I’ve not gone back to reread all of the Gen Con posts, but I am wondering whether they come across as more of a colossal tale of woe and despair than I’m really wanting them to.
Yes, stuff went wrong; Transport getting there was chaotic & disrupted, and the ending of the holiday was not what I’d planned.
But there are many good things which I think need calling out, if only to remind myself that they exist.
Did the Orc Stomp 5k. I did this a few years ago with Frank & Moni, and decided to do it again. Granted, I did it in walking mode, but it was surprisingly fun. ( though the idea that I’d immediately rush off to a game afterwards was flat-out wrong, as it turns out )
I’m even visible in the background of one of the pictures of the event.
Did a bunch of catching up with friends, most of which went unphotographed, it seems, though a few made it through.
It’s difficult to know where to start. A lot has happened, both at the con and after it, much of it kind of horrible.
Focusing On The Good – The Games
Didn’t have a bad game this time around. There was one ( “The Strange” ) which didn’t start well because multiple players had also run the game and felt that everyone needed to know that, and needed to benefit from their wisdom, which meant that the group took a while to gel & work together. Once we did, things went well, and the scenario ( basically ‘Jumanji’ with a Halloween theme ) was a bunch of fun.
Played a very fun Timewatch game, where we ended up in Medicine Lodge, Kansas in 1900 battling giant mutant cockroaches from an alternate timeline to ensure that the temperance movement continued so that JFK would be at the helm during the Cuban Missile Crisis. And I got to do weird time shenanigans where future-me assisted present-me by dropping an anvil from a roof onto my opponent.
Kids On Bikes was a new one on me, and I was impressed enough that I ended up buying it as my Gen Con Impulse Purchase. Hilariously unsupervised kids rounding up escaped Hammer Horror monsters to return them to a spooky house that wasn’t there. Also, we may have inadvertently stolen a car.
A Groundhog Day styled Masks game went well, including the bit where we realized that we absolutely had to let the loop happen one more time, owing to the enormous amounts of horrifying mutagens which got dumped in the water supply. Ended up having a nice “OK, now I trust you” narrative arc with one of the other characters, which I suspect is difficult to make happen in a four-hour con game. ( Masks looks at types of characters, not powers, when building characters. Mine was The Janus, which is about someone with a mundane life and a superhero life that they’re trying to keep secret, so a big thing is the question of “Who knows your real identity?” and “When do you reveal that identity?” )
Zombie World was another new one; I’d heard about it last year ( while buying Masks ) and was interested enough to back the Kickstart, which came in two days before I left for Gen Con, so I left it in the box. It’s one of those games which winds the characters up and points them at each other, with various secrets revealed along the way, so it does a nice job of doing the “The Zombies Aren’t The Biggest Problem” thing from many movies in the genre; You’d want to be comfortable with potentially being actively working against some of the other players for this one. Fortunately, everyone at the table was good with that, and nobody took it personally.
Part Time Gods was another new one. The group got on well, and I got to play a Tech Tycoon / God Of Cold who was, to be honest, kind of an asshole when things didn’t go the way he wanted. The game ran long by about an hour, but I don’t think anyone minded; It was fun, and we eventually defeated the divinely-powered Ancient Egyptian Death Robot.
Final game was Bulldogs!, a Pulp SF game about bottom-of-the-barrel freight hauling, run by one of the creators, Brennan Taylor. It was awesome, and I got to play the Undead Medic; A fungal lifeform inhabiting a corpse.
For some reason, possibly related to having too much free time, I decided to do a roundup of this year’s Gen Con plan; Specifically, the games.
As you can see, I have coloured pens, no ruler, and am terrible at lettering
These are, with one exception, events I have a ticket for, so there’s a place at the ‘table’ reserved for me. Most of the events are games to play. So, from the start;
The Stink
Not actually a game, and also not something I have a ticket for. It’s a gathering of folks, nominally the ones on the Gen Con forums, and the ticketing is more for getting attendance numbers than anything else; Once the ticketholders go in, anyone else can, and there’s often groups giving away free stuff & misc. promotional items. There’s a cash bar, a sort of ice-breaking “find a person fitting X criteria” passport game, that sort of thing. I tend to put this one in the “I go there to meet up with people I know will be there, then leave when it gets too annoying or loud” bucket.
Timewatch – Hatchet & Axe
What does Carrie Nation have to do with World War III? Everything, when your mission to prevent a nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis leads you through centuries of pre-apocalyptichistory!
Timewatch is a time-travel RPG. Played it once before & had a hell of a good time, so hopefully that’s a repeatable experience, especially as I have a copy in PDF that I’d like to get some use out of one day. It allows for a lot of the wacky time-travel shenanigans, like “Once we get through this locked door and escape, we can go back in time and hide a key in this plant pot!”, or “In order to blend in at spring break, we need to learn to play music so we can be a band; OK, done that.”
