TOPIC: anxiety over the cleric class

I think the bead test is fine the way it is...the only one I would fine easier is the wizard test...i suck with leaves and runes.

Leaves are the only one you can study in the off-season.

Kevin Jacobi wrote: Hi all,

I just wanted to thank everyone who helped be get over the anxiety of playing the cleric. It is very much appreciated!

I did pretty well as I missed 1 out of 8 challenges.

It was pretty hard this year. Last year, the GM would ask me to chose from 3 beads. This year, all but one of them handed me the bead string and asked me to pick out the bead! Crazy!

I appreciate all the people who volunteer but it really felt disorganized this year. The room GMs were pretty rough around the edges and the people at the end of the adventure were having issues with the experience computer (my entire party didn't get their experience put in).

I will never go again on the Thursday - it was just too haphazard.

Hi! I do hope this does not come across in any way negative or condescending. I hate the written word when trying to have a discussion with someone because the little things like tone of speech and the little things can be missed or over-looked.

I want to start off with something you said in a later post about GenCon being a vacation and a time to hang out with friends and volunteering can eat into that.

I TOTALLY understand!! I've been coming to GenCon since 2005. And, that's only because I grew up in a stick town in Pennsylvania in the heart of coal mining old towns and never even heard of GenCon. If I would have, I can guarantee I would have been going since early childhood. And, my 1st Ed AD&D friends and I would have made weekly or monthly road trips to Gary's [Gygax] home to play with him and his friends. Margaret Weis and Gary himself told me that he had an open door policy for people to play AD&D/D&D with him.

Anyway, I ramble...

It wasn't until last year that I started volunteering for TD because I wanted to start giving back to the TD Community. Also, since I had worked for a local Ren Faire a couple years I wanted to keep my skills honed.

So, who knows? Right now you want to get the most out of GenCon. A few more years from now you might want to volunteer. Either way I can understand.

Funny story...

After this year's GenCon I felt like I only got to do half the stuff I wanted to do. I didn't get to playtest any D&D stuff (although, I am strictly a 1st Ed AD&D person and won't play anything else from TSR/WotC); didn't get to do more TD runs; and forgot to register for a Formula De event.

But! It wasn't because of volunteering for TD. It was because two of my best friends finally made it out together for a GenCon and wanted to spend time with me. I had to oblige because I love these guys like they were my identical twins.

As a matter of fact, one of them took my ticket for the Catan Guinness World Record attempt Friday night. I paid for the ticket and he gave me all the free swag. I so wanted to do this, but it conflicted with my TD Volunteer Shift. Am I disappointed I couldn't do the Catan thing? Heck yea!! Do I have any regrets? Nope!! I could have asked someone to switch shifts with me, but I had the perfect shifts to work with at TD this year: the late shifts so I could do the Dealer Hall and stuff during the days.

So, Jeff, Lori, Jean, and all the AC's who may or may not read this...

That is how great my dedication is to you and TD... I gave up actually participating in an event to get me in the Guinness Book and I have NO regrets.

Okay... back on topic...


Just like the Magic-User's board; the Druid's leaf cards; and the Bard's symbols, the Cleric's beads aren't meant to be easy. They can be after a few runs or a few years, but they aren't meant to be easy at first. TD imitates a realistic D&D-type world/experience. When a Cleric is cloistered away in his/her studies they don't just have everything come to them easy. They have to practice and practice and use memorization skills. Just like students today in school. The ones who study and dedicate themselves to their school work will succeed better than others. IIRC, old school AD&D did have a INT percentage for M-U (Magic-Users) that they would have a spell failure chance for low intelligences. And, NO I am not saying you or anyone has a low intelligence.

I have actually played a M-U so much that I have his chart memorized since last year. This year during my first run I just had to do a 1 minute refresher to remind myself where everything was on the board by visualization.

So, if you keep playing a Cleric then by the end of next year or the midst of the following year after that you will know the beads by heart.

I know as a DM I memorize about 2-3 things for each class and when a Player does his/her skills test I can keep the Room going smoothly and fast by already knowing the answer and not having to waste time looking up the answer. Although, every once in awhile I have to because I'll get a Cleric or Druid casting 4 or more spells than I have beads/leaves memorized.

Yes, you are right Thursday can be a little chaotic. But, that is to be expected with anything on the very first day. I know the WizKids Heroclix area was nuts the first day because of some last minute things they added to make the rest of the weekend flow smoothly. But, everyone involved in that said the rest of the days were awesome.

TD is kind of the same way for different reasons. I know prior to my first shift as DM I had my Room memorized and my script memorized. But, like any first night jitters, no matter how prepared you are you get a little stage fright.

My very first Party that came through did not get my best. And, I apologize for that! Not to say I did bad, but I know I sounded hesitant and cold.

But, like any actor on stage, every other performance gets better and better. Which I like to hope mine did.

