TOPIC: Thoughts on 5 rooms

I play two kinds of runs at Gencon, because I genuinely love and enjoy both:
1. pre-arranged Epic runs of veteran players with all our fancy tokens. Vibe: we're here to be challenged!
2. casual pick-up groups where I randomly buy a single ticket, join whoever's there, choose last from the classes nobody else wants, and run a build that is appropriate to the difficulty setting. Usually these runs are Normal difficulty with new players, once in a while it's a more experienced group who wants to try Hardcore, this year I got one of each. Vibe: we're here to play a cool game and have fun!

For my Epic veteran runs, the reduction to 5 rooms was a bit of a letdown as expected: sweet, this dungeon is awesome so far, I'm ready for room 6! Oh, wait...

In addition to being only 5/7 of the fun, this devalues tokens: for example, why bother equipping gear to cast extra spells when there aren't nearly enough combat rounds to use up the spells I have?

But here's the thing: for casual runs, it felt *perfect*. Everybody seemed to be having a great time, the dungeons were well designed and the room 5 combat felt like a satisfying conclusion, and of course I can't deny that for most people a two digit price beats a three digit price by a psychological mile.

So here's what I personally am hoping to see next year:
- ditch the 4-room format, it's not much different from 5 anyway
- several 5-room dungeons for $98
- one "True Dungeon XL" premium 7-room dungeon for $128, so those of us who crave that level of challenge can get our fix

Going to throw this out again... Run as GenCon, but also introduce special runs: TD-Ironman - 10 room or even 15 room runs.

Run all 5-room dungeons back-to-back-to-back without another coaching, no spell refresh, etc. Minimum level being Nightmare.

That way the casual players play the 5-room, but the vets get a challenging experience.

Honestly, as an established player, I never really felt threatened during the 5 room dungeons. The game isn't really designed for 5 rooms, when 5th level and tokens are involved.

David, your “have 5 room and 7 room dungeons” idea is really interesting.

I didn't particular enjoy the 5 room format. Spending 36 minutes in coaching/training seems like too big an investment for an hour of substantive content. (I know the coaches need the time to prepare the party card, but coaching and training isn’t what I’m there for.) Plus, as a Barbarian with Bog’s, I could literally Rage every combat. Indeed, if my party chose puzzle over combat, I’d have a Rage leftover. That does devalue higher-end tokens.

That said, some of the “we like TD but aren’t obsessed with it like our quartermaster is” members of my party said that they preferred the 5 room format. It gave them the TD experience they wanted (some cool puzzles and combats in an immersive setting) but cost less and used 24 fewer Gen Con minutes than a 7 room run.

I wonder how a program of 5-room sealed, 5-room regular, and 7-room regular would be received? (Maybe with 2 of either the non-sealed options?) Having a sealed pack option is important because is reduces the barrier to entry. I have at least one friend who has said the only way he’d play in a PUG is sealed pack (he doesn’t want to run into a super-geared player pushing for a higher level). Having a shorter dungeon at a lower price point but playable at all levels would appeal to the causal TD player. Having a traditional 7 room dungeon would appeal to token collectors. That’s my theory, at least.