Advice for new events runners
Advice for New Events Runners 🏴☠️
Drawing the timeless advice from our beloved Apollo in Ye Olde Puzzle Pirates Events Workshop forum, these guidelines remain relevant for anyone looking to host events in Puzzle Pirates. Whether you're planning a Discord-based event or an in-game challenge, these steps will help ensure that your event is successful and enjoyable for participants.
You are always welcome to host your event! However, some players may want to seek Ocean Master assistance (advice, prizes 🎁, logistical help, etc.) for events they plan and run on their own. General information on hosting events and how to request OM-support for events can be found on the Event guidelines and policies page.
Although we get a fair number of emails from people who have little or no experience with events, many of the requests for support end up being turned down, which is a shame. The three main reasons for this are:
- No event experience. We really prefer that people have run some kind of event before, and can provide us with a link to the forum thread for the event.
- Event is too complex relative to their past event experience.
- Wanting to run a familiar event without obvious event experience.
The underlying reasoning is that for OM-supported events, we need to be confident in the event's fair and competent management. The more complex the event 🧩 and the more valuable the prizes 🏆, the more reassurance we need. Below are structured steps designed to help you master the art of event planning in Puzzle Pirates.
Step One- Participate in Existing Events 🕹️
- Take part in events: Participate in various events, whether they're in-game or on Discord, high profile or small. Get to know how they work, watch how the event hosts handle the event (examples here can be good or bad, of course, but you can learn from both!)
- Community Involvement: Stay active in Discord event channels to learn about common practices and prize expectations, which will inform you about typical events and help you plan your own.
Step Two- Gain Some Experience 🔍
- Assist Others: If appropriate, help out with someone else's event.
- Start by planning and running small and manageable events to effectively handle all aspects.
- If you have lower-level prizes, that's absolutely fine, and people will expect the effort they put in to be appropriate to those prizes.
- Schedule events for times when you are available - don't post an event just before going on vacation for two weeks.
- Solicit feedback through the Discord Events Workshop. Don't be discouraged by negative comments; they often come from experienced players offering constructive criticism.
- Run at least one event yourself.
- Take care with your first post, and explain the event clearly so that people know how to participate and understand any rules. Although perfect spelling and grammar isn't expected at all times, it's important that your post is good enough that potential entrants understand it.
- Watch the event thread, answer questions promptly and courteously.
- Remember to post a list of winners, results and prizes, even if it's an in-game event.
- Follow through on prizes - if you're having difficulty contacting someone to deliver a prize, try DMing them to arrange a time to be in game, or ask them whether they have hearties or flagmates who you could entrust the prize to.
Step Three- First OM-Supported Event 🌟
- Review OM support guidelines available on the Event guidelines page.
- Don't be over-ambitious - again, make this a straightforward and manageable event.
- Initially request prizes that are not high-value, such as familiars or rare items. Event-only trinkets are a good start.
- It's a rule for all events, not just early ones, but don't ask for coding changes to support an event - we won't be creating new objects, charts, routes, ships, etc, for an event, and nor can we change the normal game mechanics for an event.
- Again, if you need any advice to finalize your event post, post it in Events Workshop - many of the people who post there have a great deal of events experience, and are likely to be able to help you with advice or suggestions. Don't be discouraged if they point out a big flaw with the event - better at that stage than later! Take the advice on board, and amend your event or come up with a new one!
- Once you are happy with your event plan, follow the template and use it to put together a proposal. Complete all parts of the template that are applicable to your event.
- If you don't get support for your event from the OMs, don't despair. You can still run the event yourself if you want to, and you can always email the OMs in the future with another proposal.
Practical Insights from an Event Veteran
Quoting from the original post.
- Making your first event straightforward can't be stressed enough. You don't need to do a whole day of events, or a gunning bakeoff, or a Discord-based deathmatch. A limerick contest or avatar contest are simple forum events for first-timers. Races and scavenger hunts are good in-game events.
- For your first event especially, it's a good idea to base it off an event that has already run in the past. Don't do something that just happened last week, but dig back through the events of the past couple of years and pick one that seemed to run easily and successfully. Your ocean will have fun if you pick a good event to rerun. You may even be able to get advice from the person who ran it first.
- In-game events are necessarily more difficult. Your first event can be in-game, but you should **test it with your crewmates to make sure it works before you run it for your whole ocean. If you're doing a race, have a couple of mates run the race while you watch, to make sure you can actually tell if they left at the right time and who finishes first. If you do a bakeoff variant, make sure it's easy to score from the duty reports. Get extra helpers so there is someone to take care of things if you or another helper disconnect or get called away by real life.
- Even events that don't award a familiar can be fun and popular with entrants. I know everyone wants to give someone a new parrot or monkey, but folks enjoy winning trinkets, sleeping animals, nice furniture, clothes, doubloons, and dozens of other smaller prizes, too. In fact, some of the most fun events I've run were not familiar events.
- If someone trolls in your event thread, don't sink to their level.** Nothing ruins an event faster than an angry coordinator who unleashes her wrath upon the thread. Everyone who runs events gets trolled at some point. The best thing to do is to remain polite when answering the troll's questions and if it seems to get out of hand, deal with it in PMs.
That said, **not all criticism of your event is trolling**. Take suggestions seriously and look at your event objectively. Even with good forethought, we have all missed something. Rules may be less clear than you originally thought, deadlines too soon for the work required, etc. The sooner you can fix any problems with the event rules, the smoother the event will run. This is one of the big reasons why it's important to read your thread frequently.
Conclusion 🎉
Becoming an event runner is a rewarding endeavor that contributes significantly to the vibrant community of Puzzle Pirates. By adhering to these guidelines, you can create events that are enjoyable, fair, and successful.
