From: engjs@wombat.newcastle.edu.au (James Smith)
Subject: Re: Timetable blues
Organization: University of Newcastle, AUSTRALIA
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 05:17:46 GMT

Geoff Horne writes:

I appreciate your comments about timetabling, but they are ill directed.
Nucon last year had about 150 entrants, and all but a couple were
timetabled so that they could play all sessions that they paid for.
Proper timetabling is difficult and time consuming, but it is not
impossible.

> now it is not so much that the cons are team oriented but on average
> a single game will get around 90-95% of it's entrants baing in teams

I know from experience that this is not true, unless you mean both full
and partial teams.  My experience is that less than half of the entries
at a con are in full teams.

> I was one of the DM's of Dungeon of Doom (not Death)

'Dungeon of Death' is a generic name I use for a module.  My (made up)
example was not supposed to refer to your game.  In fact the situation
I described has happened to me a number of times at a number of cons.

> but like i said earlier, out of
> 11 teams of 5 we had only (i think) 4 individuals enter.

I signed up to play Dungeon of Doom.  I was timetabled to play with a
group of four (Dogs Choking on Phlegm) who brought a fifth along on the
day.  I was then offered the chance to play with another group made up
of four individuals but it would have meant missing the last session
and I wasn't that keen.  I think the Necro organisers grouped a lot
of individuals together and gave them team names without them actually
having entered as teams.

Your comments about timetabling indicate that you haven't actually done
any.  Neither have I, but I've been on the outskirts of it and have studied 
the problem. It is not nearly as simple as you describe.  In practice,
a good solid timetable will only leave a few individuals who don't
get to play what they want, but it takes a *lot* of work to get that
timetable.

My aim in starting this thread is not really to talk about the problems of
timetabling itself, but about the organisational problems that surround
it.

> 	Necro had a total of 11 sessions - to expect to play 12 0f them
> is absoutley absurd and gets loads of laughter from the organisers.

Let's see: 4 on Friday, 3 each on Saturday and Sunday, 2 on Monday.  That's
twelve, isn't it?

> to expect
> to play more than 6 of them without problems is also wishfull thinking

A lot of people did.  Any timetable should allow most entrants to play
ten of twelve sessions, with most of those playing the extra two as well.
Most roleplayers don't enter for a full timetable, which does make things
easier.  The difficulty lies in filling the last couple of sessions, and
placing the last few players.

> 	Assuming you have been timetabled - you then have to find your game:
> DOD had a table and a sign and there were people there on fri morning from
> 8.30 - however, after 9am we had to go and run some sessions so we couldn't
> hang around and wait for people to turn up when they felt like it

I think DOD managed better than other games in this respect, but it was all
pretty abysmal.  Many games did not have a staging area of any kind.

> that's what the central desk is for - (if there is one) If you really
> wanted to find us all you had to do was find the rooms we were using - not
> hard - and ask someone in them where to find thegame organiser.

How do I know that you are using some room, or which room it is?  There
was no indication at all of how to go about this.  Did each game presented
have its own room, or were you a special case?  Was there always someone
in the canteen who knew where your room was, and was there always someone
in your room to take a person with a problem to someone who could sort
it out?

Finding games at Necro devolved into a process of knowing who to ask
and chasing, and that is where most of its problems lay.

> What _Should_ happen is there should be a con organiser or assistant ot a desk
> al _all_ times to answer questions and direct people in the right direction

Con organisers are usually far to busy to sit at a desk at the times when
they are most needed at the desk (between sessions, and at the start of the
day).  People who are drafted into sitting at desks usually do not know
enough to be helpful.  People who know enough to be useful are usually doing
other things.

> the next best option is to do what ends up happening: at the end of each
> session we all go out and hang around under the sign (that said D O D) and
> wait for the next group to show up and say "what's happening"  -if you do this
> you will get no problems - even if you don't know who else is in your team
> the DM will and everything will work out - BUT IT HAS TO HAPPEN BETWEEN
> SESSIONS - 

I can give you numerous instances from numerous cons where I have done
this and it hasn't worked.

Both of your suggestions rely on there being sufficient manpower available
to man a contact point.  There usually isn't.  This perhaps is why the
organisation always seems so painful.

One good way of solving these problems is to put room numbers on the
timetable.  Both Cancon and Macquariecon do this, and it does work.
There are problems with this though.

I guess what I'm saying is that most con organisers don't think enough
about this sort of thing before the con, as is evidenced by the fact
that a lot of cons do have major problems in this area.

I apologise if parts of this post seem inflamatory.  They are not
meant to be, and I hope you won't take offence.  It's simply my
rather pessimistic writing style coming through.

Jim
-- 
James J Smith             | "I couldn't get over it. All these women
School of Engineering     | in the world...and under their clothes
Newcastle University      | each and every one of them was naked, you
engjs@cc.newcastle.edu.au | know..." -- Psycho-killer, "Sandman"
Newsgroups: aus.games