Dragon Con Suggestions

 

One of the things we discussed throughout the Dragon Con weekend this year was how it feels (fair or unfair) that Dragon Con makes very small, incremental changes so that you don’t always notice them in the moment. Looking back, though, you can see how certain things have improved or changed. This section is less an airing of grievances and more a hope for a quicker change.

Attendance

Capping the attendance. I actually think having maybe 65,000 people might be a number closer to what would work best, but overall I think where we are is alright enough (75,000). I’m hopeful they will keep it around/near this value for the near future. And unless some other hotels are added in the area, I’m not sure they can support much more.

Loading the Panels

Load the rooms earlier. Please. There were multiple times this year and in previous years where they didn’t start loading the rooms for the next panel until there was 10 minutes left. It didn’t take 20 minutes for the previous panel to clear out. The biggest problem is that you make it so that people miss the beginning of the panel they just stood in line for an hour (or more), which honestly shouldn’t happen.

Badges

Mail us our badges. While the badge pick up process is much smoother these days than it was 10 years ago, I think we’re well past the point of having to fight those lines. When we were driving around looking for a parking spot, I saw the line for Saturday badge pick up was outside of the Sheridan and down the block. I know people have this fear some kind of mass fake badge market will crop up, but I’m not sold on that being the reason to not do it.

College Football

College Football Kickoff Game (or whatever it is called these days) – Since Dragon Con is on Labor Day weekend it is always going to share the weekend with something in downtown Atlanta. I’m not sure anything can be done about that. However, over the last 15+ years the Kickoff Game has also been on Labor Day. That made a ton of sense as you want to highlight the beginning of your season and Atlanta is a mecca for college football.

Now things have changed. We have this weird Week Zero thing where we get a handful of games but for some reason it doesn’t count as opening weekend. So here’s the solution:

Have the Kickoff Game on Weekend Zero!

It would not only help Dragon Con and downtown Atlanta by not having multiple BIG events on top of each other, it would allow the hotels in the area to have back to back BIG weekends… which feels like a win-win to me. Who wouldn’t want to be booked solid for 10+ days. The networks can still build this up as the BIG thing and with the sheer number of teams, Labor Day weekend will still have plenty of potentially good games.

And let’s face it, those fans who are coming to see their team play would come regardless of if it is a 3 day weekend or a regular one.

Note, if this did happen, I would be slightly disappointed to never have the experience of visiting fans from Missouri or Mississippi looking around with the odd look of “what in the world is going on around here” from all the cosplayers.

Also, this is something completely out of Dragon Con’s control. It is more about me putting it out into the universe and hoping!

***

If you haven’t already, you can check out my two previous blogs about my experience at this year’s Dragon Con:

Part 1

Part 2

***

I’m thankful we have Dragon Con in our backyard. And there isn’t a year that goes by I don’t wish I would have found a couple of hundred dollars in order to get an Eternal Pass all those years ago! Looking forward to next year.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con 2024 Recap Part 2

Check out Part 1 here.

Saturday Cont.

Traveller

The only thing I knew about Traveller was that it is a scifi game, and it is old. I remember seeing ads for it in old Dragon Magazines. According to our GM (a wonderful fellow from Melbourne, Australia), it has been around since the mid-70s. This was extremely interesting to think about as the game unfolded. Technologies we take for granted in our daily lives were not considered when they developed the game. So you end up with some weird things like “Pony Express” information exchange. There is no send an email or whatever. Information is hand delivered.

Just an interesting look back at how those developers looked to what the future might look like. And makes me want to go down the rabbit hole to see what other things might have been developed (or not developed).

The game itself was one of the very few I’ve ever played in at a convention where there was nearly no combat (technically we fired on a ship near the end and destroyed it, but that it was it for the entire 4 hours). The GM stressed early on the system was brutal. In addition, we only had 2 fighters with us. Given that I was playing the Scientist role, I knew I wanted to avoid combat at all costs anyway.

Funny enough, in most of these gaming sessions, when you play a scientist type you do so knowing you are going to be rubbish at anything combat related. Your hope is that you get a couple of moments to shine in between fights, but mostly know it’s going to go a certain way. But because we didn’t have those fights and because we needed to have the Scientist investigate a bunch of things – I was the rock star of the group, and probably rolled the dice more times than just about anything else (which I wasn’t expecting – it was a nice change of pace).

Overall it was a cool session and while I’m not sure I’ll likely be able to play it again outside of a convention (since none of my playgroup has any experience with it), I’m glad to have had a little trip into history via the future.

Afterward we grabbed a bite (way too late) and then got home some time after 12:30.

Sunday

Seth Green and Nathan Fillion Panel

It said something about Robot Chicken in the panel title, but there might have been one Robot Chicken question 45 minutes into the panel. Of course, it had to do with a Firefly style episode in the same vein as Star Wars or the Walking Dead. You can imagine this idea went over really well with the crowd.

This was Seth Green’s first Dragon Con, and he seemed to be having a lot of fun. Randomly (though appreciated) someone asked him about his role on Can’t Buy Me Love, which is one of those things I always forget until I’m rewatching the movie. He also told someone on the phone (who was named Meg Griffen apparently) a “heartfelt message” in Chris’s voice. And even had a story about when he was on Buffy making the director uncomfortable because he was only had a sock covering his privates (for those who may not know, he played the werewolf Oz on the show, so when he woke from transforming he was often… without clothing).

The two of them apparently vacation together and were a great pair to have on a panel together.

Resident Alien

Maybe this is the bit which causes Courtney to actually watch the show (to be fair, I think she’s probably watched 10 or so episodes over my shoulder, but is only half paying attention)? I always love when the actors are asked what their “nerd” thing is. Many times you get answers which are ok. Maybe they say Star Wars or Star Trek, and you know they like them, but probably not in the same way many of the people in the crowd do. But then there are those moments when their posture changes and their voice gets a little faster/higher, and you just know “oh, this is their THING”.

Alan Tudyk apparently is really into yard sticks (yes the measuring kind) (no it wasn’t a joke). Alice Wetterlund loves Star Trek. Sara Tomko talked about meeting her first fan who cosplayed as her. And Meredith Garretson mentioned a book series (which I sadly didn’t catch the author), but she came back to it a couple of times.

See they are just like us! 🙂

Agents of Shield

Probably the cutest moment from the convention was when Brett Dalton’s daughter (maybe 10ish) asked him a question after standing in line. He made sure we all gave her applause enough to “embarrass her”, which we did. Having him and Cobie Smulders on the panel created an interesting balance as he was on the show for however many seasons while she was on there a handful of times but has all the MCU movies under her belt. Which meant their experiences were wildly different and created some interesting conversations.

You could tell that both of them really enjoyed working on the show/movies, and are always down for even more if the time allowed.

 

LitRPG Writers Panel

Weirdly, the only panel I almost didn’t make it in was this one. There was one seat left (which left Courtney outside the room, but this wasn’t really her thing anyway). I’m interested in LitRPG, this whole genre which is probably only a decade or so old. I have a short story which is morphing into something more that I feel like fits right into that heading. So I figured I’d sit in and see what some of today’s writers had to say.

Overall, I learned a few things. It definitely feels like they all (though to differing degrees) put a fair amount of thought into the game system the characters are playing. It also seems like the indy publishing plan of writing in series, releasing a lot of books overall (though many tried to stick to trilogies), and maybe even the use of spreadsheets to keep track of everything. Dakota Krout also reinforced that idea what we see in the finished product started years before. And the core of the game may have started even before that.

I need to check out a few of the novels to get a better feel (I’ve only read two, maybe three LitRPG books at this point). but it feels like a very interesting path to have available.

***

Once that was done, we grabbed food, and then did the slow drive home with a little of the post-con blues to keep us company. Overall, another great time, and I’m kind of thinking we may try to dip our toes into the hotel craziness if our luck can hold. The 40 minute drive downtown and back home wasn’t bad, but there were a couple of things we likely would have done if we were staying downtown.

Hope everyone else had a great time. See you next year!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con 2024 Recap Part 1

One of the biggest questions I had this year, and honestly every year, was how would Dragon Con 2024 actually feel? Would it be overly crowded? Would we end up waiting in long lines for panels and miss out?

The only way to find out is to go, right?

Friday

In the week leading up to Dragon Con we go through the App and I star literally anything and everything I might have some interest in. Which means 4 or 5 panels might show up in my schedule for a time slot. I do this for a number of reasons.

To coordinate my panel interests with any that Courtney might have earmarked.

To not forget about anything that might get lost in the amazing number of panels Dragon Con puts on.

To have back-up panels available when you realize the line for the one you want is wrapped around the hotel.

To have a back-up panel when you are in the Hilton and the next one you scheduled is in the Westin and it is Sunday and your feet hurt.

Nathan Fillion Panel

This was the one Courtney and I both had marked as the number one panel to see. Aside from how good he is on panels, I don’t think we’d ever seen him solo one. We also knew the line was going to be long. As soon as we reached the backside of the Hyatt, we found the end of the line and crossed our fingers. About 10 minutes before the panel began, the line started moving. By the time we got into the room (about 3 rows from the back), Nathan had already begun talking (annoying).

Once we were seated, he treated us to stories about his career. How he got the speaking roll as Headpool in Deadpool/Wolverine (apparently the key is Ryan Reynolds helping you out and then thinking you did him a favor). How he has a trick knee, so any running you see in the Rookie is not always him. How he would do a Firefly: Captain Malcom show in the Picard style now 20 years later.

The hour went by far too quickly. I could listen to him talk for days.

Smallville Panel

Given the quick turn around (30 minutes after our first panel in the same room), we took a bathroom break and grabbed a snack. Luckily the line wasn’t very long, so we were able to load in and were fairly close to the front. Kristen Kreuk and Eric Johnson were on hand to talk about Smallville among other things. Starting a trend which would be a common occurrance through many of the weekend’s panels, I believe this was each of their first Dragon Cons. They talked about how cool it was to see the cosplay and seemed to be having a good time. We determined Kristen must be a vampire of some sort since she looks exactly the same as she did 20 years ago. Eric told a great story about his time on Vikings when he kept blowing a scene because his sword kept getting stuck in his scabbard.

 

Saturday

Before I get into Saturday proper, we had a bit of an adventure getting there. Egg again came over to the house to carpool, and we left around 10 AM. My thinking was that since our games don’t start until 1, that will give us time to grab lunch beforehand. While I knew the Parade was going on, I hoped we’d pick a route not to get caught in it.

What I didn’t consider was that the College Football Kickoff game between Clemson and Georgia was at noon (WHY?). This meant the interstate snarled. Once we got off on our exit, it was no better. Then to top it off, the parking deck I chose first didn’t have any empty spaces. Of course, they were letting us in, but after going through 7 or 8 levels we didn’t find anything. We finally had to park much further away than I would have liked. All in all it took us over an hour once we got off the exit before we had parked and exited the vehicle.

 

Gaming

This was our second year of doing our best to avoid the crazy Saturday crowds and instead just hang out in the Gaming building (Mart 3). There is food to be had there (Chick fil a and Jersey Mikes) and the area where we game has plenty of space so for the most part you are not ontop of each other which is sometimes a problem at Gen Con.

