Running games at conventions

I'm just back from GMing five games at UK Games Expo, and I thought I'd share my experiences. I'm hoping this might be especially useful for GMs who aren't used to running convention games. There are significant differences between running games at conventions and running your home game, and you need to be aware of them. Some of these things are going to sound obvious, but they may not be to everyone. Some of them are going to be common sense. Most importantly, they are things that everyone can do to make games fun.

I've been running games at conventions for more than thirty years, and here's my distilled list of what I find works. If you disagree, that's totally cool. Put something in the comments and tell me how you do it better!

1) Turn up ahead of your players. You should be in your seat 15 minutes ahead of the start time of the game. No excuses. Having players turn up and not knowing what's happening sets the tone badly for the game. First impressions matter.

2) On that, when players first turn up for a game, they may not know that you are the Best GM In The World (TM). Unlike your home players, they don't have weeks of experience of your awesomeness behind them. They are sometimes trepidatious, wondering whether they have spent their £5 per game well. Bear in mind that your game may not be their first choice - maybe they couldn't get into that game of the Last Of Us RPG run by Pedro Pascal and they've come to you instead. You need to spend the initial few minutes of the game welcoming them, making them feel comfortable and creating a convivial atmosphere. Breezing in two minutes after the start time and moaning about the number of people in the trade hall is going to set a bad tone, and once set, a bad tone can be difficult to overcome.

3) Work hard to involve everyone. Avoid, if at all possible, allowing characters to go off on side quests. There are players who seem to make it their sole intention to have an adventure by themselves. Maybe have a quiet (friendly!) word with them to encourage to work together as a party. In a convention game, you don't have time to minister to everyone's little solo game. It's going to cheese everyone else off and detract from the game. Some games have group tests - absolutely make sure that you go round everyone and ask them for their specific contribution. I've seen GMs on occasion get distracted and stop after half the characters have done something. Don't do this! Also, don't let more vocal players talk when the quieter players are telling you what their characters do. "No, don't do that, you should do this instead" comments are not welcome. Each player is responsible for what their character does and should have a chance to speak uninterrupted.

4) Avoid excessive exposition. The players are here to roll dice and play their characters, not listen to you describing why the fourth orc rebellion a thousand years ago is directly relevant to what the princess wants for breakfast. Absolutely minimise this stuff. If you have to have exposition, write it on cards and let those characters who might know about it read it out - but even this is not great. Your job is to get out of the way, largely, and to maximise each person's play time.

5) Set clear objectives. Avoid sandboxes. I love sandbox games but they are not appropriate for conventions. Campaign games - railroading bad. Convention games - railroading good. Find ways to make it subtle, but you have to lead the players to a satisfying conclusion. Make the objective really obvious and continually reinforce it. Remember, no-one is as invested in your game as you are, and it's easy for people to forget what they're supposed to be doing. You might need to stop and say "OK, let's recap what you're doing here. Remember, you need to...because..."

6) This is my golden rule. My absolutely don't break it rule. And it's this. Have a proper finale to the game, where the clear objectives you have set can potentially be achieved by the characters. DON'T DO A CLEVER TWIST WHERE, ha ha, you can't achieve the objective because aliens land and wipe you all out. This is not satisfying. Unless you really know what you're doing, stick to a finale where they meet the objective. And MAKE SURE THIS HAPPENS in the time allowed by the convention. Don't start the finale with 5 minutes to go. Cut earlier stuff and summarise it. If you've got an hour to go and you're still on the first encounter, find a way to cut it short, and SKIP TO THE END. You MUST finish. Imagine if your favourite TV show had stopped on episode 9 of 10. Sigh. I really must get over Firefly. At least they made the film.

7) Have a break halfway through. Most convention games are four hours long. Pick a suitable break between scenes and give everyone five minutes. But encourage them to keep it to five minutes - some players will go off and get into a 20 minute queue for drinks, and that is going to seriously eat into your game time. If necessary, restart the game before everyone returns.

8) DON'T, DON'T, DON'T look up rules in play. Don't even take the games rule book. If you don't know the rule, improvise it - but look at the player and say "does that sound reasonable?" They may have an opinion. Nothing kills the vibe worse than a GM leafing through the rule book trying to work out if a potion cures 2d4+4 or 1d10 hit points.

9) Above all, have fun yourself. It's just as important that you have fun as well as everyone else, because your mood transmits itself to everyone around the table. If you mess up the rules, forget the stuff about encounters in the swamp, can't remember that slime creatures have the gloop ability or any other detail but yet you retain your enthusiasm and good humour, your players will have a great game.

Running games at conventions is enormously rewarding. You get to meet great people and play things you might not otherwise have played. Nearly everyone (nearly) at conventions is 100% trying to have a good time and, really, all you have to do is avoid getting in the way of that good time.

Hope this is useful. I would love to see your comments!