How was your Beginner Box Bash?

[DecembersOwn]

I attended the beginner box bash yesterday at my flgs and had an amazing time! The scenarios were well written and fun, I was able to get my wife to play and enjoy it and she has never played an RPG before. What are your thoughts on the bash?

[Tamago]

DecembersOwn wrote:

I attended the beginner box bash yesterday at my flgs and had an amazing time! The scenarios were well written and fun, I was able to get my wife to play and enjoy it and she has never played an RPG before. What are your thoughts on the bash?

I rand all four demos for a large group here in Indianapolis, and the game went swimmingly! Everyone had a great time!

My table had three experienced PFS players, two Pathfinder players new to PFS, and one person who had done RPGs before but was new to Pathfinder. For the last module, we picked up another player who had played 1st and 4th editions, but not 3.x/PF.

My group had a great time role playing the different characters and going off on little side investigations during the games -- it kept me on my toes as a GM! I ended up kind of melding Terrors and Tomes into a single adventure when the Party decided to do some further investigation into the Twilight Academy in Galduria. The players didn't notice at the time, though, and everyone had fun through it all.

However, people were a little frustrated by the Evil Cleric who stunned two PCs with a Sound Burst and then used Hold Person on another. Not getting a turn is just plain Not Fun. I try to avoid it when I write my own games. After all, the point of the game is to play, so getting hit with a Hold Person is basically saying, "sorry, you can't play for the next 20 minutes. Have fun watching everyone else enjoy the fight!"

But regardless, it was a fun time and a great event! Thanks to everyone involved for all your support!

[lastblacknight]

the Shadow Lodge had a couple of tables running at my local store - Good Games, Burwood - (I was one of the GM's). We had two tables going; one of experienced players and my table of newbies. Both groups had a blast - the hour long format worked really well as people got hooked on the first part and then stayed for the rest.

A really good event. The store loved us and we will have some new players coming to of monthly game days for sure.

Oh and the GM Boon was particularly awesome!

[thelesuit]

The Seattle Beginner Box Bash at Card Kingdom went really well. I don't have a good count of how many players sat tables. But we ran steadily from noon to 6pm, 6+ (at one point ten) tables, with four players per table. Everyone had a blast!!

The mimic encounter was particularly challenging -- but I think most everyone survived. I haven't heard of any TPK's. The wolf in the goblin encounter was also pretty nasty.

We had a good mix of PFS players and new folks and we look to have done a good job of getting the word out (we were pretty much pack the entire time). We also ran 6 PFS tables after the bash with five new PFS players sitting tables.

All in all it was a good day! I am entirely beholding to the folks who stepped up and ran tables.

CJ
Seattle VC

[Michael Brock]

thelesuit wrote:

The Seattle Beginner Box Bash at Card Kingdom went really well. I don't have a good count of how many players sat tables. But we ran steadily from noon to 6pm, 6+ (at one point ten) tables, with four players per table. Everyone had a blast!!

We ran a total of 47 tables of the Bash events at Card Kingdom.

[Drogon]

Michael Brock wrote:

thelesuit wrote:

The Seattle Beginner Box Bash at Card Kingdom went really well. I don't have a good count of how many players sat tables. But we ran steadily from noon to 6pm, 6+ (at one point ten) tables, with four players per table. Everyone had a blast!!

We ran a total of 47 tables of the Bash events at Card Kingdom.

Wow! I'm a little jealous, right now.

We had 17 players at Enchanted Grounds, so 16 tables in all. I gave away a voucher for a huge black dragon from the upcoming minis set, a copy of the Beginner Box, and a miniature of their choice to every player. I think (hope) a good time was had by all.

To echo some of the other comments: the Tome adventure is pretty tough. Dunno if a CR 4 solo should really be part of a "demo" for 1st level pregen characters. I probably should have toned that down a little, considering the ending death total. They were all PFS veterans, for the most part, so I didn't hold back. 'Twas fun, in the end.

Thanks for putting on a good show. I hope the response justifies more of the same kind of event in the future.

[Sarta]

We didn't get a chance to run it. My FLGS said they shot off an email trying to get more info or the Bash materials, but is still waiting for a reply.

Is there simply a link to the Beginner's Bash scenarios and chronicle sheet?

[Rogue Eidolon]

At Pandemonium in Boston we ran two tables each through all four of them. It was totally awesome, though murdertastic. At the minimum size of four, the pregens seemed ill-equipped to handle most of these encounters (though admittedly in Terrors I had excellent luck in critting the cleric with an 18-20/x2 crit before she acted). All but one of the players at my table were tabletop vets, and I think they chose good tactics, but the encounters kept beating the crap out of them.

Relics--TPK:

They refused to hand over the fake because Merisiel had it and it was still worth 150 gold so she wanted to keep it. The enemy Cleric Hold Personed Merisiel, who had gone back over the rune pillars first, forcing Valeros to come across to block the free double damage crits for being helpless, rather than try to kite the Bloody Knuckles. The two guards were incompetent, but the Cleric had ~37 HP and a total of 14d6 negative energy damage to dish out in an AoE, so she eventually TPKed everyone.

Ruins:

The only one to not have a PC death. Three of them were Sleeped by the Chief (he used his Arcane Bonded item to cast it twice, but they had already dropped two goblins by then, and the goblins couldn't really hit them, so they eventually won by meleeing with Ezren.

Terrors:

First round scimitar crit on the Cleric. Valeros bled onto the candle and was flat out killed by the skeletons for it. The Rogue was KOed, and Ezren ran his butt away until eventually the skeletons collapsed.