Deadlands (Savage Worlds)

After many, many, many attempts to play the current Deadlands system including that one time at Gen Con when we thought we’d gotten it right and instead it was for the 1st edition version of the game (which felt very complex). I’m a big fan of westerns and weird westerns, and this came at a time when I am knee deep in playing through Red Dead Redemption 2… so I was ready to be a cowboy of some type. With the five players at our table, I felt like we had some good interaction with one another, and the premade characters (from the Kickstarter box set) had some interesting flaws on them that helped inform some interesting roleplaying directions for players.

I chose the Witch to see how the magic system worked. And it didn’t disappoint. While I had some “charm” style spells, I didn’t have a ton of opportunity to use those. The Blaze ability (think Fireball) helped turn the tide (or made it so we didn’t get our asses kicked) when dealing with some Federal officers chasing after the same item we were hired to go collect.

With Savage Worlds I learned I have a red six side (likely stolen from a Risk game many years ago) who loves to “explode” on me (in Savage Worlds when you roll the maximum on a die, you get to reroll it and add the new roll to the previous one). This allow my character to do a ton of damage in one of the shots. And since in Savage Worlds you are supposed to be Big Damn Heroes, it goes a long way to helping you get that feeling.

We ended up destroying the abomination keeping the item in question, and then Lee managed (with his dying breath) to outduel the enemy Gunslinger by drawing the Joker card (which basically let him go first). It was a really cool moment we had joked about earlier in the session (as in – it’s likely not going to happen), and then to have it show up in the biggest moment was awesome.

A great game and one I’d love to play a campaign in.

***

Tune in next week for Part 2 where we see Nathan Fillion again, play cowboys, and nearly miss a panel.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con Through The Years

Late summer in Atlanta means some level of reprieve from the blistering summer heat (not that it is really gone until October some years). Baseball is beginning its downslope to the playoffs. Football is just under way. And 90,000 of your best friends descend to participate in Dragon Con!

I’ve been going semi-regularly for over 30 years now. From when it was more comic convention to now when 90,000 best friends MIGHT be a little too many on Saturday. As I get ready to make my way downtown again, I wanted to look back over the various recaps I’d done and collect them all in one place. So in that tradition, here’s the full lists of reviews I’ve done since 2014 (minus 2020 for obvious reasons):

Dragon Con Memories – A walk through the years before 2014 as I talk about my relationship with the convention

Dragon Con 2014

Dragon Con 2016 – The Bad

Dragon Con 2016 – The Good

Dragon Con 2017 Recap

Dragon Con 2018 – Wish You Were There – I missed this Convention due to family commitments, but it has a few Dragon Con Hacks which I should honestly expand on in a blog at some point.

Dragon Con – Everything Pop Culture – A lead up to 2019 where I put my Old Man Yells at a Cloud pants on (a little bit).

Dragon Con 2019 – Review Part 1 – Where I find out I’m allergic to Aleeve!

Dragon Con 2019 – Review Part 2

Dragon Con 2021 – Review

Dragon Con 2021 – Review Part 2

Dragon Con 2022 Recap

Dragon Con 2023 Recap – Part 1

Dragon Con 2023 Recap – Part 2

***

If you’re heading down for the weekend, hopefully I’ll see you!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Gen Con 2024 Recap – Part Two

Flashback to Thursday (Day 1)

If you missed Part one, you can find it here.

In writing this blog, I realized I left out one of the things we did on Thursday, and that was to attend the Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman Dragonlance 40th Anniversary Panel. I ended up getting there about 1/2 way through it (which meant I needed to pick up my copy of the book at the booth rather than at the panel, but luckily that process was smooth enough), but I was still able to listen to them talk about about the journey to this point… though, every time they said 40 years I felt a little bit older. Chronicles were some of the very first novels I read once I discovered the joy in reading. In many ways Dragonlance was more of a gateway to roleplaying than anything else I’d done, enabling me to see exactly what it meant and how these numbers and names on a few sheets of paper could be transformed into living/breathing characters. A process I still try to employ in my writings.

We all went into the panel thinking this was the last ride for the duo of authors within this world, so imagine our surprise when later that day it was revealed they’d be writing in Dragonlance once more, this time going way back in time to Huma.

I haven’t started in on the new trilogy yet, but now that this 3rd book is in my hands it is next on the reading list!

 

 

Friday (Day 2 cont.)

Old Gods of Appalachia

We pick up with my favorite session of the weekend. Horror games are not something I get a lot of opportunity to play overall. In my experience they seem to lend themselves more to shorter campaigns (stories), or perhaps it is just I’ve only been a part of a handful that have lasted longer than a few sessions. Whenever these sessions open up, I’m excited to see what opportunities they might provide.

The other thing I’ve definitely noticed about any horror or horror adjacent game is you have to have buy in from the players. And by that I mean you need to all be on the same page as to whether you are going to take it seriously or if you are going to effectively do a version of Scary Movie (or insert your Horror B-movie of your choice). We were lucky on Friday night (plus the best horror games are done at night, right?) where we had an excellent GM. His ability to set a scene and weave the right amount of tension throughout the session really made for an excellent experience. And all six of the players were pretty much bought in on the story. While there were definitely a few moments of laughter, it did exactly what you wanted it to do, give you a tiny pause from the impending doom that certainly awaited you.

We played the adventure “Best Leave Them Ghosts Alone” and without giving any spoilers, I felt like it had room within it for everyone to have a moment to shine. The story had some combat but also allowed for the roleplaying moments I really appreciate during these gaming weekends. After the game we spoke with the GM for a maybe twenty minutes and looked at the various products Monte Cooke had to offer. I thought about buying the book, then thought I shouldn’t, then we left the room… only for me to get about 10 feet and say f- it, and go back and buy it. I’m looking forward to reading through it and maybe get one of those short campaigns going at some point.

 

Saturday (Day 3)

13th Age

I was listening to the podcast Reading D&D Aloud when I heard Rob Heinsoo, co-designer on the 13th Age RPG. They had just finished up their Kickstarter for the 2nd edition, and in discussing the system he mentioned something called a Escalation Die, where every round it increased by 1 and added to your To Hit rolls in an effort to both end combat a little quicker and increase the ability of the heroes to potentially win the fight. I’d never heard of such a thing, and it made me wonder about the system in general.

Saturday, as originally planned, had a lot of free time with Daggerheart being the only game we’d secured to start. When I mentioned this to Egg, he said he might be able to get us a game of 13th Age through some of his media side contacts. Sure enough, we secured a two hour session… with Rob Heinsoo!

Normally with two hour sessions you get pregenrated characters, but Rob wanted us to see a bit of the character creation, so while the abilities and powers had been listed out on the character sheet – the “cool stuff” was coming up with our “One Unique Thing”. Basically, 13th Age has you come up with something extremely special about your character, and in theory, it could be anything you’d like. Anything is a large box to figure out, so Rob gave a couple of examples (which I wish I could remember them all), but the one that told me you could dream big was:

I am a former god who has fallen from the patheon.

I mean, you can’t get much bigger than being a god.

So we went at coming up with our Unique thing. Egg had his bard whose instruments were from skinned trolls (so the playing kept them from fully regenerating). Lee had a Draconian whose claws were his weapons. And I was playing an Elf Ranger…

As an aside, I’ve thought about Elves in our roleplaying games. Here are beings who are effectively immortal. And I always wonder how they could possibly live so many lifetimes without going mad from the pain and loss of loved ones. From the sheer amount of memories weighing them down. In my mind, I’ve thought it might be cool if every 100 years or so you must return to your homeland and have a Renewal Ritual performed that would excise some of those memories from you. It might not be a complete mind wipe, but by reducing some of your experiences, it would let your mind reorder itself.

In that vein, I said my Elf had forgone such a Renewal and now suffered from swiss cheese brain. All those memories are in there, but they come and go as they pleas making it so there would definitely be a lot to roleplay if this was an ongoing campaign.

Rob listened to each of our Uniques and you could see his mind racing to find threads to potentially use as well. Even though this was a 2 hour session, I felt like he’d have come up with a full campaign based on some of those ideas.

The actual play was a brief encounter where we fought some wannabe dwarves and got to experience 13th Age a bit. Given the lineage to D&D we had a leg up on much of the terminology, but it was still interesting to see how things like the Escalation Die worked. I liked that even if you missed in an attack, you still did some damage (3 for my character). Having damage be more based on your level and not on whether you had a Longsword or Short Sword worked well – one less thing to track, I think.

Rob Heinsoo has such an exuberance for the material (and for roleplaying in general) you couldn’t help but be sucked in by him. I’m a bit envious of any of those who get to have him as their GM for that reason. I’d like to thank him for taking the time to do the session with us, and show us a little bit about the game itself. They are still finishing up the 2nd edition (but you can still pledge here), but I’m super interested in seeing how it turns out.

Deadpool Roleplays the Marvel Universe

I still remember the good old days where if you played Marvel then there was a huge chart that needed referencing. This session had no huge chart… so I guess we need to figure out how to play this game?

Another 2 hour session, but there were a couple of roleplaying style opportunities within but mostly focused on the combat systems. Which appeared to work… fine. I did like that you roll 3 6-sided dice with two white and one red. The Red one has a MARVEL logo as the 1, but if you roll that it acts as a 6 and a Fantastic (critical) on which many of your powers and abilities do something extra with. I played Winter Soldier, so mostly it was a damage enhancer. Damage also keyed off whatever number was on the red dice.

There were really 2 “bad” things for this scenario:

The first was the example characters were Miles Morales, Daredevil, Luke Cage, Winter Soldier, Annabelle Riggs… who? Egg had her as his character and asked me (the comic guy) if I knew anything about her. We later figure out she has about 25 total appearances before this, and I have read a total of ZERO.

Look, in the main game if you want to stat out the lesser known characters – great, go to it. But at a convention, we should really focus on name recognition first.

The second “bad” was the character of Dagger (which Lee had). Her powers affect an ability stat called FOCUS, which is what you draw on to use your super powers. However, in this scenario we are going up against Gun Thugs and Taskmaster, who are melee types… which meant her powers weren’t going to do very much at all. Again, in a longer session/campaign, someone who can make it so the villain can’t use their powers because it has been depleted makes a ton of sense, but in this environment it was more of a feel bad.

Overall I thought the system worked well enough and would actually love to go through character creation just to see how that worked.

Daggerheart

Which brings us to the last game of the night and the trip. This is the Critical Role system which is still in a Beta (if I understood correctly) so this version may be vastly different when it is released in 2025.

I mentioned that sometimes the players and the GM mess really well at a convention and the game takes on a really good flare of its own. For me, this was another example of it. I think this was fostered as well by the fact that while we had the combat moments, we probably had a bunch of moments which allowed us all to focus on roleplaying. In fact, I made a decision that had I known how long the scene was going to last, I might have not done it.

My character was a Cat person, ranger type (a lot of that going around on Saturday for me apparently). Another of the party was a more grizzled veteran. After our first battle, someone asked him for pointers for the dinner we were going to have and he gave a couple of nice answers… so I said – “Remember the scene in Jaws where the kid mimics his dad while they are at the dinner table… that’s going to be me at this meal”. However, I’m not used to playing in person, being an online player these days, but then it occurred to me – I could just act it out.

