Introduction and questions at the bottom.

[black1blade]

So hi guys, first post. Anyway. first off a brief introduction. At school, I am part of a role-playing club which meets weekly after school. I consists of me, 3 of my friends ,a random year 11 girl and a nerdy I.T teacher. The club was started by my I.T after we all showed an interest in tabletop role-playing. The first I had heard of a proper table top RPG was watching someone unbox a pathfinder beginner box on a wargaming site. Being a Lotr wargamer my self, the pathfinder system just made scene for the system to go for (after very little research). As the pathfinder rules are sort of available online and there being many helpful youtube videos, I worked out the basics I told my friends about it and that was the system we thought we where going to play. After telling our IT teacher, he said he would be more comfortable running a 3.5 campaign as he new the rules. From then, we designed our characters and began meeting up for 1 and a half hours every week. Our teacher Dm'ed and our first few sessions where great. However after a while the magic wore off, I was the only one the group trying to roleplay, 2 people where only interested in their stats 1 just messed around and the other was always on their phone. Now I think our It teacher was more used to being a character and slowly lost enthusiasm with descriptions as the adventure wore on. I think a mix between him not having enough time, people not roleplaying and just general silliness, the whole thing started to break down and much of the enjoyment left for me. After about 10 weeks of playing, we moved onto a star war RPG for a few weeks and that was okay I suppose but I didn't really get into it. Accuse the IT teacher has several things going on for the next few weeks, I have shown my desire to run a basic fantasy campaign in the near future, either this term or beginning of next year. Now coming from a wargamer background, I like following the rules as close as possible. If a ran a 3.5 campaign ,or short time would be consumed with me flicking through the rulebook all the time. With BF there aren't very many rules, so I can make up rules that feel right and speed up he game. This is what our It teacher was doing with 3.5 anyway. My powergamer friends say it's too limited but I say that there character should be defined by their roleplaying not their abilities. Rather annoyed my friends said they would be happy to do a campaign sometime in the future. Now time to get to the point, sorry about long wall of text but whatever, now here are my questions:
Is 1.5 hours a week enough to run a small but healthy session using BF?
How do I get people to be better roleplayers?
How do I get people hooked on the game and not be silly or get distracted?
Anyway thanks for reading this.

[Hywaywolf]

My first suggestion is to read the Quick Primer for Old School Gaming By Matthew Finch. A quick introduction to playing (old school style D&D). This booklet is designed for the modern-style gamer who's planning on taking the old-style rules for a trial run -- because open-ended rules like 0e are USED very differently than rules are used in modern systems. Its a free download. http://www.lulu.com/us/en/shop/matthew- ... 59558.html .

Second, don't say that you are making up rules. You are making a ruling. A 2nd level ranger wants to leap from the table, grab the chandelier and swing himself over the melee in the tavern and escape out the back door. Well, there is probably nothing in the rules to fit this exactly so make a ruling using the ability rolls table on page 141. "Ok, roll against a target of 16, add your dex bonus and since you are already on the table, add an additional +2 to your roll".

3rd, and 1 1/2 is tight, but if they come in ready to play and get right down to it then maybe its enough time. Set up a way to message each other about the game in between sessions to take care of things like experience and dividing loot so as not to waste game time on out of character discussions.

4th, if you want people to be better roleplayers then reward them when they roleplay well. Someone bargains with a goblin guard to get past it instead of just hacking away (which is fine) then give them 25 xp on the spot.

[black1blade]

Another brief question, say if one of the classes isn't in the party, will there survival rate suffer? I say this because 2 or 3 will want to be fighters.

[Hywaywolf]

A cleric is a fighter.

And yes, it is more likely that the survival rate will be low if you don't have a well rounded party. That doesn't mean you can't succeed with mostly fighters if they play smart. If they are the types to engage in melee at every opportunity then there will be lots of funerals.

[black1blade]

How do I deal with selfish characters who are only interseted in getting more loot than everyone else?

[Hywaywolf]

you don't. You are the referee, not a player controller. The other players need to deal with it. Now, you can make statements like, "you were just looting the dead milkcow, you didn't have time to do that and snatch up the gold necklace before anyone else could act."But if you want to stop someone from grabbing everything first, then leave some cursed items for them to grab. If I were in a party where one player was totally disregarding everyone else in the party and grabbing up everything and generally treating the rest of us like we were nothing, well he's got to sleep sometime. Either he wakes up dead or he wakes up wearing nothing but his skivvies with a knot on his head and a splitting headache. No prty members, no loot and maybe his own gear (or maybe not, depending on how big a jerk he was)

[black1blade]

Well I mean we're all friends but he can be increbebly stubborn and annoying. The day before, we where talking about what clases eveyone would be he said he would be the thief. After rolling his stats,I allowed 1 ability score swap, he decided to be a fighter becuase he had 17 in strength. However, my other friend has already decided to be a dwarven fighter, basically they just squabbled but ended up being both dwarf fighters with stupid names, with the stubborn one being female. It really annoyed me that they wern't taking it seriously , as i had spent my entire evrning on my adventue and while the other friend hadn't help the situation, the stuborn one caused it. I also feel that he hasn't quite grasped the concept of old school gaming as I said "You may have to find other suloutions to encounters than combat and if the party loses a meber or two, you may want to run away." At which he replied "Thats not how I like to do things,I'll never run from a dungeon." I want to teach him a lesson with out him not wanting to play. Anyhow I'm sure we're going to have lots of fun anyway. (sorry about poor spelling, I am posting this on my phone.)

[Hywaywolf]

My point is that you don't need to teach lessons. Just let the dice fall where they will and they'll learn about poor play on their own. Let him race in to combat, that doesn't mean the rest of the party has to race in with him. For example, I am a big believer in ranging. I am going to range until I can't range any more. If the fighter types don't want to wait til range takes a few chunks out of the enemy thats fine with me. I am not rushing in simply because someone else wants to. I only hope I don't hit them if I miss LOL. joking, sort of. I don't shoot into melee once there is no other choice, but I don't let someone charging into action stop me from taking my action. We all make our choices

The fact is, that this game is only good for people who want to play a role. Its not for people who just want to play a game. Your friend may not be a good candidate for olde style play.

[black1blade]

I am hoping that he'll warm up to old style play, he normally has really lucky rolls.

[Jandolar]

A few things I'd like to add. First off back when I started playing D&D there were no cell-phones (thank God). With that said I'd advise that you set a house rule stating that phones are either off or left in a shoe box for the duration of the game. Next thing is get a DM's screen and do all the rolling for the characters and use story telling to describe what happens. It'll keep Mr. In-it-for-myself more intent on the role playing and less on the roll playing. If he still wants to grab and go before others have a chance to look through the loot then by all means hit him with something cursed.

When you roll up the treasure that the party has found write it down and hand it to the designated party leader (hope it's not the grabby-guy) and let him/her tell folks what has been found.

Or you could always kill the grabby-guy.......