Hi all I was hoping to start up a Fate game based in the Dresden files world not sure about the storyline yet as character creation has significant impact on this, but it would take place in Christchurch at the height of the wizard/red court war. I am looking for 4-6 players to play on tuesday or thursday at saga, for thise who dont know the fate system I can run a one off with premade characters if you want to learn the rules

I’ve just confirmed with the UCSA that we have KD07 and KD08 booked Tuesdays and Thursdays for the month of December up until the 19th22nd. Usual times and days – Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6pm onwards.

Unfortunately, with the new year we won’t be able to book rooms until after clubs day, so no University gaming for the months of January or February.

If you have any issues with getting into our rooms, I’m pretty sure security knows about our woes by now – my advice is to find someone in an office around that area, ask if you can use their phone, and use it to call security. They’re generally able to unlock rooms for us.

The event itself was a rousing success – we had a great turnout and the board-gaming room was full to capacity most of the time. Thanks go out to Jennifer DuBois and the Sci-Fi Society for letting us be a part of the event.

Quite a few folks were interested in joining up too, so expect some new faces at the next few regular SAGA Inc. meetings. If you’re looking to start a game, now’s a good time to start advertising – don’t forget that we have that newly-revamped campaigns page that could do with some love, so if you want to start something in particular, send me the details.

If you have some photos of the event, it would be great if you could upload them to Flickr with the tag “Sancon2011″. If you’re not on Flickr, or are uploading them somewhere else, we’d still love to know where and to advertise them to everyone else.

3rd and 4th of September, Saturday and Sunday 8am to 7pm, both days Otakaro Building

That’s two days, TWO DAYS, of gaming awesomeness folks.

Anyone interested in running large scale board games or even RP one-offs and want to advertise the fact before hand, let me know and we’ll advertise it!

For those of you interested, there are plans to rerun the Saga Inc Fruit Intiative (SIFI), but this can’t go ahead without donations to the fund. So, if you are intending on coming to Minicon and want some handy, dandy fruit around to munch on, email secretary@saga.org.nz and tell me how much you want to commit to the fund.

Also, since Saga has become -far- more accurate at predicting earthquakes then certain Auckland based individuals, we’ll be taking a collection for a donation to the Red Cross. Or the start of a warchest for a campaign against the Molemen.

Until the 4th of July, grab Apocalypse World, Dogs in the Vineyard, In a Wicked Age, Poison’d, Kill Puppies for Satan and Mechaton in PDF format for USD25. Not a bad little deal.

“…the group just steps up to play some D&D without defining an edition or even having a rulebook; furthermore, the GM acts as the gatekeeper of the rules, defining and explaining the rules as they’re needed.”

Game Design is about Structure | Primitive D&D

• When: June 16, from 5pm onwards
• Where: Starting in the Big Top
• Cost: $14 for members of Sci-Fi Soc, SAGA Inc., or UC Gaming Guild; $16 for non-members (includes sign-up to Sci-Fi Soc), $18 if we get a heap of people.

We will be running console and board games in the Big Top (along with the UC Gaming Guild), and then around 8pm we will make our way to the movies via the best available route (car, bus, however). Pizza will be provided at the Big Top and I hear there might be stuff happening afterwards too.

SAGA Inc. has TWENTY TICKETS to give out to our members at the special $14 rate. Spots are limited, so if you want to grab one of the SAGA tickets you’ll need to email Rose around about…now.

I’ll make sure that the SAGA website is kept up-to-date regarding future events – here’s hoping that at the end of this we still have a venue!

Barring the game of Castle Ravenloft that I played last Monday at the BG&BBQ, the above link on the West Marches has been the greatest incentive I have seen in a long while to return to old-school kick-down-the-door D&D-style gaming. Given that ever since I picked up my copy of Spirit of the Century I’ve been a hardcore story-gamer, that’s somewhat of an achievement.

It’s not all old-school orthodoxy, however – West Marches is a campaign that should have between 10 and 14 players, the author suggests, and not everyone need show up every game night.

The setting of the campaign is the very edge of civilisation. The PCs are adventurers who have come to, well, seek adventure. They explore the wilderness, kill off monsters, collect loot, upgrade, and so forth. The game deviates from your standard Keep-on-the-Borderland run in that the players have the control over what they do. One player might think that the forest off to the west needs exploring. They’d get a few other players interested, and the group would pick a time when the GM was free in which to have the adventure.

Like anything this character-driven, there’s a good bit of prep for the GM. You need to have a good idea of what every area will have in the way of monsters, environment, and so forth, and when the players give you three days’ notice that they’re going to explore a set of caves, well, if you don’t have a cavern map handy, you’d better get drawing. But there’s no intricate plot to work out, either. Nothing in the game is plot-driven, and you generally won’t have to run any NPCs either.

One thing the author stresses is that none of the areas are balanced for the party’s current level. If you’re level one and you wander around the wrong places, you will be killed (or at least sent crying back to the village to Cure Minor Wounds your way back to full health). If you go wandering in the woodlands and your ranger notes owlbear tracks, maybe it’s time to mark it down on the map as “too hard for right now”. Or you could get a bigger group of you together and go hunt some owlbears – it’s up to you.

Adversity, the author points out, results in teamwork. People will cooperate to explore the dangerous bits. But it also results in friendly competition. When you finally reach the head of the pass that five other parties have failed to reach, you’re going to brag about it to the rest of the group. Here, too, we finally see how actual play (AP) reports can be useful: usually everyone was either there, or doesn’t care about your campaign. Now there are people in your campaign who weren’t there and do desperately care about what’s over that hill and what you had to fight to get there. And hell, maybe that ruined tower you spotted a couple of hills away is interesting enough that the next adventuring group will head that way and see what it’s about.

So, will I suddenly be pulling out my D&D set to GM an old-school campaign that takes up half of SAGA? Doubtful. For a start, I’d be more tempted to run this using Dragon Warriors, DungeonSlayers, Flame Princess, or some hack of Apocalypse World – I’ve had enough two-hour-long fights to make me think that D&D just won’t hold for the sort of game I prefer – and even if I did get the system that I wanted, I’m pretty sure I’ve already promised to run about four different campaigns before I get to this. But at some time in the future, I think it’d be interesting enough to try out.

Or you could run it. I’ll play. I’m going to be a bard.

Thanks go to Francine and Sara for helping out cleaning up in the kitchen after the barbecue, and special thanks to Rose for helping with buying and preparing food, and generally being organised.

That’s unfortunately the last event we have planned for SAGA this year. Due to the UCSA still being used as study space, we don’t have a regular meeting place, and won’t do until the start of next year.

Thanks to everyone (especially my committee) for making this year a success. Keep checking this space for news on what’s going to be happening next year!