No Show players up this year?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by glamcrist, Mar 3, 2016.

  1. gizmomathboy

    gizmomathboy Spellbinder

    or even iZac
     
  2. brendar

    brendar Staff Member Staff Member

    This was discussed but not implemented this year. It will be next year.
     
  3. Khasimir

    Khasimir Footpad

    They should all be called the Stewards of Gondor!
     
  4. Khasimir

    Khasimir Footpad

    I actually build in 2 or so no shows into my games when I am planning them. I had 6 out of 6 show up for Thursday, 7 out of 8 for Friday, 7 out of 10 for Saturday and 3 out of 8 for Sunday. Some of them were walkups by generally it was players who registered.
     
  5. mordrin

    mordrin Spellbinder Staff Member

    I really saw unusually few walk-ups this year (and, yes, GMs were using the flag).
    I think it must vary a lot by location/game type.

    Either that, or I frighten people.
     
  6. brendar

    brendar Staff Member Staff Member

    We had about 300 more events than our target, so the event-to-player ratio was a bit off, even with slightly higher than expected turnout. This was also a contributing factor.
     
  7. glamcrist

    glamcrist Footpad

    Well, I probably won't be able to GM next year, not because of no-show discouragement, but because we're moving back to the end of the month. I snuck vacation for GC 6 in on a new manager last year, but she responded by forbidding vacation in the latter half of March. I was absolutely ecstatic when GC 7 was moved earlier. For some reason she wants us all available for the state certification testing... :D
     
  8. gmbarry

    gmbarry Footpad

    All my games were sold out except 3 slots in my 2 hour toon games...
    I was fine with my 8 AM Thursday
    but I had several no shows in my toon Game (5) and 1-2 for my others
    Friday toon had 1 no show as did my AD&D games
    Saturday afternoon I had 5 no shows for toon, but that most likely due to an event change
    Saturday evening I had 3 no shows in the evening
    Sunday, I was the only game in town (well, mostly) and had 1 no show

    I would recommend staying away from 2 hour sessions

    I heard a lot of complaints that completing an adventure was a rarity.

    I always have written my con modules with the time limit in mind and never did I we fail to complete the adventure... Only once was the objective not met due to poor rolls
     
  9. Wil_Upchurch

    Wil_Upchurch Level 0 Character

    We 8 players were left out in the cold by our GM, Jason Cook. I hope he's ok. :/
     
  10. Kubo

    Kubo Level 0 Character

    Yeah, game pacing or time management is one of the far underrated skills of an effective GM/DM. The skill in preparing a compelling adventure that fits well in the designated game time is also underrated.
     
  11. There were a LOT of total no-shows in the Legends of Wargaming miniatures battles. As in, "Six are signed up, nobody shows."

    Miniatures games take an hour to two hours to set up, and about the same takedown time. Just not being arsed to show up is incredibly rude.
     
  12. nesbit37

    nesbit37 Level 0 Character

    As someone who no-showed to a few games (including one of yours Mike, sorry, Historic Battle on the Ice is still on my must do list but I had something else come up in that slot I got in to that forced me to pass on it this year), I have to blame the registration system. In years past at Gary Con and other cons I always try to sign up for everything I can during registration day since there is never a guarantee of what you are going to get. This year I ended up getting most of what and my group wanted, which meant we had extra backup tickets. Returning tickets was not clear and when the registration system was closed almost immediately after registration and kept closed for a long time it personally seemed like there was little point to return anything when no one else could pick them up anyway. Additionally, having attended several Gary Con's in the past I was expecting there to be plenty of people walking up to everything along with most of the others players showing up so no-shows not really being an issue since it, mostly, was not in the past.

    As for fixing that, I think just having an automated way to return tickets and keeping registration open would fix most of it since this has not seemed nearly as bad as in years past. I don't think its fair to limit adding things to your cart that have overlapping times unless two other things are resolved. 1, some sort of ranking system should be in place ala Gen Con so if you don't get in your first choice you could maybe get your second or third instead of risk just losing that entire slot. 2. buying tickets for others needs to be clarified. I was attending with my family, a group of 9 people (3 of them children), so we were also needing to get tickets for kids games and trying to get tickets for each other that also ended up in or two instances of more tickets than needed (see above for why those were not returned). As long as tickets can be traded among others (which I think is a good thing the way the system has been set up historically) I don't see a way of fixing this or that it necessarily should be.
     
    dndgeek likes this.
  13. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Troubadour

    No kidding. My no-show games were both Squad Leader, which is ALSO a fairly-involved setup.
     
  14. Registration system be damned; signing up for multiple games in the same time slot is just plain rude.

    And would it ****ing kill people to stop by and say "Sorry, I won't be able to make it?"

    I had six people for "Battle on the Ice," so I don't care. But considering Mike Reese got left high and dry for TRACTICS, I wouldn't be surprised if he said "screw it" next year. Another battle had six people signed up and the only reason it even happened is that two walk-ups came by.

    That sort of crap is totally unacceptable and I blame PEOPLE, not the registration system.
     
    Poindexter, Kubo and Jarlaxle like this.
  15. francisca

    francisca Troubadour

    I totally agree.

    I returned a pair tickets without any problems, in plenty of time for others to grab them. To double book yourself, then not return some of the tickets for others to use is selfish and rude, and not showing up without a legit reason is incredibly rude and disrespectful to the folks running the games. Do that enough, and people will quit running games.
     
    Kubo likes this.
  16. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Troubadour

    I have. No way will I EVER run another Squad Leader game after wasting 2 hours setting up and six I could have booked to play something else!
     
  17. chainsaw

    chainsaw Troubadour

    I ran three Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea RPG events, each slotted for six people. I invested some time leading up to the convention marketing my events to my friends and other people online. When game day came, every schedule had a mix of people I knew and people I didn't. All of the people I knew showed up and all of the no shows came from the people I didn't. I managed to snag a few walk-ups and my final attendance count was:

    Thurs 12PM-4PM: 5/6 with one no-show
    Friday 8PM-midnight: 7/6 with two no-shows, three walk-ups (turned away one walk-up*)
    Saturday 12PM-4PM: 5/6 with three no-shows, two walk-ups

    If you have not actively recruited people for your games, I would highly recommend it as a way to mitigate the effect of no shows. Don't leave your hard work in the hands of chance - stack the deck in your favor. Also, if you insist on running games early morning, adjust your expectations for no-shows and remember that traffic is much lower then and walk-ups will likely be fewer.

    * Although I love accommodating interested gamers, I also believe I have a responsibility to keep the group size reasonably close to what was advertised for people that have pre-registered. If the event listing says six, then I'm not going to allow twice that many people because of walk-ups. That's just rude and plain old false advertising.
     
    Last edited: Mar 13, 2016
    dndgeek likes this.
  18. brendar

    brendar Staff Member Staff Member

    While I agree, staff has a lot more control over the process than the people. When designing a good system, you have to assume that people will make mistakes and make the wrong choice at every opportunity. A good system minimizes people's opportunities to make those choices. The ability to double-book your time has got to go.
     
    Poindexter, Kubo and stahlnee like this.
  19. stahlnee

    stahlnee Spellbinder

    Will this also mean the ability to book multiple tickets to same event will go?
     
  20. Jarlaxle

    Jarlaxle Troubadour

    If it does, so be it.
     

Share This Page