3 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

You have stated that Korath was a ginzu with a lightsaber, strong in the force, strong willed, a jack of all trades, drill sergeant of a jedi master, and I have seen you roleplay him as that and more across decades and across systems. The ffg build you put together for Korath did not measure up to that concept and you drained the destiny pool to upgrade your combat checks while fighting mooks. I encouraged you to use a build that fulfilled your concept using 400 to 500 fewer xp than your build for Korath at the time.

I have optimized most of my characters for broad utility (Jack of all trades with an area of elevated focus) with interesting novelty gimmick abilities that correspond to a narrative schtick for the character, and my character optimization has always been second place to and in support of how I have roleplayed the character. I can and have "always" (for as long as you have known me) optimized my characters in a way that enhances the story rather than detracting from it. So say that all I do is look at the numbers is at best a highly incomplete statement, and when you say mechanically best it's false because I as noted usually optimize my characters for broad utility with the goal of being second best at as much as possible so I can round out and support a party rather than hog the spotlight.

For the context of why I was trying to help you build a character that matches your espoused concept (i.e. what follows is an explanation not an attack)

You don't fit the definition of a power gamer but you most certainly are a metagaming power player, and you "always" (standard disclaimer on always but I've never seen you not do this with a character) try to control the narrative so that Korath (or Rei) is "always" in the spotlight/at the center of the story in a position of power so that characters that do not defer to him (or her) are either put in their place or forced out of the game. That's the kind of metagaming that detracts from (and kills) games, not building well rounded characters. And i was hoping that if you had a character that could mechanically pull his own weight/live up to your espoused concept then maybe you wouldn't feel the need to metagame the narrative to get enough time in the spotlight.

No, I haven’t. I’ve said that in D6, he had a relatively impressive lightsaber skill (at 9D+1, of which 5D+2 was actual skill), though certainly not anywhere near best in the galaxy, and he knew a lot of different Force powers. His actual three Force skills (Control, Sense, and Alter), however, didn’t even hit 7D (often considered the standard for a fully trained Knight in that system), being 5D+1, 5D+2, and 6D respectively), and that he picked up a lot of different skills over the course of actual game play.

The D20 conversion made him into a 18th level combat monster, and that was solely because of how WotC designed their conversion system.

I based my FFG conversion primarily on my original D6 character, only taking the talents from D20, something that didn’t exist in WEG.

As for your assertion that I always try to control the narrative, check out the Kandosii, Beroya campaign in the EotE beginner forum. I’m currently almost purely combat support (much to the GM’s chagrin, who wishes I could contribute more from a role-play standpoint), a blunt instrument sent in to crack skulls, and, given my current limited amount of time to role-play because of work, that suits me just fine. Even then that character fails more often than she succeeds (mostly because of poor rolls), and has often taken on a more comedic role as a result of her pratfalls and other antics.

This was also true of my Zeltron Racer, and Wookiee Sentry, and many other characters I’ve played in other campaigns I’ve played over the years. Neither character dominated the narrative, nor did I try to make them do so.

So, no, I don’t try to dominate the narrative. I role-play a character , each based upon any of various specific concepts, that each has specific skills, and personality quirks unique to that character. The fact that you didn’t like how I played those two characters (one of which didn’t even really get a chance to be developed beyond one situation) does not mean I was trying to dominate the narrative.

This was also the case with Rei. I was role- playing that character, a character with a very rigid sense of justice who was angry because neither your character, nor the Jedi master there, nor anyone else in that bar had lifted a finger to stop two bullies from picking on those weaker than them . You took it as a personal attack on you when it wasn’t and killed the game before the whole scenario could be resolved. The one who was trying to control the narrative was you. You tried to control how my character was introduced, what people knew about my character before I was ready to reveal it using knowledge your character couldn’t have known. You were the one using metagaming to try to control the narrative and play spoiler .

2 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

This is the definition of min maxed for combat, which is a very specific choice of objective function... min max means to be awesome at one thing or a small set of things and suck at everything else... you have further restricted min maxing to the one thing you're good at being combat but you could also minmax to being a good face and suck at everything else.

