Pre-gen character sheets - picture, or no?

[nick_coffin]

Forget about those other silly little questions. Time for the important queries...

I'm running a convention GURPS game with pre-gens characters. Should I put character photos on them, or not? What do you prefer?

On one hand, a photo might help a player connect to the character, but on the other hand, his view of the character may be vastly different from mine.

What do you think?

[johndallman]

I wouldn't bother, but I'm not very visual: it takes me years to get round to finding character pictures.

[CeeDub]

It depends. If you were really good at drawing or digital art, creating an image might help the player see the character you had in mind, especially if it's a non-human or modified human.

Do not use a picture of a well-known character. Frex, if you use an image of Harrison Ford for your Adventure Archaeologist, don't be surprised if the first thing the player has his character do is to buy a whip.

[Bruno]

... what kind of pre-generated character doesn't start with their equipment in the first place? Particularly for a convention (quick start) or hand-holding newbie players (giving them a chance to overlook buying the Whip for their Indie clone with 24 points in the Whip skill would be bad).

More seriously, if the idea of the character is indeed to be Montana James, the Harrison Ford picture I think would be very helpful.

[Evil Roy Slade]

Originally Posted by Bruno

... what kind of pre-generated character doesn't start with their equipment in the first place? Particularly for a convention (quick start) or hand-holding newbie players (giving them a chance to overlook buying the Whip for their Indie clone with 24 points in the Whip skill would be bad).

More seriously, if the idea of the character is indeed to be Montana James, the Harrison Ford picture I think would be very helpful.

I would think the better photo would be Garth (a/k/a/ Fedora), the character whom Indiana Jones is an expy of.

[Gollum]

Pictures are required! They are the first contact with the character, what makes people want to try... And often what they will remember after the game.

Did you ever see Shadowrun's character's pictures?

• http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.co...5029731186.jpg
• http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.co...5030445959.jpg

Once you saw them, you immediately know what the game is about, what is its atmosphere. It's far much more effective than a long speech, and far much more attractive too. Which is the goal of a convention.

So, as said above, as long as your pictures are not too famous movie actors who will disturb players from the game ("Oh, I love Harrison Ford, he played so well Han Solo..."), that will be perfect.

[simply Nathan]

Take pictures of the minis you use so people know which sheet goes to which toy.

Only partly joking.

[RogerBW]

I try hard to find character illustrations for one-shot games: for a significant number of players it seems to help them connect with the characters. Some sorts are much easier to find than others... I run a lot of games in something approximating the real modern world, so that helps.

[mook]

Originally Posted by simply Nathan

Take pictures of the minis you use so people know which sheet goes to which toy.

Excellent idea, that's pretty much what I do. :)

For most convention games, I find there's usually not a whole lot of 'connection' with the characters beyond "Ooh, I'll take the knight" or whatever. There are exceptions, of course, but usually there's just not enough time -- you've got about 225 minutes from start to finish, the focus tends to be on really broad strokes. An image of the character can go a long way towards helping the players "get" what they're about without having to even read them all over.

I do try to leave at least the name and gender blank.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Bruno

More seriously, if the idea of the character is indeed to be Montana James, the Harrison Ford picture I think would be very helpful.

I'd use Monterey Jack....