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What specific ways can you think of that Paizo and the volunteers can improve the PFS experience for GenCon 2013? Please be as detailed as you can. Also, if you like someones idea, say so.
Top on my list: Get the scenarios out to the GMs at least one week earlier. Next year that would be by August 2nd. Mark M. I think this is your department. I have repeatedly heard and read that GMs were not prepared. I myself was not as prepared as I should have been. I really only had time to prepare my maps, collect my minis and get a good overview of what the scenario encompassed. Real-life commitments and getting ready to leave my family for a week consumes much of my days before GenCon. I didn't have time to look over the stat block and understand how the villains would act.
-Swiftbrook
Just My Thoughts
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From what I heard?
Set up the event musters a bit better. A lot of the issues I heard was 'group wrangling' and mustering.
Sooner seated, sooner playing. And with events like the specials time can get critical.
NOW in the planners of this years events.. I heard participation was MUCH greater than planned.
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So I can hang out with my non-PFS friends and play games all weekend? Sweet!I have a number of notes on this, specifically for improving HQ next year. However, I'd like to hear other people's thoughts on the matter.1. Make Sure Jonathan Cary has nothing to do with HQ... ;)
Sorry No, I think the btter Idea is to have you as GM Gopher.
You will need to go to every table during a slot and ask every GM.
"What can I do to help you good sir?"
;)
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Notes for improving Gencon 2013:
1: One of the most popular things I saw was people got a real kick out of seeing Mike and Kyle DM a table, I especially would like to have some Author/GM's at various points. Tim Hitchcock or Mark Moreland running something they wrote would be really cool, of course this would only be possible for some of the tables in a given time slot, but this would be cool.
2: On the issue of mustering, this was only poor at the Special, at other slots it was fine. Pre-mustered table seating for the special I believe would eliminate this concern.
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There are network restrictions to the app idea, plus they'd have to get someone to write it.
I would say a small overhaul to the mustering would help quite a bit! A couple of the volunteers mustering were having people organized by sub-tier (1-2, 4-5 and 3s in the middle). This greatly sped up assembling players of the same sub-tier and allowed the mid-tier players to fill in the gaps. If we approach mustering with this in mind, then I believe games will get started much more quickly.
For "real" ticket holders vs. "generics," it might be easier to have a generic only mustering area, or even another smaller subset.
We had some volunteers telling mobs of people to sort themselves out and just let them know when they could seat a full table. I don't believe it should be the players' jobs to assemble themselves, but the responsibility should fall on the mustering volunteer.
The water for GMs was awesome! I'm going to GM next year (all 10 slots!) just for the water. I'd have given up tokens for water, that's how awesome it is.
Better table signs/numbering system would help. Sometimes it was hard to find the table, but this is a minor issue.
Quick wipe-down of the tables between sessions would help. Sometimes we'd sit down and there was a soda stain or similar on the table that we'd have to wipe up.
Better audio set-up/training. This was a huge issue during the special, but also during other announcements. I understand the convention center was a bit frustrating on this, but a bit more practice with the system you had could have prevented issues.
Overall it was a ton of fun, and I look forward to the next big con I get to attend!
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1. Have a more interactive special. As much as I like the competitive idea for this year's special. I really enjoyed Year of the Shadow Lodges table interaction. (Example-1 table opens a door it opens for all tables)
2. Better table mustering. Some were really good at table mustering (Nani, Mike B), others were really quiet and it took longer then it should have to get tables sorted.
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We had some volunteers telling mobs of people to sort themselves out and just let them know when they could seat a full table. I don't believe it should be the players' jobs to assemble themselves, but the responsibility should fall on the mustering volunteer.
Can you explain this a bit more? I have the complete opposite opinion. If the person mustering has to build tables it'll become an auction, "I need a fighter on table 3, fighter on table 3." (seven hands go up) "4th level fighter with 55hps and tanks" (four hands go down), "65 hps, going once, twice, ..." I've seen it when putting the responsibility of table-building with the muster-volunteer created a huge bottle neck. I've also seen tables rejecting a player because he/she didn't meet their power or class standards and the muster-volunteer asks someone else to appease the rejecting table. That is not a situation for anyone to create or experience.