Tomes:

The mimic basically drops any PC in melee in one round with extremely high probability. It attacked from surprise, so this happened to Kyra and Merisiel before they could go. Everyone else moved away, and it's too slow to chase, so it threatened to kill the downed girls if the team didn't surrender the book. Ezren refused, and so the mimic killed the girls, with Ezren, Valeros, and the professor fleeing the scene with the Apprentice Primer (the mimic was way too slow to give chase--at this point they had hit it with a maximum damage magic missile and tricked it into the fire trap, but no one in the party has good ranged options past that one Magic Missile, so it would have taken too long to kill it and they would have had to flee and take the fight outside, where they were worried the mimic's master would join in.

I think the main problem was that the pregens have no way to heal other than Kyra, so if she goes down, there's no waking up. A potion of healing for each would have made Terrors a fight rather than a successful retreat. The Dexterity of Kyra and Ezren is also rather unfortunate, both for AC and for ranged accuracy. If there was a Barbarian pregen with 16 Strength, 15 Con, 13 Dex, 10 Int, 12 Wis, 8 Cha plus Rage and a Greatsword to replace Ezren or Merisiel (or as an addition), she would probably have helped with the damage output (since she would hit with greater accuracy for about twice as much as Sneak Attacking Merisiel or Valeros's Longsword). As is, it's going to be hard for a party of 4 to whittle away enough hit points in Tomes before being wiped out without resorting to a total kite tactic based on move speed where they spend ~10 rounds firing and running away from the melee-only enemy while it can't counterattack.

The flavor of the scenarios was awesome and everyone had a great time. No one minded all the character deaths at all, since there was no consequence, and since we had experienced players, they loved the challenge. The most experienced Pathfinder player told me it was way more awesome than expected, as the challenge and flavor were both exact what they would have expected from a non-beginner event. However, I feel bad for actual beginners and/or children unless the GM lowballed it. If the beginners were the sorts to place blame internally, they might think something like "We weren't good enough to play even the beginner box bash."

[Qstor]

I think the mimic was over the top. So I adjusted it. I agree about the lack of healing other than Kyra. Did anyone have a group that had no cleric? That would be a TPK in some of the encounters.

Mike

[Tracy Windeknecht]

Qstor wrote:

I think the mimic was over the top. So I adjusted it. I agree about the lack of healing other than Kyra. Did anyone have a group that had no cleric? That would be a TPK in some of the encounters.

Mike

We had a party without a Kyra TPK'd in Indy on Tomes. The table insisted that the GM go all out, though. Sounds like the mimic got a surprise round and was lucky on the initiative.

24 tables in total ran at three different game stores in Indy. It seems like a good time was had by all!

[Michael Brock]

Sarta wrote:

We didn't get a chance to run it. My FLGS said they shot off an email trying to get more info or the Bash materials, but is still waiting for a reply.

Is there simply a link to the Beginner's Bash scenarios and chronicle sheet?

I've responded to every email I received. Make sure they check and have the correct email. Mine is [e-mail]

[Dragnmoon]

Here are some Pics from our Bash!

Friend teaching the Beginner Box
Young Friend teaching the Beginner Box
2 Friends teaching the Beginner Box
Merisiel Vs Mimic

[Lamplighter]

I ran four rounds at C4 Comic Con, and got a nice mix of experienced PFS'ers and new folks. Ran with 4-5 players each time, and had to pull punches to avoid killing folks on two of the four.

Tomes:

Spoiler:

This was the hardest one, the mimic killed the rogue from surprise, everyone else's weapons got stuck, and I could have TPK'd had I not started rolling behind the screen to pull punches.

Terrors:

Spoiler:

Nasty as well, AC21 and DR/5 big bad guy is tough for first level folks. The party went right for the candle to put it out, hoping they skeletons would all die immediately. Alas, it was the cleric who tried this stunt, and he was surrounded and dropped right away. No healing and no channeling makes this a very deadly fight.

Relics:

Spoiler:

A fun one - the group (including two newbies) negotiated their way out of it without a fight after solving the puzzle and rescuing the rogue who fell into the pit. I had the cleric leave, and kept the guards around for a round or two just in case the newbies wanted to try out the combat system, but the whole party was quite happy to win without fighting. (I hope those guys come to PFS!)

Ruins:

Spoiler:

Wished I could have played the goblins more... goblin-y. Fairly straightforward and not a tough fight.

[Chris Mortika]

The local VC ran it for us last night at the local game store. I played along with two new-ish guys (one is playing through a 3,5 Rise of the Runelords campaign) and the couple who owns the store.

I thought the battles were very simple and pedestrian. The mimic (AC 13? Really?) landed one blow to grapple a PC before it was brought down. The rest of the fights were all of a kind: A bunch of skeleton goons. A bunch of goblin goons with a wolf. A team of three brigand goons. We cycled the pre-gens around so the novelty was more "I'm now the cleric" rather than the fights themselves.

Out of curiosity, if the opportunity to run these quests ever comes up, I'd be happy to run more people through them. Are they available anywhere?

[Rogue Eidolon]

Chris Mortika wrote:

The local VC ran it for us last night at the local game store. I played along with two new-ish guys (one is playing through a 3,5 Rise of the Runelords campaign) and the couple who owns the store.

I thought the battles were very simple and pedestrian. The mimic (AC 13? Really?) landed one blow to grapple a PC before it was brought down. The rest of the fights were all of a kind: A bunch of skeleton goons. A bunch of goblin goons with a wolf. A team of three brigand goons. We cycled the pre-gens around so the novelty was more "I'm now the cleric" rather than the fights themselves.

Out of curiosity, if the opportunity to run these quests ever comes up, I'd be happy to run more people through them. Are they available anywhere?

Uhh, it should have had the same stats as the Bestiary Mimic (16 AC, 52 HP, +10 to hit for 1d8+6). I'm guessing your group's GM gave you a toned-down version due to its killtastic tendencies.