Had a blast GMing Epyllion at Gen Con. I ran three sessions, and each time the players quickly got into the spirit of the game. The rules are easy to grasp even when I haven’t explained them very well. My third session included a player who had never roleplayed before, and she jumped right in and was storytelling along with the rest of the clutch.
I did notice that it seemed trivially easy for players to hand around friendship gems. Since these were just 2-hour sessions, I wasn’t too worried, since it helped the players build up to the big rolls they needed near the end. However, players who weren’t casting magic were able to save up quite a big bonus for “help another dragon” rolls. Over time I expect it would take some of the drama out of things if you were sitting on 10 gems and you could always roll a hit on your “help another” rolls. Possibly I’ve misread part of the rules there.
Overall, though, this was a joy to run, and I’m looking forward to trying it again at the next Games on Demand. I’m also planning to clean up my GM notes for the adventure and share them with the G+ group.
Excellent. I’m keen to see what you used for notes and ideas.
While this wouldn’t work for just short one-shots, when I ran Epyllion for some kids over the summer, I found the best way to do gems was at the end of the session. It was easier for the kids to remember to give them out that way, and it reduced the number of gems being given out so they didn’t get loaded down with gems. This might work well for anyone doing long (or longer) term games.
I’ve never had a problem with folks having too many gems, but I tend to make sure people are justifying their exchanges pretty solidly.
I also don’t worry much about people having +3 to help – Every time a dragon almost misses and someone leaps in to help them, narrating how they help their friend is usually some of the best fiction in my games.
Also, I don’t think it’s specified anywhere, but I make sure that two things have to go on a Player’s name tent – Dragon name, and Virtue, so that everyone can always see what virtues their friends are looking for.
All good suggestions, thanks. I wasn’t worried too much since this was a one-shot two-hour game, but it did make me curious as to how I would handle it for a longer campaign.