What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

[gmurie]

I'd like to run a game at a con, and I remember one striking thing from the rare occasions when I played in various Champions games (or tried to). The pregens tended to stink out loud, or rather I never found exactly what I was looking for in a character.

 

I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm a unashamed brute in games. I'm the guy who smashes down the doors, kills the monsters, and pillages the treasure while the rest of the group dithers about whether the door was oak or pine, and whether that meant it was trapped. I look for bricks and I never find them in con pregens, or I find some weak kneed energy projector with a strength boosting slot in his MPP ultra'ed against his flight so I don't even get the joy of suicidal move throughs.

 

So I know what I'd look for in the pregens I need to provide (melee oriented ass-kickers) what is it that YOU look for?

 

So far I've got the following (no capes! It's specific to the plot.):

 

Officer John Patterson - A brawler with Spiderman strength and wolverine regeneration plus beat cop equipment and skills. Martial arts with an emphasis on grabs, disarms, and takedowns.

 

Joe Sideways - A precog/postcog who's potential future selves talk to him. He's also got some telepathic gifts/curses that give him some utility for knocking people's perceptions out of whack. He's central to the plot, but can be used "off screen" so he doesn't steal anyone's thunder.

 

DJ Dischord - a non-hero ex-petty crook with sonic powers, an attitude, and a kid to care for. He scrapes by doing endorsments and minor stunts for small businesses.

 

Stanley Case - Got Growth/DI powers in an industrial accident. Union man, and an "independent contractor" that uses his powers to help on big construction sites where using normal equipment might be too hazardous.

 

Milton Freely - Engineering school dropout with power armor or gadgets and mechempath powers. Had to drop out because he was "cheating" on his final project by use of that power.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

You should offer something for each of the major archetypes, no more than one oddball character, and try to arrange your characters either to fit a specific target audience (all easy for HERO newbies, all solid for a known group of veteran players, etc) or a couple each at different levels of complexity (2 easy, 2 moderate, 2 complex).

 

Also, you should take the time to annotate any specific rules elements that apply to / are important to the character, and / or relate to the design decision you had in your head when you put something on the character. Spend more time doing this on characters you intend to be played by newbies, if any.

 

I also try to add a "munchkin-bait" character if I have space / capacity with an ability set that normally probably wouldn't be allowed in a normal game and some critical weakness that I can exploit if I need to. These tend to draw "that kind" of player and if they get out of control I can easily take them out via the built in off switch, preventing them from running amok with the game.

 

That's my take anyway. You can see examples of this in the two ready-for-con adventures I published via Digital HERO -- Project: PREDATOR and Through a Mirror Darkly, which both contain numerous pregens, with art.

[Arkham]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

I look for characters with a strong roleplaying hook. It is hard enough for me to game with strangers and make myself heard without being saddled with a wishy-washy personality, or something undefined that I'll have to feel out in a short amount of time surrounded by people I barely know, some of which have a decade or two more experience in the system than I.

 

So I'll look for characters I can say, "Ok, this guy would probably talk like Clint Eastwood", "Storm? Sure, I know how she talks", or "A deity of hairdressers? This just screams to be played a certain way..." Any character that has something obvious that I can use as a foundation for interactions.

[gmurie]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

@Killer Shrike

 

Thanks, that's all good advice. I like the newbie/intermediate/advanced suggestion. I tend to get carried away with frameworks, advantages, and disadvantages too much. I should add some simplistic characters for newbs.

 

I really like the munchkin bait idea.

 

@ Arkham

 

So would those character outlines I wrote give you a hook if fleshed out enough?

[Lord Fyre]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Well, take this as an example of what I like to see.

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1460953&postcount=27

 

Notice how all the characters are woven together . . . in ways that hinder as much as help them.

 

I have found that this can make for some interresting roleplaying if the players are up to it.

[Arkham]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

@ Arkham

 

So would those character outlines I wrote give you a hook if fleshed out enough?

 

Most of them. But you don't need to make every character appeal to every player... Just one per player. The characters don't seem overtly Heroic. I don't know if this is intentional. But if it is not part of the theme, you might want to add at least one with obvious Heroic Potential to appeal to the players that prefer that type.

 

Officer John Patterson - Based on the description of Brawler/Police Officer, I would base him off of the wrestler, Big Boss Man. Aggressive, and a follower who wants to be a leader.

