I have run scheduled games at several 'cons where the GM supplies the description of the game. At several of them I ran a Don't Rest Your Head game with a special scenario which is an immediate sequel to a famous Lovecraft story. Character selection is done by picking a picture of a loony in a straight jacket. My descriptions are always explanatory that its a hard R horror game (not for sexual content, if someone asks). I did get a youngish girl walk in who begged her way into playing it (she thought the character selection was neat) but she rp'd the best lunatic of the bunch.

I won't take on the role required of the con organizers by getting tangled up in an age debate. If they let in the wrong person then its on them.

Quote from: Ravenswing;923908No, there really isn't; that's a fiction peddled by the "OMG Something Might HAAAAAAAPPEN!!!" helicopter types who really do think, over the last couple days, that behind every bush and in every alley in America there's an Evil Clown out to violently sodomize their cherubs.

Yes, there really is and it is caused by the very paranoid parents you mention.

Quote from: Ravenswing;923908
I rather doubt that either your state or the OP's has an explicit law on the books forbidding minors, beyond adult supervision, from being in a room where RPGs are being played.  Mine certainly doesn't -- for one thing, it'd be a surprise to the local FLGS if it had.

It doesn't have that law but it does have laws about duty of care and public liability.

Quote from: yosemitemike;923930Yes, there really is and it is caused by the very paranoid parents you mention ... It doesn't have that law but it does have laws about duty of care and public liability.

Yeah, I didn't think so.  But go ahead.  If you think that your state really does have a law prohibiting minors from being in the same room with an unrelated adult, unsupervised, or for an unrelated adult to run a RPG for them, then name the state and cite the law.  If you can't, then you're talking out of your ass, which is my experience with about 97% of the times a layman pretends to legal knowledge.

Quote from: Ravenswing;923967Yeah, I didn't think so.  But go ahead.  If you think that your state really does have a law prohibiting minors from being in the same room with an unrelated adult, unsupervised, or for an unrelated adult to run a RPG for them, then name the state and cite the law.  If you can't, then you're talking out of your ass, which is my experience with about 97% of the times a layman pretends to legal knowledge.

No one talked about such a law or claimed it existed so talking about it is just a straw man.  Such an absurdly specific law is not required for there to be potential legal problems either.  You seemed to have missed that part about duty of care and public liability law.  Here's some clues.  People who run a public event have a duty of care to make sure that attendees are protected from harm.  In this case, harm isn't limited to physical harm.  It includes stress and anxiety as in "My fragile child is experiencing stress and anxiety because of the inappropriate things she was exposed to in that game because the people running the venue failed to carry out their duty of care so now I will sue and name anyone with any conceivable duty of care in that situation in the lawsuit including the person running the game".  Don't try to tell me that this can't happen because we all know things like this can and have happened.  The people running the event will settle and their liability insurance will pay the settlement.  The GM named in the lawsuit probably won't have liability insurance.

In that case before you run a game at any con no matter who the attendees are you should make sure that while you are representing the con ie running the game, you are covered by their insurance.  

Easy fix.  Also never serve on a board if it doesn't have insurance to cover the directors.

Are people who run events but are not official con staff covered under that?  People who run unscheduled games?  I would guess that it's probably no to the first and very probably no to the second.  Does anyone know for sure?

Quote from: yosemitemike;923998Are people who run events but are not official con staff covered under that?  People who run unscheduled games?  I would guess that it's probably no to the first and very probably no to the second.  Does anyone know for sure?

According to the lawyer I consulted about this, the answer is "no". Only official staff are covered by the convention's insurance - if they have any; most small cons don't - and any GMs are covered only by the relevant clauses in their homeowner's policy for things like theft, loss, or breakage. The venue will also normally have their own insurance to protect them against the usual run of possible property claims.

There is also a huge difference between 'criminal' (you are breaking a law) and 'civil' (you offend me) complaints. The former have much higher standards of initiation and prosecution, and the latter are things that anyone can file if they pay the filing fees. They are a very useful form of harassment, as the costs of even the most basic defense fees to get the complaint just dismissed are usually ten times higher to the 'defendant' then the filing fees are to the 'plaintiff'. (See also the "Prenda Law" cases) Litigation costs money, and these days anyone and everyone can get offended by something and get a suit going. It cost me $800 to get rid of some people who thought that they owned what's in my brain, for example, and who wanted to use me as a stick to beat some prospective business partners.

One example of 'outrage' is I've had complaints from people about my Barsoom and Ancient Egyptian figures - "OMG!!!" - and so (after taking advice from our lawyer) I do not allow anyone under the age of 18 into the house unless they are accompanied by their parent or guardian. I have a notice on my blog that basically says "no parent, no play".