I can't speak for other DMs/NPCs, but I know I would be very appreciative of constructive criticism after the Room is done. I know if time runs out for the Room we have to hustle Players to the next Room, but a quick word of advice can be very constructive. Please, understand it's not to be jerks!! Players only get 12 minutes to a Room. By hustling Parties at time's end it gives them the full 12 minutes in the next[ Room and it gives the new Party coming in their full 12 minutes in the Room next.

Yes, the XP Room was a little out of tune this year. Jeff has already said this will be greatly improved for next year. TD pretty much doubled in participation this year compared to last so these things can be expected. Is it an excuse? Yes and no. Jeff is dedicated and in love with TD. Trust me when I say he will make it even better next year with post-run experiences as well as everything else.

Now, onto some Volunteer DMs that may have been rough around the edges that you mentioned. As was already mentioned, some were 1st timers and can be expected to be rough around the edges the first couple of Rooms until they get their groove.

The other thing is that, as yet again was already said, TD had MANY Volunteers that bailed on their shifts. They used volunteering with TD to get their free GenCon Badges and then bailed. In my world I call this being a thief... and not the good kind like Raven.

And, here is something I may or may not be allowed to talk about... but, I will because if I had been Jeff in this instance I can guarantee I would have done something other than be strictly professional like Jeff and Lori and Jean were.

A group of 4 Volunteers signed up for full-time and got free GenCon Badges and a free hotel room. Right after training and getting their free Badges they put the hotel in their name and used their credit card to keep the room and screwed TD. Did TD lose money for the room? No. Did these 4 people get a sweet room close to the Con Center without having to go through GenCon and/or wait on a waiting list for a sweet hotel room? Yes.

As a GenCon attendee who had to walk 8 blocks from my hotel everyday I am ticked with what they did. If Jeff/Lori/Jean would have told me the room they were in I can guarantee they would walk into a room with all their stuff covered in shaving cream.

Anyway...

... the point of that story is that a lot of people had to pick up the slack from those that bailed on their committed duties and run Rooms that they literally had to learn in 15 minutes or less.

And, I am not disparaging those that had to bail because of emergency situations. Life happens and that is excusable.

So... with all my long-windedness... I hope I didn't come across as a jerk. I hope you come back next year and I know you will have a great time.

I hope that the people that bailed like that on TD have some negative repercussions.

It bothers me when people offer suggestions on how to improve a situation without understanding it. At best, the suggestions are ones that were considered already. At worst, they can come across as ungrateful and offensive, especially when they involve placing more demands on the time and energy of those willing to help.

Alvin Oliver wrote: I hope that the people that bailed like that on TD have some negative repercussions.

I believe they are prevented from ever volunteering again. If you are looking for "plagues of Egypt" kind of retribution, that falls short. But at least they are prevented from playing that trick again.

"Plagues of Egypt" Hmmm, now I want to watch the Dr. Phibes movies again...

Harlax wrote:

Alvin Oliver wrote: I hope that the people that bailed like that on TD have some negative repercussions.

I believe they are prevented from ever volunteering again. If you are looking for "plagues of Egypt" kind of retribution, that falls short. But at least they are prevented from playing that trick again.

"Plagues of Egypt" Hmmm, now I want to watch the Dr. Phibes movies again...

That is a start, but if could be proven they did it intentionally I wish that GenCon could ban their badge numbers from playing TD or buying TD tickets

I'm surprised the hotel allowed them to do that.

For probably 90% of the volunteers in the front area this year, I walked in and said "Hey, have you seen what the run completion tokens are?"

And they said "What is a run completion token? You get treasure chips at the end of the runs."

Me: "Uh, no. The special tokens you get from doing a run. There's an uncommon for Normal difficulty and a rare for Hardcore and Nightmare."

Volunteer: "There's no such thing. But there are Treasure Chips. I think."

What this says to me is that the volunteers are randos from the street, which is fine, but doesn't scream "I'm here because I know anything whatsoever about TD."

Exactly. I get the feeling that many of the volunteers haven't even played any sort of fantasy RPG before. I'm sure some of them just do it for the GenCon badge and/or hotel room.

I guess that's okay, but it hardly makes for good DMs.

DMs and coaches had to complete online training this year in addition to onsite training.

Customer Service volunteers had to complete onsite training. I was trained for treasure pull and XP desk and the completion tokens were covered. What others learned I can not say.

Toran wrote: For probably 90% of the volunteers in the front area this year, I walked in and said "Hey, have you seen what the run completion tokens are?"

And they said "What is a run completion token? You get treasure chips at the end of the runs."

Me: "Uh, no. The special tokens you get from doing a run. There's an uncommon for Normal difficulty and a rare for Hardcore and Nightmare."

Volunteer: "There's no such thing. But there are Treasure Chips. I think."

What this says to me is that the volunteers are randos from the street, which is fine, but doesn't scream "I'm here because I know anything whatsoever about TD."

I didn't consider that. I do think or wish that GenCon would take some kind of action against people that abuse the system like that.