There’s a new Doctor in town and it appears that the most of us (48%) tuned in to the new series and are proud to announce we have a worthy new time lord. The next largest group was 18% who haven’t watched the new show yet but plan to, a group into which I fall, while 17% say they did not watch and probably never will. A decent remainder (9%) are a little bit confused as to who is handing out all of the PhDs in time, and 7% of you watched it but thought it could be improved by the proper application of more Tardis. The smallest group was actually people who watched the new season and did not like the new Doctor, a miniscule 1% of the votes counted.
This week we are not posting a new poll as part of the Inquisition, instead we are looking to solve a very terrible problem which Dave and I now have. You see…we simply have too much stuff that we want to give away on this fancy-schmancy website and we aren’t entirely sure how to do it! So, for this week’s Inquisition we are asking you all to post in the comments here your ideas for contests, giveaways, competitions, whatever you can dream up that would allow all of you – our most excellent readers – to prostrate yourselves to win excellent goodies!
Here’s how this is going to work. You leave a comment here, on this post, with your best ideas for any type of contest that we could have in order to give away some of the stuff that we have. Next Monday Dave and I will go through all of the comments here and pick one or more of them that we absolutely love (or possibly choose people at random, if they are all excellent) and they will win something from the list of things we’re giving away. We haven’t hammered out all of the details yet, but rest assured you will win something that you will like!
After that we will hopefully use many of the contest ideas we receive here to give away the rest of the stuff that we have, which includes:
- Krod Mandoon Season 1 DVDs
- Uber Goober DVD
- Three-Dragon Ante: Emperor’s Gambit
- 4E Player’s Handbook 3 (one or two)
- PHB Races: Dragonborn
- 4E Underdark
- RPG Blogger’s T-Shirt (XL)
- Rock Band 2 T-shirt (L)
- Mutant Chronicles CMG (Okay so we opened this one and played it once)
- Planet Terror DVD
- 1408 DVD
- Several CD’s including Freezepop’s “Futurefutureperfectperfect”
- Entropia Universe CD (and codes for free stuff in game)
- Some Magic:TG promo stuff
- and several other random games/books/etc we have lying around to give away!
We still haven’t figured out exactly how we’re going to give away any specific item, which is why we’re doing this Inquisition in the first place, but I imagine the PHB3’s will be the hottest items so one of those will probably go to the winner of this contest (of contests). However if you do win and would like something else, well we’ll cross that hurdle when we get to it. For now, this is all about giving and we would really love to give you guys all of this stuff!
Have at least one contest where you randomly pick the winner with a die roll? Have players comment in, pick a number from 1-10, or 1-20, depending on how many you’re expecting. Then physically roll a die, and declare the winner.
That would be fun.
Alternatively, have a “six-word dungeon/adventure/character”, akin to Hemingway’s “six-word novel”, pick your favorite responses.
.-= Andy´s last blog ..Hiatus =-.
Contestants should describe, in 100 words or less, a person, place or object which can be used/expanded upon in a campaign game. Contests can be themed to make them more interesting, for example “water”, “death”, ‘healing”, etc.
Best entry wins on the Judge’s decision, though the other entries will provide useful to players and GMs alike no matter how they fared!
I would like a contest based on character deaths. The character who bought the farm in the coolest way wins a prize for his/her ex-player.
Thanks and keep up the good blogging.
Have gamers tweet an entire adventure “pitch” to you (maximum 140 words obviously), and judge it upon which one can be most taken from tweet text to polished adventure with the minimum of skullsweat. You could call it Twitterquest…
.-= Neuroglyph´s last blog ..Review of Fey Folio by Alluria Publishing =-.
Ask for, in 100 words or fewer, or via Twitter, or by some other means that limits word count, one’s most embarassing/cringe-worthy gaming experience. I shared one of mine already with Chatty — plugging Def Leppard into a DnD campaign (I was 12, dammit!), I think we’ve all got characters, plot devices, places, events — whatever — from our gaming past that, in retrospect, we’d rather keep quiet…but not for cash and prizes!
You may spend my two cents wherever you’d like.
I love the idea of the twitter-esque posts, because it forces everyone to be concise and makes for slightly easier judging.
So I’d suggest the following contests all using the 140 character limit of Twitter (or perhaps 100 words):
NPC concepts for DMs
Best one turn multi-power combo (for use with an action point)
Funniest playable character concept with quick explanation – think “Gnome Paladin who specializes in whip (along with a quick bit about why that’s effective” or something similar.”
Place descriptions – “You enter the Rusty Beggar, a wretched hive, etc”
Also, some design contests, which would require longer entries (but still within a limit).
Freeform trap design – design any trap you want.
Specific trap design – design a trap using a unicorn.
Hazardous terrain design.
And stories –
Funniest TPK
Worst DM
And lastly, how about some picture contests?
Dress up like your character using only cardboard.
Coolest battle scene with minis.
Coolest hand drawn map.
