New GameMasters running the game. How's it going?

[emirikol]

To the new GMs and players of new GMs out there? How is it going?

Jay H

[Sara Marie]

I ran it for some other Paizo folk and we had a blast. It was VERY easy to run and I had great time running it. I am incredibly excited and looking forward to this weekend where I am GMing two of the demo games at the Seattle Beginner Box Bash.

*I do a small to moderate amount of playing, and this was my first real attempt at GMing.

I felt like the game was a lot more "fun" oriented because it was not so complicated. There was so much less time spent worrying about all the different options and what is legal and what a character could/couldn't do. I think a huge part of this was a direct result of taking out AoO's.

[fjw70]

It is going good. My 10 yo DMed my 5 yo and me through Black Fang's Dungeon. It was a lot of fun for all of us. He immediately took the GM Guide to bed with him and started making notes for a follow up adventure to run us through.

The Beginner's Box gets a huge thumbs up from me (this was my first time with PF but I am a verteran of AD&D and 4e).

[kaymanklynman]

fjw70 wrote:

It is going good. My 10 yo DMed my 5 yo and me through Black Fang's Dungeon. It was a lot of fun for all of us. He immediately took the GM Guide to bed with him and started making notes for a follow up adventure to run us through.

The Beginner's Box gets a huge thumbs up from me (this was my first time with PF but I am a verteran of AD&D and 4e).

I am so jealous of you , I have two high intelligent nephews( 7y and 12y, the older one it is already fluently in english). They are asking me every day when the "GAME" will arrive.

What is happening with Amazon? why the publication date is NOVEMBER 15?

I cant wait no more. I NEED that BOX.

A desperate gamer from Brazil.
HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[Elorebaen]

That is an awesome story fj!

[The Rot Grub]

fjw70 wrote:

It is going good. My 10 yo DMed my 5 yo and me through Black Fang's Dungeon. It was a lot of fun for all of us. He immediately took the GM Guide to bed with him and started making notes for a follow up adventure to run us through.

The Beginner's Box gets a huge thumbs up from me (this was my first time with PF but I am a verteran of AD&D and 4e).

I love this! How many of us, as younger gamers, took our old D&D manuals to bed as bedtime reading? Please give us more updates -- I'd love to know what kind of terrible perils this kid is thinking of for his parents! lol

[Liz Courts]

The Rot Grub wrote:

How many of us, as younger gamers, took our old D&D manuals to bed as bedtime reading?

Never stopped. :D

[fjw70]

The Rot Grub wrote:

fjw70 wrote:

It is going good. My 10 yo DMed my 5 yo and me through Black Fang's Dungeon. It was a lot of fun for all of us. He immediately took the GM Guide to bed with him and started making notes for a follow up adventure to run us through.

The Beginner's Box gets a huge thumbs up from me (this was my first time with PF but I am a verteran of AD&D and 4e).

I love this! How many of us, as younger gamers, took our old D&D manuals to bed as bedtime reading? Please give us more updates -- I'd love to know what kind of terrible perils this kid is thinking of for his parents! lol

I will do that. He has hinted that the dragon was in a weakened state when we faced him but he won't be when we face him again.

[Lamplighter]

For those euinning the Beginner's Box Bash demo scenarios, be aware - it is very easy to wipe the entire party of pre-gens in short order. The encounters are epic, and I as GM had to pull punches to avoid killing a party of experienced Pathfinder players who had an extra fighter. New players without optimum tactics can get slaughtered. Be careful out there.

[Helaman]

Lamplighter wrote:

For those euinning the Beginner's Box Bash demo scenarios, be aware - it is very easy to wipe the entire party of pre-gens in short order. The encounters are epic, and I as GM had to pull punches to avoid killing a party of experienced Pathfinder players who had an extra fighter. New players without optimum tactics can get slaughtered. Be careful out there.

