Discussion of Modifications to the Normal Squash
In michalmas 2015 I propose trying to do a Durham style 'Chat and Stat' meet in a pub or college JCR rather than the societies normal weapons practice for the squash. The intent would be to have an informal meeting where new players can learn about the society and game and work through ideas for their first characters. In an ideal world all interested newbies would leave with an idea of what they want to play for their first char and possibly a set of numbers to go with this, though that is more optional. My hope is that this will allow for new players to come into the game with more engagement and give them opportunities to do things like buy starting bits of kit from charity shops before the first interactive.
Please if you have any comments or thoughts about this please put them below, please tag comments as it will make it easier to follow conversations.
Comments and Thoughts
- I'm a fan of this idea. ~Ivan
- Agreed! As long as it doesn't get scarily numbers-heavy. It also might be fun to bring some weapons just for holding and stuff, or to also hold a weapons practice on a different day. But IDK. Also, might be a good idea to print out some nice NFNC pictures and talk about what happened in them. Sort of illustrate some of the stories, you know? ~Pia
- Yeah, I was wondering about this one. I was thinking if it might be worth organising a bit before hand and having most people be general talky, and just one or two being 'ask me about numbers'. --Hark
- What Pia said. I'm very wary of this turning into a numbers-fest, given some of our players tendencies. If that doesn't happen, all is good. --Pufferfish
- Might be good for us to start a list for people to sign up as "They will be there" and state if they'll be a statbunny or a talkbunny... And statbunnies, please discuss beforehand and keep lists of what characters you've statted in order to avoid warrior saturation like last year. :)
- ALSO, in previous years, some new players have found it a bit intimidating how tons of people who know each other really well turn up and just talk to each other. So, I'd like to propose holding an extra frothsquash for society members just as a social-catching-up event, and remind people that the Chat and Stat is mostly for the benefit of potential new players. ~Pia
- It's also just a great idea in general ~IvanS?
- Current refthinking is talk to people, have some quickstart guides and example builds on hand, maybe a hard copy of the manual, and a small weapons practice in a different area of the hall. I think NFNC froth should be encouraged (esp along the lines of 'I play X, and they did these cool things last year!'), but second the point that general froth can be offputting. --Hobnoblin
Documents
- We get warrior saturation every year. It is a known issue. I've made a minimal-numbers summary of what the Ritual trees do for the Manual, and I'm going to work on that for the other Skills. The idea is to have a short summary of what the rules let you do ("Teleport things", "Make zombies", "Divination", "Do more damage") without going with how they necessarily do it. That way players have some starting points before they need to bother with too much detail. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LHb9NUX_fQfHg75Z0S0VF4YY6sAfhseSVhIJ1LnVCVo/edit?usp=sharing --Jim
- I think it could be useful to have some "fill in the blanks" character concepts that are not tied to any given statsheet. So vague backgrounds, with say 5 leading questions to answer about who your character is. Like "What is your character's greatest ambition and why?" for the Aspirant. Stuff to help a new player put ideas together that roughly fit the brief. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xSXbMYsvioj1zdFYksgics-ti_CVrAyHheGs7ggKzi0/edit# --Jim