Who puts the K&K Social on the NTX schedule?

[Jeff]

Generally, who puts the K&K social on the schedule every year at NTX?

I know it's pretty early to discuss, but, it's on my mind.

Mike B. and Doug often requests "high profile" games for Thursday night, and several of them are games that I'd like to try next year. For example, Ben Burns' Paranoia game.

Would the powers that be consider changing the K&K social to Friday night instead of Thursday?

[Flambeaux]

Jeff, whomever talks with Doug & Mike first schedules the Social; changes year to year. However when we first set it up we went back and forth on day and concluded that Thursday was the best option. Nearly everyone wanted to play in or run something Friday & Saturday, and many were tired from travelling in on Thursday morning or afternoon. So the Social arose as an opportunity to hang out, drink beer, decompress, and meet each other face-to-face.

The first couple of years, the games were incidental or haphazard: Allan Grohe running Aliens while most of us talked, a couple of small games at different tables in a hotel lounge while others mixed and talked as at a social event. The organized game emerged as the Social grew larger and more people wanted to play together while drinking Jimm's homebrew.

This past year was, in my opinion, about ideal. Intimate-enough we could get to know each other but not as huge as the year before. The game was relaxed but enjoyable for everyone playing, so far as I could tell.

I'm certainly open to a discussion of whether Thursday evening still works best. I think it does...but it's a reasonable question after several years of doing it this way.

[benjoshua]

I've only been a part of things for two years, and my take is that there is no perfect time slot. I think we have a great tradition going, and as it grows, other games might even start to schedule around us. Ben Burns' Paranoia game may have a longer tradition than us, but perhaps you could talk a number of people on these forums into requesting that Ben change his game slot to something complementary.

[EOTB]

Thursdays have worked pretty good for us in the past. Fridays and Saturdays have a lot of games people try to get into, and some members are playtesting stuff for future publication on those days.

As for who puts up the next social on the con schedule, it's an OD&D year next year so I'm sure the many great OD&D DMs here will sort that out.

[Steve]

Badmike's B1 game is always on a Thursday night, conflicting with the Social. I played in it 3 years straight, and the K&KA Social the last 3 years. Both are great games, but you can't do both.

I'd be fine with changing or rotating the day/time slot, so long as it isn't on a Sunday.

A couple of non-forum members who attended the K&KA Social in 2017 told me they would have liked to sign up again for this year's Social, but the game's post gave them the impression they weren't supposed to register for it, being non-members.

What was nice about 2018's Social is that it felt like a "real" D&D game, as in a regular game with a normal sized group. But the "party-sized" parties of previous years was a different experience that I missed a bit. (The larger sized groups are easier to deal with in OD&D than AD&D, due to OD&D's simplicity.)

I'm not sure how to resolve all this, but just throwing it out there for food for thought.

[Falconer]

A couple of non-forum members who attended the K&KA Social in 2017 told me they would have liked to sign up again for this year's Social, but the game's post gave them the impression they weren't supposed to register for it, being non-members.

Well basically I think as the legend grows, all games run by K&KA members should have a big bold **run by a member of Knights & Knaves Alehouse** tag on it so outsiders know where to get the real deal. But the Social should obviously be for us (and our real-life friends).

[benjoshua]

Well basically I think as the legend grows, all games run by K&KA members should have a big bold **run by a member of Knights & Knaves Alehouse** tag on it so outsiders know where to get the real deal. But the Social should obviously be for us (and our real-life friends).

Exactly. While the size of the game was optimal this year, much of that had to do with four or five no-shows. If they had all been there and then other people had joined in, it would have been more difficult manage everyone. I doubt we'll have as high a percentage of no-shows next year. It's not like there aren't other games people can join, and it's not like people can't join our banter and community here either. We all make our own choices in life.

[Flambeaux]

Once upon a time the game wasn't central to the Alehouse Social. It was originally intended, when we first started doing it, as a chance to meet and hang out: a social. People could game, or not, as they chose but the focus was on Alehouse members getting to meet each other face to face. While someone running a "beer'n'pretzels" game ended up being an element, it wasn't initially the focus.

Thursday night ended up being best: many Alehouse members are either running or playing "serious" games on Friday & Saturday night. Travel schedules may prevent some from getting in with enough time to join a 6pm or 7pm Thursday night game. And Wednesday is still not officially part of the Con.

Thus, Thursday still seems the best night for the Alehouse Social. I'm all in favor of it being a social more than a scheduled game since there's no shortage of scheduled or off-grid Alehouse-dominated games at NTRPG Con.

[tetramorph]

Well basically I think as the legend grows, all games run by K&KA members should have a big bold **run by a member of Knights & Knaves Alehouse** tag on it so outsiders know where to get the real deal. But the Social should obviously be for us (and our real-life friends).

Yes, I like this idea.

Could we somehow set this up to show up in some official way in the presentation of the games?

Or should we must post something of the sort in the descriptions when we list our games?

I know it would help me zero-in on games I could trust in those rare instances when I can't remember the real life name of a regular poster.

[EOTB]

If the description is searchable then it should work to put it there and make a general announcement to search events for "K&KA"

[Falconer]

Maybe even put that announcement in the description of the Social.

[Zenopus Archives]

The "Additional Info" section of the game listings, where you can put a longer description of a game, is definitely hit by queries in the Tablestop Events search engine. I just tested and "Lemunda" pulls up my game and one other.

[Jeff]

Thanks everyone, for the input. I'd really like to play in Badmike's game, but it's always on a THUR night. I talked a good bit with Ben Burns about running an extra Paranoia game on an off-night, but he also runs a booth and so that's time consuming.

Regardless, missing the social is probably not something I'll do moving forward, even if there are great games on THUR nights.


I just wanted to hear other people's feedback because you guys have more history than I do.

If Thursdays are best, then I'm OK with that.

[Flambeaux]

Jeff,
The thing about the Social is that it was meant to be drop-in, drop-out. So you could do a different game that evening, swing by for a beer and a chat on break, and head back to your regularly scheduled game. Even the games the first couple of years were like that: open-ended with PCs appearing, disappearing, or changing personality throughout the evening.

I'd certainly like to move back to something like that. But I may be in the minority. I like playing with you guys but I'm mainly at the convention to hang out and get to know my friends better offline. If I game, fine. If not, fine.

As an aside, I remember an online game PnP ran at RPoL around the time I first joined the Alehouse: the PCs "emerged" from shards of some kind and, so long as at least one shard was with the party, new PCs could join without too much concern about the fact we were trapped deep underground.

ETA: there were also a couple of years where we rotated DMs with each DM crafting a section of dungeon for casual exploration, again, with an eye towards encouraging a relaxed atmosphere.

[grodog]

Yeah, I've missed the social the past few years primarily because the games became too large to allow for the social aspects of hanging out with K&K folks. So I've scheduled games on Thursdays instead of attending the social.

That said, it is absolutely impossible to make everyone happy, and to accommodate everyone's schedules. Keeping the social on Thursdays in the past had seemed to be the best-possible time over the extended weekend. The only other suggestion I can make would be to consider moving it to Wednesday, since many people are coming in earlier now, and see if that works to draw sufficient critical mass while freeing up the Thursday night slot.

Allan.