So I did. The other side of the table noticed it immediately (the person I was copying sat to my left), but soon enough he not only realized what I was doing, he started f-ing with me. Dangling his arms, crossing them in weird ways, and placing them on the table in random ways. I was having fun, Egg snapped a picture of us at one point, and it was a good bit that really didn’t distract (too much) from the other players moments as well.

And the scene lasted for over an hour.

That’s a long time to keep up the bit. When we finally reached a scene change, I offered an apology to the guy “I hope I wasn’t annoying you.”

“Not at all. I appreciate your commitment to the bit.”

“Yeah, if I had realized I’d need to keep doing it for that long, I might have made a different choice!”

As to the system, there were things I liked and other things I’m not entirely sure of. Instead of a D20, you rolled 2d12s for skill and combat checks with one being a HOPE dice and the other being a FEAR dice. If you succeeded and the HOPE dice was higher, you accomplished your goal and got a HOPE point to spend on one of your abilities. It seems like another thing to track (and it is) but it also feels like something you’ll actually use a fair amount as opposed to Inspiration (which I never remember). Other things had to do with the damage/armor system which I think could be streamlined a little more. Egg’s character died toward the end of our adventure and it seemed like the rules did him no favors there.

Overall, I really liked the session. I liked aspects of the system. And the GM and players were great to play with. A win!

 

Sunday (Day 4)

Always a somber day no matter what convention you’re at. Some Sundays are a sort of sprint through the Dealer’s Hall in order to see the 4 or 5 rows that we’d somehow not managed to get over to during the weekend. This time was not one of those. Since most of our games started around 2PM, we actually had a good amount of time to make our way through the maze and see everything we wanted to see (a couple of times). After a final pass and couple of goodbyes, we made our way back south to Atlanta where I managed to walk in my front door at about midnight (much, much shorter drive on the way back).

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Gen Con 2024 Recap – Part One

 

Wednesday (Day O)

Normally we take a very leasurely pace going from Atlanta to Indianapolis, making stops for food, gas, and then normally for stop at a couple of toy/comic style stores. It turns a calculated 8 hour drive into around a 11 or 12 hour drive, but we’re so excited for the coming weekend it is well worth it. However, for some reason the drive took nearly 16 hours. We left Atlanta at 6:30 and arrived in Indianapolis around 10 or 10:30. We may have hit a time warp somewhere in there, I’m not entirely sure.

The other thing that I should note is we weren’t as lucky in our hotel placement as last year (where we were across the street from the convention center). Not that the Sheraton wasn’t nice or anything, but after a day of walking around and playing games, you kind of want to be able to get to your room sooner rather than later. The Sheraton must have moved by one block ever night as it always seemed one block further away than I remembered.

Thursday (Day 1)

Wizards of the Coast are in the process of preparing for the big release of One D&D (D&D 2024) in about a month’s time. While I think it might be nice to have the release at the 50th year of D&D celebration at Gen Con, the logistics didn’t work out. Instead they had 3000 copies (750 each day of the con), but instead of doing the same as the Lorcana release last year which created all sorts of problems, those interested had to be online at 7:00 AM and try to obtain a ticket there.

Lee, Egg, and I all discussed this. We’d love to have a shot at the Players Guide, but we also know that waking up that early is THE SUCK. I basically said that if I happen to wake up to pee and it is 6:50, then I’ll give it a try.

I woke up at 6:45… and hit the submit button as the clock turned to 7:00. The I watched the working circle on the phone spin and spin. Egg was wait listed at 900, Lee was higher I think… but mine said 275. Then it said 200. 150.

Was it actually going to happen?

Of course not. That’s not how my luck works. The odds were stacked against us anyway.

The rest of the con I woke up at 7:02 and 7:30, and 9:00… so I only tried the once.

1879

If it is somewhat Steampunk, you have my interest. Somewhere along the way of signing up for events months ago, I mentioned this one to Egg and he secured us a 4 hour block. It turns out the GM actually writes for the game (I did not write his name down, otherwise I would give him a shout out) which was really awesome for us since we had never played it. Many times the games may have a GM who knows the system only a little bit. That was not the case here.

1879 is a game where you have 3 factions struggling against each other on a distant planet in another solar system. Thousands of years ago a portal opened on Earth and the Babylonians went through and set up their own society while encountering and defeating the local lizard man population. Then the portal closed until the 1800s when it opened in Victorian Era Britain. Britain then did what they did during those times, which is colonize this new location.

The game can kind of take on a couple of different options depending on which civilization you want the characters to be from. The GM told us the previous year the players had played Lizard-folk. This time we were the Babyloanians dealing with the British.

The game was fun, though the system kind of felt like it was doing a little bit of everything. It had D&D style attributes, but then there were different dice used in your attack rolls (say d8+d6). It was fine but likely not a system we’d want to play regularly in our home game.

Cyberpunk Edgerunner

If Steampunk is my thing, Egg has a similar affinity for the Cyberpunk genre. The GM summed up the game in a very succenct way: You just have to give the characters enough money to pay 1 month’s rent and you will always have something for them to do. In the rebellion against the establishment, it is truly the rent which holds the biggest sway over our lives. The adventure itself was well done.  Some big corporate project manager decided our tenant building would be cheaper to buy and put up a new cell tower.

This would not stand!

Highlights of the session was Egg’s rocker getting a Nat. 20 when winging an empty bear bottle at the suit’s car and landing perfecting through the sunroof. Our group deciding to take the battle to the Project Manager’s house by posing as garbage men. Us finding him in a compromising position early in the morning. Me raiding his fridge for all sorts of expensive food and alcohol. And finally extracting the appropriate amount of revenge before slinking back to our side of town.

The only bad thing was we probably stole too much money from the PM, as I had enough to pay my rent for at least 2 months!

 

Friday (Day 2)

Shadowdark

We don’t play a ton of OSR style games in the home group. Our default ends up being 5e for the most part with the occassional White Wolf style games coming in second. But we were all interested in seeing the game that would end up sweeping up at the Ennies later that evening.

Given its lineage, it was easy enough to slip into as being D&D players we have a common language. We were playing pre-generated characters which helped us jump right into the game itself. Tasked with destroying an enemy fortress’s heavy balista, we encountered a world that had to make immedaite adjustments to the lack of darkvision for dwarves and elves with firefly style beetles trapped in overhead lights. A clever solution to a problem which doesn’t really exist in regular D7D settings.

In addition, setting up the turn order at the start of the game and just rotating through that kept the combat and non-combat moves flowing easily. At no point did you feel like you didn’t have some level of impact on the game. However, there was one tense moment where the Real-Time aspect of Shadowdark nearly snuck up on us. We had to set explosives to blow up the weapons and those would go off in 10 minutes. Literally 10 minutes of real time would have them explode. Which meant that we needed to get through another full turn to ensure Lee’s character was actually able to make it out. We were so engrossed in playing, there were about 3 minutes on the timer when I realized it and noted we might not want to monologue anymore and get to Lee’s turn!

Egg ended up buying a copy of the game, so I’m interested in seeing how the book presents the game and how any of those things might be used in any of our games (D&D or not).

Transformers

Transformers is my childhood toy. While the Star Wars movies captured my imagination, I had far more Transformer toys than I ever had for Star Wars. Issue 4 of the Marvel series was the first comic book I remember buying, even before I even really knew comic books were a thing that existed. I experienced the pain that every young chiuld hopes to avoid when their grandparents, who don’t even understand these cars who change into robots thing might be, buys you an assortment of Go-Bots for Christmas… scarring you well into your 40s.

As to the game, this was a two hour introduction session. Which most of the time I think those aren’t going to really allow you enough time to do more than an encounter or two. It doesn let you get a glimpse at the system, which is kind of the whole point in a lot of these cases. We did get to see some of the system which also uses addition dice (including a D2 – so flip a coin). One of the things I’m not sure I like is if you don’t have a proficiency in a skill, then you are rolling at disadvantage immediately. It is a bit of a “feel bad” for me. Heck, I already don’t have any skills in a particular thing and now I get an additional penalty as well.

While the system didn’t wow me, we did have a moment that was a bit odd. As we went around saying our names, one of the players said “TireIron”. I’m jotting down the character names and didn’t think anything of it since I could very well see a Transformer having that name. However, his buddy sitting beside him was like “that’s not your name… your name is on the first line of the character sheet”. It struck me as odd at the time, but the more and more I think about it, I’ve been struggling to make sense of it. Since we were in Kindergarden, we’ve been taught to put our name at the top of the page. It’s my default at this point. So… if TireIron wasn’t written at the tip-top of the page, why would you grab a word from some other random area of the character sheet?

Who knows?

***

Check back in for part 2 next week where there will be Cats, Giants, Frogs, Deadpools, and very, very Old Gods.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Once More, Into the Breach!

Another year, and another chance to go up to Indianapolis and play games with 1.5 million of our friends (ok, maybe it’s more like 70,000 at this point) at Gen Con. It will be a bookended by two longish drives and the middle will likely be filled with a random assortment of games we may or may not have any idea what system they are using prior to sitting down. In between those sessions we’ll travel, slowly, through the Dealer’s Hall (which realistically takes about a day to go through due to the sheer size), and then we’ll have many, many evenings where we try to kill Egg Embry by making him laugh so hard that he loses his breath completely.

Next week, I’ll likely have part one of my review, which I’m so thankful I started doing from that very first year we went (2017) as there are definitely little moments and games that I might have forgotten without my brief histories to jar the memory back to the surface. So in that tradition, here’s the full lists of reviews since I started going (minus 2020 and 2021 for world ending reasons):

Gen Con 2017 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

The Best Game I Played at Gen Con – Tales from the Loop

Gen Con 2018 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

Gen Con 2019 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

Gen Con 2022 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

Gen Con 2023 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

***

And for anyone else traveling up, down, or over to Gen Con… safe travels!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

Dragon Con 2023 Recap – Part 2

You can find Part 1 here.

Saturday

We’d left off half-way through our gaming day…

 

Mothership

This is the 3rd time I’ve played Mothership (I’ve run it once, we played it at Gen Con this year, and now Dragon Con). Each time has leaned into a different style. One was more suspense/horror, one was a scalvaging mission dealing with pirates, and this one was a race against time as the colony we were on slowly disentigrated. As we all noted, the actual adventure ended a little early (maybe 45 minutes early), but due to the way things were run with us bouncing from various points on the map, trying to get to the Space Port, it felt like a full session.

I also appreciated the Warden (GM) letting us know not to bother picking the Scientist character class as we built our characters since this adventure was more focused on combat/speed. Too many games don’t let you know something like that, and then you have to just make your way through the adventure without the skills truly needed to succeed.

The Warden also simplified the initiative system, just going in clockwise order. You had 2 actions – you could move and shoot, you could shoot twice, or you could move twice. All of that did a great job of keeping the game moving with a heightened level of tension throughout.

Mothership really can be whatever you need it to be, and since character creation is so strightforward, it might be a perfect convention game.

After that we ended up going out to eat, finding out that some places shut their kitchen down 2 hours earlier than you would think. And here I thought that was only a Indianapolis policy.

Sunday

We woke up bright and early because Chad Shonk had a Star Wars panel at 10 AM. Let me say that by day 3 of any convention, 10 AM might as well be 6 AM for how excited I am to wake up that early… but I braved the morning and we made it down there about 10:10. The panel was on the High Republic books/comics/etc, which I have close to zero knowledge on. I’m good with the various live-action shows Disney Plus puts out, and back in the day I collected most of the old Dark Horse comics, but once the rebooted those stories, I used that as a perfect time to jump off the bandwagon.

