tips for demo'ing DFRPG?

[Tom H.]

Originally Posted by Dalin

This is a great idea, and especially useful when they have multiple sources of energy (FP, ER, and a power item). I've been thinking of a similar sheet, but didn't think of tokens. I was just going to have boxes that players could label for various quantities that change a lot: HP, FP, ER, power items, and arrows.

Yes, this is one reason I recently posted an example character sheet of how I presented it, see Tom's Demo Reports.

For my characters that have arrows, I just listed groups of capital O's that players can mark off in the equipment listing. For the demo, I let players choose on the fly whether each arrow they loaded was bodkin or regular.

[Beoferret]

Well, I gave the demo this past Saturday and it was a mixed bag experience, but still fun. I got together a bunch of pre-gens (from the standard pre-gens, along with some from the forums and HoJ) and wrote a basic summary of each character's advantages and disadvantages ... which I then forgot to actually print up. Crud. (At least that info's ready for next time!) Only two people actually showed up, both of which had prior GURPS experience (one had DFRPG experience too.) So I didn't introduce anyone new to the game. BUT, I did get to help explain some of the magic rules a little better to the guy who'd played DFRPG before, and we had an overall good time.

I went with "You All Meet At An Inn," since it was so simple and direct. The players picked Uncle Seamus from the pre-gen packet and Bash Crashky, the half-ogre knight that Kromm posted to the forums. I ended up shortening the underground portion of the adventure (into three rooms, instead of four) and dropped several of the encounters, since there was only two players and since time began to be an issue. High points of the adventure were: them messing with a potion/snake-oil salesman who tried to sell them stuff, a great hasted Bash slicing up lots of zombies, Bash grappling with the flame lord in the Hidden Temple and jumping into the well with it (which I ruled killed it after a couple of turns, and them being carved up real good by the peshkali.) I kept the guardian crypt, but modified it so that it as just a fright-check inducing magical trap (visions of Raiders of the Lost Ark-style melting face, once someone tried to take the sword held by an otherwise inert skeleton.)

Anyhow, no new DFRPG players. I didn't help the shop I demo'd at sell their copy of the boxed set. But a good time was had and I found some other people I can play some GURPS/"power by GURPS" games with. Thanks for the advice and help everyone!

[Tom H.]

Originally Posted by Beoferret

Well, I gave the demo this past Saturday and it was a mixed bag experience, but still fun.

Thank you for updating us Beoferret; I was curious how it turned out.

It sounds like you got to enough adventure content, which is great considering a lot of GURPS mechanics. Granted, the players weren't newbies.

Sorry that there wasn't a larger turnout with more uninitiated. However, it reminds me of an event I attended maybe in the last year in Austin.

Someone advertised at a local game store to introduce GURPS 4th Ed. I arrived late just to check it out. There was only one other attendee beside the host. I believe the attendee had some past exposure to previous GURPS editions.

I caught the tail end of a demo in which the host was teaching a single combat with all the detail between a mage and a fighter.

Anyway, the point is that that similar event had about the same attendance as yours.