For convention games or other 'public events', I let the event organizer know what I will be providing, and let them make the decisions. In writing. I've got posters about the miniatures for display, and formal written warnings to hand out. And I keep the lawyer on speed-dial.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923531Imagine the following situation:

You have announced to run a gritty hard scifi game at a local gaming convention.

When you show up at your table, it turns out that of the six players, two are 12 year old girls. A quick conversation reveals that they have roleplayed before (once, some kind of homebrew), they chose your game because they like scifi (although you haven't heard the scifi things they mention), they claim their parents are ok with them playing (but they aren't anywhere near), and they are eager to play.

You have prepared a pretty straight forward investigation/action scenario, but it touches some mature themes. There is nothing in it that is overtly unsuited for children that you couldn't tone down or change on the spot, but the base premise still is "Blindsight" meets "Invasion of the Body Snatchers". A 12 year old might get the "rough picture" ("those aliens killed and replaced the scientists"), but they probably won't get the nuances and implications (which might be a good thing). Your pregenerated characters all have some transhumanist element in them: Cyberware, shared consciousnesses, one is an outright AI, that kind of thing.

The other players appear to be normal convention folk, perhaps a little bit on the annoying side.

What do you do?

Run the game, but tone down any mature content.

I am always flexible about how I run games at conventions and tailor them according to who is playing, what they seem to want from the game and so on.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923641As you might have guessed, this happened to me. I didn't put much thoughts into it at the time, just told the other players to behave like there were two 12 year olds present, and then we played. About an hour into the game, one of the mothers showed up for 20 seconds, but was gone before I could talk to here. The girls had lots of fun with their neurally linked cyborg twins, and didn't seem to mind too much that they were killed and replaced by "body snatchers" in the end.

Glad to see that everyone had fun.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923641Nonetheless, I think I should have talked to the parents first, just in case.

Why?

In the Conventions that I have been to, younger kids generally played in games with their parents, older kids joined games on their own. It has never been an issue. Kids on their own are freed from any parental influence and can roleplay how they want to.

While I'm in the run the game as is, I also endorse Lines and Veils at any convention game where you deal with darker subjects. I've recently seen a GM use an X card which is a card any player can hold up and the GM will veil the topic and move the story forward. As a former regular at Dragon*Con I've had a fair number of kids come to my table.The plot lines in Fractured Kingdom tend to gravitate towards the darker end of the spectrum, the introductory story involves drug use, accidental murder, and child soldiers. With that said, the Hunger Games is written for 12 year old girls and involves subjugation, abduction, the televised slaughter of children, and forced intimacy for survival, so it's really all in how you handle the topic.

Amusing side note, I've had a pair of kids, right in that age range, come to my table three years in a row. Our convention games became more like a mini-campaign as I'd run different story seeds from the website and just tweak them slightly to incorporate their actions from the year before. The first year they came alone, each following year I got a parent from each kid joining us, so by year three it was two dads and their kids. I think that last year the story I ran involved them being hunted down and trapped after losing their home and being forced to figure out how to save other refugees before facing the man hunting them.

Quote from: soltakss;924204Why?

They are still minors. If something should happen, I could go directly to the parents without having to ask around.

I've GM'd at RPG cons for over 30 years and I've been a con organizer, board member, etc for over 40 different events in California. So my comments are based on my experience as both as a GM (who revels in blood and gore and horror) and as con staff dealing with complaints from parents and GMs.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923531You have announced to run a gritty hard scifi game at a local gaming convention.

Excellent! I love gritty hard sci!

Did your announcement write up state Mature Themes?

Does your convention have a Rating system for games? AKA, "All Ages", "Mature Themese", "Adults Only"?

If not, please encourage them to do so. It saves lots of misery. Not just for RPGs, but for board games and card games where many modern games of all types can be "problematic" for the Mommy Outrage Brigade.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923531When you show up at your table, it turns out that of the six players, two are 12 year old girls.

Many parents are shitty moronic assholes.

Many parents treat cons as theme parks and GMs as free babysitters.

Fuck them.

I actually enjoy running games for teens and tweens. Like me, they are really into blood, gore and horror! But the problem is the Mommy Outrage Brigade (and the emasculated bitches in tow), so the best defense is communication BY THE CON with parents.

You may want to communicate with your con staff to provide a "Dear Parents" blurb in the con booklet or even better, a handout to parents they need to sign when they buy tickets to the event for their kids.

Quote from: Pyromancer;923531What do you do?

In the 90s? I just ran the game AS-IS.

In the 00s? I almost put "Mature Themes", "Rated R" or "Adults Only" in every description for my games. If a kid still showed up after I posted the warning, then I ran the game AS-IS.

