Playtest as shakedown cruise

Yesterday we play a playtesting one-shot.

We originally discussed having the players use characters from DF Felltower. In the end, though, we went with seven brand-new PCs.

I refer to this as a "shakedown cruise." Normally I'll let players modify their PCs after the initial session if they realize they didn't quite make the guy that they liked. But then again, it's still a real, live game. If your neat-o new PC gets killed, your neat-o new PC is dead.

In a playtest, though, it doesn't matter. Get killed? Fine. Make the guy again and play him for real. Designed him wrong? No problems. Wanted to just try something out you never would otherwise spend a valuable real-game session on? Go for it.

So I have a real fondness for opportunities to playtest DF materials like this every once in a while. The players jumped in with some against-type PCs, guys they'd wanted to try out but weren't sure they like, and tried sub-systems they usually don't. All in all, it was a lot of fun. I highly recommend breaking out an adventure and giving it a go with PCs whose survival doesn't matter, because you're just trying everything out.

We may need to do this again with the DFRPG adventures at some point . . .

Fun stuff, yesterday's game.