TOPIC: Room layout change to help trading next year

This used to be the standard - having a well-lit tavern with activities going on. I'm putting together a longer post about this as well as my opinion that having a separate AG area is harmful to TD generally.

Just a couple of thoughts to clarify some things. Anything that overhangs player space (more thane we have pushed it with the canted roof lines) and places itself in the way of the existing overhead sprinker systems is an issue from fire code. Even if the material is fire rated in some way. (Think melting burning cloth falling on people trying to get out of a room...)

We have done some things in small ways in the past, but it all came with huge overhead to implement.

Fog brings its own issues, the particle sensors in most buildings must be shut off to use fog, doing so requires a warm body on site (usually from the union or fire department as a firewatch) and that gets very pricy, not to mention the added scruteny. They can be very cool to deal with, or not. Even with sensors in the room turned off and a fire watch, you still have problems as we did with the marriott where constant movement of staff in and out of the access corredor behind the scenes let out enough fog to set of the hall sensors outside the event. It is never easy.

Having a well lit tavern in the past was doable because in the Marriott we could physically separate off space with movable walls and could control the lighting in that specific area. In the convention center, unless you hang some sort of divider, any overhead light from those large lighting pods spreads out to far to make it feasible, we have tried. Dividers would have to be purchased and provided by us as far as I know, and we would have to have the unions install and take them down, since they do not work on Sunday without huge compensation, we would have to pay for the room until they could be taken down on Monday, which again is a huge expense either way you go.

I am sure Jeff is already thinking about what can be done next year. I think the cry for more lighting has been heard and what can be done will be tried.

Dave

Thanks for taking the time to explain all of this.

I suppose one solution may be to rent a small area in an adjacent hall in order to set up the lit tavern area, with players walking through the doors in the divider walls to get to the dungeon proper. That would certainly add expense, but since it might open up more floorspace in the main (dark) hall for more runs, it may be an idea.

How about peddler's carts to assist the traders. It is mobile, can be lit via battery, the top can display goods and the bottom can store extra good's and gold once an item has been sold. Heck you even can install a lock to secure the items inside. George as well as others can be mobile to reach people within the story scape as well as outside in the convention hall. I do not know if outside the story scape will infringe upon the commerce rules of gencon but I think the cart would add to the carinval / bazar feel of Medieval life.

I find it interesting that the storyscape/tavern used to have activities. The lack of that was one of the things I was disappointed with this year, and I was wondering if my expectations were just set too high on that.

I only caught myself looking at the ceiling once, which is pretty good as I am a haunter and go to houses so how things were done, what they used from props, etc. I think directed lighting it the way to go. Also what about "trees" or such being used to direct the lighting as well. I really don't think you would need a while lot of light to make a difference. Maybe more of a maze or light break in those areas will be helpful too.

2005 had the first city scape with two stores that traded gold for tokens, one store that was like the current TD store, the largest tavern ever and some extra space that was kind of for exploring. There was a cash bar run by the hotel.

2006 had the great but smaller tavern which included the first bar tavern game (a PVP sliding game, it may have been a ticketed event). Not sure if there was a bar this year (I cant picture where it would have been).

2007 the tavern shrank a little more and had a lot of rounds of the Bar fight sliding game. There was a Bard contest this year. Cash bar was present this year.

2008 may have been the last year for the tavern, there was a bards contest and I think bar fight was still run but given the location, it didn't do as much business. The tavern was at the opposite side of the dungeon from the entrance.

We need a marketplace. Traders help the game by offering newer players tokens they can use for gold they may not have a use for. Retaining new blood is important for the future of TD. The new player today can turn into a big token buyer in the future. I really don't care where the marketplace is as long as it is well lit. Half of my enjoyment from TD comes from trading and getting new players hooked. With the lighting situation being what it was this year I spent very little time trading as I could barely see my own hands let alone the tokens I was trying to trade.

Rafiq