Planning a game night may seem like a simple thing, pick a time and place, everyone shows up and you game, piece of cake! The truth is that most game nights are ruined long before anyone shows up to the table as there are so many things people don’t think about when they decide to host a gaming night at their house. Any one thing in this list of problems/solutions may not ruin your game night, but mix a couple of them together and the combination can create some pretty horrible game night experiences. If your host or organizer of a game night, be a good one; Here is some advice!
Lighting
Without question one of the most important thing you can do to see massive improvements is proper lighting. In particular dulled, but bright lighting focused on the table itself rather than the people. There is nothing worse than playing an awesome board game or role-playing game and finding myself squinting to read the often small text of cards, game boards and RPG books. I can honestly say that most of the gaming environments I have played in over the last 30 years of gaming have been in relatively shitty lighting, it’s an epidemic in gaming areas as gaming space requires far brighter lights than you would ordinarily need in a room. It has to be more akeen to a pool table light than a room light. I’m certain that lighting and performance, speed and organization of game play is severely effected by poor lighting. If you take no other advice, take this one, keep your playing area’s very bright.
High Seating
Another common problem to gaming space is low seating. Typically when you game you need to be almost hovering over the table, in particular for board gaming. You want a top down view of the game board and as such the table either needs to be low with normal seats or you need high seats. Again this comes down to visibility, gamers need to be able to see what’s going on, if you are sitting at a table and you can’t see what’s happening on the other side of the table without standing up, you have a seating issue in your game space that needs fixing.
Be A Good Host And Know When You Can’t Be
One of my biggest pet peeves, one that has resulted with me actually skipping game nights when a certain player hosts in some cases even leaving a game group all together is the quality of it’s host. Being a good host is not so much about being gracias and generous but rather welcoming and comfortable. So often I find that when I go to someone’s house for a game night it’s crystal clear that it’s forced. It’s little things that get to you like a host who has children who are being ignored because they are gaming, or where clearly someone’s wife or girlfriend doesn’t want us there giving us the stink eye all night, or where instead of playing in the kitchen table with great lighting and access to a fridge and bathroom we are ordered out to a fidget garage or basement.
Gamers are often willing to tolerate inconveniences and rudeness for the opportunity to game, but as a host it’s your job to know if your house/situation is not a good one for gaming. Sure, it’s in a way easier for the host as the gamers come to him, no need to drive anywhere, but if you can’t be a welcoming host, if your situation is obviously not ideal and makes your guests uncomfortable then don’t host.
Proper Gaming Table
If you don’t have a proper gaming table, don’t host gaming nights at your house. There is absolutely nothing more detrimental to a game night, in particular a board game night than playing on a table that is obviously way too small. It’s absolutely destructive to a gaming experience to not have enough space. It’s better to skip gaming all together than play on a cramped table or cramped space. Let the people breath!
Plan Ahead
In particular for board game nights it’s absolutely vital there is a plan in advance. You want everyone coming to your game night to know what games you are going to be playing so that they have the opportunity to read the rules/rulebooks of the games. More importantly if your hosting or if you are going to be introducing a game to players, read the rules in advance, know how to play the game well so that you can explain it to the others quickly and efficiently.
There is absolutely nothing I hate more than someone pulling out a board game and saying “hey let’s play this”, followed by him pulling out a 20 page rulebook to “figure out how to play”. It’s practically a guarantee that three things will happen. First the game will take 2-3 times as long to play. Secondly you will play rules incorrectly, overlook important rules and this will likely lead to someone winning/losing a game because of this fact. Finally it’s likely that the game will be rejected in the future, this often happens because the game appears unbalanced/broken or boring as a result of getting the rules wrong.
So be smart about your game nights, plan what you’re going to play in advance, read the rules for the games that are planned and be ready to teach players how to play the games without having to read the manual to them.
Know Your Audience
Kind of part of planning ahead, but know who your gamers are and what games are appropriate for them. There is nothing worse than inviting casual gamers or first time gamers to a game event and trying to introduce them to an epic, highly complex board game like Twilight Imperium for example. You really need to think about what sort of game you’re going to play, in particular it’s complexity level and compare that to who’s coming. It’s a sure fire way to ruin a game night to pull the wrong game off the shelf for the wrong kind of group.
This goes a bit further as well for player count. For example Twilight Imperium is clearly a 4, 5 or 6 player game. Sure you can play it with 3 players but you know it’s a shitty game with 3 players so don’t pull it out. Find a game appropriate for the audience and the amount of players you have.
Don’t force it, play games that you know will work with the amount of people you have and the type of gamers you have.
Don’t Take It Too Seriously
It’s a tragic illness that many gamers have, myself included, that we often take the hobby too serious. We become obsessed with trying to find that victory in a complex strategic game and if we can’t be it because the dice gods are against us, or the rules of the game leave something to be desired that we can get outright mean towards our opponents. We forget that we are there to play games and have fun, become competitive, aggressive sometimes even vengeful.
Remember, it’s a game, the people you’re playing with are your friends, quite possibly your guests if you’re the host. Keep your cool and win or lose do it with grace.