they are coming back. Combat with plant-like undead.
* Meeting Hall: Remains of a barricade, but broken. Combat with a demiwraith in one of the upstairs offices. In that office, journal found that offers insight into what happened.
* Agriculture chamber: Wildly overgrown, encounter more plant undead, main enemy here is a horror like a crystal entity, but with wood instead of stone, possessing a large tree.
I've got another adventure that revolves around tribal orks and city orks in Cara Fahd. (I often refer to it as "Romeo and Juliet, but with orks.") Rival parents, children falling in love and running off, that kind of thing. Heavy on the roleplay and interaction, not so much on the combat.
A third involves following a "treasure map" coded as an old poem, with each encounter location as a step on the trail. A final showdown with a group trying to get the treasure for themselves (inside a former temple of Rashomon/Raggok) for the climax.
Of course, I've been running Earthdawn at cons for years, so I've got a good feel for how time is going based on the group, and will adapt based on how things are going. I tend to have one or two ideas in my back pocket I can pull in if I need to fill time, and also plan ways I can skip stuff if we're running long.
The key to a convention game, I feel, is to provide a strong goal, keep things moving, and provide stuff that hooks people on the setting so they want more (and, even better, come back to the booth to buy books). The only way to do it is to do it, and get better with practice.
(As a side note, our "Legends of Barsaive" adventures are generally intended as one-shot convention games, so those can also serve. I'm hoping to get a couple of those out here by this summer.)