So just by some fluke I happened across another player in my city on this forum, hoorah! Together we want to try and get things more organized and set up some demo days at our LGS. We plan to meet up there and play some games on their open board game night and hopefully get some exposure, but I would also like to advertise for a demo day and see if people will come up to learn about the game.

Our store mentioned they had a kit available from last fall that nobody has used, so we thought about using that and giving the extra cards away to people who show interest in the game and/or want to purchase it.

Just curious if there are any recommendations here from others on what they have done.

We ran a demo evening at my local FLGS a few months ago. Went pretty well.
We had two people running it and the store had an open box too.

We had the two of us playing 2 skirmish games with a friend and another player who turned up.
Then had 5 people playing the intro campaign mission with the third set.

So in total 9 people were involved, which I though was pretty awesome.

I think the key for these things is to try make them regular. Between all the X-wing and Magic that already gets played, it might be hard to fit IA in.

Also I think demoing campaign is easier and quicker. The rules are similar and you don't have to worry about list and command deck construction.
Get people interested in the easier game mode first, then show them the benefits and flexibility of skirmish.
Running both together seemed to work well.

Also, printing out some skirmish maps can make it much easier to demo to more people even with only 1 or 2 core sets.
Hell, you can even play without command cards just to make it a bit easier.... make up a bunch of example lists for people to use and some printed maps, and you're good to go.

Thanks for those suggestions, originally I had thought that promoting the campaign was counter productive to us building the skirmish scene, but it makes sense that the game is much easier to learn through the tutorial/first mission. Did you guys just skip over the tutorial? I was thinking of starting with that and having everyone watch/pick a hero to control and then after that breaking up into groups for campaign and skirmish depending how many people we have.

Leaving out the command cards is a great idea as well to break down the game and also printing out the lists ahead of times to be used as examples/let people customize.

I demo'd IA at a comic con, and it went very well. People seem to enjoy the campaign mission a LOT more than skirmish. What I had to get to with Skirmish was 3 or 4 pre-built 20 point armies, and no command cards. I put out a couple terminals on a small map I made up (figure 8) and started them in different corners. Having one hero and one small double/triple unit worked best and no command cards. If they wanted to try it with command cards I had a generic set of cards and we both drew from the same pile. For the pre builts, it was things like Boba Fett and trandoshan hunters. Or Royal Guard champ and two officers. Things that generally worked together thematically. I suppose if I do it again this year I'll use the bantha rider and HK's or something similar. Having the game take 30 minutes or less (including learning) is VERY beneficial for a large format demo like a con.

Interesting, I like that format, simplify things to remove the intimidation of learning the game. Thanks for the input.

I hadn't thought of doing smaller armies like that. That would be a great way to get a quick feel of skirmish without having a massive amount of stuff going on to have to also pay attention to for a first foray into it. P.S. I am the other player in his city haha. totally random occurance...

So we played some games at our LGS last night and had some good interest from the regulars and got support from the store to do a demo day. We have to hash out the details with the owner still but sounds like we will be using a previous seasonal kit as a sort of mini prize pack for people. Probably give the acrylics away to people who actually buy the game on the spot and the alt cards and dice bags to people who win their skirmish games. We will borrow your smaller army size jonnyd to simplify things and leave the command cards out of it unless people want to try another one with the cards and then use the generic shared card pile idea.

Did you make up a cheat sheet of rules to run over quick before they cut their teeth on the skirmish demo, or just play a few turns first to show them how its done?

So we played some games at our LGS last night and had some good interest from the regulars and got support from the store to do a demo day. We have to hash out the details with the owner still but sounds like we will be using a previous seasonal kit as a sort of mini prize pack for people. Probably give the acrylics away to people who actually buy the game on the spot and the alt cards and dice bags to people who win their skirmish games. We will borrow your smaller army size jonnyd to simplify things and leave the command cards out of it unless people want to try another one with the cards and then use the generic shared card pile idea.

Did you make up a cheat sheet of rules to run over quick before they cut their teeth on the skirmish demo, or just play a few turns first to show them how its done?

Cheat sheets are nice, there's a few different ones floating around on these forums and BBG.

But an absolute must is these:

http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/imperial-assault/images/d/d7/Imperial_Assault_Die_Face.png/revision/latest?cb=20150825022932

Having quick access to all the dice results makes it much easier to plan your moves and attacks, and makes it much easier to pick re-rolls with stormtroopers (since they are pretty basic and you'll probably use some in your demos).

Also have a few copies of the last rules page with all the movement and line of sight examples.... those pictures are super handy and much easier to visually explain.

Just as a follow up for this post, Shadowlink and myself hosted a demo this weekend at our LGS, went great. We used a small army format, so roughly 1 hero and 1 multi unit card like Vader and ST, Boba and Trandoshans, RGC and RG etc.. we used an existing skirmish map and just condensed it to a capture the flag type scenario. We also set up Hunted Down so people could see both sides of the game.

We basically had a lot of people tell us they loved the look of the game, it covered all the bases being a minis game with strat combat and the Star Wars theme, but most just weren't interested in investing in another game. They already played Guildball and X-Wing, or the LCG or whatever and just can't justify another expansion based game. Many balked at the idea of having to own all of the content just to play at sanctioned tournaments. So we really tried to stress the Campaign/Skirmish angle, getting two games in one box, but early on it wasn't looking good. It wasn't until later in the afternoon we started getting more foot traffic and were actually able to get people to demo the game instead of just look. All and all I think we sold 3 core boxes and at least 2 of each expansion as well as numerous blister packs. We got a few more people to contact now to set up skirmish events and also a lot of other people who were interested and thought about picking it up at a later date, so we will see if they come around. We had an old summer kit so we gave away dice bags and acrylic tokens to people who purchased the game and the alt art cards were a big hit with the little kids.

Basically my advice for people looking to grow the game in their area would be:

1. Contact your LGS, tell them you want to run a demo day

2. Ask them to play ball with you on it in regards to any prizes or hand outs they can supply, this helped draw attention and keeps people thinking about it after they leave (remember whatever is bought comes from their store, we generated easily over $600 in sales from our demo)

3. It would be smart to discount the merchandise that day, our store did 20% off to move the product and it was a huge help, especially on a big item like the core box

4. Set up both the skirmish and campaign, I recommend a modified skirmish map (smaller with capture the flag type scenario) and Hunted Down for the campaign side

5. Simplify the skirmish, small armies, no command cards

6. Advertise, post it on the stores facebook, post posters up in the store and anywhere else you know gamers frequent

7. Show up early, set it all up, put some extra figures out like the AT-ST and the Nexu, Wampa's etc.. so they can see what they are getting

8. Stay positive and be upbeat. What is it that they say on Wall Street? ABS, always be selling? You are basically an employee of your LGS for that day, you want people to buy the game so sell it to them. Build up both sides of the game, talk about how great the community is (even if it is just you and one other person, you aren't telling a lie!) I actually ran the demo a few times to my wife before the event so I could speak clearly and explain things coherently, and always encourage questions

We exceeded our expectations basically following these points, so don't be scared to try it out yourself. Feel free to PM with any questions even if you dig this post up 2 years from now in a forum search.

Nice job! Glad you had a positive experience.

~D