General Impressions
The Orc Stomp I Didn't Go to:
I had seriously considered doing the Orc Stomp this year. But there was one big complication. It started around 630 I think? and My first seminar of the day would begin at 8 in the Stadium, and I was staying a couple miles away. BUT my old friend (see below) was staying at the Embassy Suites, so maybe, just MAYBE, it could work. I could do the run (was getting my time down to around 35 minutes...I'm old and slow but I can still kinda run. Thank you soccer refereeing to keep me in 'shape') and then pop into their room and take a quick shower before speeding off to my seminar.
Thank Olidammara we realized in time that they were actually going to be at the Embassy a town over and not downtown! Figured that one out before the con, at least. Would have been ugly showing up to give 2 seminars in a row smelling like a 48 year old who just ran a 5k. So I decided to not do it. I believe I chose wisely.
Grade: Incomplete
I tried to add a little something extra to this year's offerings and 3d printed out a prize for each session. I wrote a short python script to roll d100 for every person on the roster and the highest roller was given their choice of a collapseable dice tower, or a dice -sword case for their dice. People seemed excited, so I'll probably do it again for 2025.
There was an extrememly memorable moment in which a younger attendee (I'm guessing 10 or so) was sharing an exaple from a game he GMed from his family in which -- and I quote -- "These goblins were just RAILING my mom!" Almost instantly his Dad, who was sitting next to him, and I locked eyes with the deadpan "oh my god, did he really just say that and how are either of us going to keep a straight face and not lose it -- keep it together man....HOLD!! HOOOOOOLLLLDDDD!!!!". Many others in the room were sharing the same look. It was just priceless and worth the entirety of the trip for me. As the saying goes, "...from the mouths of babes..."
I spent some time updating the slides I've used in the past, and I think they are getting pretty good. One lesson learned though is that if my voice starts to fade by day 3, I'm in trouble with being loud enough to hear in the back of the room. I think next year I'm going to get one of those little wearable mini-PA systems. Yes, the seminar room with the projector also has microphones, but those are sitting at the table, and I just can't give a presentation sitting down. It feels unnatural.
Designing Card Based RPGs
Mark Diaz Truman of Magpie games gave this seminar on what goes into making an RPG that is card based. And by that he did not just mean 'uses cards for resolution', though that was talked about as part of the process.
Grade: A-
Games
Zoetrope
The famous pre-con gaming at the Crowne. Seven Asmund, the creator of Zoetrope, ran the game for us. I'd played it once before at Games on Demand a few years back. It was run by one of Seven's friends and I was so impressed by it that I reached out to him to get a copy - it wasn't yet in production. So it was cool to eventually connect in meatspace. And a bonus, the game was done, and in production. It is a lightweight story focused RPG about time travelling problem solvers, which uses cards to drive action and game. The cards are played to a timeline to establish what happens (or doesn't happen). There are "timecards" that can be used throughout the game to alter the timeline; you can rewind, jump forward, steal cards back, and other things.
And if everyone dies, this triggers an emergency recursion back to the last time anchor, or beginning of the mission. If at first you don't succeed....
The game is a lot of fun, and the card artwork is equal to it - silly and wild. A perfect match for the subject. I could go on and on. If you like games that are just a little different, or are looking for no-prep, low-prep games, or one shots, this should be on yout list.
Grade: A
Deadlands
Hoo boy, where do I begin. We had a lot of fun on this one despite some headwinds. You know when you sit down for a convention game and a rando sits down and brought the rulebooks with him, and isn't the GM? You know you're in for a special kind of hell. There's no rules lawyer worse than a rando rules lawyer. This was a multi table group event, and this kid went around to all the tables specifically looking for one particular character class. And when he found it, took it off its table and brought it back to ours. I really wish the GM had gotten on top of this kid from the startm he nearly ruined the table, and I don't think I'm alone on this opinion. Constantly 'offering' suggestions to others...translation: telling everyone else who would even listen to him what to do. I tried to swat it away after a bit with a quote from Archer -"You're not my supervisor!!" in a falsetto tone.
I feel bad for the young lady at the table who was seated close to him. Fortunately, an older gentleman, I'll say an elder Xer came in and ended up taking the seat in between him. She seemed a little uncomfortable with the way this kid was looking at her, and mega-mansplaining everything to her. The Xer seemed to take on a paternal attitude (the good kind) toward her and did a pretty good job of tanking this dude's "alpha" chauvanist aggro and the creeping vibe.
GM was pretty good aside from his player management skill with his unrequested assistance GM. When the tables eventually merged into one for a mega fight at the end, the GM who was running that part of it (different than our table's) was just an ass. Rude, dismissive - even of the other GMs, and overly controlling. Pretty much everything you don't want in a GM. Game was fun overall, but an uphill battle to get there.
Grade: B+
7th Sea
One of the best convention sessions I've ever played in. GM - phenomenal. Convention randos - phenomenal. My home group there to play it with me - magnificent. One of the randos had actually never even played an RPG before, and took to it like he was born for it. I don't have enough good things to say about it. Was the absolute highlight of the con for me.
Grade: A+
Mothership
This is another game that has been on my list of RPGs I've been dying to check out. Didn't quite hit the mark for me. I understand what it is trying to do, but mechanically it feels like it missed the mark
Grade: B
Learn to Crochet
I'd tried teaching myself crochet before so that I could repair my wife's blankie. (Yes, I'm a romantic) So I figured I'd take a class to get better. I did not get better. Not the class's fault I think, but for the results I got, wasn't worth my time. I think I'm just getting more and more uncoordinated.
Grade: B+
Aerodrome
The game is still fantastic. There were a couple of people at the table so obnoxious and annoying I really just had to excuse myself from the event and split. I hung in for a while and had some fun, but it wasn't paying off enough to go through the exhausting mental exercise of being patient with people who just suck the life out of you. Went to find something better to do. I think I ate a pretzel and bought a game. Fair trade off I think.
Grade: B
Social
Stank / FB meetup
I went over to the stank to deliver a prize to someone I'd been talking to on the FB group so that was cool to meet them. Then I went over to the block party for the FB group meetup and I couldn't find anyone. Maybe I was just disoriented and confused? 50/50 I'd say.
Grade: D
Dinner with old friends
I was lucky enough to be able to meet up with one of my oldest friends - a great friend from my days in the army, who coincidentally also came in 2009. She lives in Las Vegas, so we don't get to see each other much. I was her first DM, and how could I have known what I'd gotten her in to. That country girl I knew back then has turned into a nerd-queen these days. Dare I say even geekier and nerdier than me! Her husband John came along as well and had his very first Gencon! They were both also generous enough to come to my GM101 and GM201 Seminars - hopefully it was worth the time for them.
Anyway - Back to the title of this section. We grabbed dinner at Weber Grill, which is just one of my favorite places to eat. So any excuse to go to Weber is a good one. And its a GREAT excuse when you get to see great friends. We weren't able to get in any games together though. I guess that just means they'll have to come again some day.
Dinner with Joe
And to add to the social coolness of it all, my cousin from Illinois attended again, so of course I made some time to meet up and have a bite. This one was a doozey though. I picked a place a few blocks from the ICC, and it had just started to thunder and lightning - VERY close by and downtown. Close enough that the con closed up the block party area. So what did this genius do? If you guessed he jumped on a scooter in the pouring rain and lightning and zipped across the blocks in between, you win a prize! Not my brightest decision. But dinner was great.
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