In the 10s? I will rarely run an event without the parent present in the game or sitting next to the table. That's not been my requirement, but seriously laid down by several players who are VERY CONCERNED about the Mommy Outrage Brigade. In the past decade, I've seen adults walk away from games where there have been teens at the table and let me know that unless their parents has their ass there, the adults were bailing.

This also has been a conversation at many staff meetings. At what age, should kids be able to sign up alone to a game? I've argued 14. Others fear 18 is the only safe answer.

Quote from: Crüesader;923776I have personal rules about playing with people under the age of 18, sometimes 21.

And that's 100% fair.

I've had dads who tell me they won't play with kids. Why? The con is their vacation from "being dad" and they want "adult time". I absolutely don't begrudge them that, and my "Adults Only" description actually made them happy because they could count on the event being 18+ even if the themes were just TV PG fare.

Quote from: Bren;923803

• And how exactly does the 12 year old's gender matter one itsy, bitsy bit to the appropriateness of hard scifi or grittiness?

Allegations of misconduct are monumentally higher when girls are involved.

Quote from: daniel_ream;923865It's precisely because of this cultural shift that I wouldn't game with unaccompanied minors.  It's not for their safety; it's for mine.

As con staff, we've had many attendees say these EXACT words and ask for THIS to be official con policy.

Based on the number of complaints I've had to deal with, I have lobbied two separate cons to make their entire events age 14+. But they won't because families are worth extra badges and hotel rooms. They pay full price, buy more shit from vendors, but then play much less, so they are a net win.

Quote from: yosemitemike;923998Are people who run events but are not official con staff covered under that?  People who run unscheduled games?  I would guess that it's probably no to the first and very probably no to the second.  Does anyone know for sure?

Insurance is mostly about medical liability. GMs are volunteers. I have never seen any insurance that would protect volunteers from the complaints of attendees.

Theft is an issue at cons, especially back in the day with Magic cards. If someone stole your M:tG deck, you should tell the con staff who would probably tell you to check Lost and Found. Some cons would alert the hotel staff. In these cases, the hotel staff usually recommends you call the cops if you feel you were robbed. That's how I have seen it go down.

I have not seen any small con or regional con have insurance against the Mommy Outrage Brigade. I imagine the big cons (GenCon, Origins, PAX) have legal liability insurance in case they are sued, probably a part of a business insurance package.

I'd strongly agree with Spinchat; similar experience as a convention and event organizer, and some really great advice.

Quote from: yosemitemike;923972No one talked about such a law or claimed it existed so talking about it is just a straw man.  Such an absurdly specific law is not required for there to be potential legal problems either.  You seemed to have missed that part about duty of care and public liability law.  Here's some clues.  People who run a public event have a duty of care to make sure that attendees are protected from harm.  In this case, harm isn't limited to physical harm.  It includes stress and anxiety as in "My fragile child is experiencing stress and anxiety because of the inappropriate things she was exposed to in that game because the people running the venue failed to carry out their duty of care so now I will sue and name anyone with any conceivable duty of care in that situation in the lawsuit including the person running the game".  Don't try to tell me that this can't happen because we all know things like this can and have happened.  The people running the event will settle and their liability insurance will pay the settlement.  The GM named in the lawsuit probably won't have liability insurance.

Thank you, but I've been a legal professional for nearly 25 years now; if you'd like a definition of 'duty of care' above and beyond a layman's knowledge, I'd be happy to educate you.

Yes, indeed, lawsuits such as you describe have happened, and they are far far rarer than people fantasize about, lurid tales in the media notwithstanding.  You have about fifty times as much chance of getting yourself seriously injured driving to work in the morning as being the target of a frivolous lawsuit, but that doesn't prevent you from getting behind the wheel.

Certainly steps such as maturity ratings such as Spinachcat describes are sensible deterrents, but an even better one is a tough stance against frivolous lawsuits.  Our firm has a staunch policy against them: we won't settle, and we're more than happy to go to the other party and say that not only had they better be prepared to go the distance, but that we'll be filing for costs as well as Rule 11 sanctions for a frivolous filing.  After nicking the other side for five figures in an appellate case a few years back, it's no idle threat.

One other thing to keep in mind, following another point raised, and something I've hammered on in LARP and convention circles: while waivers are commonly believed to be "Get Out Of Litigation Free" cards, they're nothing of the sort.  In particular, no waiver every penned immunizes against negligence, and courts can be creative in defining it.

I think kids are a lot more acclimatized to things than we imagine. But then, I had a 9-12 year old who played for 3 years of my DCC campaign, and if you've seen the session reports of that one, you might think I'm grossly negligent.   The kid in question didn't bat an eyelash though.