In addition to this most people are going to be more comfortable meeting in a public place instead of someone’s private residence.Īlong with this gaming at a public venue will make your event more accessible, especially if you can have it in a central location, close to amenities and things like public transit. In addition, you will be in public with other people present and have more safety measures in place. Public spaces, especially retail or commercial spaces and restaurants, have insurance for things most homeowners do not. It’s best to avoid any of these potential issues by gaming in a public space. These can include, rudeness, hygiene issues, worries about damage and theft and a ton of other issues that I don’t want to dive into here. Along with those legal issues you also have to worry about potential people problems. This is true for many reasons including liability issues, zoning laws and fire codes. Do not open your own home up to the general public. Save that personal space for people you know and trust. I don’t care if you’ve got a garage that can fit four 4×8 gaming tables and plenty of space or if you’ve got a super awesome game room that can fit a large number of gamers at once. The first thing you should drop from consideration and forget about ever doing is playing at your own home. For a public play event to work, you need a place to play, games to play while there and people to show up at that place to play those games. There are also some great, nice to haves as well but let’s start with the basics.
Tips for setting up a public play gaming event:įor any community gaming event, you are going to need three things at an absolute minimum. That way I hope that this information is applicable to the widest possible range of people. While Jennifer is coming at this with some experience, I’m going to start off assuming that anyone reading this has no prior event organization experience. I also want to point out that we discussed this topic on Episode 139 of The Tabletop Bellhop Gaming Podcast: Gaming Together Again and I encourage you to check that out when you have time. The hobby needs people like Jennifer who take the time and effort to advocate for this awesome hobby of ours. With things opening up around the world, now seems like a good time to start answering questions like this and talking about public play gaming again.īefore I get into my suggestions for launching a public play event, I first off want to thank Jennifer and those like them who take steps like these, steps that help bring gaming to a wider audience. Do you have any advice for jumping into something like that?” I was surprised since they do sell modern board games.īut it got me thinking about organizing a public event like that, maybe approaching Barnes and Noble or having it at a library. It ended up being the classic games like Clue, Monopoly, and the like. “My question involves organizing community events.Ī few months ago, I saw a local Barnes and Noble advertise a family game night. This article is based on a question I received from Jennifer who asked: A question about organizing community gaming events.