Has anyone ever tried to run an arena for pathfinder? Theres a venue in my town that is openly recruiting new business, and I had the idea of trying to get some tabletop started on Sundays. I had the idea to kick it off by running an arena tournament, but I'm not sure how much interest it would generate.
I guess I'm just looking for feedbackn if anyone is willing to weigh in.
The general idea is to use character creation guidelines, like PFS, to allow players to enter prior to the actual event and then use a bracket system to narrow the event down to a championship match.
Characters would start at some yet-to-be-determined level, and advance if they won.
I have an unlimited number of considerations to table with my local gamers. I'm really just looking for anything that I might be missing that affects the viability of the idea in the first place.
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I keep hearing about an arena combat at our local cons, but I haven't been there at the right times. (It seems to be something that benefits from late nights, and moderate consumption of alcohol.)
Typically, they use the pregens, I believe, which has the advantage that no one gets their feelings hurt if their favorite character gets curb stomped by someone else (who they may have to game with the next week!)
It also opens things up to new players in a way that having everyone build their own character does not do.
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I keep hearing about an arena combat at our local cons, but I haven't been there at the right times. (It seems to be something that benefits from late nights, and moderate consumption of alcohol.)
Typically, they use the pregens, I believe, which has the advantage that no one gets their feelings hurt if their favorite character gets curb stomped by someone else (who they may have to game with the next week!)
This is an idea I could get behind:
Pregen Deathmatch! Five drink minimum!
Lem vs. Meligaster! Sibling rivalry! Two will enter, one will leave!
Ezren vs. Estra! Battle of the Old!
Valeros vs. Hakon! Who is the true master of two-weapon fighting?
We're still ironing out a lot of the details, but character creation was gonna be one of the high points since, as Im fully aware from my own experiences, it gets frustrating to be overwhelmed with good ideas that never see a table.
Im starting by drawing up a setting for the Arena itself, to try and attract some roleplaying draw. Gonna print two sets of fliers. One that appeals to the character development and another that stresses the story. But in the end its just gonna be a good old fashioned d20 bloodbath...
That said, Ive always liked the idea of pregens, but have yet to find gamers that are willing when its time to start the game.
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In regards to the Arena that Flite mentioned, I actually run that event at the local cons. The only time we can really do it is after the Saturday night session. It's a PVP tournament and I select various pregens or npc codex characters. Winner usually gets a book from our prize support, and everyone who participates gets a boon.
We experimented with capture the point/king of the hill but I'm thinking of going back to straight PVP for the November convention. Working on making the arena cooler. Might add wandering monsters to increase the difficulty.
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I keep hearing about an arena combat at our local cons, but I haven't been there at the right times. (It seems to be something that benefits from late nights, and moderate consumption of alcohol.)
Typically, they use the pregens, I believe, which has the advantage that no one gets their feelings hurt if their favorite character gets curb stomped by someone else (who they may have to game with the next week!)
This is an idea I could get behind:
Pregen Deathmatch! Five drink minimum!
Lem vs. Meligaster! Sibling rivalry! Two will enter, one will leave!
Ezren vs. Estra! Battle of the Old!
Valeros vs. Hakon! Who is the true master of two-weapon fighting?
UndeadMitch... sounds like something you should organize, and test out next Wednesday. Maybe starting around 9PM... I have just the volunteers playtesters for you!
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UndeadMitch... sounds like something you should organize, and test out next Wednesday. Maybe starting around 9PM... I have just theI keep hearing about an arena combat at our local cons, but I haven't been there at the right times. (It seems to be something that benefits from late nights, and moderate consumption of alcohol.)
Typically, they use the pregens, I believe, which has the advantage that no one gets their feelings hurt if their favorite character gets curb stomped by someone else (who they may have to game with the next week!)
This is an idea I could get behind:
Pregen Deathmatch! Five drink minimum!
Lem vs. Meligaster! Sibling rivalry! Two will enter, one will leave!
Ezren vs. Estra! Battle of the Old!
Valeros vs. Hakon! Who is the true master of two-weapon fighting?
volunteersplaytesters for you!
Hell, I'm in!
We just recently started talking about this locally. We were gonna simply allow any current, legal PFS character to play. Setup divisions based on level (I'm thinking a special 0-XP division).
Since it's not a sanctioned event, your "real" PFS character doesn't gain/lose anything in it. I figured we'd work up some fluff/flavor about a magical arena that the Grand Lodge maintains for training agents.
Far as I can tell, most people want to have losers brackets, so killing would be frowned upon. As far as the modes being restricted, we were figuring that starting at 1stish would help eliminate that kind of thing, and soeed up the matches, but that if the finals took a while it would work towards the spectacle.
You dont think that the game would balance itself? In the endn the players that know the system would have an edge, but they cant account for every random opponent and terrain.
I know that some class matchups are PSR, but lick is still gonna play a huge factor. Without it though, versatile characters may end up having an edge since some arenas are gonna affect how useful certain abilities are. I.E. a forest arena would be awesome for a rogue, but not so much an wizard.
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I'm talking about rulership channeling clerics of Ra. About gunslingers weilding four double pistols. About vivisectionists-turned-Calikang pouncing while greater invisible. I'm talking about disruptive, sillily overpowered thinktank-bred gamebreakers. But if you do get people to play fair? Do it. I'm just jaded.
Welln it starts at first level. And the equipment will likely be controlled buy in game purses and so on. Some items will certainly be unavailable. But as far as builds gon id like tonleave it open and handle the cheese on a case-by-case if the reception warrants an encore.
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Maybe even prebuilt equipment packages. Im not sure. Im still in the promoting phase lol
I feel like this would need some sort of banned list. There are PFS options I would consider too strong for a reasonable pvp game. It sounds fun though.
Team Objective based games would probably lead to more interesting characters. Even simple classics like capture the flag can add a lot to a game.
This is something we've considered. As well as 2v2, 3v3, PvEn and so on, but id like to kick it off with a 1v1 bracket style tourney and then expand from there.
Owner of the bar is open to a full table top setting on Sundays if the kickoff goes well, so Il have plenty of room for innovation after that.