You are not wrong but I simply went with shooting instead of social-fu or crafting or whatever because Eoen had already strongly implied he was talking about combat ("when the drenn hits the fan, all his prctical examples were combat-related...)

Quote

Maximizing utility, a.k.a. max meaning, is to try to have the highest AVERAGE ability across a very broad set of skills, these are the characters that can pull their weight in any situation without being the best at anything, they are typically better at everything that a specialized character hasn't specialized in, so frequently end up being the second best character in the group at everything... this let's them fill holes when a specialized PC misses the session or when the players split the party.

I really love playing jack-of-all-trades characters and most of my characters are, but they are by definition not optimised. To be optimised, you need to be optimised at something.

1 hour ago, Rimsen said:

This was specifically mentioned in the video. Obviously the table has to know what you are about and agree with it, otherwise it will just cause tension, if you are surrended with players who thinks you are dragging them down.

Nothing wrong with either, needs communication.

Are you assuming some sort of home game or long term group? I'm talking about a walk in game at a game store where you meet all sorts from good players with decent personalities to autistic spikeys teens with zero social skills. Or online convention play where the player base is almost totally random.

*shudder* I rarely do this. But this calls for a clarifying typology.

Quote

"Definition of optimization: an act, process, or methodology of making something (such as a design, system, or decision) as fully perfect, functional, or effective as possible specifically: the mathematical procedures (such as finding the maximum of a function) involved in this." (source: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/optimization)

That's a dictionary definition. Vagueness and precisision all rolled up into one, it's a wide definition that entails both ends of the spectrum presented here; whether it focuses on system, design or a decision.

And:

Quote

"min-max [ min-maks ]; verb (used with object) min-maxed, min-max·ing: (in a video game or role-playing game) to optimize (a character) by assigning all, or nearly all, skill points to the ability essential to that character’s success in a specified role and environment, and no points to other skills, rather than distributing skill points more evenly across attributes." (source: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/min-max)

So, min-maxing is a type of optimisation, but optimisation doesn't have to entail min-maxing. That should make sense and be logical enough to get this particular nonsensical disagreement out of the way.

Neither definition is necessarily exhaustive or precise. But basically, some above seems to understand "optimisation" as being "min-maxing", and around a certain table or gaming groupt, the difference may not be of importance (regardless of the imprecision of that understanding).

I made this rudimentary typology. I submit that optimisation follow along at least three non-exclusive dimensions: system, design, and decision. System refers to mathematical optimisation of the placement of XP to characteristics and skills. This placement is informed by design and decision (and can also inform those dimensions). Design refers to optimisation of the character concept; whether it's to play a noble, fighter, rogue, murderer, dark sider, paragon, or whatever else is central to the character concept, it may be regarded as more focused on role playing, but also on other non-mechanical or tertiary mechanics in the game, that fulfills a purpose that, for instance, turns the character into someone who fits a certain socio-economic position or is from a certain profession, or whatever else is essential to the concept that does not (exclusively) rely on mathematics. Decision, poorly named, refers to the degree to which the character follows tradition, or convention, by fulfilling the concept in choosing level of mathematical optimisation; whether that is a one-trick pony (min-maxing), jack of all trades, or something whatever else they may choose to do.

These choices are not made in a vacuum, and neither are they always conscious. Some also focus more on one of these three aspects than the other two, but they are not mutually exclusive.

5 hours ago, Rimsen said:

This was specifically mentioned in the video. Obviously the table has to know what you are about and agree with it, otherwise it will just cause tension, if you are surrended with players who thinks you are dragging them down.

Nothing wrong with either, needs communication.

This. Communication seems to be a challenge for many, which is odd, considering these are games that are intrinsically about communication...

3 minutes ago, Eoen said:

Are you assuming some sort of home game or long term group? I'm talking about a walk in game at a game store where you meet all sorts from good players with decent personalities to autistic spikes teens with zero social skills. Or online convention play where the player base is almost totally random.

See. This is an important premise, that could be explicated before making assertions. It highlights another dimension that affect our experiences.

