Re: Big Games

At 01:26 PM 5/21/02 -0400, you wrote:

(My mail appears to be acting up; the messages I sent on Monday took
nearly
a full day to be posted to the list.  With luck, the curse will be
lifted
with this one, which I am sending on Wednesday evening.  If not, well, I
blame society.)

>Not to sound pedantic but...  don't run FMA skirmish...
>
>Not for a big game with all-new players.  If I was going to run a game
of
>that size for new players (and frankly, when I run demo games at
>conventions or stores, I like to keep them to 4 players or less, just
so I
>don't go mad), I'd do a Stargrunt game where each player gets to
control
>maybe 2 squads, or a squad and a vehicle.  And I'd leave out all of the
>"optional" rules, and keep the equipment types and TO&E's simple.  Then
>they get to see the nature of the game, but it doesn't get bogged down
in
>detail.  FMA skirmish is fun, but can have lots of detail.  While the
basic
>mechanics are simple, it's like running a stargrunt game when you add
on
>all the extra stuff (off table arty, EW, etc etc) - slows the game down
a
>lot, and can be confusing for new players.

The general idea is to kick off a miniatures group that's going to meet
once or twice a month, hopefully drawing new players into the fold along
the way.  Ultimately, the best thing to do is to run multiple games (the
store in question could support two, maybe three games at a time), but
it's
hard to be sure how many people will be showing up at first.  This in
mind,
I'm trying to run something that will accomidate as many people as
possible, while remaining playable at the same time.  Full FMA might not
be
the best choice for this, as I'm starting to see.

>And, of course, you can't buy FMA skirmish yet...  Only the lucky folks
on
>the test list have up-to-date versions of the game.  If you're going to
do
>a demo in a store, you might consider demoing a game that the store can
>actually stock, and use miniatures that they have "for sale".

This is an excellent point, frankly.  Of course, of my two system
choices,
one is OOP and the other is NYIP (Not Yet In Print), so I'm reasonably
damned whichever way I choose to go.

Story of my life, that.

>Beyond that, perhaps consider creating and printing a "rules summary"
card
>with the basics of fire combat - keeping it *really* simple - for
players
>to refer to.  Maybe one side can have the "how to shoot" instructions,
and
>the other could have a squad card for the squad or two that they are
>running.  That would include a quick description of how you calculate
squad
>firepower, etc.

So noted; that's something for me to work on over the next few weeks.

>I don't normally use squad cards because I've got all that stuff in my
>head, usually, but I've played a couple of games run by Tom Barclay
where
>he supplied squad cards for all the units, and it could be a help for
new
>players.

I always try to do this, and should have no problem with having these
for
the game no matter *what* system I run.  I tend to lavish far too much
time
on this kind of frippery, as anyone who saw my squad card for Carnage
Con
Queso can attest.

John Crimmins
johncrim@voicenet.com