February Dungeon Run Review

mythic

mythic

Exemplar
Hi folks!

So with after a very busy day we would love to hear what you thought of our first Dungeon Run. High points, low points, what you liked and of course what we could improve upon.

I would also like to hear how people liked/disliked "double hooking". This is where you took a turn at being the monsters for the next group.

Post your thoughts below!
 
Firstly I would like to make an apology to you my fellow larpers. Part of what I thought of during this review what I did with the characters.

I have gotten a bit too eager and entered different individual’s personal bubble. I apologize if I cause you any discomfort. I have to remind myself that we all perceive this differently. Please contact me know if you want to talk about this personally.

*I would like to mention that I am bringing this on my own and I have not heard of any complaint. I appreciate playing with all of you and want to keep it fun for all of us. Don’t hesitate to approach me for anything if you ever wish so.

Secondly the review:

I had a great event. Unfortunately I must say at times it slowed down a bit but It was expected.


-Thank you to David for going to do some errands and get some stuff to facilitate the day.

- Thank you to all the NPCs for helping making the tavern more living during the event.

- Thank you to the PCs for playing along.

I had a great time. Funny unexpected things made the whole day more interesting. We had the visit of a dog wearing a hat..We had some strange visitors. Apparently our drinks are not strong enough …
 
I had a lot of fun, despite being absolutely exhausted afterwards. Double hooking was interesting, and though the whole thing felt very rushed, I think that's normal? It was still fun, especially bursting out of that scarcophagus - I'd spent the whole time group three was doing their run laying curled up on the floor with my head on my boffer, waiting for them to come into my room. I'm pretty sure I fell asleep a couple times, hehehe.

Some thoughts -

When Gwen knocked on my box, it tipped off some of the players that I was about to come out - I know Garnett, for sure, was expecting it. Maybe some other way of signaling hidden NPC's in the future? not that we had time to set anything up, though even a string tied to my finder, or a bell being rung elsewhere in the hangar would have done it.

Rearranging the whole dungeon every time seems, in hindsight, to be kind of excessive. I think it would have been much less work overall to use the same overall room arrangement every time, and just change the props. There ought to be a way to change the flow of the dungeon with just a few small changes.
 
Third said:
Rearranging the whole dungeon every time seems, in hindsight, to be kind of excessive. I think it would have been much less work overall to use the same overall room arrangement every time, and just change the props. There ought to be a way to change the flow of the dungeon with just a few small changes.
Click to expand...

Yup. PLOT has already discussed this and agreed that "next time" the room layout will remain where they are and our dungeons will "fit" to the floorplan. :thumbsup:
 
Well seems the plot director.....in training, should have gotten all our props etc sorted out Phillippe.....opps my bad. :yummy: I would like to thank Shauna for helping me out with tavern, the npcs, you guys were awesome and patient with the new guy hehe. To the players, I hope we kept you entertained if not let us know what we can do to improve your game.
 
i had a ton of fun in the dungeon my group was tight the threat was there it was a good time. Special thanks again to keith for the loaner boffer :). also third I can't speak for the others but i didn't notice any tapping on your coffin though i remember one of my party saying "watch that something probably coming out" as we entered (who knows how accurate my memory is) it was a heck of a shock to see half my party arrested for conspiracy XD. all in all i had a good day and really enjoyed myself.
 
Event Review:

Overall: For the first dungeon crawl for Calgary Alliance, well done! It was definitely a lot of things learned and several things to consider for future events like this. I had a lot of fun both as npc and pc, and with it I hope our new players and veterans alike enjoyed what they saw in and off the dungeon field. Now for the specifics:

Dungeons vs Parties: These were for the most part well designed for the level ranges to expect and the parties composition. I heard the fighter group got plenty of fighting while ours a lot of traps-for the tower I did not hear as much but these ones were fairly well and played.

My only concern came of the new players and theirs, which was set up I thought at first very simple and straight forward. Because of the unwillingness to attempt either destroying the door via action (chopping at the door one, two) or forgetting the key piece of evidence it was ironically one of the longest bits for it; well played on the npcs squatters. The problem came of the effects of the frog man and the werewolf against effectively a crowd of people in a small hall or at least encouraging them first to get in the room as most were casters-the two able melee characters from my understanding had almost no armour due to a miss-communication for one of them back at logistics.

While it was up to the players, the “easy” mobs were likely now also terrifying because they broke weapons on the frog and the werewolf was swinging for six. For the experienced players, hearing “werewolf” and “frog” would have brought up the more fearful reality of the things, but for players (at least half their first real taste outside of a tavern night) it seemed overbearing, especially with the fact while players are willing to re-supply it would have been discouraging.