24 minutes ago, micheldebruyn said:

You are not wrong but I simply went with shooting instead of social-fu or crafting or whatever because Eoen had already strongly implied he was talking about combat ("when the drenn hits the fan, all his prctical examples were combat-related...)

I've never heard any GM complain about a character being too optimized around diplomacy, gambling or some other social skill as being too powerful or over the top. Have you? I can just see it "OMG his diplomacy skills totally disrupted my plot arch! **** who puts 4 ranks in Nobody’s Fool!"

12 minutes ago, Eoen said:

I've never heard any GM complain about a character being too optimized around diplomacy, gambling or some other social skill as being too powerful or over the top. Have you? I can just see it "OMG his diplomacy skills totally disrupted my plot arch! **** who puts 4 ranks in Nobody’s Fool!"

I've had this challenge, in a different system, a couple of times. That's not to say min-maxed social-monkey is regularly as big a challenge as min-maxed combat-wombats...

27 minutes ago, Eoen said:

Are you assuming some sort of home game or long term group? I'm talking about a walk in game at a game store where you meet all sorts from good players with decent personalities to autistic spikeys teens with zero social skills. Or online convention play where the player base is almost totally random.

Yeah, okay. Those don't really exist at all around here. Not even back when we still had multiple gaming stores. RPGing with random people has never been really a thing around here.

Even back when we had gaming stores with playing spaces, they just tended to be places where existing groups held their games, not where random people could crash your game. At least not in the venues I frequented.

26 minutes ago, Eoen said:

I've never heard any GM complain about a character being too optimized around diplomacy, gambling or some other social skill as being too powerful or over the top. Have you? I can just see it "OMG his diplomacy skills totally disrupted my plot arch! **** who puts 4 ranks in Nobody’s Fool!"

It depends on what you play. Star Wars isn't really set up for non-combat characters to be super-awesome. Making yourself stupid-good at Mechanics is certainly going to make the entire party's life a lot easier though.

I remember a character optimised for bureaucracy that was arguably the most powerful and essential member of the party, and a character optimised for dancing that required the GM to rethink his approach to combat encounters.

1 hour ago, micheldebruyn said:

It depends on what you play. Star Wars isn't really set up for non-combat characters to be super-awesome. Making yourself stupid-good at Mechanics is certainly going to make the entire party's life a lot easier though.

I remember a character optimised for bureaucracy that was arguably the most powerful and essential member of the party, and a character optimised for dancing that required the GM to rethink his approach to combat encounters.

The modder in our group as 5 Int and 5 ranks in Mechanics. It makes certain checks pointless, so I make use of the passive skill check optional rules from EotE CRB (page 322) in some instances.

The right use of knowledge skills can make the combat-wombats go without anything to do ... if the GM is not on the ball. Preferably, everything sould contribute to the drama, tension, and ultimately the action. Which this system allows for, with decent GMing, to an extraordinary degree.

My group is suboptimised for combat - I mean, two of them have 3 in Agility, and everyone has one rank in a ranged combat skill, so they are ok (by some standards). We do however have really exciting combat encounters, where fight or flight is always a consideration, if both are an option. Good uses of stealth, skulduggery, athletics, deception, and knowledge skills, help in avoiding, and solving, combat - many talky-talky, chasey-chasey and sneaky-sneaky scenes... last time leading to "having to" steal a Czerka ship, instead of going back to their own ship...

4 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

It depends on what you play. Star Wars isn't really set up for non-combat characters to be super-awesome. Making yourself stupid-good at Mechanics is certainly going to make the entire party's life a lot easier though.

I remember a character optimised for bureaucracy that was arguably the most powerful and essential member of the party, and a character optimised for dancing that required the GM to rethink his approach to combat encounters.

The FFG SW system does allow social characters to be super awesome since winning those opposed checks generally gets you what you want (and more with Advantage/Triumph, complications with Threat/Despair). The system is less vague in this way than many other systems, which means powergamers can min-max for social power and the rules support it. A super-social character can bend almost anyone to their will without even using the Force. If they do have the Force and the Influence power to add on Success/Advantage for the tougher checks, then things can get crazy really quickly.

