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View Full Version : How to introduce someone to table top role playing.



xBlackWolfx
2015-02-18, 11:36 PM
The biggest hurdle I've been facing so far is not finding a player, the problem is my player is having a hard time learning the rules of the game. She's willing to play, and I chose as simple of an rpg as I could find, but its just too much for her. And I agree, even BASH actually looks rather complex, assuming you've never seen something like 3rd edition DnD (which was my introduction into rpgs).

I tried typing a document for her that just said how to attack and use skills, which is about as simple as I could get it, but even that is a bit much for her. I think it might be due to BASH's odd dice mechanic.

I decided that probably the best way would be to just demonstrate it to her. And she agreed. But after I got to thinking about it, that too may be rough since she doesn't even understand the concept of character creation (the idea 'point pools' to create a character is completely alien to her). And worse yet, she doesn't even seem to be able to come up with a concept for a character so I can just make one for her. The game does come with pre-made characters, but she doesn't seem to understand what they do since of course she has no idea what all the stats mean. Some are obvious (like archers and blasters), but many others don't have good descriptions to them, you'll only understand what they do if you know how to play the game!

What I was thinking of doing is coming up with my own pre-gens, and carefully explaining to her what their powers actually do and such. But I don't know if this would help, and I would feel kinda silly doing it since the book itself gives examples of most of the common archetypes anyway. Really the only one I feel is worth-while making is a batman-esque character who isn't world-class (though that kind of character might be a bit too complex).

What should I do? Should I just have her come over here, hand her a random pre-gen, and go through a few fights with her just to give her an idea of how the game works? I'm afraid that doing that might make her see it as a board game, where she can only do the things that the book details.

JusticeZero
2015-02-18, 11:39 PM
The part you need to get is how to RP with a character at all. Don't even worry about teaching rules, but have the rules happen in their vicinity, and as rarely as possible.

Kid Jake
2015-02-18, 11:47 PM
I agree with JusticeZero, you worry about the rules and let her worry about her character. Make sure both of you have a sheet for referencing and when she wants to do something tell her exactly what to roll and where she can find what she has to roll, but keep everything else to yourself. That's how I've taught everyone I've played with; they pick it up easier that way.

Also, I'd suggest you ask her what kind of character she wants to play and then make it as close to what she wants as you can; rather than having her pick through pregenerated ones until she finds one 'close enough' to what she'd like to be.

xBlackWolfx
2015-02-18, 11:56 PM
One thing I was thinking about right from the start was to have a friendly npc help her out. Not like fight with her, mostly I just want one there in case I put her in a situation that she can't win (the book sadly doesn't really tell you how to make a campaign that isn't too difficult for the players). Typically I was just going to say something like 'he handles these minions over here while you take those over there'. That way, he's not technically helping her, and if something does go wrong I have an easy excuse for why she wasn't captured or killed or w/e. He could also act as a back-up in other ways, for instance if she failed to figure out something on her own he could just point it out to her, or help her if she failed a skill check. But now that I think about it, maybe he could also help her learn how you're supposed to play the game.

I definitely need to talk with her about creating a character. Might be more time efficient if I did this through e-mail though, it would give her more time to think about it. I know the process will take a lot of time, especially since she has no idea what she's doing.

edit: I just sent her a link to an actual play over on the official forums for BASH. Hopefully that'll give her an idea of how an RPG should work, even though they the GM doesn't bother to explain the mechanics of what's going on, all he does is relate what happened as far as the story goes.

huttj509
2015-02-19, 01:19 AM
Hopefully that'll give her an idea of how an RPG should work, even though they the GM doesn't bother to explain the mechanics of what's going on, all he does is relate what happened as far as the story goes.

Heck, that's probably better for an intro. Rules can change. "Can I try to knock the guy over" stays valid in any system.

kyoryu
2015-02-19, 01:49 AM
I'd probably use Apocalypse World or one of its hacks as an intro. The "move" structure is pretty useful especially for new players.

neonchameleon
2015-02-19, 08:01 AM
The biggest hurdle I've been facing so far is not finding a player, the problem is my player is having a hard time learning the rules of the game. She's willing to play, and I chose as simple of an rpg as I could find, but its just too much for her. And I agree, even BASH actually looks rather complex, assuming you've never seen something like 3rd edition DnD (which was my introduction into rpgs).

