Yeah I probably should’ve asked for advice, but I knew while assembling the deck that all my picks were garbage. Plus I was intimidated by being the only one there who didn’t already know someone else, so the anxiety took over and I didn’t do a whole lot of talking. The first opponent might have helped me out a little, he seemed pretty nice. The last two were a little scary tbh haha.

And yeah this group had 24 I think. Funny thing is that this is the small shop nearby me. It just happens to have high ceilings so every sound on the floor is amplified.

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Ah that sounds nice. Makes me wish anyone played Jumpstart. Cracking a couple of those in a similar way to your Pauper decks would’ve probably kept my energy up after a terrible round!

Yeah, I tried to not show that I was wearing down because I know that can dampen the mood. I did reflexively apologize to my first opponent because I assume one sided matches are boring, especially if someone is high skill, but to his credit he said not to worry about it and thanked me for the pack, so maybe I was overthinking it.

If I go again I’ll bring noise dampening earplugs and hopefully weather the environment better.

This was great, very comprehensive. Thank you!

Yeah nobody said or did anything egregious. I could just see my second opponent getting bored and kind of annoyed even of she kept it to herself. At least I think she was, I’m admittedly not great at reading faces. I think most people had friends there, so I felt like every moment they were spending on our games was going to be time they couldn’t be getting in a real game between rounds. Lots of friendly side games seemed to be happening between rounds. If that’s not actually an issue, then I won’t worry about it if I go again.

And yeah, the format change didn’t really change my odds of winning, but it threw me off and since I don’t really have fundamentals yet, it kind of felt like the floor falling out under me. Not a big deal though, just harder to learn from.

My solution is to run with as few as 2+me (the DM), and use a play structure that doesn’t require the same players to be present at every session. We always end rhe session in a safe location (town, safehouse, etc). If someone can’t make it, they’re just in suspended animation along with their gear and hirelings/retainers until they’re back.

Just not sweating the fact that it’s a game has gotten me a very consistent game every two weeks like clockwork.

What’d you end up picking? I was going to suggest just trying to get used to OBR 2. I agree it’s not as wonderfully minimal as the original, but it’s still not nearly as top heavy as Roll20, Foubdary and the rest, and the accounts, at least, are free. I’ve been running a megadungeon in it and the learning curve is pretty shallow compared to everything else.

Not a zoomer, but I am on the youngest edge of millennial – the first computer I remember using was running Windows 95, and our first home computer was a Pentium era HP. My love for the older stuff didn’t start until I was much older.