6 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

6 hours ago, Eoen said:

Are you assuming some sort of home game or long term group? I'm talking about a walk in game at a game store where you meet all sorts from good players with decent personalities to autistic spikeys teens with zero social skills. Or online convention play where the player base is almost totally random.

Yeah, okay. Those don't really exist at all around here. Not even back when we still had multiple gaming stores. RPGing with random people has never been really a thing around here.

Even back when we had gaming stores with playing spaces, they just tended to be places where existing groups held their games, not where random people could crash your game. At least not in the venues I frequented.

The closest I've ever heard to a game store that allowed walk-ins to a game with strangers was one time when someone had brought in a game to demo. In that case it was advertised previously, and myself and a buddy went there specifically to participate in the game. It wasn't a real "walk into a game and sit down at random with players" situation, because how would that work? It sounds like it would be a total nightmare. I have trouble believing that ever happens anywhere. It almost seems like something you'd see in a movie written by someone who hasn't ever really played RPGs.

7 hours ago, Tramp Graphics said:

No, I haven’t. I’ve said that in D6, he had a relatively impressive lightsaber skill (at 9D+1, of which 5D+2 was actual skill), though certainly not anywhere near best in the galaxy, and he knew a lot of different Force powers. His actual three Force skills (Control, Sense, and Alter), however, didn’t even hit 7D (often considered the standard for a fully trained Knight in that system), being 5D+1, 5D+2, and 6D respectively), and that he picked up a lot of different skills over the course of actual game play.

The D20 conversion made him into a 18th level combat monster, and that was solely because of how WotC designed their conversion system.

I based my FFG conversion primarily on my original D6 character, only taking the talents from D20, something that didn’t exist in WEG.

As for your assertion that I always try to control the narrative, check out the Kandosii, Beroya campaign in the EotE beginner forum. I’m currently almost purely combat support (much to the GM’s chagrin, who wishes I could contribute more from a role-play standpoint), a blunt instrument sent in to crack skulls, and, given my current limited amount of time to role-play because of work, that suits me just fine. Even then that character fails more often than she succeeds (mostly because of poor rolls), and has often taken on a more comedic role as a result of her pratfalls and other antics.

This was also true of my Zeltron Racer, and Wookiee Sentry, and many other characters I’ve played in other campaigns I’ve played over the years. Neither character dominated the narrative, nor did I try to make them do so.

So, no, I don’t try to dominate the narrative. I role-play a character , each based upon any of various specific concepts, that each has specific skills, and personality quirks unique to that character. The fact that you didn’t like how I played those two characters (one of which didn’t even really get a chance to be developed beyond one situation) does not mean I was trying to dominate the narrative.

This was also the case with Rei. I was role- playing that character, a character with a very rigid sense of justice who was angry because neither your character, nor the Jedi master there, nor anyone else in that bar had lifted a finger to stop two bullies from picking on those weaker than them . You took it as a personal attack on you when it wasn’t and killed the game before the whole scenario could be resolved. The one who was trying to control the narrative was you. You tried to control how my character was introduced, what people knew about my character before I was ready to reveal it using knowledge your character couldn’t have known. You were the one using metagaming to try to control the narrative and play spoiler .

"Ginsu with a lightsaber" is not wording *I* would use to describe a character, it is an exact quote which you have used repeatedly over the years to describe Korath. The first time I heard you use it back I think in 2005 when you were describing Korath to me for the first time the sentence was "He's a real ginsu with a lightsaber". Earlier in this thread you expressed the same idea in different vernacular

From page 2Elias is referring to my signature character,

Elias is referring to my signature character, Korath , who was never even brought up, nor is he the subject of this thread. That character was a D6 character, converted to D20 RCRB, and again to F&D. He started out as a focused lightsaber jockey , and, indeed, a lot of his XP in D6 went into that skill, but a lot more went into many other, more diverse skills as time went on playing him in an actual campaign

In all three failed play by posts on this forum the campaign was centered around the jedi star (Korath's ship), in the last one you tried coerce KathyKitten away from playing a star fighter ace with here own sil 3 ship into being a gunner on your ship with her junior character, and when after much antagonism her master character didn't give you what you felt was the proper respect you announced your intent to drop off the character at the next port, thereby forcing the character out of the campaign. The GM had to retcon her one shotting Korath dead to stunning Korath unconscious and KathyKitten quit the campaign shortly thereafter.