New Characters/Players: I did notice a sudden untrusting aura about several new characters and players after the dungeon that was the sewers event. While this was less at the environment they were put in, I have some suspicion it was because of the party mechanics that played out that they felt treated badly on being unused to the game and taken advantaged of. Walking away with two silverpieces when it's verbally known other groups walked away with up to two gold pieces a member would irk me as well, and when I asked about magic items four of their members blinked and asked “We got miniscule rewards at all, what about magic items?”
I would like new blood in our ranks and to be encouraging new players to enjoy ourselves. I'll not name my suspects but I will ask personally to not pull Kaldorian tactics on the new folks to at least let them enjoy and get used to the game before someone starts introducing sharp wit and scams.
 
I had a great time myself though was exhuasting before arriving. Going to groups in dungeon was interesting expernice. Playing npc roles was fun afterwards. Can't wait for the tavern night Trial of Tal the traitor :)
 
Overall - I had a great time. I felt kind of useless overall in the dungeon (except I did eventually remember that Artie said to tell them he sent us - but I was Paranoid when the rest of the party started talking to the NPCs and for some reason was under the impression that they were talking to an Ogre when I was expecting to tell that to a thief's guild. I love, however, that it gave Kimahri a chance to try to sell them coffee :D )


Between failing to spot (let alone disarm) every trap and spending a fight literally dumping out my bag wondering where I put my Cause Damage gas globes while everyone else was fighting werewolves w/o silver weapons was annoying (I also should have known from my foray into the smurf village last summer that giant frogs sometimes have acidic skin - damnit!). I was pleased that I managed to unlock the first door we encountered with tweezers (even though the NPC promptly re-locked it before I could convince the fighter to open the door) I was also kind of pleased when Abbey (as marshal) asked me how I unlocked the door to the werewolves so quickly. "I had a key..." "Yeah.. but it was a puzzle lock." "Uh... okay that explains why the sliding bar was shaped so weirdly, but it seemed pretty straight forward to me, did I not do it right?"

I loved some of the alternate uses for skills - digging a chest out of a wall with a blacksmith phys-rep while the celestial casters kept the frog at bay (we didn't want to kill it) was kind of fun! I'm just glad the marshal was counting because I kept losing count - 5 minutes is a long time to focus when you have ADHD :P

In retrospect - we probably shouldn't have gone in with 7 people (even though I was the most vocal in saying it would be the most fair to all who arrived) This, combined with the fact we were a little nervous to go into the rooms was what caused the fights in the hallway to be very, very bad for us (but I couldn't bear the thought of leaving a player behind just because we had one too many people :( ) I very clearly remember at once point everyone cowering behind me since I had the most armour (10) and whacking a zombie for 2 with my staff before ducking into the room where we fought the werewolves ... only to hear the walls falling down in the hallway behind me.

I was really looking forward to 'double hooking' and a little sad that I didn't get a chance to play a monster :(.


The twist at the end - having pretty much every person that Math considers a trusted ally all being arrested for Treason all at the same time... quite a shock!


Garnett wrote;
"Walking away with two silverpieces when it's verbally known other groups walked away with up to two gold pieces a member would irk me as well, and when I asked about magic items four of their members blinked and asked “We got miniscule rewards at all, what about magic items?” "

While the coin distribution is already being addressed in detail - I do want to point out that Math has *never ever ever* seen a magic Item except for a Titan Token that was given as a reward for RPing (1 event use only) and a silence item that got used ON him (but he doesn't remember that). Also - this was the first event I've ever seen a reagent - and I've been playing nearly a year!

Maybe this can be chalked down to the fact that I'm a support character for the most part and don't loot bodies directly, but it does seem a little annoying when people talk about magic items non-chalantly and I'm like 'wow - those things are pretty rare, I don't even believe they exist'.
 
One other thing that just came to mind - if there's a time limit, I think players need to know that before they go in - not mere minutes before the time is up. My group didn't know there was a time limit until there was 10 minutes remaining - and I hear the FIRST group didn't know until they were told "2 minutes left" which basically caused them to grab everything they could and BOOK IT!
 
>flex the mental fingers<


Okay lets have a great honking look at this shall we?

I have taken part in a number of dungeon crawls. And I've had the "joys" of also helping set up and even suddenly find myself hooked into NPC'ing in them as well. So perhaps I come at this with a different view point.

I come back thinking what was executed was brilliant. Not afraid to admit it. Yes, I will grant there is "learning curve" involved here as they've never done this before. I am thrilled to think they've set the bar this high this soon, but that's starting to become what i expect from the "Resurrected and Improved" Alliance crew here. This is what I expected from Alliance in the beginning the first time, so they wonder why we keep coming back for more? :whaa:

All right let's break it down more then.

