First game advice

[ZenDog]

Hello All,

I haven't had TRoS long I've read it through once, I'm alright with most of it (bit shaky on sorcery but not planning to have any supernatural elements in my game initially).  The CharGen and ComSim programmes are both excellent and have been very helpful.

So despite not being totally on top of the rules, I've decide to run my first game anyway and learn on the fly.

Here's the thing because I don't like making things easy for myself, my first game wont be a standard game in two respects.  Firstly it's going to be an online game. Secondly it's going to be 1 0n 1. Me and one player.

So I'm looking for any advice.

1) On running your first TRoS game in general.
2) Playing TRoS online.
3) Playing with just one player character.

Any thoughts on the above (or anything else you think might be useful) will be much appreciated.

I intend to have a couple of pre campaign sessions, to get a feel for combat and chargen. Once that is done and the player has his final character concept/SA's I'll design a campaign to suit.

[Malechi]

there's a fair bit of advice here on how to do a first session...

I posted some advice recently here...

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=10179

Jason K.

[Bankuei]

Hi Zen,

I ran a demo one on one, online.  TROS, is a big enough shift by itself, online, there's a lot of other issues as well.  Compounded...eek!

I managed to do fairly well, although the hardest part is that there is a LOT of non-verbal communication that happens face to face, that you can't really get online.  These things work like an approval/disapproval feedback loop for everyone playing.

This is a BIG deal in roleplaying, because a lot of players have only experienced being railroaded throughout their time as gamers.  Railroading relies a lot on the GM's responses, tone of voice, etc to subtly let the players "know" what they're supposed to be doing.  

TROS isn't about that, but the player may still be looking for clues as to "what I'm supposed to do" and have only the words on the screen to work with.  You may find yourself having to switch to OOC conversations regularly to clarify what is going on.  

I've found online, OOC comments letting players know what you think is cool("Nice!", etc.) help in that regard.

Chris

[ZenDog]

Thanks guys.

[ZenDog]

BTW Bankuei how did you do the red dice/white dice online?

[Lance D. Allen]

When I've done online dueling, it's like so:

GM:On drop....
GM:Drop!
P1:r
P2:w

or any variation thereof, so long as it's understood.. Also, as we often did not have a GM when dueling we usually took turns calling the drop, and rarely ever had issues with it.

[Brian Leybourne]

You can also do it easily enough by making a couple of extra channels. Each player has his own one, and the GM is in all of them. This lets each player chat privately to the GM whenever necessary, and allows the dropping of red/white and other things that other players shouldn't see.

Brian.

[Bankuei]

Hi Zen,

I pretty much picked the NPC's red/white and then let the player pick his.  Had to go on trust system, but it worked out fine.  We also skipped on doing manuevers for the demo.  I'd recommend skipping manuevers until players get the basic hang of things, excepting, perhaps, Terrain Rolls, which cover a lot by themselves.

Chris

[bottleneck]

If the single player doesn't know the rules himself, then go easy on him.
Give advice if he's suggesting stupid things (such as explaining the mechanics/ odds). This goes for combat and noncombat.

I'd give some advice to the _player_, though:
*stick to the basic combat maneuvers for starters; attack, block, sim.block/strike (for r/r) and full evade can get you a long way. Perhaps throw in feint if combat gets static. Do not but initiative unless you know what you are doing.
*do not try to maneuver into extreme situations in order to exploit/test the rules. If you wonder about a special case, make a note of it and ask afterwards. Things get complicated enough with 'nice' players.

:-)

[ZenDog]

Cheers for the pointers guys!

I think combat will be basic to start with and not just for the players sake, I'm a newb myself.

I think he gets the idea though, yesterday after he'd rolled up his character, he was playing on the combat simulator.  When I signed off he was in combat with a giant. He had spent 8 or so rounds doing full evade, and was overjoyed to have got a hit on the giant's knee.  I spoke to him again later and asked how the fight with the giant went, and he said he "made a bad decsion" and got squashed, so I think he 'groks' the combat.

For the first adventure I'm going to give him the chance to find his feet with out worrying about death.  

This is the plan, he will be playing both his character as a child and his father in this opening session. There will be a raid by the Cymri (He decided in chargen that his characters father died in a raid by the Cymri and he has the SA's Passion: Hate the Cymri and Destiny: Destroy the Cymri) and his father will fight the Cymri until he dies.  I'll be using mook level Cymri, and his father will be pretty tough, so I start by sending single Cymri against him, then send them in twos and keep throwing them at him, until his fatigued father is overwhelmed and killed.

This should give him the chance to get a few combats under his belt with having to be too cautious for fear of losing his new charcter in the first exchange of the first fight.

I also have a plan which will explain his characters total and utter hatred of the Cymri, beyond the mere death of his father at their hands.

God I love this game.