That is perhaps the clearest example of what you do, metagame power playing... saying it's my way or the highway after trying to make sure there is no other option to stay in the game.

As for Rei... and Korath... who you professed to a drill sergeant of a jedi master... when your idea of roleplaying a character is berating of the players in character, that violates rule zero don't be a d!ck, good roll playing never justifies d!ckish behavior.

right after I had compromised at your insistence what my "millennial female pantoran force sensitive smuggler" starting character would have in character said (i.e. I compromised my good roleplaying) to let you have the "big reveal" moment that was already obvious to everyone else in the campaign, you turned around and berated me in character, refused to alter it when I asked, insisted that I respond in character to resolve it... I did... my millennial female character left the cantina after being insulted after having just walked into it and not having seen how the fight started. The in character good roleplaying that you insisted on left your starting character without a connection to the party. At that time the mediation started and you announced for the first time that you wanted to roleplay an ongoing antagonistic rivalry between our characters which I was not down for, you refused to give up, then I quit the campaign, then you went back and edited the initial post that triggered it but still refused to give up on the antagonistic rivalry between our characters, but that was too little too late because I had already left the campaign.

Please get a room you two. I'm not sure how much more of this I can take... 😅

So I'm not the only one completely uninterested in two people bickering about a personal dispute? That's good to hear. Half the thread is taken up by a petty squabble.

45 minutes ago, EliasWindrider said:

"Ginsu with a lightsaber" is not wording *I* would use to describe a character, it is an exact quote which you have used repeatedly over the years to describe Korath. The first time I heard you use it back I think in 2005 when you were describing Korath to me for the first time the sentence was "He's a real ginsu with a lightsaber". Earlier in this thread you expressed the same idea in different vernacular

From page 2Elias is referring to my signature character,

Elias is referring to my signature character, Korath , who was never even brought up, nor is he the subject of this thread. That character was a D6 character, converted to D20 RCRB, and again to F&D. He started out as a focused lightsaber jockey , and, indeed, a lot of his XP in D6 went into that skill, but a lot more went into many other, more diverse skills as time went on playing him in an actual campaign

In all three failed play by posts on this forum the campaign was centered around the jedi star (Korath's ship), in the last one you tried coerce KathyKitten away from playing a star fighter ace with here own sil 3 ship into being a gunner on your ship with her junior character, and when after much antagonism her master character didn't give you what you felt was the proper respect you announced your intent to drop off the character at the next port, thereby forcing the character out of the campaign. The GM had to retcon her one shotting Korath dead to stunning Korath unconscious and KathyKitten quit the campaign shortly thereafter.

That is perhaps the clearest example of what you do, metagame power playing... saying it's my way or the highway after trying to make sure there is no other option to stay in the game.

As for Rei... and Korath... who you professed to a drill sergeant of a jedi master... when your idea of roleplaying a character is berating of the players in character, that violates rule zero don't be a d!ck, good roll playing never justifies d!ckish behavior.

right after I had compromised at your insistence what my "millennial female pantoran force sensitive smuggler" starting character would have in character said (i.e. I compromised my good roleplaying) to let you have the "big reveal" moment that was already obvious to everyone else in the campaign, you turned around and berated me in character, refused to alter it when I asked, insisted that I respond in character to resolve it... I did... my millennial female character left the cantina after being insulted after having just walked into it and not having seen how the fight started. The in character good roleplaying that you insisted on left your starting character without a connection to the party. At that time the mediation started and you announced for the first time that you wanted to roleplay an ongoing antagonistic rivalry between our characters which I was not down for, you refused to give up, then I quit the campaign, then you went back and edited the initial post that triggered it but still refused to give up on the antagonistic rivalry between our characters, but that was too little too late because I had already left the campaign.

