Dragonmeet: Customer feedback

[Graham W]

I wanted to do this in a separate thread, so as not to get in the way of the Collective Endeavour counting their takings and laughing manically.

If you were a customer of the Collective Endeavour at Dragonmeet, post some feedback about your experience of the stall.

I arrived at the stall just after 10am. After about twenty seconds of browsing the books, Joe Prince started talking to me: "What kind of games do you like?". I just said I was interested to see what they had, so he talked a bit about Best Friends, then Cold City, then Swansong. All very low pressure and very cool: no pressure to buy, just recommending games he liked. I liked this. Swansong sounded great, and I said so, and Joe said "Well, I guess we could organise a demo".

(By the way, this was a bit too non-committal: there was no need to hold back. I wanted to play a game of something.)

We sat down to do the demo. It was a bit complicated. I had a full character sheet, which I didn't totally understand: halfway through the demo, I suddenly noticed that I was meant to be working against one of the other players, not with them, as I had been. I was also given a token, to represent "Flair"; and a cached Tarot card. I wasn't quite sure what these signified.

At the beginning of the demo, Joe described the characters and location and said "...and we'll just start by roleplaying for a bit". We roleplayed a short scene in a tavern. It was a bit awkward: I didn't really know what to do and, especially for a 15 minute demo, I'd have preferred to go straight into an action scene, even straight into a conflict.

The rest of the demo was a conflict, and that was fun. I still didn't entirely know what I was doing: I think I could have used Magic, but I wasn't sure; and I wasn't always sure which stat I was using in a conflict. I'd have preferred to play a demo with a simplified version of the Swansong system. But it was fun and showed off the conflict system well.

The demo lasted about 30 minutes, which was too long for my tastes, and I had to leave before the end because I was booked in another game. I came back later and bought Swansong.

After my other game, I came back and browsed around the stall for a bit. I spent a while flicking through Covenant and would have liked to talk to someone about it, but the two people behind the stall were talking to other people. I could be wrong, but I think those guys were talking to people they knew: they didn't sound like sales conversations. I think I'd have bought Covenant, especially after a demo.

Hope that feedback's useful and I hope it doesn't sound too negative: I wanted to mention the less satisfactory bits because they're potential areas for improvement. It's important to note that I was sold on Swansong: I liked Joe's no-pressure style, I enjoyed the demo and bought the game later. I'm fantastically pleased the stall did so well.

Graham

[GB Steve]

I already owned most of the games and so didn't engage in any sales banter but I did want to play at least one demo which the crew were only too happy to offer.

In the end I settled for Covenant. Matt's demo was fairly well structured. He provided cut-down versions of the character sheets and crib sheets to explain what things meant. We got into the conflict pretty damn quickly and the basic mechanic was explained as we went along. By the end of the demo I had a good understanding of the system and wanted to play some more. I also enjoyed the demo and think Matt did a good job. I certainly picked up good pointers for my demos.

The situation was well set-up and it was immediately obvious that there was conflict and what that conflict was about. What was less obvious was how that conflict related to the character sheet and how I could influence resolution.

It was the last demo of the day so we were probably all I bit tired. I'd just run four 30 minute demos of Esoterrorist and a 2 1/2 hour LARP so I was not necessarily on best behaviour. There were just two of us playing the demo so I took the opportunity to ask lots of questions. I wanted to know what all the stuff on my sheet did, from the start, and I think Matt was set up for the slow introduction. So if I wanted to be hyper-critical, I'd say that Matt didn't quite recognise that I had different needs from other audiences. But that would be really nitpicking.

My opponent rolled two 6s on his first roll. Although I pretty much tried everything I could, I couldn't get higher than a four and so was doomed to defeat. For me, this represented the ever more desperate efforts of my PC to justify his actions in the conflict, which he knew was ill starred from the start. The mechanic followed through into the narration, much as it does in Dogs.

[Matt Machell]

Great feedback guys. I think there are definitely areas that can be improved, so the more comments the better!

I think the, "friendly approach" works well, but as Graham's comment proves, it can make it feel like the booth is full of people chatting to friends, rather than people ready to help. How to balance those elements is a tricky conundrum. I'd appreciate any suggestions. I wonder if it was particularly noticeable during lunchtime when we were slightly understaffed, and didn't have people ready to dive in?

Steve, I think I mentioned elsewhere that I felt that particular demo was a bit flat on my part. I'm wondering if it ties into your comment about you not being quite sure how the sheet related to what was going on. Do you remember if I gave my spiel about the character sheet elements before we got into play?

Cheers

-Matt

[GB Steve]

There is a bit of crossposting madness going on but I'd thought I'd join in wherever possible.

Matt - I'm not sure. I think you might have pointed at the crib sheet but I don't think you said much about the character sheet. If this was the worst demo you think you did, then I think you shouldn't worry too much. I got what I wanted from it.

[Joe J Prince]

Dragonmeet was great, it wasfantastic being part of the Collective, but if I'm honest I'm disappointed with my performance and sales.

I'd only run the Swansong demo once before the con with two of my friends, they'd enjoyed it but it had run on for nearly two hours! So if I was a little non-committal it's because I was worried the demo would be a bit complicated and go on too long. And guess what? It was over complicated and went on too long.

I should have made sure Graham knew about his character's goal, and began the conflict straight away. I thought he was just cunningly biding his time before he struck!  Thankfully Graham bought a copy anyway, gord bless you sah.

I didn't run the Swansong demo again and will try and trim it down for next time. It's difficult to draw the line between showcasing the mechanics and allowing the players to just play and have fun. The guys in the demo did some great roleplaying and had a cool idea so I just ran with it.

Lessons learned, but the main problem was me not the games. I was lacking the confidence necessary for selling.

Cheers
JoE

[Matt Machell]

Joe, if you start an AP thread about the Swansong Demo, I reckon we could do some serious optimising, based on feedback.

-Matt