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pondering, how do you pick a game to play on any given day?

locally its usually someone suggesting it and no one objecting, ends up with a wide range of games played but usually only a few times before they are back on the shelf to return a while later

context: typically game one day a week as a group, some have other games mid week, focus tends to be something that can be played such two games on a slow moving Saturday are fine

the effect is games such as 40k tend to be shut out, not because its seen as bad (most of us have armies for it) but because with limited time there are other things that are seen as "better" (in some cases this is found to be untrue upon playing)

curious how others work this?

do you normally have a game you play, e.g. 40k, star wars, whatever and maybe play something else as well? play the same thing for a while? only really have one or two games you play or are you lucky enough to have a group that is large enough to have multiple systems on the go at once so its largely turn up with whatever and you will get a game?

We have a vague attempt to turn up and play X (Epic, KotB, 40k, heresy, etc.), but also bring other games (dungeon saga, Nemesis, Blood bowl team manager, etc.) that we can end up playing if the main event falls through or tastes change.

No joke but it depends largely on how much energy I have to repack my carry case.

We have discussed but never implemented a sort of seasons approach. We have about a half dozen games that we typically play and remembering rules or even improving your game gets harder with random rotation.

Seasons (with backup games brought just in case) lets you incorporate more advanced optional rules, play actual campaigns and lets you work ahead on units and terrain projects.

Our group’s individual likes/dislikes can seem like a grad school entrance exam logic problem. A likes all games. B will only play fantasy themed and mech games. C hates activation mechanics that might prevent using a unit when they want to use it. D plays only historicals and refuses to use social media for group notifications and session planning.

Bit of an aside, maybe, but I keep a one page set of OSR rules in my wallet, along with a few tiny dice for a pick-up game wherever I go. You'd be surprised how often it comes in handy.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/177317/Swordsmen--Skeletons?term=swordsmen

Depends on your local scene. we have a very active local FLGS as such we game every weekend with a large group of gamers who's games overlap with most of us playing 5+ different game systems. we usually try to schedule a few games with specific players for the upcoming weekend before we leave for the night. but also leave space open for games on the fly (we are there all day long so we have the time).

I personally bring with me armies for at least 7 different game systems. some of them are skirmish so they do not take up to much space.

We mostly play what people are excited to play. Often times this comes down to someone getting a new shiny and being excited to try it out so away we go. Other times someone just has been longing to break out a favorite and asks to play. I try to keep an army packed of recent favorites so anyone can ask and I'm ready to play. Not everyone plays the same game each night and not everyone plays every game in our group, but enough people play enough different games that we can usually make things happen.

Well, all the local shops have active Discord & FB pages. And active player bases for a wide range of games.
So if you want a game just post & odds are good.

Beyond that the one shop runs campaigns & Crusades + has a few set days for certain games. Ex; Battletech is on Wed. Of course you can play BT any other day as well....

Within my actual circle of friends? We discuss what to play next week at the end of the current evening.
Sometimes the choice is influenced by who all can make it.
We rarely play the same game more than 3 times in a row.
Usually we play something we all have. Every now & then we pick something where one or two of us have to supply everything (ex: historical boat games)

interesting mix, asked more through curiosity than anything else.

have found the concept of a game thats easy to carry works, locally DBA for a while filled this role as its quite easy to have an army or three in the car to fetch if needed and the space required is small - became a sort of "while waiting for another game to finish game"

some games dominate through logistics, e.g. lugging my LotR stuff about is in theory easy, however there are then a few boxes of terrain and the bag that gets my dice box etc only takes so many hard backed books before I don't fancy carrying it

local club does have a forum with a space to arrange games, however some want to use facebook, some use a different forum, some use texts, its amazing games get played half the time

default is towards the end of one Saturday working out a rough idea for the following Saturday

nice to see some make a far better stab at it

leopard wrote:
interesting mix, asked more through curiosity than anything else.

have found the concept of a game thats easy to carry works, locally DBA for a while filled this role as its quite easy to have an army or three in the car to fetch if needed and the space required is small - became a sort of "while waiting for another game to finish game"

some games dominate through logistics, e.g. lugging my LotR stuff about is in theory easy, however there are then a few boxes of terrain and the bag that gets my dice box etc only takes so many hard backed books before I don't fancy carrying it

local club does have a forum with a space to arrange games, however some want to use facebook, some use a different forum, some use texts, its amazing games get played half the time

default is towards the end of one Saturday working out a rough idea for the following Saturday

nice to see some make a far better stab at it

Logistics.....

depending on the game......... i have 3 totes and 2 carry bags of actual game miniatures. a small rolling toolbox that has all the gaming aids and rule books , on average i also bring along around 10 totes of various sizes of terrain for the various games that are in different scales or settings... oh and a cooler with food and snacks. it literally fills my entire car. that is why game night is an entire day event for me. some games i only bring models and terrain for if we planned for it ahead of time because they are not the normal games in rotation. i have to make room for them by swapping out some of it.

As an aside, pre-pandemic when it was a lot easier to just show up and find an opponent rather than use social media to schedule, I brought armies for a half dozen games and figured out what we'd play on the spot. That works quite well with skirmish stuff but is a lot harder for army scale games.

Our approach is similar to yours Leopard.

However, we tend to go in streaks. We have also found Kill Team a great way to pick up new players in the area, so our focus has been there the past few sessions.

We are working towards a 15mm Force-on-Force game and have played a lot of Castles in the Sky in the recent past as well.

First is what do I want to play, then its what can I find an opponent for.

I run a small club from my house that meets twice a month. Monday night gaming means that there's usually time for only one game per table.

Second Monday of the month is mostly for whatever the "campaign" game we've selected as a club. Usually this game will occupy the second Mondays for 4-6 months. Sometimes a smaller game will take place on a side table.

Fourth Monday is open gaming. in the week prior, I and others will post a few games we're interested in playing on our forum and folks will pair off. Often -though not always- smaller games will be played on this day.

No one really plays 40k, but over time the above schedule does generally result in some larger games (Grimdark, KoW, K47, etc) being played as well as some smaller games (Space Weirdos, Song of Blades, Full Thrust, etc).

that sounds just about perfect

leopard wrote:
that sounds just about perfect

Thanks!
It's something I only stumbled on recently. For the previous decade up until Covid, the club met every other week and would play a campaign every meeting for a few months. It did result in some good campaigns, but it was often tougher for some folks to attend every campaign night, and the twice monthly schedule seems to be working better for most folks than every-other-week.

After Covid we restarted once-monthly but pretty quickly moved to the schedule we have now.

Not sure how much of the success of this new schedule is due to us all being due to us all being a bit older...