Con newbie runs Sorcerer

[droog]

I just attended my first con on the weekend, so I thought I'd try to get down my impressions in an actual play context.

Unicon is a small con run by a local uni club (if I'm not mistaken). It seemed to me when I arrived on Saturday morning that everybody knew everybody else. My own offering, In Utero, was rather overlooked (I had two people signed up at two different times and nobody else). Nobody at all for the first session. Oh, well, I'd half expected it, as I didn't know anybody.

Then two friendly-looking fellows rocked up and said they wanted to play Sorcerer. I asked them if they could rake up another player, which they did in short order. So I had Gareth, Matt, and Alice. Oh, I have to get a room. Off we go, to find that the room is devoid of any sort of table or other dice-rolling surface (apart from the floor). Tricky. We moved to a nearby room and sat around a box.

I think I'm getting pretty slick at introducing Sorcerer. I told them that it was a game about summoning and consorting with demons, that demons were things that weren't supposed to be, and that they'd need a bunch of d10s. Matt and Gareth both had lots of questions, being already interested in Sorcerer, but I tried to move on through and keep it from getting fragmentary.

Then I gave them the backstory and handed out the character sheets. We went through the numbers with a quick explanation of each stat and its role. I explained that Kickers would normally be written by the players, and that this was an important part of playing Sorcerer (Matt was impressed by that). Then we got to the first scene. Elapsed time: about ten minutes.

It looked to me as if none of the others had the slightest trouble with the rules. I have found this every time I've introduced people to Sorcerer, for what it's worth. We had several combat situations (it was a particularly bloody game), which all resolved quickly and cleanly. That Jennifer demon sure is tough in a cat-fight.

Time was running out, so I broke off at the point where they had succeeded in a Banish ritual against 'Jennifer' and 'Robert', and we discussed what might happen next, whether the characters' stories were done, what were their fates, and whether they could be played further, which led to discussion of how the play cycle of Sorcerer works.

I'd give the game about a 7. It neither sank to the depths nor soared to the heights (not many Humanity rolls), but the players were engaged and Matt and Gareth both said I'd sold them on Sorcerer. I was happy. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to do any cross-analysis, because my other sessions were cancelled for lack of players and I never got any others up. But I got to know lots of people, and play a few good games, and I guess that's what it's about.

[muddlepud]

If I wasn't GMing so much during the Con, I would have played! Curses!
I'm currently reading through the game at the moment and would like to see how it plays out.
Once I get Indie Sundays up and running again, I'll get you to run Sorcerer at one of them. I'll email at some point soon about that.

[Ron Edwards]

Sounds like a happy story to me!!

Did the two guys already know Alice, before recruiting her? Did the characters they chose to play line up with the real players' genders?

Best, Ron

[droog]

Hi Scott – I'd appreciate it.

Hi Ron – Yeah, Matt knew Alice from somewhere. If I recall correctly, Gareth took the fetus first (seems to be usual), Alice said she'd play Jennifer, and Matt took up the slack, so no surprises there.

[Ron Edwards]

Off we go, to find that the room is devoid of any sort of table or other dice-rolling surface (apart from the floor). Tricky. We moved to a nearby room and sat around a box.

There's something very punky about this, which simultaneously exasperates me (whaddaya mean nothing in the room you were assigned!) and delights me ("wherever you train, that's a dojo").

Great work, Jeff. Thanks for representing the game so well.

Best, Ron