It's faster when players build themselves into a table of six and elects one person to represent that group who alone approaches the muster-volunteer to be sat. This is how I instruct everyone when I muster. It clears the area so everyone isn't mobbed around me and I can easily sit up to 10 tables in less than 10min. I've seen a smaller mob take 20-30 min when their table-building with the person mustering.
I have the firm belief and experience to prove players can call out what PC they want to play, what tier and fill an available slot quickly. The player can also listen to a table call out its need for a certain class to balance it, and if they have that character, the player can raise their hand to be welcomed to that slot.
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What specific ways can you think of that Paizo and the volunteers can improve the PFS experience for GenCon 2013? Please be as detailed as you can. Also, if you like someones idea, say so.
Top on my list: Get the scenarios out to the GMs at least one week earlier. Next year that would be by August 2nd. Mark M. I think this is your department. I have repeatedly heard and read that GMs were not prepared. I myself was not as prepared as I should have been. I really only had time to prepare my maps, collect my minis and get a good overview of what the scenario encompassed. Real-life commitments and getting ready to leave my family for a week consumes much of my days before GenCon. I didn't have time to look over the stat block and understand how the villains would act.
-Swiftbrook
Just My Thoughts
There's a lot of good feedback and advice on the list Mike Broke started asking for such comments.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Arizona—Tucson
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FWIW, getting scenarios out sooner doesn't guarantee better prepared GMs. There are GMs out there who just won't put the time in.
If you give me the time, I'll generally have appropriate minis picked out. I'll paint some up if I can, ensuring that I have some decent minis. I'll have maps and battlemats printed. I'll make up handouts. I may even make a model.
If you don't give me time for such frivolity, I'll still do the best that I can.
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I partially agree on the mustering.
I had one musterer who would not seat us GMs until he had a table for us. This did not give me a chance to set up before the players got there.
Mustering GMs first should be required.
After Mustering Sunday Morning, I know how overwhelming it can be. Get the Gm's in place then sort by Mod and level.
The Auction table was in the way when turning in Tracking sheets, and should be moved.
A clearer understanding of what is expected of Overflow GMs. I thought I just had to worry about running one mod for my overflow. Turns out I should have been preped for several mods/ and beginner's Box.
And I Googleplex the idea of getting mods out earlier. I didn't get them until after 9pm local, and the printing and downloading didn't get done until 11.
I also like the idea of knowing teirs ahead of time on the special. save time and paper. (I made a doc that listed everyting from teir 1-2, then 3-4, then 4-5, etc. By the time I was done It was 30+ pages long.)
Most times our group played the scenarios, we pretty much took initiative to self muster and create a group. Maybe a few signs to folks in the mustering areas encouraging folks to self muster to speed things up before the sessions would help.
As for the special, I would plan for too many GMs for the special, so that when GMs don't show up, folks are prepared for the specific tier. I felt sorry for some of those GMs who were unprepared during the pressure filled special.
I was really happy with Gencon. My compliments to all involved.
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Mustering players first demonstrates focusing on the PAYING CUSTOMERS and indicates that the (hopefully) compensated judges are expected to provide the desired product . . ..
I totally disagree. You can't have a game without judges, period. So you need to do everything in your power to keep them happy. I remember the good old days when Gen Con had 14 time slots and you could judge 7-8 of them for your motel room and still have some time to play. Then Gen Con went to 10 slots, but the judging requirements weren't adjusted. I'm frankly surprised that the big OP campaigns do as well at attracting judges as they have.
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1) A better mustering system. Contrary to what others have said, it was complete chaos.
2) Make sure you seat people with actual tickets before you seat generics and strictly enforce people having thier tickets at the table when ticket collectors come calling.
3)Make sure the GM's have read and are prepared to run the scenarios. It was painfully obvious that some had not.
