Gold Star Method of dealing with new Players

This was tested at Kublacon 2008, and reportedly worked very well.

Make up a bunch of pregen character sheets.

Contact established players and arrange for their characters to know or be otherwise related to one or more of the pregens. It's better if multiple people are.

List the relations on the pregen sheet.
If somebody uses the pregen, make sure the established player remembers how they know the pregen.

Give the new player a gold star sticker to wear, or other prominent symbol, that indicates, "new player, playing a pregen."

Basically the idea is to get new players playing, not have them spend the whole game making a character. making a character when you don't know the game is time consuming and generally fun killing. Most new players are there to have fun, not to do paperwork.

Having the gold star means everybody knows to help the player, go OOC to help with rules, establish that they know each other, treat nice etc.

New players are often treated badly. Players try to take advantage of them or just don't act well towards them. A friend of mine went to an OWBN game in the midwest, and was yelled at by the player of the Prince. She had given no indication that she was an experienced roleplayer, but she told me that she almost didn't come back. I don't think a new player would have come back.

I think in general, establishing a new player symbol, and rewarding those who interact with the new player and if necessary, disciplining those who try to take advantage, will serve to help recruit players and get them to stay in game.