To build on previous ideas (that’s what communities are for!), you could have a series of contests where people submit different adventure components–140 char outlines, single monsters, etc, and then have further contests where the elements are being tied together. So maybe you have a “submit basic adventure idea” contest, then a “submit villain for basic adventure idea” contest, then “submit mcguffin for basic adventure idea” contest, etc. Contest-driven community adventure writing!
Alternatively, some kind of scavenger hunt (perhaps through the critical-hits archives? or maybe for related work on the RPG blog network?) could be fun–I know I found myself digging up your description of True Dungeon yesterday ;p People wouldn’t be able to leave “answers” in comments, but email submission could work.
I posted earlier, and now I’ve refined my thinking, based in part on others’ posts since mine.
Let’s all create a dungeon together, in the tradition of those found in 1e books — that is, one that makes zero sense at all. The challenge is to create a room/trap/wandering monster/whatever in 100 words or fewer, and then you guys assemble them into a massive ye olde school dungeon. Winners would be those whose dungeon elements were chosen to be part of the final product, based on their merit as individual elements, and the synergy they achieve alongside other elements. That way, you choose a single winner for this phase of the contest, then multiple winners for the next…which would enable you to clear out ALL the excess stuff in one clever move.
jdg
How about a most unique original monster contest?
Have an Easter egg/scavenger hunt/cryptology puzzle. Start the week with the contest post that gives clues to words/phrases to be found in subsequent posts for the week. Have a wrap-up post at the end of the week where people can post the answers. Perhaps the selected words form a thematic phrase or sentence when put in the right order. Pick a winner randomly from the correct answers.
.-= Kameron´s last blog ..Forging ahead =-.
I’ve wanted to do the scavenger hunt idea for a long time- really happy to hear other people want that too. That moves up in the list. Of course, we don’t have to do just one contest, so keep those ideas coming!
The scavenger hunt seems like it would be fun. I’ve never done that online before. Ok, like, ever.
.-= Charisma´s last blog ..Rescuing Racel – Steal this Adventure =-.
Provide descriptions of 4 characters, a setting, a BBEG, and a title. Ask for 150 word submissions that take characters through meeting, going on an adventure in the setting, and confronting the BBEG.
Survivor: Eberron. (or Forgotten Realms or whatnot; or actually make those the two tribes!).
Immunity challenges consist of some of the quicker contest ideas (twitterquest, 6 word adventure, pick a random word out of the dictionary and make a monster/power/item from it, etc), small prizes for the immunity idol, and so forth. Meanwhile the peanut gallery can vote on winners for some of the challenges, or bet on brackets a’la college sports and earn a few prizes of their own if they predicted correctly!
Best Flavor Competition: Users must submit a scene set in the 4e universe that encompasses the culture of the Critical Hits community. The scene must express the desires and stances of a wide variety of gamers while containing a clear thesis and incorporating a robust narrative. The scene would read as though a Dungeon Master were unfolding his story to a group of wary adventurers. It could, for example, be the prelude to an intense battle, or a quest event that unfolds a unique subset of political intrigue.
How about a contest that involves your podcast? Maybe pick some people to come on and answer trivia or do a skill challenge adventure through talking. Give them a situation they need to solve through skills or whatever their character has on them, kinda like MacGyver. Whoever is deemed to have the best or most creative solution wins.
How about an RPing challenge? You give people a character to RP and decide who does it the best. Give them a background, personality, class, race, etc… and see who can be the most creative.
Since your blog is called “Critical Hits” you could even do something like seeing who can roll the most 20’s in 2 minutes or so.
Hopefully some good comes out of this! Keep up the good work as always. 😀
The entrant must come up with a question for the Inq. of the Week. If it gets chosen, they get shiny stuff.
How about best Leroy Jenkins moment? Readers would submit stories detailing the time they ran headlong into danger leaving the rest of the group shouting WTF!!!!??!?!?!
In the campaign design genre, how about worst opening line for a module synopsis? This would be like the Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest. (http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/)
Here is a contest idea….
Come up with a unique monster that doesn’t exist in the D&D universe, complete with basic stats, and a few abilities. Most unique/coolest monster created wins.
Or write up something detailing a funny or unique moment from your very first D&D campaign, since we were all new once. I bet there is a lot of interesting stories out there.
Or how about describing the most “unique” person you have ever played D&D with, or how they killed one of your characters.
Iron DM Encounter competition. Have a couple lists of ingredients, for example monster type (canid, draconic, undead, etc), complication (difficult terrain, traps, changing terrain, etc) and theme (elemental, time limit, etc). People pick an ingredient from each list or roll for ingredients (honor system), write up a short description of an encounter (~200 words) and give Critical Hits the right to flesh it out as part of a series or pdf later.
By the way, if you somehow end up short on prizes, Chaotic Shiny Productions is always happy to sponsor contests.
Take 5 household items – for example, an egg, a soft drink can, a fork, an elastic band, and a Lego minifig – and create a diorama using just these elements and a shoebox. No adobe potatochopping allowed! Alternatively, provide one piece of clipart which must also be incorporated into the image.
How about a DM appreciation contest? Each entry would be a short description of why their DM is deserving of winning some shiny swag.