I liked how Tavern was used to swap tales before and after, and how the npc camp along with players helped keep in engaging. We even had a "patrol" to figure out what all that howling was...least after certain games of chance were dealt with. No luck but frankly we weren't going to search an area in cold we don't know so well with "bar and other unsafe things" sticking out near ice. Last thing we need is Cory making a desperate lunge for the medical waivers. :shock:

Love our new players...I think Tess is adapting the Sarr coffee merchant. :yes:

Ah, now the big moment. The Dungeon Crawl. >dun dun daaaaaaaaa<

I have had my fun designing a dungeon and going through the routine of "setting it up". I've had the fun of finding out about "lack of electricity not scouted"...seen "real bones and blood" used, and the stains that left. I've had to design traps, puzzles, and even be in the dungeon furiously trying to get things ready while a party is already making it's way through. Designing and running a dungeon on paper is one thing, setting it up live, QUITE another! It is then you get a real appreciation of just what this team had to go through and perform. I think they achieved the goal with dare I even say it, panache? I shall elaborate.

The extra decoration and details that were different for each dungeon crawl added so much to the adventure! I know that adding little things like that fantastically add to the immersion and overall "role play" for the characters involved. (The Big revel we had of "say, isn't that?" made for quite the discussion with the characters.) The little clues left here and there that let the "smart characters" suspect that the Crypt had "something that comes in and out" meant that when we got ambushed, we were ready for it. (Sorry, Laurent is an old dungeon crawl vet literally, he sees a crypt with the "hints" that something has come in and out from examination, and he made sure the party knew to be ready. Course the scream and leap still made for brown trousers time, well done! :hahaha: ) And our Kobold Mine detector did her job also flawlessly, much to the sighs of the betting pool against her back at the tavern.

Modular. I am still pretty impressed with the kahonnes it took to come up and execute that. And it is brilliant. I have seen the crew in Chicago do that, but they only change after a Day...this was after each run. Balls to the walls on that one, and I think it does work. The limitations only come from experience, and materials. Give them some real time and I think we might see a larger run in the future. There was impressive use of the space to make different designs, problems, battle grounds and encounters. And with the lessons learned by the plot team in "And now we see how it works in action and not theory" I feel pretty confident we're going to see an even further "step up" the next time. Bluntly I think the concept and execution are so good the plot team really needs to write this up and send it in to the Alliance HQ so that other chapters can feel the "step up challenge" that this does.

Now I'll pause on the "high praise" and agree, after several swap out the materials did indeed show "wear and tear"...that might have helped with the cave ins of the fourth group. (Yep, us monsters saw the "sag".) Again, learning curve. I am pretty confident that now seeing how the set up and materials act in proper field conditions over several times, they will come up with solutions. Identify a problem, solve it. One just has to be aware of it, and again that is not going to come up until AFTER you've done it.

Mind you the fourth group skipping the "easy encounter of paddy-cake zombies" and going for the tough ones first...>facepalm< Just read the cartoon on how players and DM's are in a never ending quest of messing the other up. :roll:

So group Three is a particularly good example of "How to successfully win a dungeon crawl". That comes down to the characters in that group and what they can do. Imperials and Biata with a selected Home Guard ranged specialist, it was one pretty effective group. Okay we "squelched" the first home, but that was literally getting used to lower light at the time. If anything that was Team Canadian losing to Sweden game one. :grrr: We came home with the gold didn't we?

Monster view. Again I think that this was a pretty inspired line of thinking. Gives plot more resources, and makes the players more involved. That was fun! Okay maybe not as much fun for the Zombie room...though that was a great game of paddy-cake! (thank you Bud and Big Daddy...) Sometimes I really do think what you get out of NPC is what you bring to it. Goes back to the earlier speech of "try out NPC camp once in a season" to see what the other side is like. I stand by the thinking that it really is a good idea and should be done by PC's at least once. Besides there is some untapped acting and Christopher Walken talent out there. ("Oh me me me pick me!")

Ah the great treasure debate. Some groups did miss things, others were like an Imperial at a coin factory. :funny: It will work out, and funny enough it will be likely over the next few sessions how it all sorts out in the end as interactions by the players will help others get a better feel for "heroic" in this kingdom. (the grossly slanderous and misaligned charges of the four true heroes of the Breach non-withstanding...roasted Biata anyone?) Just ask Math and Third hwo they've gotten aid from the unlikely of sources...and I am pretty sure there are more stories to tell on that. (Without giving away the secrets of the homeworld.)

Now to get my Christopher Walken on, as next session I have a circus to perform at. :twisted:
 
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