I Have Powers - January 28th, 2008

So,

drivingblind picked me up from the Greenbelt metro station, and we went up Columbia way to pick up

rob_donoghue.

During the drive to NJ, much was discussed -- S7S modifications, Dead Inside the Second Edition, and Hyperworld -- as long range plans.

(Unfortunately, actually running and talking about S7S has, in retrospect, invalidated about 90% of the S7S ideas generated on the drive up to Dreamation 2008.)

We got to the hotel, checked in, and had a couple hours before we could register at the con. This time was spent in the company of several kickass-cool people, most notably

ptevis and

macklinr.

Eventually, I was able to register, and prepped for my demo slot.

. . .

As far as I can tell, I made every single rookie mistake for running a demo/playtest session that you could:
* I allowed 7 people to participate in what is essentially a 4 person slot.
* I talked a lot -- probably at least an hour and fifteen for setting description and going through chargen.
* I offered the full scope of the entire game for chargen.
* I am craptastic at describing systemic issues verbally (written, I'm okay).
* The simple fact that 7 ppl around the table made it difficult to pay attention to everyone.
* I felt I gave short shrift to Dreamation playtesters ~~Richard Flynn~~ Matthew Gagan/

nemomeme,

spring_violet,

miranda1369, and Steve Harvey.

All that being said: the session ROCKED. Everyone seemed to "get it" and were willing to run with it.

The biggest problems were narrative control (I blame myself for falling into old GMing patterns) and PDQ style damage (a recurring issue).

I feel bad about the former in general (it was my first con game, and I got nervous) and sincerely bad about the latter (the reduction of Ranks in PDQ games from damage is a constant roadbump; it's inobvious to many folks what I'm trying to do with it and how it works; biggest issue is the divide between trying to treat it as representational of something or just treating it as an ability).

Despite a hazy initial premise and some rules potholes, I think we ended up having an enjoyable gaming slot. Everybody seemed to have fun -- and that's what's important.

Afterwards, we did a short debriefing -- what I like to call "What Was Good? What Was Bad? What Was Ugly?" Fantastic comments given, which -- along with a discussion with

macklinr over brunch -- helped me refine stuff for running a pick-up game on Sabaday.

Good stuff, all around.

For a very brief comment on the Thorsday night game, see:

http://spring-violet.livejournal.com/248793.html

Tags: asmp, conventions, evilhat, game design, gaming, s7s