However, this time frame interests me in not only how they’ve rolled it out, but also because it truly is a time period that hadn’t been explored. So even if I wasn’t sure about all the details and characters the panel talked about… it did get me back in the mode to start reading those novels and see if they can grab me like the old ones once did.

After that was a quick stop at the Art Show and a visit with Amanda Makepeace. I’ve known her since high school, but over this last decade her talents have reached truly awesome levels.I was so happy to hear she had won the Hank Reinhardt Award, which is a lifetime achievement award that honors someone that has made significant contributions to fandom culture in Georgia. So amazing.

Lastly, we made our way to the Firefly panel where they avoided talking explicitly about the show, but didn’t shy away from saying the names of certain shows they’d been on. We actually got a handful of great stories about Ron Glass which were both sad and funny and really the perfect type of story to tell at the panel. The other thing I always take away from the cast is how much they appear to truly like/love each other. From the physical touching here and there, to the inside jokes, to the shared text chain… I always like to think that the people on my shows are friends (even if I know that isn’t the case), but here, I think it is very true.

There was another panel I’d hoped to jump to, but it was about 3 hours later, and I hit the wall. I hated cutting things short, but between all the walking, waking up “early”, and knowing that if I didn’t listen to my body I’d end up with Con Crud (or worse), we called it. All told, I think the Saturday gaming is likely to become a annual thing, helping to break up the weekend very nicely, and really letting me experience even more the con has to offer.

***

One last thing before I go.

Image by Albrecht Fietz from Pixabay

Escalators

I was reminded of the scene from Mallrats where Brodie ends up ranting:

“Listen, not a year goes by, not a year, that I don’t hear about some escalator accident involving some bastard kid which could have easily been avoided had some parent – I don’t care which one – but some parent conditioned him to fear and respect that escalator.”

Apparently, in 2023, people no longer understand fundamentals of using the escalator.

First, you have to clear the area in front of where the escalator ends. You see, unlike regular stairs where you can potentially hang out, these “moving stairs” are going to dump more and more people ontop of you. So when you don’t move quick enough, I end up bumping into you… that doesn’t give you liscense to give me a dirty look. YOU need to move it!

Second, when you are getting on the escalator, you normally allow the person at least one step of distance. If you don’t know the person, you do NOT get on the same step as me. I’m not sure why you would think that was a thing we were suddenly doing. But maybe I missed the memo.

Third, reread the quote above. Almost had a little girl (say 4-5 years old) in her pretty princess costume get run over because she didn’t step off at the end, instead tried to slide off for some reason. Luckily, she didn’t fall, and I had given an extra step to seperate us… thus avoiding disaster.

Look, I just want to have a fun convention, but apparently all of you need to go back to class and figure this mechanism out again.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con 2023 Recap – Part 1

After my early August trip up to Gen Con and the record setting attendance that convention set, I was very curious as to how Dragon Con would end up feeling. After only going for one day last year, Courtney and I had our 4 day passes with a sure-fire plan in place on how to attack the convention.

Friday

Step 1 – Arrive around 11 AM on Friday and get our badges, praying that the lines were mercifully short.

Step 2 – Go see the Lucifer Panel, praying the lines were mercifully short.

Step 3 – Head over to the America’s Mart and venture into the Vendor’s Hall, praying the lines were mercifully short.

Step 4 – Make our way through the 4 floors while not going into too much debt… and praying any lines were mercifully short.

The first part went off without a hitch. I’ve mentioned it before that back in the day the badge pick-up line was insanely long. It didn’t matter when you showed up, you were going to be there for a solid 2 hours no matter what. However, at 11 on Friday morning we spent a total of maybe 5 minutes in total. Note, I still question why they can’t just send us our badges in the mail and cut out this step entirely (and before someone says “counterfeiting”, I’d argue that Gen Con has nearly as many people and still manages to do it).

The Lucifer Panel had a small line… so no real issues there. The panel itself was good, if a bit strange. With the Writers/Actors strike, the panelists can’t really talk about any shows they were on. Which makes it a bit of a word play dance when answering any questions about their lives. In a truly funny moment near the end of the panel, DB Woodside said the name “Lucifer” in a clear reference to the show. The entire room did an audible gasp. But Lauren German was quick on her feet “He meant from the Bible” which received a nice laugh.

The third part was our first experience with a line. It was wrapped around the building, in and out of the loading/unloading area… and while it was constantly moving, it was still 50 minutes of our lives we won’t get back. Luckily Atlanta’s weather was cooler than many other Labor Day weekends (I don’t think it got above the mid-80s on any day). Even so, that line kind of sapped us a bit immediately.

The Vendor Hall itself was full of the normal wares. Anything from Cosplay to comic books to loot boxes to artists wowing with their works. The majority of my purchases centered around half-off or $5 trades, and a number of reader copy comics from the late 70s (The Champions and What If) that I really had no choice on whether to purchase or not.

There were a handful of panels we had tagged to go and see, but we didn’t leave the Vendor’s Hall until around 6:30 and by that point Courtney’s back had enough (and my calves were barking as well).

Saturday

This was the first year of a brand new plan. One I’d actually wanted to try last year and couldn’t execute because I only ended up going for one day. Egg, Lee, and myself (the Gen Con crew) would see how Dragon Con did their gaming. The thought was that this would keep us in one location, limiting not only our walking, but fighting any lines. Saturday normally has the most people anyway, so trying to deal with the extra people over the years has become less and less fun. Plus any opportunity to game is a good one.

Shadowrun 6E

I’ve never played Shadowrun in any edition, but it’s been one of those that I’ve been interested in. The Cyberpunk world with bits of magic thrown in for good measure is always intriguing. Egg summed it up – the more dice you roll, the more fun you are having. Shadowrun using d6 to resolve in game issues where you end up rolling as many dice as you can based on your various stats (a 5 or 6 are successes). I think I was rolling 8 dice at one point in assisting another character, whereby every success I had added a dice to his roll. Lee ended up with around 14 d6. However, in his typical “con game” mode, he would only have maybe 3 successes. Probability was not on his side.

The adventure was an extraction of a prisoner just outside of Savannah, Georgia. We then spent about 1/3 of the time meeting NPCs and leveraging those contacts to try and make things go as smoothly as we could during the mission itself. Of course, there was bound to be issues along the way, but overall our planning paid off and our target was delivered to a safe house for our client. It was a fun time.

I did have one critique of the pre-generated character sheet though. And this isn’t limited to Shadowrun, I’ve seen it in plenty of games. There were entirely too much going on. I was a Rigger, which means I dealt with Drones. But I probably had a dozen different ones listed on the page. Considering this is a one-shot adventure, I’m not sure I need all that extra stuff. I didn’t end up using most of it… and some of the time it felt like something I couldn’t be sure if it was more of a reconasance drone or a battle one.

In general, I think that character sheets should be fairly bare bones. The more “stuff” listed, the more potential for confusion.

***

That’s it for this week. Next week will be part 2 with Mothership and Firefly and… Escalator Safety.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

John McGuire will be at FLUKE in Athens, GA this weekend

I’ll be making my first convention appearance of the year at FLUKE at the 40 Watt Club in Athens, Georgia this Saturday from 10-5. FLUKE is a one-day convention focusing on independent comics and creators.

So come and stop by and we can chat. I will have copies of the Gilded Age trade and copies of the recently funded through Kickstarter In Our Dreams Awake #1 as well as copies of The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, and The Echo Effect novels.

Hope to see you there.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Free Comic Book Day 2022 – Report

This past Saturday was Free Comic Book Day.

It was also the first time since 2019 I’d done a Free Comic Book Day or any other convention of note. In the meantime, I’d published another novel, put out a comic, and just ran a successful Kickstarter for the first issue of another series. The hallway closet has mostly sat unopened for all of that time as that’s where all my stuff to sell is located (not sure how I managed to get such a prime spot, but it does make things a bit easier to manage when it is all in easy reach.

Anyway, I was able to get a last-minute spot at my local comic shop: Galactic Quest in Buford, Georgia. And when I say last minute, I mean the week of was when I locked it in, which I really appreciated.

Galactic Quest opened up at 9 AM and probably had about 30-40 people waiting in line to kick off the festivities. And throughout the day (I was there until 5 PM), there was a steady stream of comic enthusiasts to watch navigate the free comics and the handful of us who had set up tables.

Since it had been nearly 3 years of no conventions, I was a little rusty on my various sales pitches for all my wares. And since I had a couple of extra products, I tried to both give as succinct a pitch on each, while trying not to just eat away at someone’s time. And like any other time, you do spot people that are definitely willing to engage with you, and then others who are ready to just move on to the next thing. I think I judged most people pretty quickly.

I never know how much “stuff” to bring to any convention I go to. I always worry that I’ll run out of stock and then curse myself for not having that 25th copy of something. Usually that means I’m actually bringing extra stuff to the point that I am a full-on pack mule, straining under the weight of graphic novels, prose novels, a banner, and all the other things that I end up with. I did recall that the last time I set up at Free Comic Book Day, I did run out of one of my novels (The Dark That Follows), so I grabbed at least 5 copies of everything I had, with another 2 of each novel in the trunk of my car “just in case”.

I was pretty much the first thing you saw as you walked in!

Much like last time, the novels ended up being the overall bestsellers (when taken as a whole) while The Crossing #1 pretty much wiped me out of the little bit of stock I had of the regular cover. As with everything though, I’m just happy to get the books into people’s hands so that they can read what I’ve written.

All in all, it was a great way to dip my toe back into the water and get my work back in front of people.

Thanks again Galactic Quest!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Origins 2021 Recap – Part Two

You can find Part One here.

Day 2

We continued on with another quick stop at the Exhibit Hall and then attempted the thing that always seems to get the best of us during these conventions: trying to fit a meal in at a restaurant in the hour between the Hall closing and our next game. Somehow we manage to get into one of the local places leading Lee to have a conversation with the waitress about potentially getting either a Bison Burger or a Chicken Sandwich… both of which they were out of. Funny enough, two year previous they’d been out of both of those foods as well.

Regardless, we managed to make it to the game only a few minutes late. Luckily we got there just before they effectively gave our seats away (to some people with generic tickets).

Kult: Divinity Lost

Kult is one of those games where I might not know anything about it, but I’ve seen the images over the years. The best way to explain it is a horror game along the lines of Call of Cthulu. Horror games feel like they are perfect for conventions as, in my mind at least, they should be dangerous for the adventurers (investigators?). I expect that not all of us may survive any particular encounter we have.

For this particular adventure, our GM was running an adventure of her own design which set the PCs up at Paranormal investigators whose leader has received a call from a longtime friend who is having problems with shadows within his apartment coming to life, noises in the hallway, doors opening, and he’s at his wit’s end. Of course, as we begin to dig into the building, the neighbors, the landlord, etc. things begin to take a more sinister turn with the creatures taking an interest in us as well.