Three? There have only been two, and in both games, the trouble didn’t start until you joined in.

Secondly, I never used the term “Ginsu with a lightsaber” to describe him. Was he lightsaber focused? Yes, to a point. He was above average with a lightsaber, but not an “ubermensch” with one. For that he’d need over 15D+. He was the best in our D6 group with a lightsaber, but probably the weakest with the Force, even though he had a lot of powers, and that is because every time you added a pip to any Force skill, you also learned a new power. That adds up to a lot of Force powers over time, even with only a few dice each in your Force skills.

As for demanding respect? He’s the Captain of the ship . He was the person responsible for everyone’s safety and the running of the ship. That is what demanded respect. It had nothing to do with his “power level” or “Uber skill” with a lightsaber.

If you have a starting XP “nobody” with his own ship, guess what, he’s the captain , he deserves the respect due the captain of that ship. That means he makes the rules on that ship for that ship because he is 100% responsible for everyone and everything on that ship .

Third, it was you who insisted on “my way or the highway” even after the GM at the time had said to take the discussion out of the thread, and you were reminded repeatedly to do so, but you still pushed the issue in the thread. You broke the table rules by initially bringing in two related characters even though you knew that wasn’t allowed for that campaign. You knew going in that a player’s two characters could have no relationship whatsoever with each other. You knew that my ship could not accommodate another ship docking with it, but you pushed for another player to have a ship because you didn’t want Korath to have any “authority”, and you weren’t even in the campaign yet. And you insisted on dragging another player’s character with you in your huff when Rei called your character out for her inaction, never even giving that player any agency in that decision. Lastly, You insisted I scrap my starting character entirely. That is what I refused to do. You killed that game. You were the one metagaming .

You did the same thing in the first game. You came in decided you were going to take over as GM against my wishes, and tried to push me into a no win situation against a Star Destroyer. No thank you. You don’t like how I built Korath, you don’t like how I play him. You never even really got to know how I was going to play my starting character because you quit in a huff all because my character got angry with your character (and everyone else in the bar) over your character’s (and their) lack of action in the situation with the bullies .

oh this is pathetic

its not even worth proper capitalization and punctuation

21 minutes ago, atama2 said:

So I'm not the only one completely uninterested in two people bickering about a personal dispute? That's good to hear. Half the thread is taken up by a petty squabble.

Nah. For some reason these two enjoy battering each other in front of everyone. It's quite indecent.

Not that I'm innocent of such socio-masochism myself. Not by a long shot. But I strive ...

Anyway. I've been considering my typology above a bit more. I think there is definitely room for improvement.

As a player will make more or less informed decisions along those three dimensions, possibly more....

Sorry guys, I didn’t want to drag this up.

So here's another go at the typology. Somewhat simplified.

It is at the very least somewhat cleaner I feel.

So, the idea is that these are considerations that are weighed when making (and playing) a character. What I would call "hard" choices pertain to the system, and will mostly have to do with game mechanical aspects of optimisation and convention considerations (i.e. Must have Niman!), whereas what I would call "soft" choices, pertain to the type-role, i.e. role playing aspects of the character in the in-game world, its status and background, and performance or execution as they relate to profession (i.e. career and specialisation) and the character, its identity, demeanour, outlook, appearance, and active/passive decision-making.

They are, as the astute observer will notice, not mutually exclusive - they interact and depend on each other, at least to some degree, if varying intensity depending on direction.

1 hour ago, Jegergryte said:

So here's another go at the typology. Somewhat simplified.

Character creation decision - making
Defer/Reject convention (“wrong” vs “right”) (suboptimal – optimal)	Defer/Reject convention (“wrong” vs “right”) (suboptimal – optimal)
System	Type-role
Numeric (i.e. min-maxing stats, skills, talents, abilities, career/specialistaion, species, etc.)	Character concept (i.e. role play, archetype, IC status/rank, etc.)