4)Don't forget the players who aren't in the Special but are playing a scenario at the same time. Those who got shoved into the overflow room of the overflow room never saw a PFS rep the entire night on saturday.
5)Remember that the people who are there playing spent a large chuck of change to come play your game. They should come first.
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There's some weird vibe about who to treat better your players or your judges.
The whole concept of seating players before judges to be nicer to them seems completely ludicrous to me. It's not about the person sitting at the table has some higher status.
The reason judges need to be seated is they have the most prep necessary. Maps, minis, adventure, chronicle sheets, handouts etc.
The way to provide the best experience to the players is to send them to a table with a GM who's ready to go. Not letting the judge sit down first is not going to make their experience better.
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huston; Did you notice that clipboard the musterers were carrying? That tells them what judges they have, and how many people have been assigned to what table at what tier.
So the Judge physically being there doesn't mater. If they have 10 judges then they can seat 60 players.
If they get enought for another table, they alert the HQ and Hqw gets an overfill to cover it.
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The point that Tim is making is that a GM ideally should be ready to greet their players, have their stuff laid out and ready and not be in a crowd of 7 people trying to jockey for appropriate positions around the table. The GM should have as much stuff as the players, and then some, and so it is a mark of professionalism to seat the GMs at the tables before sending players to them.
The costs that a player pays to get to the con are not really relevant to the order of seating judges before players - seating the judges first lets the judge have time to be ready to run, and it seems that having the players sitting around waiting for their judge is disrespectful to everyone's time.
+1. It let's the judges prepare, and relax.
And then seat tables from highest tier to lowest tier. The reason is because I presume that GMs will only study 2 tiers next time, and upper tier is infinitely more complicated to GM than subtier 1-2. And not every GM has the experience to handle upper tier play.
I think lots of things were done right at this year's Gencon, so congrats. My only suggestion for improvement is to try to do something about the sound. But this probably means less tables. I had trouble hearing at various time this year and everyone especially had trouble hearing announcements. In 2011, the sound was fairly good, but this year was worse than 2009, at least for me.
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Seating the judges first worked well from my perspective last year. Being given my table assignment first meant that I could put out my maps and get my area set up and ready to do w/out having to fight players for table space.
I was sitting down and ready for the players when they arrived at my table and could efficiently collect tickets and get the game going.
My suggestions (based on my perspective of last year since I couldn't make this year)
have muster stations out in the hallway vs inside the room,
have each musterer muster one scenario -- he's better able to create tables from the players available for that scenario...
seat the judges first, this gives them a chance to set things up and be ready for the players
Seat the ticketed players first, generics 2nd, in the case of families that may have split tickets seat them together either under ticket or generic - I had a father/son group last year that ended up with the son being seated with a ticket and the dad kept the generic but they wanted to play together -- this created a 7 player table in a high level scenario and while the table as a whole didn't mind it was still a 7 player table that didn't need to be
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I'm still laughing about the idea of judges being "compensated".
No disrespect to Paizo intended. They took good care of us as GMs and it is immensely appreciated but anyone who things it's a paid gig is delusional beyond measure.
I flew in from Canada and took 3 extra days off work to prepare for my slots. We do this for love, not money.
You do realize we aren't paid the $6 per person per slot as GMs, right?
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You declared that the campaign staff shouldn't bother to get things out to judges earlier because some won't use the time.
Quote? Do us all a favor and stop trying to put words in my mouth just to form a basis for your opinion. I said that giving the scenario out a week sooner doesn't guarantee that GMs will be better prepped. That's it.
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1) A better mustering system. Contrary to what others have said, it was complete chaos.
2) Make sure you seat people with actual tickets before you seat generics and strictly enforce people having thier tickets at the table when ticket collectors come calling.
3)Make sure the GM's have read and are prepared to run the scenarios. It was painfully obvious that some had not.
4)Don't forget the players who aren't in the Special but are playing a scenario at the same time. Those who got shoved into the overflow room of the overflow room never saw a PFS rep the entire night on saturday.
5)Remember that the people who are there playing spent a large chuck of change to come play your game. They should come first.