It was definitely an interesting game as the PCs seemed to work really well together. Between the group of us, I feel like we managed to look under every tock and look in every hiding place to get to the truth behind everything. The thing with these types of games is that sometimes you end up not asking the right questions and suddenly you’ve gone in circles instead of advancing against the plot. Luckily, I don’t think that happened. The only “bad” thing is that we really didn’t have any dice rolls to speak of, so I still don’t have a great idea as to the system mechanics, so I’d be interested in getting into another game down the line.

You can find out more about Kult here.

Day 3

Excellents

Now it comes to the best game I played all weekend and, of course, it would be the game where we ended up playing some kind of Saturday Morning Cartoon Princesses. The system 9th Level Games uses for this game is based on playing with one die for each player. You have your choice of a D4, D6, D8, or D10 which helps define your character. While having a larger dice means that you are likely better at some of the more physical facets of the game, the lower die are perfect for the more intelligent style of rolls.

Oh, and you get your very own Animal Companion. For my Princess (Of Video Games), the animal pet was the Dog from the old Nintendo Duck Hunt game.

The actual game was very much a collaborative story-telling environment where in conjunction with the GM and the dice rolls, we all got our chances to shine throughout the game session. The GM was amazing to be able to think on his feet with so many crazy things the group threw at him. The ease of the system and the other players at our session made it just a fun game with tons of laughs.

More than anything, the Dice System they use is very interesting and makes me wonder how well it translates to more… “serious” games. But if you are looking for a good session, I’d urge you to check out this particular game. You can find more information about the game here.

The Few and Cursed

This left us with our last session on Saturday afternoon and the chance to participate in an actual playtest session of sorts. I knew of the comic the game is based on from a Kickstarter I supported a couple of years back of the same name. Plus, I’m a sucker for a good western style play experience. For this particular game, it uses a D100 system, so you are trying to roll under for all your successes.

Our adventure focused a bit on the harshness of the world, a world in which water is the most precious commodity. In playing the game, I can see how resource management will be of utmost importance as time goes on, with your PCs scrounging for food and supplies wherever they might be able to find them. Some of the other bits and pieces we gleaned were how critical successes ended up not only increasing your damage/skill result, but you would reference a chart where you wouldn’t end up just getting a 1 for damage, but instead tried to make that moment a feel good for the player (which is one of those things we all have experienced, make the great attack and then do very little damage – so I loved they were taking a look at some way to make all that work a little better.

They are looking to have a Kickstarter for the game sometime in late Spring/early Summer, so be on the lookout over at Rock Manor Games.

 

Day 4

We hit the Exhibit Hall one last time to make those last minute purchase decisions. In previous years at Gen Con, Sunday would be the day I’d end up buying a new game that would seemingly never actually get played. For this year, I opted not to do that (even if there were a few things here and there that certainly spoke to me). Instead, we did our final walkthrough before making our trip back south to Atlanta many hours later.

Due to the pandemic, Origins end up somewhere around 10,000 attendees, which is about 50% of a normal year. So while I got an Origins experience, I was assured that I hadn’t gotten a true experience just yet. At this point, Gen Con is still the one I’d rather do if just for the spectacle of it all, but I wouldn’t mind coming back to Columbus in a couple of years and checking out a more normal Origins!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Origins 2021 Recap – Part One

 

The past few years I’ve been able to make the trek northward to Gen Con. With the pandemic, 2020’s Gen Con was postponed, and after various new dates were determined for not only Gen Con but also Origins, our group made the decision to go to Columbus, Ohio instead. Partially because even at half capacity, Gen Con would still be around 35-40k in attendance, whereas Origins in 2019 was around 20k. It felt like the more prudent option of the two. Thankfully Gen Con allowed us to roll over our badges one more year, so hopefully, we’ll be back in Indianapolis in 2022.

Lee and Egg had gone to Origins a couple of times and reported having a good time. I knew that no matter what, this trip probably wouldn’t give me a complete picture of the convention due to a potentially reduced.

Day 1

CHEW

Thursday began with an afternoon game of CHEW, a roleplaying game based off the comic book of the same name. The concept is that you live in a world where poultry is illegal and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now the uber-powerful agency. While I am familiar with the comic book, I must confess that I have not really read any of the comics.

There were a number of pre-generated characters to choose from, and after we all made our choices we start our adventure getting ready to go on vacation, departing from the Baltimore Airport. However, we are pulled aside for a special assignment to discover why a nearby research island has suddenly lost 30 of their prized chickens. As we proceed on this mission, we learned that not all is as it seems at the facility, and that, perhaps, the chickens are not merely animals.

If you’re thinking that the premise is fairly goofy, I’d say you’re spot on. At the same time, we had a good group at the table who all leaned into the humor (even when it was at their character’s expense). The game is currently in the midst of a recently (launched on Tuesday I believe) Kickstarter. You can find it here.

Shadow of the Demon Lord

I remember seeing this game when it was initially Kickstarted a number of years ago, but this was all of our first time playing the game. It is set in a Grim Dark world, where it would appear that the darker forces have succeeded in turning the world into a darker reflection of itself. And while there are those heroes who will rage against the darkness, it is supposed to feel like an uphill battle. For the rules, they were very similar to Dungeons and Dragons in a lot of ways.

For this adventure, it was a twist on Night of the Living Dead, with a bunch of us stopping at the same Tavern just off the road. After finding a dead man upstairs, the reanimated corpses from all around begin to converge on our spot. It was here that I think I misjudged how well I might be able to help with my Clockwork, and ended up taking enough damage to reduce me to one hit point. And while there were opportunities to potentially heal a little bit in between the waves of the dead, you had to make a choice on healing or fortifications or potentially trying a ritual to help put an end to it. Sadly, as the waves became worse and worse, we began to fall before the hordes until eventually, all but one of us died.

During the year when we roleplay online, Egg is notorious for his horrible rolls. I mean, his rolls defy logic, luck, or probability. However, the universe has decided that when he plays during a convention, his dice treat him much, much better. Yet, that terrible luck had to go somewhere… and this time, I was the sacrificial lamb. At one point during the game the GM asked me if I’d actually hit anything the whole session (this was probably 2 hours in). I had early on, but since then I rolled a series of dice that only served to mock me.

I wonder if this was one of those adventures wherein an attempt to show the players how dangerous the world is, they pushed things to make it extremely difficult to survive? One thing I did really like about the system was the initiative where you could choose to act Fast (1 action) and go before the monsters or Slow (2 actions) and go after the monsters. It streamlined things really well, and I wouldn’t mind trying to incorporate it into other games we play.

You can find out more about the game here.

Day 2

On Friday, we made our way into the Dealers’ Hall to check out the various booths. From what I’ve been told, normally this stretches at least two of the exhibit halls; however, the area with the dealers and companies were confined to about 1/2 of one of the halls. There was still plenty to look at and buy, but I’m sure in a normal year it would have been a whole day to really look at everything, whereas, we probably spent around 5 hours in the Hall all told over three days, and I felt like I’d seen everything (and some things twice).

Misspent Youth

You play youths (between ages 12 to 17) who are raging against the machine… whatever that particular machine happens to be. We started out brainstorming ideas for what the big problem with the world actually was. We ended up in a world where organs are harvested from the poor and given to the rich and old who use it as a way to prolong their lives. They wall off their areas to keep themselves away from the riffraff of the rest of the world.

We were EMTs sent out on our first solo harvest, but the patient we were sent to help had already been harvested. We managed to not finish the poor man off by taking his last kidney, but soon uncovered a hospital where people were being harvested against their will (rather than being paid something for their organs).

What was interesting about this system was that you the story is broken into scenes and you roll 2d6 and place a marker on a list of numbers between 2 and 12. You want to seed it with your own numbers, but the GM is doing g the same to trip you up. If you ever roll one of your numbers, then you dictate what happens in the scene, but if you land on the GM’s number, he narrates it. It was another case where I’d never seen a game do something like that, and I’d love to figure out a way to incorporate that type of idea to other systems too.

You can get the game here.

***

That’s the end of Part 1. Next week I’ll finish up the convention and reveal the best game I played all weekend.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con 2021 – Review Part 2

After taking Saturday to go hang with family (and watch the Georgia Tech Football game that I’m still not sure how they lost… or actually, I know exactly where they lost, I just still can’t believe it), we ventured back down to Dragon Con on Sunday for what would be our last day.

Actually, before I go into Sunday, I wanted to say that this year’s Dragon Con felt like being in a time machine about 10 years earlier. With a self-imposed attendance cap (and what ended up at an estimated 42,000 people), I just looked on Wiki and it has 2011’s attendance at 46,000, so the 10 years feel was right on. Regardless, in this last decade, the convention has expanded to other hotels and America’s Mart because, well, it had to. And this will sound both stupid and obvious, but the difference of having 85,000 people and 42,000 people spread over the same area meant that this year you could breathe (ironic as we were all wearing masks). The Dealer’s room wasn’t so full that it was bursting at the seams. You could actually take a minute and look around and not worry about being in the way. The lines for the panels we chose were of normal length and didn’t have any problems getting seats.

I really hope that they don’t try to jump back to that 85,000 number next year. I know the money is better that way, but the experience was so much better this way.

In addition, all the other guests really stuck to wearing their masks in the hotels. I think I only saw 2 people not wearing them (the old “chin-diaper” look). I know it helped put us at ease that this wasn’t going to end up as some super-spreader event.

Anyway, we managed to get into the Zachary Levi panel. We’d done it in 2019 before we’d even seen Shazam (since we knew him from Chuck mostly) and were blown away by his frankness in dealing with mental issues, his frankness about his roles, and just how personable he’d come off. This time was no different as he still managed to mix in some cool anecdotes and made us laugh while still not shying away from the harder questions about his upbringing.

After that, we went to see Harvey Guillen (Guillermo) from What We Do In the Shadows. While I only know him from the aforementioned TV Show, there were plenty of questions about some of his other roles. Probably the biggest takeaway for me was just this idea of something always happens for a reason (or if you’re meant to do something, the universe will find a way). He had a couple of roles that seemed to work out just perfectly… apparently, even his audition for Shadows was one where he only got the shot because he showed up to a friend’s party and met someone whose boyfriend (husband?) worked for the show. The actual role of Guillermo was supposed to be a 40-something-year-old man (Harvey isn’t 40), but they humored him and gave him the shot. Then he said he’d blacked out in the process of doing it… just had no memory of it at all. Time went on and he’d heard nothing, so he figured that was it. And at the last minute, he received the call that not only did he get the job but it was starting that next week.

Finally, we decided the Smallville panel had been a ton of fun, but we were bummed we hadn’t seen Michael Rosenbaum (Lex Luthor). However, all four of them were there for this panel… and we got to see Michael in action. He was all over the room, answering questions (even those not meant for him), getting everyone to sing along with the theme song, and just generally someone who I could tell from this panel and the previous one would have been hilarious to have on set with you (the never a dull moment type of guy).

When it was done we had another panel on the list and some years we will do the Masquerade, but the previous two days had begun to wear on Courtney (and me as well) and AEW was having their Pay Per View at 8 that evening, so we opted to head out.

***

With so much trepidation in the weeks leading up to this event due to the Delta Variant, I am so happy we decided to go. Here’s to another one in the books and looking forward to next year!