I tried typing a document for her that just said how to attack and use skills, which is about as simple as I could get it, but even that is a bit much for her. I think it might be due to BASH's odd dice mechanic.

I decided that probably the best way would be to just demonstrate it to her. And she agreed. But after I got to thinking about it, that too may be rough since she doesn't even understand the concept of character creation (the idea 'point pools' to create a character is completely alien to her). And worse yet, she doesn't even seem to be able to come up with a concept for a character so I can just make one for her. The game does come with pre-made characters, but she doesn't seem to understand what they do since of course she has no idea what all the stats mean. Some are obvious (like archers and blasters), but many others don't have good descriptions to them, you'll only understand what they do if you know how to play the game!

What I was thinking of doing is coming up with my own pre-gens, and carefully explaining to her what their powers actually do and such. But I don't know if this would help, and I would feel kinda silly doing it since the book itself gives examples of most of the common archetypes anyway. Really the only one I feel is worth-while making is a batman-esque character who isn't world-class (though that kind of character might be a bit too complex).

What should I do? Should I just have her come over here, hand her a random pre-gen, and go through a few fights with her just to give her an idea of how the game works? I'm afraid that doing that might make her see it as a board game, where she can only do the things that the book details.

The first question is whether you want to introduce someone to tabletop roleplaying or to D&D in specific.

3.X is not a good intro for what you've described of her. It's large, heavy, and complex and while some revel in this others don't. She sounds as if she doesn't. BASH is better, but it's arcane looking which is a problem. There are two issues - she doesn't get it, and she doesn't know the setting.

I'd therefore look for something that's both very light and understandable and where she knows the setting.

For light and understandable (with a video to watch) there's Fiasco (http://www.bullypulpitgames.com/games/fiasco/) - Tabletop Playthrough (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXJxQ0NbFtk), complete with a video playthrough.

If she's a Trek fan it's hard to beat the one page Lasers and Feelings (http://onesevendesign.com/lasers_and_feelings_rpg.pdf).

If she's a Harry Potter fan I'm going to suggest my homebrew Harry Potter RPG (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1avqZm0uZXEVLLki7OfvveyxEF4awjWSQ_62aABPO3Ko/edit#) with characters that fit on a post-it note. (Name, four houses each with a number, two special qualities). (My homebrew there is an Apocalypse World hack)

xBlackWolfx
2015-02-19, 08:14 PM
She's a superhero fan. Her favorite character is the hulk. I was going to run Basic Fantasy, but I couldn't figure out how to run a solo campaign for that. I think even the people who developed the game told me that it was designed to encourage teamwork, and discourage solo play. Bash doesn't have the problem, and she admitted to me she would be a lot more interested in that than a fantasy rpg anyway. I don't think she's into anything else really, besides possibly zombie apocalypse stuff, but I think that's just because her husband loves those games so much, and I don't care to run such a campaign myself anyway.

cougon
2015-02-20, 02:01 PM
You said that she might be interested in zombie apocalypse stuff, which leads to another thought. If she does like that stuff, or the show Supernatural, than you might try going with nWOD. The rules are easy to get into and understand, plus it's modern world so she wouldn't have a hard time understanding the setting. If you start her as a normal person using the core book only, then maybe branching into Hunter, she should have a pretty easy time learning how to game.

kyoryu
2015-02-20, 04:50 PM
You said that she might be interested in zombie apocalypse stuff, which leads to another thought. If she does like that stuff, or the show Supernatural, than you might try going with nWOD. The rules are easy to get into and understand, plus it's modern world so she wouldn't have a hard time understanding the setting. If you start her as a normal person using the core book only, then maybe branching into Hunter, she should have a pretty easy time learning how to game.

Or Monster of the Week is good for a Supernatural-esque vibe.