 

Joe Sideways - I got nuttin. But lots of people can get into the weird characters easily.

 

DJ Dischord - Sounds like a Chris Tucker or Lil' John, as much as that may annoy the GM or other players. But it'd be fun.

 

Stanley Case - I'd focus on the 'Union man' part of his description, and end up playing him at least sounding like a leg breaker called Stanley "Hard" Case.

 

Milton Freely - Not much grabbing me as an obvious personality hook.

[gmurie]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Yes, it is very intentional. Save the capes, destroy the world.

[Lord Fyre]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Yes' date=' it is very intentional. Save the capes, destroy the world.[/quote']

 

No, no. It is "Save the Cheerleader, Save the World!"

[Certified]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

There are a few things that I use to help demo games run smoother. Each of the characters should be unique in their personality and abilities. Rolls are going to overlap, so how the character performs that role should be unique, if there are three heavy damage dealers one may be a martial artist another a weapon master while the third uses small arms. To look at it another way, while the weapon master uses multiple strikes and has a wealth of endurance the martial artist may have large single attacks that wear them down quickly. In a fight although both are in melee range, one would (hopefully) focus on the fodder taking out multiple foes while the other held off against a stronger single foe.

 

Not to focus on combat too much, although in any demo game there's likely to be a fair share of fighting, what else can the character do? Characters should have some skills outside of their fighting abilities and again with as little overlap as possible. If one character is a detective there should be a chance for him to use those skills the same with a scientist or even a dancer. People need to feel they are contributing and getting to use some of the skills they thought were unimportant is a nice way to draw players in.

 

Just a quick other note for demo play. Although most groups will follow the carrot and work together, unless you have a strong reason they should there is also the opposite. There have been con play sessions where players sat down at the table greeted everybody then began looking for the opportunity to start a fight with each other. These players know it's a one shot game, and like everyone else they want to feel like they have value. Their way of showing it however is a little more direct. Some con's you can boot people like this, others it's a bit harder to justify, players at Dragon*Con pay to play so I do my best to roll with whatever they throw at me.

 

I've been running demos of 6th World at conventions for about 6 years. Over the last three years I have developed a standard demo team of six characters. The stories I use are designed for three players and can be scaled to six. Each one of the characters has their own quirks and serve a diffrent role. Although, it's not to everyones taste I do hand them out in a specific order to ensure the integrity of the party and they will have at least the minimum skills to complete the adventure. This has thrown a few people off at first but players often find themselves in roles they may not be used to and have to adapt their style for the game. This usually goes something like: "I don't normally play X but that was fun."

 

Well, I hope this helps, it seems to have gotten away with me a bit. Look forward to seeing what you put together.

[Diamond Spear]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

I'd like to run a game at a con, and I remember one striking thing from the rare occasions when I played in various Champions games (or tried to). The pregens tended to stink out loud, or rather I never found exactly what I was looking for in a character.

 

I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm a unashamed brute in games. I'm the guy who smashes down the doors, kills the monsters, and pillages the treasure while the rest of the group dithers about whether the door was oak or pine, and whether that meant it was trapped. I look for bricks and I never find them in con pregens, or I find some weak kneed energy projector with a strength boosting slot in his MPP ultra'ed against his flight so I don't even get the joy of suicidal move throughs.

 

So I know what I'd look for in the pregens I need to provide (melee oriented ass-kickers) what is it that YOU look for?

 

So far I've got the following (no capes! It's specific to the plot.):

 

Officer John Patterson - A brawler with Spiderman strength and wolverine regeneration plus beat cop equipment and skills. Martial arts with an emphasis on grabs, disarms, and takedowns.

 

Joe Sideways - A precog/postcog who's potential future selves talk to him. He's also got some telepathic gifts/curses that give him some utility for knocking people's perceptions out of whack. He's central to the plot, but can be used "off screen" so he doesn't steal anyone's thunder.

 

DJ Dischord - a non-hero ex-petty crook with sonic powers, an attitude, and a kid to care for. He scrapes by doing endorsments and minor stunts for small businesses.

 

Stanley Case - Got Growth/DI powers in an industrial accident. Union man, and an "independent contractor" that uses his powers to help on big construction sites where using normal equipment might be too hazardous.