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

Dragon Con 2021 – Review

It was, as they say, a game-time decision. After the cancelation last year, our 2020 passes were rolled over to 2021. There was definitely a large part of me who kinda hoped they might do the same again, but we live in Georgia, and Georgia is going to Georgia to be sure. With the numbers from the Delta at the top of mind, my wife and I weren’t exactly sure whether we were going to go or not this past weekend. Given that we are both vaxed, I was less concerned, but still, when you are going to be hanging out with 40,000 of your friends in a relatively small area for the weekend… well…

So we made the decision to go, at least on Friday. I figured that if it was half the s-show that I thought it might be, we could always bolt. If things were alright then we would end up coming back on Sunday (Saturday the in-laws were in town).

The doubts began creeping in when a few of my friends went down on Thursday night to pick up their badges and reported waiting in line for nearly two hours. As many years as I have been going, the ticket line has been the most hit-or-miss thing with the whole con. I remember some years where 2 hours was considered a short wait time. Then a handful of years ago something changed and the process seemed like it had sped up. To hear about the back-slide was disturbing to say the least.

I would like to say, after having been to Gen Con, I really wish Dragon Con would step up and mail you your badge. Gen Con charges an extra $10 for the process and it is the best money I’ve ever spent.

FRIDAY

We tried to give ourselves about 75 minutes to get through the line and still make our first panel at 11:30. I dropped Courtney off at the Sheraton and then went to park the car…

And found out she’d already gone through the line. 5 minutes. No problems. It was the same with me. I’m not sure if everyone came on Thursday or maybe they didn’t have the volunteers or what changed in the preceding 12 hours, but I was overjoyed!

Our first panel was with the Smallville cast. Courtney and I watched Smallville through about season 4 or 5 when I believe we fell behind in our viewing and the DVR ate the intervening episodes (and I kind of, sort of, but really didn’t, write an episode for the show). It’s always been one of those shows I would have liked to go back and finish out (and after this panel Courtney mentioned possibly doing that after we finish our Chuck rewatch). Still, it was great to see Tom Welling (Clark Kent), Laura Vandervoot (Supergirl), and Sam Witwer (Doomsday) talk about the show with such a fondness. I hadn’t realized it had been 20 years since the show debuted.

They talked about stunts gone awry (Laura passing out in the harness which they use to have them fly). Sam having appendicitis in the midst of a shoot and no one realizing it until late in the evening. And the fact that Tom had it in his contract that he wasn’t going to put on the suit. I’d always thought it was an executive decision for that not to have happened before the very end of the show, but Tom talked about how very early on (Season 2) they started talking about it. He put an end to that as he wanted the show to be about Clark’s journey prior to him being Superman. And once he’s in the suit, that’s really the end of the show.

It was such a good panel, the only bad thing was that Michael Rosenbaum (Lex Luthor) wasn’t going to be there until Saturday… which meant we might need to check it out later in the weekend to see what wackiness he might bring.

At this point we decided to hop over to the Exhibit Hall for the 4 floors of artists, dealers, cosplaying, clothing, comics, and just about anything else you can think of. We made our way through. Learning from 2019, we resolved to go through the entire thing on Friday as we knew it would be our only real chance to do so. Courtney bought some jewelry, a trio of shirts from the folks that make the Unstable Unicorns game. I ended up browsing through hundreds of $5 graphic novels only to end up with a pair of them. And even though I rarely get to play live other than conventions, I bought a new Flash dice bag for the impending Origins Convention. Finally, we bought a nice piece of artwork, a bit of a cutout of Buttercup and Westley from The Princess Bride surrounded by “As You Wish”.

Of course, by the time we’d gone through all of that, it was dinner time and we’d missed the two or three panels in the early afternoon. After dinner, Courtney and I split up… she went off to a Lucifer panel and I went to a pair of writing panels (one on Indy Writer secrets and the other on controversies in writing). The first was interesting, though the biggest thing for me coming out of it was more about using these types of panels as motivation. One of the panelists said something that really stuck out (James A Hunter): your best marketing is your next book. He’d written 35 books in the last 6-7 years with the thought that if you are prolific enough (and are writing decent enough stories) the odds of something hitting are only going to be increased. You take 35 shots and surely something is going to go in.

Now, I doubt with the day job being a necessary thing to put food on the table and a roof over my head I’d ever be able to have that much product in such a short amount of time. But, I also realize that putting out a book every 4 years isn’t going to get me where I want to go either. Sometimes it is hard to see where the road might be on this writing journey. These panels are like little check-ins for my psyche. I know I need to be a bit more diligent with all of it.

We ended our day with a comedy show. We’d done it once before and both really liked dipping our toes into some of the later nightlife which is the biggest part of the con to elude us. A bunch of laughs later, and it was time to head home so that we could go spend the day with family before returning on Sunday.

***

Next week find out what happens when you see the “same” panel twice but with a new panelist.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Bracketology

Image by Jeff Jacobs from Pixabay

Little teams facing off against Goliaths. The blue bloods going against the mid-levels. The unknowns hitting their last-second shot. The upsets.

That’s exactly what indy comics feels like.

It feels like you are the unknown quantity and you know that you just need one chance in order to prove that you belong. But the thing is, during the regular season those big dogs never want anything to do with you. They don’t want to schedule games against you. Heck, they wouldn’t know where to go if they did. So you have to struggle and scratch and claw alongside others of your ilk. You’ve got to put in the work the same as if you were playing in the big arenas across the country.

You’ve got to create for yourself because no one else in the big leagues is going to be of much help to you.

Those dark hours you spend in front of the computer, all those loose scraps of paper with little bits of genius on them, the whiteboard where you’ve mapped 60 issues of your storyline out, and everything else you do to keep those ideas alive. Trying your best to wrap your head around the plots and put them in a coherent format so that an artist can bring your vision to life. The Fear has to take a back seat during those moments when you are creating.

 

But in the tournament it’s different. You finally get your chance to show off your skills and your stories to an even bigger audience. They can’t ignore you completely anymore. They can’t outright dismiss you, even if they would like to.

But here’s where the analogy fails. You see, while those little schools are all competing for the handful of slots just to get on the big stage, it doesn’t have to be like that for the independents. We don’t have to be competition for each other. Instead, we can be another ship in the fleet, raising the sails of anyone and everyone we can.

Hopefully, as the world begins to return to something that might resemble “normal” (though that word feels like it will always have an asterisk beside it, much like we say pre-911, I see us saying pre-Covid19), we’re going to start venturing out to the comic book conventions. You’re going to walk down those aisles where the big creators are, and that’s great. I love doing that as well, but I would say that maybe, just maybe, you take a venture down to where the indy creators are. Take your time down there. Those guys and gals have poured their free time into those books. Each one might not appeal to you, but I’m willing to bet that there are a few in there which will feel like they were made just for you.

This might be the closest thing to the Big Dance many of us are ever going to get to (and that’s ok). Not everyone is trying to work at Marvel or DC. Many creators just want to be able to put their vision of the world out there in some form or fashion. They are hoping that a handful (well, maybe more than a handful) of people are going to give them a chance. That they are going to stop and look. Pick up a comic and flip through it. To have those conversations where you can hear the excitement in their voice while they pitch you their stories.

It’s not always about the big splashy moments. Sometimes it can be about the little ones. A reader and a creator connecting with their mutual love of the form.

***

John McGuire is the writer of the sci-fi novel: The Echo Effect.

He is also the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Click here to join John’s mailing list and receive preview chapters of upcoming novels, behind the scenes looks at new comics, and free short stories.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow Empire, Tales from Vigilante City, Beyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

Press Release: Announcing the Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Convention

Announcing the Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Convention
Join a completely digital tabletop gaming convention from Onyx Path Publishing, taking place June 12-14, 2020.
June 1, 2020 – Onyx Path Publishing is holding its very first convention over the course of three days to provide fans and players of tabletop roleplaying games with a uniquely online convention experience. Onyx Path Gaming Con will be completely digital and accessible to anyone with a entry level gaming PC,  laptop, computer, or cellphone, allowing fans and players of Onyx Path games to connect with one another over their favorite game.
The convention will feature actual play streams of Onyx Path game lines, workshop sessions for gamemasters and game developers, panels with tabletop RPG industry professionals. Along with behind the scenes updates and developments of upcoming Onyx Path titles. This online content will be accessible across Twitch and YouTube channels owned by Onyx Path Publishing, Gehenna Gaming, and other partners.
A major focus of Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Con will allow attendees to play in virtual tabletop sessions run by professional gamemasters. The goal of this event is to provide Onyx Path customers a uniquely focused gaming convention experience based on the games they enjoy playing and introduce new games to fall in love with. These games include Scarred Lands, Legendlore, They Came from Beneath the Sea!, Scion, and Trinity Continuum. Along with Exalted and many World of Darkness and Chronicles of Darkness games, such as Vampire: The Masquerade, Mage: The Ascension, Hunter: The Vigil, and many more.
Some of the proceeds from the Onyx Path Virtual Gaming Con will go to both Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) as well as The Bodhana Group.
“TMCF distributes 98% of its awards exclusively to HBCUs and PBIs, which is more than any other organization that supports the Black College Community.” Read more about Thurgood Marshall College Fund here: https://www.tmcf.org.
The Bodhana Group is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advocating for “tabletop gaming as a directed therapeutic and clinical practice that can benefit personal growth as well as enhance social and educational services to individuals and families.”
Read more about the Bodhana Group here: https://www.thebodhanagroup.org.
In order to make this convention possible Onyx Path Publishing has partnered up with Gehenna Gaming, a New England-based horror gaming experience company, in an effort to assist in the organization of the event. Gehenna Gaming successfully launched VirtualHorror Con this past April, which was host to over 18K viewers and attendees. This partnership will ensure a successful con enjoyed by Onyx Path Publishing customers and players of tabletop roleplaying games from around the world.
Come walk the Onyx Path with us.
About Onyx Path Publishing:
Founded in 2012, Onyx Path Publishing is a Pennsylvania-based company dedicated to the development of exemplary, immersive worlds. Working with a group of amazingly talented creators, we explore print, electronic and other forms of media distribution to produce games and fiction based on the Scarred Lands, Pugmire, Scion, Trinity, Exalted, World of Darkness and Chronicles of Darkness properties. With over 20 years of publishing experience from which to draw, we are industry professionals who love the art of the game and plan to continue making meaningful, innovative contributions in the years to come.
Twitter:@theonyxpath
About Gehenna Gaming:
Gehenna Gaming is a New England-based company dedicated to providing unique gaming experiences to fans and players of horror-themed tabletop and live-action roleplaying games. Our distinct perspective gives insight into what players are looking for and how to best run traditional horror RPGs. We partner with game designers, distributors, content creators, and industry influencers in order to entertain players, empower brands, and educate fans. While bolstering a positive, supportive, and inclusive environment.
Twitter: @GehennaGaming

PRESS RELEASE: Origins Game Fair Postponed to October; Origins Online Scheduled for June


Origins Game Fair Postponed to October;
Origins Online Scheduled for June

COLUMBUS, OH – April 9, 2020 – The Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA), the non-profit organization serving the hobby games industry, today announced that it will postpone the 46th Annual Origins Game Fair, originally scheduled for June 17-21, 2020 at the Greater Columbus Convention Center, to October 7-11, 2020.  The tabletop convention attracts more than 20,000 attendees from around the world to central Ohio to play thousands of board games, collectible card games, miniatures and role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, Magic: The Gathering, Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, Catan, and hundreds of other titles.

