Ran the demo for my group last night and the experience was totally different than when I went through it as a player. They managed to make short work of the first group of Beastmen, but the Wargor was tearing them up. I put the Road Warden out of action and the Envoy was just one wound away from being unconscious when they finally finished him off. They were rolling poorly and just whittling away at the Wargor, while I was rolling so well that I had to forego fully using my ACE budget since I didn't want a TPK to discourage them from playing. Afterwards, they got frustrated with the social encounter because with the Road Warden unconscious and unable to contribute, the Envoy and the Troll Slayer had to do all the talking. Lacking social skills, the Troll Slayer resorted to Intimidation every round while the Envoy was trying to be Charming. If they hadn't been rolling so poorly (again), I might have been tempted to up the party tension since the Elf and Dwarf were definitely at odds in their approach. The Troll Slayer's player got so frustrated by his lack of successes Intimidating that he threatened to just kill the Merchant be done with it. Fortunately, the Envoy managed a couple good rounds in a row that finally put them over the top, but it was close the whole way, with the Merchants token never more than one space behind theirs on the tracker.
With an understanding of the basics we next started chargen for the real campaign to come. Much agonizing over how to spend creation points and which cards to take ensued, but we eventually got through it. Now they are champing at the bit to play and can't wait until next weekend. I'll be attempting to wing The Enemy Within, just making stuff work with the new system as I go rather than trying for a true conversion. Haven't run this since it originally came out and I'm looking forward to revisiting this classic and sharing it with the new generation. I'm also playing in another game someone else is running and having fun there too. I haven't been this excited about roleplaying in quite some time. This game has totally recharged my batteries. Huzzah!