1) Most slots, except the Special, were sat within 10 minutes from what I observed. What were your experiences so I have a better understanding on what you mean by complete chaos?
2) We will try to do this better next season. I admit this can definitely be improved.
3) How do we make sure this happens? Except for the Season 4 scenarios, most GMs had their scenarios 3-4 weeks in advance. Any suggestions are appreciated.
4) The overflow room was a last minute idea I decided to try to pull off 6 hours before the start. We had so many people asking could they get in with a generic, I didn't want to turn them away. The only room I could secure to do this was to have the open game room. The only other option was to turn away 12 tables of generic tickets, or a total of 70 or so players. I knew the play experience would be a lesser product than the big room. But, which is the greater of two evils? Setting up at least something for those who wouldn't otherwise get to pla the Special, or turning them away outright? In hindsight, maybe we should have turned away all of those generic tickets instead of offering a subpar experience. I don't know though. Thoughts?
5) I'm truly at a loss by what you mean by this. We tried to seat everyone we possibly could who brought a ticket, whether real or generic. How did we not put the players first? I really need feedback so I can improve on this next year.
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When you are living in a world of generic tickets, seating the judges first means telling people they chose to try to get into the wrong game even when you have judges you could assign to them, but you don't know that because the mustering team is all focused on their own bits and pieces, and the judges have already been handled.
How does seating judges first indicate to players that they chose to play the wrong game? I don't understand what you are basing that statement on.
It also makes it VERY easy to handle special situations (special needs players with judges skilled enough to meet those needs), to adjust judges from one module to another based not on who is left but based on who has the other module prepped, and more
Judges are assigned specific scenarios, they aren't required to know the other scenarios .. so switching them from one they spent hours prepping to one they'll have to run cold is not fair to either the judge or the players. The players are paying to play and deserve a good experience not a judge who was handed a scenario at the last minute.
I'm not some spring chicken talking about something he's never seen done. I'm not talking about what makes my life as a player or as a judge easier. Heck, I'm promoting an idea that makes my life as a judge slightly harder!
But it is, based on what I have seen through the years, the process which helps create the best experience for the entire player base, when it is executed well. When any mustering process is executed poorly, it hurts everyone.
I get that you have experience with other game systems throughout the hierarchy, however, PFS has stated time and time again that they are not other gaming systems and it is unfair to expect PFS to conform to the standards that other games used. I don't care to get into that debate so I'll save you the finger pounding in your response
I agree that a good mustering system needs to be in place, I think that's what the majority of this thread has been about. But saying that PFS should be mustered like all other organized campaigns is trying to generalize PFS into the OP world that PFS has worked to define itself out of. Simply put PFS isn't like the other OP campaigns and deserves to be treated and worked with differently. While you may disagree, and it's your right to, generalizing isn't going to work in this case.
PFS needs to create its' own version of the muster and redefine what that means w/in the OP world. Given as there as pretty much been a different campaign leader for the last few GenCons I'm sure that with Mike in charge for a 2nd year that things will be smoother as he'll have some experience doing it.
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Edit: Sorry Mike didn't see your post. Trimmed to the relevant point and deleted the bickering part.
We do it because it is a game, it is fun for all of us. Whatever rewards we receive are appreciated but have absolutely nothing to do with it.
Mustering should be decided based on what is most practical. Comparing our wallets to see who spent the most to be there should have absolutely nothing to do with it.
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Edit: Sorry Mike didn't see your post. Trimmed to the relevant point and deleted the bickering part.
We do it because it is a game, it is fun for all of us. Whatever rewards we receive are appreciated but have absolutely nothing to do with it.
Mustering should be decided based on what is most practical. Comparing our wallets to see who spent the most to be there should have absolutely nothing to do with it.
Speak for yourself, I do it for the women!
Speaking of which, I notice a much higher percentage of women there this year. I wonder if there's any data on that.
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I've generally found that players with disabilities make the judge aware when they get to the table, I don't see the need for assigning a special judge based on disability.
