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True Adventures, Ltd., is a role-playing game company started by Jeff Martin. It operates two entertainment venues at Gen Con Indy: True Dungeon and True Dungeon Fantasy Tavern. True Adventures is notable because their signature event, True Dungeon, is "the single most popular event" at Gen Con,〔 drawing people to the convention just for it.〔"DOUGLAS EQUILS: People fly to Gen Con just for 'True Dungeon.'" (Laws 2007, p154)〕 The event is also notable for its scale; about 3,000 players play in groups of up to eight people (more recently ten) over four days each year.〔 With tickets for each player costing roughly $40-$50 each, depending on the year, or $28 for True Grind, the event grosses about $100,000, a phenomenal amount for a LARP in the United States. The company also hosted the event True Heroes in 2004 and 2005. True Adventures ran these events at Gen Con SoCal when the convention was still in existence. The company grew out of Martin's work in creating elaborate props and puzzles for his Dungeons & Dragons game. ==True Dungeon== Although True Dungeon shares some characteristics with live action roleplaying (LARP) games,〔"JEFF MARTIN: It's a walk-through, live action dungeon where you get to experience what it feels like to have an adventure." (Laws 2007, p153)〕 the game's developers don't consider it a LARP.〔"Not a LARP, True Dungeon instead focuses on problem solving, teamwork and tactics while providing exciting sets and interactive props." 〕〔"JEFF MARTIN: ... It's not a LARP...." (Laws 2007, p153)〕 While players are free to role-play particular characters, True Dungeon does not emphasize role-playing aspects; characters lack backgrounds and names. Instead characters primarily are collections of spells and statistics useful for solving puzzles and battling opponents. The rules mechanics are loosely based on those of Dungeons & Dragons. Combat is played out by sliding weapon counters along a waist-high shuffleboard table.〔 "Combat is handled in a shuffle-board like fashion. The shuffle board has an image of the nasty being fought. The image is sectioned off with 'to-hit' numbers. Those participating in the combat place one of their weapon tokens in a slider, and slide it toward the image, hoping to score a hit. (Nelson 2006)〕 True Dungeon focuses on riddle and puzzle solving along with the shuffle board combat system. Jeff Martin originally ran yearly immersive games of this sort for groups of friends.〔 Gen Con owner Peter Adkison was invited to one of these events, then running under the name "Jeff Con" for about 30 people.〔"PETER ADKISON: ... He () was running a small convention called Jeff Con, which was literally 30 people. But for those 30 people he was running a fully immersive role-playing event out of a hotel. I got this invitation in the mail.... ...it was an invitation to attend Jeff Con. I went out in early '03 and fell in love with the event." (Laws 2007, p153-154)〕 After his experience, Adkison invited Martin to run the game at Gen Con after participating in one of Martin's events.〔 True Dungeon was first run at Gen Con Indy in 2003.〔 The first event was arranged at the last minute; there was no promotion and tickets were not in Gen Con's system.〔"JEFF MARTIN: It was a last-minute thing; there was no promotion for it. It wasn't even in the program book. We weren't even in the Gen Con ticketing system...." (Laws 2007, p154)〕 The events takes about 100 volunteers to run.〔"JEFF MARTIN: ... It takes about a hundred volunteers to run it." (Laws 2007, p154)〕 The 2006 event supplies filled two semi-trailers.〔"JEFF MARTIN: ... In 2006 we took two completely full 53-foot semi-trailers with us." (Laws 2007, p154)〕 Equipment for player characters exists in the form of "treasure tokens". These are marked plastic tokens indicating various pieces of traditional Dungeons & Dragons equipment. Examples include rope, small steel mirrors, weapons, and armor. In 2005 players were given a random weapon and random armor; they were expected to trade within their group to optimize their equipment usage. In 2006 players were given a random bag of 10 tokens.〔"You get a bag of random tokens before the True Dungeon starts...." (Nelson 2006)〕 Since the game began players could also purchase additional bags of random tokens. There is a substantial after-market for these tradable tokens on eBay. True Dungeon provides an interactive environment, complete with multiple solutions to many problems. There are a small number of NPCs as the plot requires. Players move through various rooms in the game world. Each room contains a challenge in either the form of a puzzle, a fight, or both.〔"Every room has a challenge of sorts—either a puzzle-type and/or a combat." (Nelson 2006)〕 The puzzles can be very difficult and the game has a high rate of character death, although the game's lethality has dropped over the years. Jeff Martin said of the 2004 Gen Con Indy game that only 20% of characters survived,〔"There were 1505 players in 215 with a survival rate of about 20%." 〕 while in 2005 42% did.〔"TD had a survival rate of 42% ... with 1505 players...." 〕 Closer to live action role-playing, players are expected to physically explore their surroundings, not simply describing interactions with the gamemaster〔"The room can be interacted with too! For example, if you want to search around for treasures or a clue, you need to physically move stuff around." (Nelson 2006)〕 Many interactions do require gamemaster interaction, with some details of the environment described to players by the gamemaster assigned to each room.〔"Every room has a GM, which describes to the whole party what is going on." (Nelson 2006)〕 The first few years, each group of players were accompanied by a gamemaster throughout the dungeon. In 2005, this was switched to having a gamemaster assigned to each room to ensure more consistent rulings for a given room.〔"The event has grown tremendously, and we will greatly improve the quality of the experience this year by moving to the 'one-DM-per-room' staffing model" (aeon 2005)〕 To maximize throughput of players, each room of the dungeon has a group of players in it. Groups all advance to the next room simultaneously. As a result, each room has a hard time limit. If players finish early, they must wait for the time limit to expire before advancing. If the players are too slow, they are penalized hit points and are moved into the next room. The plot for each dungeon usually provides a reason for the time limit. One year the plot specified that the characters were fleeing lizardmen. Sometimes the rooms themselves explain the time limit; in 2005 one room had a moving wall that would crush characters who failed to open the locked door into the next room quickly enough. Player success in True Dungeon (and True Heroes) is tracked in the form of Experience Points. Players with larger numbers of Experience Points (or XP) are given levels. These levels have no impact on the gameplay, but offer benefits outside of the game. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「True Adventures」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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