 

Milton Freely - Engineering school dropout with power armor or gadgets and mechempath powers. Had to drop out because he was "cheating" on his final project by use of that power.

 

Haivng just played in a bunch of con games I think I can say that the most important things are: 1) Balance, without it the less compatent character(s) get left with nothing to do, 2) Just enough background/personality, too much and it becomes too dificult for a player to do it justice in a 4-6 hour game, 3) Shtick, every character needs something that only they can do and that will come up at least once in the game. It gets everyone involved without focusing too much on just one or two characters. 4) Remember that the game won't go as planned, the players won't play the characters exactly as you envision, BUT, as long as everyone is having fun it's a good game.

[teh bunneh]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Lots of good advice on this thread so far. One thing I would add is: Simplicity of Build. Especially if you expect to be playing with a lot of folks new to the Hero system. For a one-shot Demo game, you don't need to add a lot of advantages and limitations that won't be coming up in the game, or a dozen different variations of the same power.

 

Of course, if you expect a bunch of Hero veterans, things are different. But you can showcase the versatility of Hero without overly-complex builds.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Remembered something important thanks to Certified's post.

 

Assignment vs Picking of Characters.

 

Unless you plan to always just give the players a specific character with no choice, its a good idea to write up a single page summary giving the high level version of each of the characters and print a copy for each player. Hand it out and let the players use that to pick which characters sound good to them. Its first come first serve, but if more than one player want the same character, arbitrate it quickly; usually one or the other will cede it but if necessary go to a roll off.

 

The summary shouldn't be worded in specific HERO System mechanics, but rather give the general archetype and a "bitten by a radioactive spider, granted the proportional strength and agility, sensitivity to danger, and ability to shoot webs from his hands" type description. Some insight into their personality / Disads should be included as well, but again at the "driven by guilt over not having saved his Uncle Bob from a mugger, and a basic boy scout mentality, he fights crime in his own unique way flinging one liners as often as webs!" level.

 

 

The goal is multi-fold. For starters you don't want people to have to get into the mechanics of not just one but many different characters. Not only does it slow everything down, but its both overwhelming and a turn off for people that are not system heads, it leaves indecisive / overly analytical people hemming and hawing over whether they should take character A with a 12d6 main attack but slightly sub-par defenses vs. character B with a 10d6 main attack and above-par defenses (etc). It also removes some of the fun if the other players already know what characters can do. Not only does it prevent the fun of seeing other people's characters do surprising things, it can also lead to situations where one player starts telling one or more other players what they should have their character do based on their memory of the character write up from when they looked at it earlier before picking their own character. It also takes too long to go through this pain.

 

I've almost never seen a full character review go ok, but the summary method tends to work. People will probably have some specific questions before making a decision, but this is actually a good thing. It gives you a very good clue as to what is important to that player -- they generally ask the most burning questions first based upon their priorities. You can usually peg players as RPers, powergamers, rules lawyers, social gamers, munchkins etc right here, which informs your decision making and the spin you put on the game, and also allows you to anticipate problem players. Just answer the questions at a high level without getting into specifics and be firm. For example:

 

Player A: "Hey how much damage does Blaster-Man do?"

GM: "He has a mix of attacks; his strongest is extremely damaging, his main attack is creditable."

Player A: "Huh? What does that mean? 15d6, 20d6?"

GM: "It means he can hurt even the toughest foes and drop agents like bowling pins."

Player A: "Well, Ok then."

 

Player B: "Corsair sounds interesting. Sounds kind of swashbuckly and fun. Is he like an Erol Flynn type guy, or more like Scaramouch, or Zorro?"

GM: "Well, any of those would definitely be appropriate, but there's also room for you to put your own spin on it."

Player B: "Hmm. Cool. So...it says he's an American, but what if I wanted to play him kind of over the top, with like a fakey light English or French accent? You know 'Brilliant parry old man! But not as brilliant as my riposte!' Ah ha!' or like 'Have at thee!!!'; that sort of thing?"

GM: "It worked for the Blue Rajah. In fact it would be a really good way for you to differentiate between your characters hero and normal persona."

Player B: "Cool."

 

Player C: "So, Arbiter sounds kind of cool. But does he just have a bunch of points sunk in skills and street levels stuff that aren't going to come up in the game?"

