Ambassador - Lesson 2
Strategies for Demos
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Hello there and welcome back to the Ambassador Program for Star Wars™: Unlimited.
As always, I’m your host Jonah and today we’ll be talking about teaching and demoing Star Wars: Unlimited. This is something that we covered briefly in the Apprentice Lessons, and you can find much of the same content, but presented slightly differently in the second Apprentice lesson.
Today, we’re going to be taking a slightly different look at things. There are four major ways we’re going to look at running demos - and each has it’s place. You want to consider your audience and your goals when you’re teaching someone the game, because different approaches are appropriate for different people. These methods are:
- Casual Play
- Starter Deck Demos
- Scripted Gameplay
- Narrative Experiences
Casual Play
Casual play is the least formal and most common way people learn to play the game - it’s just sitting down with a couple of decks, or maybe even just a pile of cards, and playing the game. Many people start with pre-constructed decks because they’re accessible, but sometimes someone buys a booster box and starts looking at the rules and building a deck.
The strength of casual play is that it is very natural and allows the player to explore what’s most exciting to them. If there are particular characters or mechanics that appeal to them, they can seek those out and engage with those elements.
However, it’s not a particularly scalable model, and often has a high barrier to entry, because the inherent complexity of a TCG isn’t managed in a structured way. Oftentimes, a prospective player sits down with a friend who explains the barest outline of the game, and just runs with it, either missing key elements, overwhelming them with unnecessary information or frequently both.
Starter Deck Demos
The natural evolution to that is Starter Deck Demos - these are both a bit more structured in how they’re laid out and constrained in the effects of cards - you’re not going to be dealing with Krayt Dragon or Lurking TIE Phantom in those.
Starter Deck Demos are two reasonably balanced decks that don’t have an overwhelming quantity of information or mechanics, and are designed to have exciting characters and cards. They also cover most of the mechanics, with a particular emphasis on mechanics that are new to the set.
Frequently, a starter deck demo is a bit more formal and includes taking a few cards out of the deck to explain their general mechanics - how units work, how events are played, what a leader is, and how to manage upgrades. After that, the game begins, with the tutor providing some minor guidance throughout the game, but it’s very similar to Casual Play.
A shared strength of these methods is that when someone asks a question themselves, and then discovers an answer and takes action based on that answer, they’re more likely to learn and retain that information, as opposed to simply being told something and not taking an active role in their education. (And yes, that’s a subtle hint to ask questions in the Discord or on live streams for the particular lessons and to go out and run demos and learn from that experience!).
Starter Deck Demos are also somewhat scalable - if you want to run many demos, it’s relatively easy to get multiple copies of the starter decks, which makes it easier to teach. As you run more demos with them, you’ll learn which cards bring up questions and what mechanics cause issues, and you will be prepared to handle them more smoothly. It also means that you can potentially run a few tables worth of students at a time, as they’re going to be working from the same foundation.
Mirrored Decks
Some games use the same intro deck for both players, rather than two different decks. This does help cut down on the number of mechanics and unique cards, which allows for an easier demo. However, it also cuts down on the breadth of the experience - players can’t try out different gameplay styles and are even more limited in which characters they’re interacting with.
Scripted Gameplay
Sometimes, however, you want things to be even more controlled and regimented. With scripted gameplay, players are provided with stacked decks, with cards in a predetermined order. Intro Battle decks are numbered such that they can be easily stacked. This means that if the decks are appropriately reset, every player with the same deck will have the same starting hand, the same first turn play, and their opponent will take the same second turn play.
Often times, this script is included in a book or video along with the decks, so that players can run through the learning experience themselves, without someone to teach them the game.
However, if there is someone running the demo, this allows for an exceptionally guided experience, as the teacher knows exactly what’s going to happen for each player. It can also allow for a much higher student-to-teacher ratio than most other methods, because the script handles most of the fundamentals. This does come with a risk that a player comes up with a question that isn’t addressed by the script, and if they’re not playing in a space with an expert, that question may go unanswered.
Scripted Gameplay Demos often transition into freeplay - after the key mechanics have been covered and players have a general understanding of what they need to do, but before either player has established a dominant gamestate, the script ends, and players are allowed to test their knowledge and skills.
Narrative Experiences
The final approach that we’re covering today is very different from the others. While the other demos focus on getting the player into the game and then letting go to some degree, a focused narrative experience demo has slightly different goals.
Narrative experiences focus on hooking the player quickly, teaching them the core mechanics, and preparing them to play a game, without actually having them sitdown and play the entire game.
Learning With Context
How many times have you read the rules for a game without having the game pieces in front of you, or even with the game in front of you, but not yet playing, and it makes no sense until you actually start playing?
As mentioned above, practical experience is an incredibly powerful teaching tool, and one that should be taken advantage of. In a narrative experience, players are introduced to mechanics one at a time and given relevant context of how this works and why this matters.
Learning in Steps
Rather than throwing the whole game at the player, start with bite-sized chunks. Teaching each element of the game in a vacuum allows it to receive the player’s full attention, rather than them asking, “Hey, what does this symbol mean?” for a card that they won’t be able to play for several turns.
Like the scripted gameplay, it keeps the players on track and ensures that they experience the necessary elements of the game.
Furthermore, because each step is relatively narrow in scope and discrete from the others, it allows for a faster experience. A new player can learn and experience each key mechanic of the game in just a couple of minutes, and then can make an informed decision of whether or not they want to invest more time in the game by participating in a more robust and complex experience - namely playing a full game.
Narrative Experiences, however, are a much more focused experience than any game. During each of the stages, because it’s so closely guided but still segmented, having a teacher present is very helpful.
If you’re still not sure you understand what a demo based in narrative experience is like, don’t worry - we have a script for a narrative experience that uses the Intro Battle: Hoth decks, and the next lesson covers creating your own narrative experience from the ground up.
Finding the Right Approach
As was covered in the Apprentice lesson on demos, you need to make sure you match your teaching style to the needs of your students and the enviroment you’re in.
If you’re new to the game and teaching yourself, or just starting out and teaching a friend, Scripted Gameplay is a great way to start - it goes through the key steps and gets you set up for a successful game.
If you’re at a large convention and have a queue of people who want to learn that massively outnumbers you, Scripted Gameplay lessons are also great - however they come with the cost of taking a significant amount of time, which is at a premium at conventions and destination events. To hook new players quickly and get them the information they need while tempting them with the breadth of the game in short order, Narrative Experiences are our considered best practice.
Narrative experiences balance providing a breadth of education, while also leaning on one of the strengths of Star Wars: Unlimited - its unparalleled narrative strength. Telling stories with the cards is a huge part of the game. Star Wars, at its core, is about story, and giving players the opportunity to explore their own story can quickly hook them - and running them through the basics with dragging them through the whole game means that you can be efficient - respecting both their time and yours.
If you have an extended amount of time and a small number of students more comprehensive and freeform demos are viable - either casual play or with preconstructed decks.
However, even with that additional time, part of the design of a good narrative experience demo is that it quickly hooks the player on mechanics and possibilities within the game, which can take a bit longer to establish with a proper game, and so it’s still encouraged to start with teaching in bite sized chunks, explaining the mechanics through story, before progressing into an actual game.
As mentioned above, our next lesson is going to cover how to create your own Narrative Experience, whether it be with preconstructed decks, leftover draft chafe, or with finely tuned premier decks. We also have an outline for a narrative experience utilizing the Intro Battle: Hoth decks, available for you to begin to run demos now!
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Until next time, good luck and have fun!