So this Saturday I'm hoping to introduce New Angeles to some people at an event. Some participants might be avid board gamers, some might be significantly less inclined to more complex games. I have a few of my friends I usually play New Angeles with coming as well (so roughly 3 experienced players, and 1-3 players with no experience).

There is a time constraint; on paper we have 3 hours. Due to socializing/dinner, its pretty much less. Add to that board/deck setup, and giving the run-down of the rules, we're looking at probably 2 hours. Still, I'd want the game to be more relaxing than trying to keep the pace up and rapid.

My first blush thought on reducing the length of the game would be to go through the event deck and pull out cards that result in 5 turns in the next Action Phase, maybe cards that result in 4 turns (depending largely on how many are left). The concern though, is that turns are what players need to ensure that demand is met, so it seems like the next step would be to go through the demand deck, and pull out cards that have notably greater demand values than others. At this point though, it seems like a fairly imprecise science. I would hate to pull out cards and accidentally skew the game towards unwinnable (or push it greatly in favor towards the federalist/others).

How damaging would it be to the integrity of the game to filter out cards from the demand and event deck? Would there be a set of cards that can be removed safely without greatly adjusting the "winnability" of the game?

I think you could get away with cutting out cards of the event deck but i don't think it would bring the game down to 2 hours. Demand deck alteration won't have an impact on game length one way or the other. The event cards that give 5 time generally drop more bad stuff on the board so you spend your extra proposals on that.

Alternately, you could just cut the game down to 2 rounds (ending after the 2nd demand phase). If you do that you would probably want to adjust the threat to end the game at 17 and ditto for the minimum capital the Federalist needs to win. Maybe 15 since the board won't get as crowded in just two rounds.

I think I would prefer to play all 3 rounds, but if you want to shorten it, I think 2 rounds is the way to go.