Streamlining the mustering process (in my view) means making muster spots noticeable and accessible to the player and having separate spots for tickets and generics would also be key. Last year there was a huge generic line that usually started as the previous slot ended.
Basically, making noticeable signs as to where players should be and also providing good direction should be key.
The wildcard is and always will be generics as there is no way to track how many there will be, and I think Mike planned for that with having overflow GMs.
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3) How do we make sure this happens? Except for the Season 4 scenarios, most GMs had their scenarios 3-4 weeks in advance. Any suggestions are appreciated.
This one is a hard one but I'll take a stab at it.
I really liked what we did for the special. We gathered before hand and were able to ask questions about what we did not understand. Maybe a similar system can be run where Mike assigns a VO to be the "expert" for a scenario. They make sure to prep it extensively. The first day, 30 minutes before the first slot, we huddle and each "expert" Goes to a specific area. GMs assigned to a specific scenario can go to the table with the "expert" and gather to ask questions, make sure everyone is ready, etc...
Might only work with the brand new scenarios, and I can already think of logistical issues and refinements, but it's just an idea.
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For the benefit of those who weren't at Gen Con, we had 8 muster areas. We had 6 outside in the main hall and two inside because Gen Con would not let me have all 8 in the main hall.
We also had a four foot by six foot board that had smaller versions of each of the 8 muster area boards. The large board was dry erase and we wrote what scenarios were mustering at each area.
No muster area had more than 3 scenarios at each station. The scenarios that had 9 or 10 tables per slot, such as 4-01, were the only scenario mustered at that single station. No station had more than 12 tables to muster during any slot and most only had 8 or less.
I pre mustered each table and what GM was at each on the marshal sheets. I also made sure no two tables adjacent to each other were running the same scenario except the Special. For instance, whomever was mustering 4-01 knew exactly what 10 tables they were mustering to (1,12,16, 21, etc) and exactly which GM was going to each table. I had all muster sheets completed for every table for every slot.
I also had this same exact thing for the Special so knew what table all 75 GMs would be assigned to before the con started. One of the notes I've made is to create a GM assignment board for each slot so every GM will know what table they are assigned to every slot they are GMing. I already have these sorted out before the con starts so it isn't much more effort to go the extra step to have these posted at HQ as well.
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To get things back on track:
- I would suggest whatever system you use, you may wish to have some additional HQ slots dedicated solely to mustering. By sharing these around among the HQ staff this would allow some of your HQ volunteers to have a break for a couple of hours in between slots. Unlike GMs they often didn't have time to run off for a bite to eat (okay it didn't happen for GMs all the time either but that's Gencon).
- I think that there should be one tier one volunteer who is dedicated solely to planning the mustering and training anyone else who will be helping each slot. It is too big of a job for you to have to deal with with everything else on your plate. I don't think that the debate over which system to use is as important as having consistency and a clear plan.
-Having runners look after the GMs and bring us water was awesome beyond words. Maybe if each table had a paddle we could hold up like in the auction if we need assistance from HQ? The less we have to abandon our tables to get stuff the better.
-basic comment cards at HQ with table tents advertising that they are available and that we appreciate feedback. I have gone on and on in another thread about that already so I won't belabour the point.
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3) How do we make sure this happens? Except for the Season 4 scenarios, most GMs had their scenarios 3-4 weeks in advance. Any suggestions are appreciated.This one is a hard one but I'll take a stab at it.
I really liked what we did for the special. We gathered before hand and were able to ask questions about what we did not understand. Maybe a similar system can be run where Mike assigns a VO to be the "expert" for a scenario. They make sure to prep it extensively. The first day, 30 minutes before the first slot, we huddle and each "expert" Goes to a specific area. GMs assigned to a specific scenario can go to the table with the "expert" and gather to ask questions, make sure everyone is ready, etc...
Might only work with the brand new scenarios, and I can already think of logistical issues and refinements, but it's just an idea.
I'm actually planning to work with Gen Con to get a GM meeting on Wednesday afternoon that would last a couple of hours and do this exact thing. Thanks for the ideas.