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I'm appending to your response with my own answers to the survey and responses
to some of your thoughts.
In lugnet.events.brickfest, Frank Filz writes:
>
> > 1. If you are familiar with the game (played before or read the rules),
> > would you prefer a campaign game or a battle game?
Campaign (but ideally one (or more) of each).
> > 2. What are the most attractive factors to that type of game?
RPing, flexibility (both in terms of player committment and goals),
customizability to the desires of all those involved.
> > 3. What features of the other type of game are attractive to you?
Straightforward goals, big ships, more blood, quicker play.
> > 4. Are you interested in helping GM? Are you the type who prefers to GM
> > over playing (yes there are a few of us out there)?
I would be willing to co-GM but I'm not desirous of the position. At a pirate
fest where we were going to run two seperate campaign games, I would prefer to
play one and GM one...I'd have the disposable time to be desirous of the GM
position.
> > 5. How many hours would you feel like committing to the game?
I could start on Friday at about noon and stop on Sunday at about four. I'd
want 3-4 hours of sleep each night and maybe a total of five hours off for
eating, walking, and seeing other stuff. So I think that adds up to about 39
hours.
> > 6. Do you have any thoughts on how better to run the game?
We need turn-forms that indicate the possible moves, how the wind affects
moves, and provides a blank form/spreadsheet where the players write their
moves. This would normalize and speed up play and if we turned them in to the
GM when done it would help with the recap. There could even be a place for us
to write notes on damage done and taken and stuff.
> I think we need to set up Friday. This would allow all the time spent
> Saturday to be actual play time (set up takes about 2 hours, perhaps a
> little more).
IIRC it was way more than two hours. Getting more people involved in set up or
doing as much as possible in advance would be great. What if you arrived with
baggies of crew tucked into cutters? What if those of us who wanted to built
islands ahead of time and had write-ups about what was going on there? We
could do more ahead of time if we chose to.
> I think I have gone overboard in the scenario islands. I think the next
> game will be much more focused on battling other ships, but I will
> probably still have some scenario islands. A thought which just rolled
> through my mind is to recruit a player to run the islanders.
Sure. Actually I volunteered to do that either last year or the year before.
I have some ideas about how islanders should work but the rules for
implementing it would be better if the ship-players didn't know them.
> This brings some thoughts on creative ways to use assistants in running
> the game. One thought is to have one or two players run the merchant and
> navy ships. This would make sure these ships really get run. The players
> running these ships would need to commit to making the game fun for all
> since initially the navies would certainly outgun the pirates.
I think the way to do this is to make them a viable playable position rather
than setting them up as GMs. Pirates could have a set of victory points or
conditions different from those of imperials which would different from those
of merchants which would be different than those of islanders. That makes four
(or more?) factions that could actually be fun to play with goals that run
sometimes counter and sometimes with each other. It would make for creative
interaction.
> I would really like to do something to do a better job of establishing
> the committed players.
I haven't been committed yet! I will be at brickfest.
The real trick is going to be figuring out how to get out to San Diego on my
employer's tab in February. I can't find an appropriate class to take...yet.
> The past two years, we've started out with a
> feeling of it being a small game, and that assistants would not really
> be so necessary, and would limit the number of actual players. In both
> games (more so the first year, but then the first year it was a very
> novel game to the general fandom, and we were is a central location),
Can we play in a more central location this time? We were really stuck out on
the ass-end of the universe last summer.
> If setup went well on Friday, we could even have a short battle game.
If the GM could arrive earlier that would be possible. ;-)
> I will be examining the rules for ways to streamline them. I've got in
> mind things like a "treasure deck" where I would draw one card per hull
> class of merchant ship.
That's good unless the merchants are PCs.
> I may simplify the weather (I'm not sure how
> much the multiple wind speeds contribute, but it is important that wind
> direction be used and that it change).
I like multiple wind factors (speed and direction) but I'm not sure that the
system in use is that great. I'd like the system to provide a 25% of each
factor changing from one turn to the next. That way, 50% of the time, the wind
would remain the same and only 12.5% of the time would both factors change.
> I may look at starting players
> off with bigger ships (though I hate to then dispense with the cutters,
> though perhaps each player could be started with 2 or 3 classes of ship
I agree that it would complicate the game, but some system of points to spend
would be great. Especially if more than just ship classes were on offer. Can
I buy an especially competent crew instead of an extra hull class?
> hard to come up with a way to run both a battle game and a campaign
> game. By doing that, the big ships would get their glory in the battle
> game, and the campaign game can settle for some players
> making an upgrade to a class 2 or even class 3.
This really doesn't seem that hard to me. Unless you're serious about only
spending six hours on the game. Or was that only out of your Saturday hours?
Chris
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