It is at the very least somewhat cleaner I feel.

So, the idea is that these are considerations that are weighed when making (and playing) a character. What I would call "hard" choices pertain to the system, and will mostly have to do with game mechanical aspects of optimisation and convention considerations (i.e. Must have Niman!), whereas what I would call "soft" choices, pertain to the type-role, i.e. role playing aspects of the character in the in-game world, its status and background, and performance or execution as they relate to profession (i.e. career and specialisation) and the character, its identity, demeanour, outlook, appearance, and active/passive decision-making.

They are, as the astute observer will notice, not mutually exclusive - they interact and depend on each other, at least to some degree, if varying intensity depending on direction.

And it's worth noting, there isn't really a way to build or even optimize for role-play. Sure you can write backstories and use the stats as guidance, but there's really no "decision making" in the same sense of mechanical build choices. You're free to role-play your character as an amazing warrior, even if the stats don't have your RPs back. You're free to RP your character as not all that confident in their fighting skills, even if they're rocking max combat scores. And frankly, a warrior who is highly trained but doesn't act like their skills have much value could be great RP, and similarly a warrior who is not great learning to be humble could be great RP, provided that the player is interested and willing, and able to understand that their RP does not translate into mechanical roll-play. (unless you're in a system that does that)

5 hours ago, atama2 said:

The closest I've ever heard to a game store that allowed walk-ins to a game with strangers was one time when someone had brought in a game to demo. In that case it was advertised previously, and myself and a buddy went there specifically to participate in the game. It wasn't a real "walk into a game and sit down at random with players" situation, because how would that work? It sounds like it would be a total nightmare. I have trouble believing that ever happens anywhere. It almost seems like something you'd see in a movie written by someone who hasn't ever really played RPGs.

One of local game store/restaurants and magic card commodity house in my town had a game of the month with the same GM for three years. I've played just about every simple rpg game that's come out in the last five years, Pugmire, Fate, Blades in the Dark, Band of Blades, Mouse Guard, Tales from the loop, The Yellow King, Dresden files, and a few more complicated one such as L5r, Genesys, Shadowrun, and Star Wars age of Rebellion. All walk in. I've played with all types of gamers there too, from conservative coast guard employees to Disney employee's. The same store also had a pathfinder organized play group, also walk in.

But seriously they make most of their money on magic card speculation and brokering they have more employees brokering cards than running the retail.

29 minutes ago, Eoen said:

One of local game store/restaurants and magic card commodity house in my town had a game of the month with the same GM for three years. I've played just about every simple rpg game that's come out in the last five years, Pugmire, Fate, Blades in the Dark, Band of Blades, Mouse Guard, Tales from the loop, The Yellow King, Dresden files, and a few more complicated one such as L5r, Genesys, Shadowrun, and Star Wars age of Rebellion. All walk in. I've played with all types of gamers there too, from conservative coast guard employees to Disney employee's. The same store also had a pathfinder organized play group, also walk in.

But seriously they make most of their money on magic card speculation and brokering they have more employees brokering cards than running the retail.

That’s unusual, have you seen this done elsewhere? Again, I’ve never seen this before or heard of it. You might have a unique concept there. How many people participate? (A lot of people struggle to find enough players for even a scheduled game among regulars.)

18 minutes ago, atama2 said:

That’s unusual, have you seen this done elsewhere? Again, I’ve never seen this before or heard of it. You might have a unique concept there. How many people participate? (A lot of people struggle to find enough players for even a scheduled game among regulars.)

We had anywhere from 2 to 8 players depending on the draw of the game. The Cute animal games being a favourite. Seattle probably has one of the largest nerd populations on earth. Our pathfinder (2e) lodge has dozens of active players online.

54 minutes ago, Eoen said:

We had anywhere from 2 to 8 players depending on the draw of the game. The Cute animal games being a favourite. Seattle probably has one of the largest nerd populations on earth. Our pathfinder (2e) lodge has dozens of active players online.

Wait... Where in Seattle was this? Which store? (I live in Auburn and game in Kent.)