The decision to postpone the convention follows extensive discussions with its membership, the city of Columbus, the Greater Columbus Convention Center, hotel partners, and exhibitors. “The decision to postpone the convention was not one we made lightly,” said GAMA Executive Director, John Stacy. “The safety and well-being of the Origins community is our number one priority. Given the current health situation, we believe that it is best to move the convention to October.”

With the postponement, GAMA also announced that they would be hosting an online gaming convention during the original show weekend, June 19-21, 2020.

Origins Online 2020 will be a fully virtual convention for tabletop gaming fans to enjoy from their devices and will feature an Exhibit Hall where attendees can demo and buy games and merchandise. In addition, the virtual convention will offer streaming workshops and educational seminars with guest authors, artists and game designers, plus hundreds of games online that attendees can sign up to participating in.

“We are all in this together. The postponement of the in-person event and introduction of Origins Online is an opportunity for the hobby games industry and broader gaming community to get excited together and come back stronger on the other side of this pandemic,” Stacy continued.

Details regarding the postponement of Origins Game Fair and Origins Online will be shared soon on the event website.

 

PRESS RELEASE: FLGS Locator & Programs: Support your local game stores!


FLGS Locator

GAMA has created a Friendly Local Game Store (FLGS) locator to help people find stores nearby.

During these changing times, stores have begun offering alternate shopping experiences such as curbside pick-up or local delivery for purchased items. Some stores are also offering gift cards as another outlet for customer support.

This locator, with more than 800 stores, highlights these alternative services and connects you with those closest to your home. Search for your nearby store(s) and support the gaming community!

Visit flgslocator.org to support stores!

Retailer Support Programs

Many publishers have also developed initiatives to show support for their retail partners. Several of these initiatives trigger with consumer action.

Click the link below to view all of the retailer support programs currently announced (more added constantly). This resource is designed to help you support your local stores, your favorite publishers, and the gaming community in general!

View retailer support programs!

Join the Origins Facebook Group to connect with other attendees and talk about games!

Join the Facebook group!

PRESS RELEASE: Origins Discounted Early Bird pricing ends SUNDAY!

Discounted Early Bird pricing ends THIS SUNDAY!

Buy your badge this week to save more money for the Exhibit Hall and events!

Register your badge now!

Volunteer Shifts Still Available!

We’re always looking for friendly-faces to help around the show. Sign up to…

  • Earn free badges!
  • Expand your friend group!
  • Get a behind-the-scenes look at the gaming industry!

Minimum four hours required, but perks increase as you support the show! By signing up for more shifts, you can earn food vouchers, hotel rooms, parking passes, extra badges, and even generic tickets! Don’t forget about the Volunteer Appreciation Party where we hand out Origins loot, swag, and games to our hard-working volunteer team!

Sign up to volunteer here!
Join the Official Discussion Facebook group to stay connected!
Early Bird badge pricing ends March 1! Buy your badge today!
See you at #Origins2020, June 17-21!
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PRESS RELEASE: Housing Registration Opens Sunday

Gen Con Logo

Housing Registration Opens this Sunday, February 9

If you want to make a housing reservation this Sunday:
  • By Friday Evening: Buy a badge (It doesn’t matter when you buy your badge, as long as it’s before Friday evening).
  • Saturday Morning: We’ll send you an email with your portal access time.
  • Sunday: Log in to the My Housing section of your account about five minutes before your access time and wait for the countdown to complete.
  • When your time comes: Click to access the housing portal. It’s OK to refresh your page if the link doesn’t appear right away, just don’t mash refresh.
  • Once you’re in the housing portal: Select a reservation from the available inventory, and make sure to complete checkout within ten minutes of adding your reservation to your cart.
This Friday at 2 pm (PT), join Kristen and Mike live on Twitch for a special Housing Registration edition of Gen Con News!

They’ll walk through the housing process on screen and answer questions from chat. Can’t watch the stream live? Check back after it ends to watch it on demand on Twitch.

For more details and information about using our housing portal, check out these resources:

Gen Con Returns to Indianapolis
July 30 – August 2, 2020!

Badges Available at gencon.com
Hotel Registration: February 9
Event Registration: May 17

PRESS RELEASE: Volunteer at Origins and get a free badge!

Volunteer at Origins and get a free badge!

Sign up for shifts here!
Origins wouldn’t exist without our team of volunteers – we want you to join that team! The available shifts for Origins 2020 have just been published and are ready for you to schedule your time.
Why should I volunteer?
Volunteering is a great way to make new friends, learn more about the show, and get a few extra perks to make your trip to Columbus easier.What are these perks you speak of?
For each 4-hour shift you volunteer for, you bump up one perk level. See the full chart below for an overview of all the possibilities.
What is a Volunteer Lead and how do I become one?
Leads are volunteers that have worked with us in the past and have demonstrated exceptional leadership skills. They are in charge of specific areas at the show, including fielding attendee questions and managing their volunteer teams. If you are an Origins volunteer fitting this criteria and are interested in becoming a Lead, please email Jim Godin (Meetings Manager) at jim.godin@gama.org.
What happens at the Volunteer Appreciation Party?
To celebrate all the hard work our volunteers have put in to make the show a success, we host a party with food and cash bar, recognize outstanding volunteers, and distribute games provided by sponsoring companies.How do I sign up for a shift?
Simply go to originsgamefair.com/volunteer, click on a location you’re interested in, and create an account to reserve your spot. If an area is fully staffed, you can sign up for the Waitlist to be notified if/when a shift opens up.

ORIGINS FACEBOOK GROUP

Origins Volunteer Group – for anyone currently or interested in volunteering at the show! Join here »

See you at #Origins2020, June 17-21!
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Press Release: Free League Launching the Official ALIEN RPG at PAX Unplugged and Dragonmeet

Free League Publishing

Free League Launching the Official ALIEN RPG at PAX Unplugged and Dragonmeet

Free League Publishing – Nov 27, 2019 13:00 GMT

In Philadelphia, no one can hear you scream. On December 6–8, Free League Publishing will be at PAX Unplugged to launch the official ALIEN tabletop roleplaying game. There will also be a limited pre-release at Dragonmeet in London om November 30.

At the Free League booth #3312 at PAX Unplugged, visitors can meet setting writer and sci-fi novelist Andrew E.C. Gaska and game director and rules designer Tomas Härenstam, have them sign their book and ask them anything they want. Just watch out for the xenomorph lurking in the corner…

A week earlier, at Dragonmeet in London on November 30, a limited number of the massive 392-page core rulebook and a host of supplements will be available at the Free League booth in Trade Hall 2. Visitors can also try the game out in the “Grindbone 2183” tournament.

The ALIEN RPG, officially launching on December 10, is a beautifully illustrated full-color hardcover book, both presenting the world of ALIEN in the year 2183 and a fast and effective ruleset designed specifically to enhance the ALIEN experience.

In addition, the full range of Free League’s award-winning tabletop role-playing games – such as retro-fantasy survival Forbidden Lands, the alternate ’80s Tales From the Loop, the space opera adventure Coriolis The Third Horizon, dark fantasy Symbaroum and the post-apocalyptic Mutant: Year Zero – will all be available at the booth at discounted prices at both PAX Unplugged.

Free League Publishing is a Swedish publisher dedicated to speculative fiction. We have published a range of award-winning tabletop role-playing games and critically acclaimed art books set in strange and wondrous worlds.

Our game range include the alternate ’80s Tales from the Loop (winner of five ENnie Awards 2017, including Best Game), sandbox retro fantasy Forbidden Lands (winner of four ENnie Awards 2019), postapocalyptic Mutant: Year Zero (Silver ENnie for Best Rules 2015), space opera Coriolis – The Third Horizon (Judge’s Spotlight Award 2017), dark fantasy Symbaroum, and the official ALIEN RPG.

We have also published the art books Tales from the Loop and Things from the Flood  by visual artist Simon Stålenhag, as well as the illustrated edition of the Lovecraft classic The Call of Cthulhu by French artist François Baranger.

Website: www.freeleaguepublishing.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/FriaLigan
Instagram: http://instagram.com/frialigan/
Youtube: www.youtube.com/c/FrialiganSe
Twitter: http://twitter.com/FriaLigan

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Dragon Con 2019 – Review Part 2

Part one can be found here.

***

When last we left our hero (me), he was suffering from an unknown allergic reaction to Aleve.

Sunday

After a full day of not doing much more than applying cold compresses to my eyes and staying firmly on the couch, I awoke on Sunday nearly 100% back to normal. Which really meant a morning full of deja-vu as we headed downtown to the convention via MARTA again, had to go purchase a Sunday day pass (luckily there was virtually no line again) (though, not sure why we couldn’t go ahead and get a Sunday pass on Friday and save ourselves a trip), and then attempted to get into one of the 10 AM panels. However, unlike Friday and David Tennent’s panel, we were able to make it into the Lucifer panel.

Lucifer is one of those shows that I love the concept. I knew it was a comic, but aside from his appearances in Sandman, I’ve not read any of the issues. Still the idea that the Devil takes a vacation just checks off so many boxes. And the idea of sewing that onto a police procedural with the weekly crimes works fairly well. The panel had D.B. Woodside and Aimee Garcia and the two of them had excellent chemistry up on stage. You always wonder if the cast members actually like each other, but with the two of them, there was no doubt. They had plenty of stories to tell and (since I’m a little behind on the show) only one real spoiler that I caught.

Next up was Zachary Levi’s panel. We managed to snipe that one without needing to wait in an insanely long line (always a risk). Inside the room, I noticed that there was no table or mics set up for him and a moderator. There was really no need as he stood and took questions one after the other. He was funny and had great stories, but also had an underlining message of mental health. He talked about it for himself and then elaborated on it with regard to his mother.

The whole hour might be the best hour I’ve ever seen at Dragon Con, he was that good. Heck, he was good enough that I kinda want to see Shazam (and I am not a fan of that character).

An excursion to the Art Show and Tessera Guild’s own Amanda Makepeace was in booth number 1! If you haven’t checked out her work before or it’s just been a while, go here and let your eyes get a good look at what an extremely talented artist (and better person) can do.

And after the convention was over, I found out she won Best SciFi in the DragonCon 2019 art show for “Saturn’s Twilight.” (her 3rd year in a row!)

Saturn’s Twilight by Amanda Makepeace

With every Dragon Con comes the big panel… the one I crawled out of bed for: the Venture Bros Panel!

Given that we are in-between seasons. And given that seasons take 2 years to come out, I wasn’t sure what this one would bring. I knew the two creators wouldn’t be there, but I also knew the voice actors can be extremely amusing. And that was definitely the case as they answered question after question from the fans. Then, with about 20 minutes left, they got Doc Hammer on Skype, and he had a puppet of Dr. Mrs. The Monarch on his arm. While the connection was spotty for most of it, it was a real treat to have him there virtually. Hopefully, they can all come out next year and really show out.

With all the fun and games mostly done, it was time to journey back to the Dealers’ Room again. On Friday we’d seen 3 of the 4 floors, so it was a moral imperative to venture up to the last floor )(comics and pop-culture). Yet, that pesky line was an issue again, save this time it wrapped around part of the America’s Mart Building 1 and then 3/4 of Building 2. The whole process was about 25 minutes (faster than I would have thought). Considering those early Dragon Cons I went to had a strong presence, it’s just good to see the comics being embraced again after so many years of not being cared about.