Kids On Bikes – The House On Poplar Court
Theo Easton has called a meeting of the Investigations Club. He has decided it’s time to investigate the strange, abandoned house at the end of Poplar Court.
Kids On Bikes as a genre … think The Goonies, ET, Super 8, Stranger Things, etc. Conveniently unsupervised kids getting involved with things they probably shouldn’t. Never played it before, but it’s been getting a fair chunk of attention, so I’m looking forward to this one a lot.
This was a promotional stand in one of the games halls last year
VIG Mixer
OK, some explanation. I buy a much more expensive “Very Important Gamer” badge ( entry ticket ) for Gen Con, which comes with a few perks. Biggest one is a guaranteed downtown hotel, which is fairly important when you’re coming in from overseas and aren’t that keen on driving. There’s also an area to hang out in ( with couches, tables, & ‘free’ drinks ), a swag bag of gaming-related stuff ( the 2017 games became the games lending library at work, 2018 went to a school ), and a social event – The VIG Mixer. There are drinks, nibbles, and given that the folks attending Gen Con are mostly doing so to game, it’s one of the few times you’re likely to run into a lot of the other VIGs in a situation where they’re not about to head off for their next game. I don’t always go, but kind of felt like it this time around.
Orc Stomp 5k Charity Fun Run
I decided I needed some form of challenge or goal, and chose … poorly. Did this with some friends ( in walking mode ) a few years back, and if nothing else, it’s quite a pretty route to go through while you pray for the merciful release of death.
QAGS – Apocalypse Truckers
Civilization crumbled beneath a rain of nuclear fire, but folks still need their toilet paper, beer, and Molly Hatchet 8-tracks. It’s time for you wasteland weirdos form yourself a CONVOY! The irradiated highways are dangerous for any lone trucker. Grab your shotgun, jump behind the wheel, and get ready for some post-apocalypse grindhouse fun and mayhem!
QAGS ( Quick-Ass Game System ) is a good one for somewhat gonzo games. Does cinematic well, and has a system for bribing the person running the game to let you get away with stuff. Also has damage worked out for a “Cathedralpult” in the rule book, just in case that’s of any use. I have no idea whether Apocalypse Truckers is an upcoming or existing product for the company producing QAGS, but I’ve played in a game run by the GM for this one before, and it was a whole lot of fun. Hoping that’ll happen again.
Masks – One Day
The same day keeps happening over and over. Only you seem to notice. What’s so important about today? Will you be able to get time back on track? Or are you doomed to this one day forever?
Masks is a game about Teenage Superheros, with about equal emphasis placed on both parts of that. You’re teenagers, so you’ve got parents / teachers / adults / society telling you what to do and who to be. And you’re the new generation of superheros, so you’ve got all of the previous generations of supers / government agencies / mass media telling you what to do and how to do it. Played the system before, and it rapidly became a favourite, even though I’m still a bit hazy on how parts of it work.
Zombie World – The Dying Light
There’s not much fuel left for the generators, not after last night’s theft. The harsh winter cold will kill you, if the undead don’t get you first. What will you sacrifice to take back what’s yours?
Zombie World is from the same people who do Masks, and I found out about this new project of theirs last year at Gen Con, while exhibiting poor sales resistance with respect to the Masks books in hardback. I backed their kickstarter because it sounded interesting, so I have a copy coming, but I wanted to see what it’s like to play, It’s a card-based RPG, so … I’m not really sure how that will work.
The Strange – Game Of Screams
You and your friends are playing a Halloween-themed board game purchased from Crow Hollow, but too late you discover it to be an artifact of the Strange with a deadly power over its players.
Modern day world, into which odd things intrude. Never played this, and couldn’t get into a game last year, so I was glad to find one this time around. Plus, while I’ve run a lot of horror games, I’ve not played in that many.
Part Time Gods – American Gods
Control the power of a god with the responsibilities of a mortal.
This became your life, the balancing of the mortal and the divine, the normal and the supernatural, the mundane and the strange. Maintain your dominion as part of a Pantheon and still make it to work on time.
Balancing one’s mortal and divine lives can be tricky, and divine responsibility doesn’t always pay the rent
Another one I’ve wanted to play, but not been able to. Did have a ticket for this last year, but got sick & decided that a midnight finish was a dumb idea on the first day of the con when I was already feeling ill. I was OK for the rest of the con after a decent night’s sleep, so I guess it worked.
Bulldogs! – Heir Restoration Solutions
The Frontier planet Quellim has been wracked by civil war for a decade, ever since the last king died without an heir. Now there is someone claiming to be the rightful successor of the king, but no one is willing to dive into the deadly competing factions to bring her home. What’s a lost heir to do? Hire Class D hazardous shipping to do the job! You’ve just got to keep her alive long enough to get the manifest signed for delivery.
I’m sure it’s possible to play a Bulldogs! game in a serious manner, but nobody I’ve asked has ever seen it happen. A suitable game for the last afternoon of the con.
