Giving Prizes

[M. J. Young]

O.K., this is weird, but I'm asking for ideas/advice.

I was registering to run a few games at UberCon, and one of the questions was whether any prizes would be given at the events. I hadn't even thought about it.

Do people give prizes at RPG events?

Anyway, I asked my associate, and he managed to finagle a couple of books to give away; then I asked, How do I decide who gets them?

Really, there are no winners; people will be doing all kinds of crazy things, and I'm not at all sure I want to disrupt their gaming preferences by rewarding something that particularly appeals to me. On the other hand, I'm not sure whether randomly rolling the dice (or "whose chair has the sticker on it") is the way to go.

I have a couple of possible workable ideas, but I thought I'd ask here: if it's a non-gamist RPG, how would you give away a prize after a four hour session?

--M. J. Young

[A.Neill]

Hi M.J.,

In our local convention prizes are given out for RPG competitions. Yes it's impossible to have a real "winer" in an RPG - but a competition format can give some structure to a convention.

For example there may be a CoC competition - where several groups play essentially the same scenario and points are awarded according to some arbitrary scheme at the end of the game (typically split between players and GM and weighted according to character play and player good behaviour).

The competition games tend to go the extra mile in terms of game content and colour.

The competition element then in turn gives rise to the "Prize Giving Ceremony" around convention closing time allowing for a last "comradery event".

Alan.

[Michael S. Miller]

I have a couple of possible workable ideas, but I thought I'd ask here: if it's a non-gamist RPG, how would you give away a prize after a four hour session?

I generally go with the player vote myself. I just have little ballots (usually torn from a notebook on the spot). When the game's breaking up, I have everyone cast a vote, then tally them. As GM, act as the tie-breaker if need be. I generally tell folks they're allowed to vote for themselves if they want, but no one ever does. It works pretty smoothly.

[Christopher Weeks]

I can't express this strongly enough.  I HATE prizes at cons.  I hate them.  Even for board games.  I would prefer that anyone who is there for the prizes be elsewhere.

I have generated extreme consternation by refusing to vote at these little after-game popularity contests.  I'd rather the GM keep the prize for donating his or her time.  I'd rather the convention auction or raffle the entire prize table as a charity event.  I'd rather there be no prize structure.  I'm uncomfortable accepting prizes when those voting choose me...why do I deserve this at someone else's expense?  I was just there to have fun.

I would urge you to reject giving prizes at your events.  It is a dysfunctional paradigm and if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.  Now you might look at it as a needed marketing tool, but ask yourself this:  Do you want people to come play your game because it has low name recognition and they think their chance of getting the prize is greater?  I know that people do that.

The people for whom a freebie is that important aren't going to plunk down $50 for your game.

If you want to give stuff away as a marketing tool, have can-openers, or dice, or tops or whatever imprinted with your game's logo and give them out to everyone.  Give everyone who plays your event a $5 off certificate for one of your products (or whatever you can afford).

Chris (must...stop...ranting)

[C. Edwards]

Hey M. J.,

I think that if you are going to give away a prize you should NOT have that fact listed with the game description. Just spring it on the players at the end of the game. If they don't know then it can't effect their game play.

If you run more than a couple games, word of mouth may spread the fact that you're giving a way a prize. I don't think that will too big of an issue though. Especially if you use the "player vote" method of determining who receives the prize.

I'm neither here nor there when it comes to the whole prize thing. I suppose given the choice I might actually avoid playing in the game that gives the prize, just so I don't have to worry about some overzealous player(s) ruining the play experience for me. The nature of the game being played definitely plays a big role in how I'd feel about a prize give away.

Personally, I'd prefer a small "give-me" for everyone that plays in the game over a prize for only a portion of the participants.

-Chris

[james_west]

Personally, especially when running y'all's games, I've always given my hard-copy of the game to the person who seemed most excited by it during play.

