This is a continuation of "Screaming in the Mountains, Part 1"

The designers of Eldritch Errors have said that one of the things they can always count on is Human Nature. It let them get the online community riled up and working at cross-purposes to the campers all while believing they were doing the Right Thing. It was very cleverly done. But while I was there, I learned that while macro level group reactions are important to think about, the behavior of individuals become more and more important the smaller your group is. With only five people, our group was pretty small. Here are some of the things I learned about hosting a live event:

1. Players get tired

Part of the ambitiousness of this event was the fact that it was so remote. The designers picked a location and asked that players go there. As a result, some people had driven as long as fourteen hours by the time they arrived.

The night before we left, the plot continued in the form of an abduction in front of our rented company house. With so long to drive the next day, we decided that enough was enough and put a "No more, please, we're trying to get some sleep" sign on our front door. Brian Clark, the lead designer, took this to mean that we'd called "Uncle," but that wasn't really the case. We were all in favor of witnessing more plot, but we were even more in favor of being rested enough that we wouldn't fall asleep at the wheel while driving home the next day.

Give your players down time at the beginning and end of live events so that they'll be able to travel safely.

2. Bears are dangerous

We were camping. Ergo, we had access to hatchets, knives, and lots of other bladed things. When one of the actresses started screaming at the top of her lungs at 1:30am, it was pitch black. We didn't know what was going on. What we did know was that bear sightings were up due to an early frost. So our first reaction wasn't "she's having a nightmare" (which ended up being the case), but rather "abeargotintothecabinwheresmyknife."

At the very beginning of any activity, make it clear to your players that your characters are reacting to story events rather than real events (i.e. bears).

3. If nobody sees an event, does it happen?

In the case of a long live event like this, it's important for the players to have a clear idea of when game events might occur, because they're the only ones around to see it. There were a couple of instances where people missed important plot points because they were asleep, sure that Game Time was over for the day. I imagine the folks running the game would have been pretty disappointed if they'd shown up at our cabin only to find that we were gone because we thought the event was over.

By the time the aforementioned abduction happened, not only had someone already someone fallen asleep, but someone else had left because he had work the next day. That left three people to see the event, and only two of those saw anything. And they weren't even sure what they saw, because it was dark out.

If you want your players to see something, make sure they're ready to see things.

4. It's fun to keep players in the dark about everything. Don't do it.

At least, not when it comes to the necessities. We didn't know about the second middle-of-the-woods cabin until we arrived at the first cabin. Relieved that our shelter was supplies, we left our tents and other sleep gear at the first cabin. Upon arriving at the wilderness cabin, we discover that it only had four beds, and we'd acquired a character as a night guest. With no way to retrieve our tents, people ended up sleeping on the floor.

This was totally avoidable. The character who rented the wilderness cabin had visited the night before and could have told us what to take.

Make sure that your players know everything they need to to participate fully and comfortably.

5. Have fun!

Don't think I didn't enjoy the event. I look back on it fondly. It was very well designed and wholly in the spirit of the rest of the game. I'm able to overlook these rough edges because I was having fun.

If your players are having fun, you can get away with some mistakes.