Sunday, May 6, 2018

Gencon 2017 Report Card - The Anniversary-ing

***I'm getting REALLY bad at posting these. You'd think nearly a year two years later I'd have this done. So I'm posting it now, and hopefully I will finish it later. Maybe. Right......

This year, for Gencon 50, I decided to bring my 12 year old daughter Hannah. She's a budding tabletop gamer, and usually gives me a pretty hard run for my money in whatever game we are playing. In addition to having a great palate for tabletop boardgames, she has a nascent interest in Role Playing / Story games - just like Dad, so that makes me melt inside.

Demonhunters
You know you're going to have either a great or massively disappointing con when the first game out of the gate is one of the best you've ever played. I've had the chance to play Demonhunters before, and had about as much fun the first time. Biggest difference here is that while I played the first game with a very good friend (who single handedly kept me on target enough to prevent a complete and total Gencon-Meltdown(TM) last year, so thank you to him) - was that this year I was playing with my daughter as well.

Scenario: Hannah played the Ninja Assassin Vampire with a blood addiction, while I took on the role of the gadget-builder-technomancer with a very short attention span. Did I mention that Demonhunters is just a BIT tongue in cheek? And it hits the mark perfectly. When we were being sent to investigate and put down a haunting at a theatre at the premiere of "Harrison", the musical celebrating the short but uneventful presidency of William Henry Harrison, I knew we were in for a great game. The author of the scenario is a brilliant genius, so whoever you are out there, you Sir/Madam, are a badass.

System: The game system for Demonhunters is an incredibly well done and elegant blend of Cortex and Fate. Two of my most favorite game systems for getting out of the way while enhancing and encouraging narrative play. Its hard to say exactly why this particular blend works so well, it just does. If Fate Core and the Cortex Hacker's Guide had a baby inside of the Emergency Room of a Dark Comedy Hospital, Demonhunters is what you would have. Just trust me, its that good.

Notable Moments: The two notable moments for me were Hannah jumping from the catwalks to tackle Yorick, the cheap plastic skull that was flying about attacking people, and smashing him into a cloud of fine plastic particles in which she appeared like a ninja from a smoke bomb - while I commandeered the P.A. system of the theater to read scathing reviews from the bad boss guy's previous thespian disasters, reducing him to tears

Grade:  A+ (This session was the highlight of the con for us. Hannah is a huge fan of musicals, and this just hit her sweet spot)

My Seminars
GM 101 Intro to GMing - A
GM 201 - GM Workshop - A
GM 301 - Don't remember wtf I called this one or what it was about - B ( I feel like I was off my game here)

Psi*Run
Scenario: Our runners climbed out of a helicopter crash in Montreal, Canada. We had a levitating teen, an old man who could open doors in space and time, a woman who could manipulate memory, and my 50 something who could control small concentrated areas of wind. Sounds like a typical Psi*Run recipe for disaster right? I'm not sure which game had a higher body count. This one or the session of Eclipse Phase in which we released a roomful of tigers onto an unsuspecting bio lab full of Yakuza thugs.

Grade: A

Eclipse Phase

System - An interesting take on a percentile system. Roll % under like you typically would. Doubles is a critical success or failure depending on whether the roll was a success or failure. I like the way that this inherently increases likelihood proportionally to the skill level of the character.  Another unique aspect of EP is its utilization of trans humanism. A body is merely equipment. "Sleeves" as they are known are just a tool, and you mind can be transferred into an appropriate to the situation (or in the case of disaster, a new one) sleeve. The character sheet has 2 parts. 1 for your sleeve, the other for your mind. The setting features such transhuman ideas as uplifted whales and octopi, along with chimpanzees.

Scenario: Rescue a friend who has disappeared. Hannah didn't really grok the world and was confused through much of the game. Not her bag, but I do like EP quite a bit.

Notable Moments: Hannah the hacker releasing a veritable zoo of hostile animals from their cages in the research center as we merrily escape, meanwhile the badges reap what they have sown.

Grade: B

Leverage
System - One of my all time favorites. this was introduced to me by Dave Chalker way back at Gencon 2012 maybe? Its an adaptation of the Cortex system, originally from Margaret Weis Publishing. Same system is the underpinning for Firefly, Marvel Heroic Roleplaying, and Smallville.

Scenario - A wealthy race team owner wants to get rid of a driver that isn't making him what he used to, and won't play ball by throwing races.

Notable Monents: The takedown was an immensely entertaining culmination of scams, schemes, and serendipity. The bomb the villain had intended to use to kill his driver and collect insurance money was relocated to his own private garage, where he kept his extensive collection of antique cars. Meanwhile another one, a fake designed to look like the real thing was placed on the car, swapped out for the original. We rigged it to blow just a smoke trail. Something enough to get the driver to stop without being hurt, and for an investigation to ensue, which of course would lead right to the bad guy - who is now short 1 extensive antique car collection.

Grade: A

Inspectres
System: d6 based, narrative driven. I've come to love this game more than lamp. It puts the story completely in the hands of the players, and they tell it through play. Each time a player rolls a 5 or 6 on their skill checks (from 1d6 to 4d6 based on their skill) they will earn "Franchise Dice". These represent both the potential income gained from finishing this job successfully, and also serve as a pacing indicator for the story.

Scenario - I don't recall the particulars here, other than my character was the lawyer of the group who made extensive use of the various legal contracts needed for servicing a customer with a supernatural pest problem.

Notable Monents - Lots and lots of generally zany mayhem.

Grade: A

Shadows of Esteren
System - Very simple, d10 resolution. There is FAR more substance to the ambiance and feel of this game than there is in terms of game mechanics. I found the mechanics of the game to be somewhat irrelevant, and they took a huge backseat to the story of survival we were telling. Hopeless survival...pretty sure we all died, but had a great time doing it.
Scenario -  Survive a world that is surrounded by the unknown. And the unknown is DANGEROUS. We had to come to the realization though that we were living in a dream, and dying because we were sleeping out in the elements. Freezing to death. We did realize this and eventually woke up by jumping off what seemed a cliff that would lead to certain death. Upon hitting the ground and "dying" we awoke in the mountains.

Notable Monents - In the end we all died in a cave, from a vicious pack of wolves. It was fun though grimly hanging on to the bitter end. We both enjoyed the game

Grade: B+

Inspectres
We  played inSpectres again. No surprise its a great, fun game. You should play it too.

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