May be a mild violation of y'all's intellectual property, but I figure it's more than offset by the opportunity to make converts.

I'm otherwise mildly in agreement with Chris, though - competition for prizes in games that aren't supposed to be competitive can be severely distorting.

- James

[Dregg]

Ever since the days of running "Pulp Era" at Dundracon back in the early 90's I have always gave away toys, or Pulp related items to people who came by to play in the demos (except in those days i was not calling them Demos). Personaly I see nothing wrong with giving away a item that will make them think of the game.
It's not really a bribe, and the cool thing is that others will be told of your game and you may get more players. Yes it's the feed the stray cat thoery of running games at cons but it works.
Now that I'm schlepping Bad Muthas to Conventions with me, I'm giving away Blaxploitation videos to winners/Best players
This has two purposes
1. to give a prize
2. to show people what a actual blaxploitation film is and how to model thier characters next time they play. You would be surprised on how many pepole think Blaxploitation = Shaft

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

I tend to agree with Christopher Weeks, although I admit it's based on two things that aren't easily defended. One is a value-system thing and shouldn't have to be inflicted on anyone else's policy.

The other is ... profit. My profit. The money I want to make per unit when I go to a con.

That means I really hate to give books or other stuff away, a lot. Promotional materials make me grit my teeth; I can do it, but it's always a push. Giving away actual books feels to me as I were simply pulling out my wallet and handing people cash.

So chalk it up to a piggy snort-snort personal failing: I don't give away games because I want to sell them. If someone plays the demo and gets all pumped up about the game, I don't want to reward him with a freebie. That's the first of (with any luck) several sales which justify the time I put into the demo.

Best,
Ron

[Valamir]

I like the idea of giving prizes away to various raffles or charity auction type things that the larger conventions run.  For instance, at Gen Con I gave a copy to the folks running some big Anime event to give away as door prizes to participants.  Another copy I gave to folks raising money for some cause I can't remember.

From a promotional perspective I think this is more effective than giving away copies to people in a demo situation.  Ideally the people you're demoing to are going to be impressed enough to buy a copy.  But 90% of the people in the Anime room likely never looked twice at the Forge booth, so even though I never learned for certain what happened to that copy, there is potentially one person out there (maybe even a whole group) who discovered Universalis who never would have seen it other wise.

But there are other prizes besides actual copy that can be used.  For instance an "I slew the Master" button for the player of MLwM whose character actually did would be a neat gimmie to give away.  A die cast Sherriff badge for the "winner" by vote of a Dust Devils session would be along the same lines.  A raffle of a really nice T-shirt where everybody who played a demo on any of the 4 days of the con has a chance to win it at a drawing on the last day (also a great way to get contact information from players).  A free "expansion" of some kind (of the adventure module ilk) could be awarded to anyone who not only buys the game, but brings a friend to the booth who also buys the game.

There are alot of ways to make the idea of a "prize" work.

For GenCon, imagine a little card with 4 spaces on it.  A player has to get each of the 4 spaces initialled by a Forge demoer to show they played in 4 demos of 4 different games.  In return they're entered to win a kick ass Forge t-shirt or something of the ilk.

[Helvetian]

Double Exposure has always done prizes using a point system, and it seems to work very well for us.  GMs give a pre-determined (by Double Exposure) number of points at the end of each game, either to the winners (where applicable), the best RPers (usually voted on by the players), or whatever other system is used by the person running the game, to determine the most deserving first, second and third place.  Players can then save up points to spend on prizes.  We have plenty of both smaller prizes and larger ones that people spend several events saving points for.  It gives the players the freedom either to pick up a new game that they just tried, or something else that catches their eye.  GMs do, of course, have the option of offering their own product as prizes if they prefer, and usually the larger tournaments feature product-specific prizes.  

We display both the merchandise traded for advertising space and the prize support sent us by companies, so the prizes we offer aren't coming out of any company's pocket but our own.  And the points are redeemable at all Double Exposure events.