Without spoilers we lost the first by surrender after 2 characters went down, beat the 2nd but had one character go down, beat the third by the skin of our teeth - only having one character standing after the battle and only just - it could have just as well been a tpk. The fourth battle was a loss and survival only due to surrender (again). 3 characters were down.

While there are no combat maneuevers for characters in the beginner game, the same cannot be said of the encounters themselves.

Our GM allowed us to go shopping after the 1st encounter - Kyra picked up some BADLY needed chainmail and a shield, Mersiel a longbow and Valorus a second weapon (a two-handed sword). Valorus picked up a breastplate from the big bad in the second encounter that helped keep him up in future rounds.

I'd recommend that upgrading/new equipment is made available for beginner bashes in the future.

The characters are on the wrong side of the average curve in terms of feat selection - NO idea why Ezren has got improved Fort - it may be needed for the box scenario but he go NO use from it in the bash games. Improved initiative was of little help, some of the initatives of the encounters in the bash are quite high.

Kyra's AC blows chunks for someone who is concievably a backup for the fighter - she needs a heavy shield at the least, something again that can be gotten by looting or buying.

[Ninjaxenomorph]

Oh god...

(SPOILERS)

I ran all four demos with some brutal roleplayers two weeks ago, which was my first experience GMing. I think that day gave me a new gray hair for each demo (and I'm barely 18...) but the real test was today.

For four of my friends, plus my brother, I ran Black Fang. The most stable was one of my friends who played pretty much Amiri with an axe. We had an Elven wizard named Kevin, a moody elven rogue who spoiled the dragon by rooting around in my pawns before the game, a badass fighter named Dutch (definitely a 'Real Man'), and an evil Dwarven cleric of Gorum who the rogue grudgingly came to respect. But then the rogue's player got depressed after Black Fang downed her, even though I tried to explained to her that she was not near dead. The cleric was my brother, who actually plays with me in PFS, so I was pretty annoyed with him when he started acting loony.

Some highlights:
The wizard critting a skeleton with a rapier, but due to low strength and DR doing no damage
The entire party letting loose and acting organized vs Black Fang
FINALLY hitting and doing damage... with Black Fang's Acid! AND downing the cleric, so the party got how serious it was.

EDIT I am very disappointed in the fighter (a huge video game fan) in that he didn't suggest we use the Skyrim theme when fighting Black Fang.

[Mr. Gerbik]

I had a real fun session this weekend, GMing for my friend and his 9 year-old son. It was my first GM experience and their first tabletop RPG (I only have very limited RPG experience). I thought they might want to create their characters so we started there, but the youngster quickly grew bored so he went with an elf fighter I had made up (I was most interested in making the first time as fun as possible). His dad was a dwarf cleric.
We went through Black Fang's Dungeon. I was generous with dropping hints and gentle monster tactics and whatnot to keep them interested and things moving.

Spoilers:
The boy probably had the most fun with role-playing with Fatmouth and the goblins, and me too as I can improvise goofy conversations easily enough. I did my best to avoid referencing rules to keep things moving, so there was plenty of not quite right DCs and the like. But they were quite successful at vanquishing enemies, although there were many missed attacks on both sides, which was kind of a drag, probably more than 50%. Possibly the nature of a first level encounter?
I couldn't quite recall how resting and healing worked out and didn't want to spend the time looking for it, so I said they could rest and regain 2 hp. They only did this once so I don't think it was a big deal... the cleric also did some energy channeling
The boy did critical hit Black Fang with the dragon bane, which was a big moment, although he was disappointed the dragon didn't die on the spot. Black Fang did take off after such a vicious attack, however, which caused some visible disappointment on the faces of the players, so we did some entertaining roleplaying which resulted in the fight resuming, at which point he reduced the cleric to negative hp, but the fighter hit again with the dragon bane, and BF left again to cheers.

The 9 year-old's younger brother of 7 and my 5 year-old daughter were on the sidelines offering helpful suggestions and having a good time.

An overall good experience and they want to play again. I'll probably be more strict with rules, etc. next time... And of course my grasp of rules and flexibility will improve as well.