GM: "Well...he has a good assortment of skills and some of them are directly relevant to the scenario and a few others that you could certainly make a use for with a little effort. But never fear, the majority of his abilities are combat effective."

Player C: "But he's probably all Foci based right? Guns, armor vest, etc. Are you going to have all his stuff break every time he gets hit? Or if he gets knocked out or captured and loses his stuff?"

GM: "He has some focus stuff, but he also has some Martial Arts, Combat Luck, and 'Super-Skill' type abilities that he'll be able to rely on in a pinch. He's not totally reliant on gear. And the goal here isn't to deliberately hose anyone or render a character ineffective."

Player C: "Hmm...ok."

 

 

etc...

 

In addition to keeping things moving, questions like this would tell me a lot about the players themselves.

 

Player A is very concerned about doing damage, obviously, but less obviously he's probably really concerned about being respected, he probably wants easy successes, he's probably brute force oriented and will probably not be subtle or indirect. Unless the scenario is a slugathon, I'll need to keep an eye on him, particularly if the game slows down or the other players are less direct.

 

Player B seems like more of a roleplayer, but more than that they seem to either be well read or have watched a lot of old movies or both. He's probably creative / imaginative. He probably enjoys larger than life / cinematic resolutions and is probably more concerned with style than effect. Ill need to give him opportunities for derring-do and also facilitate initiatives he takes in that direction for him to have fun.

 

Player C seems like a practical sort; he's interested in a tool-boxy character who is also a little on the darker / vigilante side. His questions indicate he's been burned on Foci and skillmongers before, so he's got at least some HERO System experience, but he's willing to try it again so he's either very fair minded or he's got enough experience to realize it comes down to the GMs style and the design of an individual character rather than a blanket problem with the archetype. Nominally, I think I can rely on this player to not do dumb things or slow the game down thru inexperience, and I might even offload some management tasks on him like tracking the TURN or helping a less experienced player find something in the book while Im busy elsewhere, things like that.

 

 

Obviously these are fairly canned, but they are drawn from real experiences and should illustrate the point.

[Certified]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

Remembered something important thanks to Certified's post.

 

Assignment vs Picking of Characters.

 

Unless you plan to always just give the players a specific character with no choice, its a good idea to write up a single page summary giving the high level version of each of the characters and print a copy for each player. Hand it out and let the players use that to pick which characters sound good to them. Its first come first serve, but if more than one player want the same character, arbitrate it quickly; usually one or the other will cede it but if necessary go to a roll off.

 

 

Just to go off of that and something i should have included in my first post when I was talking about personality. With the demo team I use there's an attached page with a kind of summery of their background a brief bit on any moral code or personality and a short breakdown of their abilities and style. this is all in plain English so anybody picking up the character can say: "Here is where I come from, this is what I'm good at and here's a bit on how she got here."

[GoldenAge]

Re: What do you look for in Con Pregens as a player?

 

I simply look for playability. No dummies, no totally arrogant bstards, no loners, no "one man shows", no mutes, etc.

 

I enjoy a character that can be up to his neck in the adventure (or maybe even over his head). I look for a character that can work with comrades and against foes. A good, concise history and/or personal description is the key.

 

Any power set (as long as it's not irrelevant to the story) is fine. I have enough confidence in my playing abilities to have fun and be effective with just about anything.

 

Sometimes a GM with the best of intentions will create a set of characters that, on paper, seem to fit together very well. But I learned LONG ago that a group of characters is only as fun to play as they can be effective in the scenario presented. Some would say that every team needs a classic Brick... But the scenario better not take place in the weightless gray miasma of another dimension... Y'know what I mean?

 

Within a serial campaign there’s room to work out differences, explore unique personalities or prove one’s worth over time. Tournament games are a whole different matter. You’ll have only a few short hours to wring out all the mystery, tension and action you can from your scenario. It isn’t easy. Keep the player characters simple and useful.

 

On another note… Determine the proposed length of your game (suppose you’re working within a 6 hour slot). Once you’re happy that the game will be finished within the 6 allotted hours… CUT IT IN HALF! Then, once you’ve reduced the game to one that YOU believe could be completed in 3 hours… CUT IT IN HALF AGAIN!!!!!! (Especially if combat is involved)