After hurrying through that last piece, we had one last panel on Webcomics to go and watch. Robert Jeffrey (Route 3 and many things on this site) and Tony Cade (Editor-in-Chief of Terminus Media) were both on the panel, so I figured it was a good idea to be supportive! After listening to the questions by the audience, I think that the biggest take-away from that panel or really any writing/art panel is that you just have to sit down and start doing your thing. And then, at some point, you need to finish that thing and put it out there for people to see and read. So many people have these half done or barely started projects (me included) that really just need to get completed.

Dinner with Robert followed as we talked about comics and the convention. Normally, that ride/drive back home is a bit more melancholy as I reflect upon another year in the books. This ride home was more of a celebration of the con, the projects Robert and I have worked on (and are currently working on). It made the ride pass far too quickly.

Just like the convention itself.

***

John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Dragon Con 2019 – Review Part 1

This was a slightly different Dragon Con Experience. Normally we have a 4-day pass (although, Thursday is now a hopping place and people are really getting things going on Wednesday. Soon it will just be a whole week of debauchery!). This year we didn’t have the 4-day and made the executive decision to buy a Friday and a Sunday pass (and go ahead and pre-purchase the 4-day for 2020). This means we are going to need to cram 4 days into 2 days.

As it turned out, this was probably the best decision we could have made… but more on that below.

FRIDAY

One of the nice things about doing the day passes was that there was nearly no line on either Friday morning (around 9 AM) or Sunday (9 AM as well). Maybe it got busier as the day progressed, but it did seem off that the day-of line would be so little, but the pre-purchased might have a longer line (or at least it did on Thursday for some people).

I normally go through the schedule and pick about 3 to 4 panels to go to every hour. This way if something has too long of a line or they cut the line off we have a back-up plan (and sometimes a back-up to that back-up). It also comes in handy on Sunday when your legs don’t want to do much more walking and the next panel is 4 hotels away:

“Hmmm… what’s happening in THIS hotel?”

I’d went through the schedule and found a handful of things on both days. There wasn’t so much Courtney “centric” things that she saw, but since we both watch most of the same things, it works out. First thing, we tried for the David Tennent line. Now, while I have watched Doctor Who, I have not really seen his Doctor (yes, I understand this is blasphemy… hey, Netflix removed them just as I was starting to watch). We were in line about 30+ minutes and was told the room was full.

Great way to start the day off!

This actually threw off our plans since we were going to do that and then head over to be one of the first for the Dealer’s room, but this meant we had an extra hour to kill. So kill it dead, we did by hanging out in the gaming room, grabbing food, and then having to walk around America’s Mart in order to get into the Dealer’s area.

Image by Emilie Farris from Pixabay

They were on 4 floors this year (2 years ago they were on 3). They had the comics/pop art on the 4th floor and I’ll give them credit when you actually support the funny books, you can get a nice turn-out. Roy Thomas, Marv Wolfman, Demattis were there (to name a few). The only companies were Aftershock and Scout (I think that’s right), but I was impressed considering it wasn’t so long ago they were in the closet.

It took us about 45 minutes per floor. They had the usual stuff. Not much in the board games, which I’ve seen CMON there in the past and I don’t think they had a booth. A couple of 1/2 trades places. A couple of older comic book dealers, and then some guy who had “grab bags” of comics. Look, I don’t understand the Mystery Box thing, but do your thing, right? So Court saw the booth and asked if I wanted to take a look and I said, it’s grab bags, I’m good. And the owner is right there and does the whole “No, they’re great. Guaranteed a variant cover, blah, blah, blah.”

Yeah, I’m good. I don’t need random variant cover for a funny book I didn’t want in the first place. I’m sure it’s great. It’s just not for me.

Courtney managed to find a bunch of decals related to Veronica Mars, Gilmore Girls, and Firefly that she got for her car. I didn’t buy anything… nothing grabbed me hard enough. Plus, I was counting on some additional time on Sunday (mistake!) to potentially find some comics.

We had a panel at 4 or 4:30 on Indy comics. You know, one of those panels where I’m hoping to glean some additional knowledge from the panelists on steps to take or just some general tips. And while there were some good ones, it was a little disheartening to hear from more than one of them that the best way to get an Indy book is to work for Marvel and DC first.

Blink… blink…

That’s not all they said, but it was kind of funny that a couple of them agreed that’s how they got into the correct position to do an Indy comic.

Then we went to an Arrow/Legends panel where only Paul Blackthorne was there (even though 2 others were on the list). They never made any mention of it. I liked him in Arrow. I really liked him in Dresden Files. But it was just odd that it was only him.

However, this is when the strangeness happened:

I learned something un-Con related this year: I’m suddenly allergic to Aleve. During the Indy comic panel, I took some and within an hour my face looked like Sloth from Goonies.

Aleve is something that I started taking for aches and pains and headaches for about 10 years now. When we were playing a ton of softball maybe 5 years ago, I was taking it every other day some weeks. Never had a problem. About 2 or 3 months ago, I had my lip swell up. This is something that I sometimes get over the years (Courtney does not believe this even after I’ve explained that it was only enough swelling that I noticed, no one else really would). The swelling would happen, and in a couple of hours, it would go back down. Mostly, I never thought anything of it. Occasionally, I would think “I wonder if I ate something I’m allergic to” but then forget about it. Anyway, I had an episode where the swelling was enough for Court to see. So I recorded everything I ate that day (I didn’t think about the Aleve). Maybe a month later, it happened again, but none of the same foods, and I didn’t think about the Aleve. During Gen Con I actually took Aleve at least once, but I don’t remember having a swollen lip.

Anyway, about 3 weeks ago, I had a reaction where my eye swelled up and it was in the back of my mind suddenly. Then I took some at DCon, on an empty stomach… and yeah, my Friday night and Saturday was pretty much me on the couch with a cold compress on my eyes, waiting for the swelling to go down. I talked with my mom (a nurse) because I wasn’t sure if this was something I needed to go to an Urgent Care or whatever, but she said that as long as I saw it getting better over the course of Saturday, I was good.

This happened about 6:30 and we got some Benadryl from one of the hotel stores and then headed home. Fun stuff. Being allergic to Aleve means I’m pretty much allergic to Asprin and Ibuprophen products, so it is Tylenol for me only now.

Just weird how it has occurred over the last couple of months, during a time when I haven’t been taken pain killers all that often.

***

Next week we can find out if the swelling did go back down, or if I just embraced my new “swollen” look!

***

John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

Dragon Con – Everything Pop Culture

My wife heard an advertisement on the radio today about Dragon Con which said that its focus is “Everything Pop Culture”.

I guess that is true. Or maybe, that’s become true.

There are a few ways to look at it. I immediately jumped to the idea that Dragon Con has grown (for better or worse) into this Convention Behemoth. In my previous Dragon Con reviews, I’ve mentioned that I’ve been going for probably 25 years at this point. I’ve watched it twist and change and contort itself over that amount of time. And really, it doesn’t share those old focuses anymore. Whether it is the idea of not supporting comic books for the better part of a decade (at least) to the point that the amount of “artist alley” folks could fit into what really was a glorified closet… or whether it is pushing some of the roleplaying related things out as well (tons of companies used to be there). Those things were traded over time to focus on other things. Things that were still very much “nerd culture”, just in the form of cartoons and tv shows (think Xena and Battlestar Galactica) and movies that only those of us there had ever really heard of (Firefly, Dresden Files). Even embracing the costuming/cosplay people with open arms, giving them a place to fly their own geek flags.

It’s all been about changing from what it was way back then.

And don’t miss the mark- this isn’t one of those things where the old man goes off on how things were “better in my day”. Do I miss some of that stuff? Yeah, sure, but I don’t dislike what it has become either. The fact that it is now showcasing things which are considered “Pop Culture” and it isn’t said in a derogatory fashion. It’s crazy.

Courtney, upon hearing this, took it to mean exactly that. Being able to go and see the actors from your favorite shows/movies, but still having the ability to showcase some of the “other” stuff in there as well. She would have never enjoyed that mid-90s version of Dragon Con. She likes the stars and the panels where they talk to us about their current projects and what might be coming down the line.

And that’s great.

I also love that authors are beyond welcome at Dragon Con. That many of them make it a specific point to venture down to Atlanta for the show. I can’t count the number of panels with novelists and RPG creators I’ve sat in on trying to glean some pieces of insight. That’s not an opportunity every convention can offer.

Or what about that lost decade for comic books and related panels? With the Marvel movies setting records over and over, the comic books have been let back into play with everyone else. They now have a whole floor at the Apparel Mart where the artists can show their wares.

Really, what it gets back to is this idea that everything doesn’t have to be for you (me in this case) to enjoy it. But to have things you do enjoy being embraced by this convention in any fashion only will create more possibilities in the future. One of my co-workers sees the convention entirely differently than I do. He and his girlfriend don’t really get going until the late afternoon. They are there for the concerts and the late-night festivities. I wouldn’t know what any of that even is.

And that’s the beauty of Dragon Con.

***

John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Gen Con 2019 Recap – Part Two

To read Part One, click here.

***

When we last heard from our heroes, they’d gone from the highest highs to back to back not-so-much-fun games. We had a couple of hours to kill after the last game, which of course meant another visit to the Dealer’s Room… which really meant trying to remember where we’d left off the day before so that we could ensure seeing all that we could. Personally, I wasn’t really looking for anything, in particular, this year. The last two times I’d ended up buying a game the last day we were there (and haven’t played either), so while there were a ton of games I might have liked to scoop up, I managed a bit of self-discipline (at least for now). After dinner and a stop by the room, we ventured into the realms of Space and Horror.

Alien

Alien was the best game I played at the convention. Hands down. It is still in the final stages of the playtest, and the adventure was a part of that (I’m pretty sure that’s right). When we showed up, the two Game Masters ended up taking 5 players each and running the session for us. In an odd twist, Egg and Lee played under one GM and I played under another… which, I wasn’t sure how that was going to work out since part of the reason we go to these things is the “shared” experience. Still, we pressed on.

One of the cool things is this is another of the games from Free League Publishing and uses the Year Zero Engine (a d6 system). Having played Tales from the Loop at my first Gen Con as well as playing in a few sessions of Mutant Year Zero, it was pretty comfortable. This was supposed to go from 10 to midnight, though the GM warned us it could go a little over. It went until about 1:30 (the other GM finished up maybe 10 minutes before my group).

The slow burn of the game was very apparent. The players knew that they were in for it, but our characters were clueless. One interesting thing we had on our character sheets were “secret” motivations. It could be that you are really a Synth or you are a spy or you are out for revenge. Mine was to ensure that word of what was happening on the planet (you know, with the aliens running around killing all the humans they can) never get out. After a long adventure, I was forced to leave my commander behind and escaped the planet as the only survivor.

After the game, we stayed up waaaay too late and talked about the Alien movies and Lee started laying out his idea for an actual campaign (which I’m very much looking forward to playing).

Day 3

Geist 2E

Last year we signed up for a Geist game, got confused, and then ended up playing a 2-hour demo rather than the actual full session. Not falling for that again, we made it to our real session at 10 AM. If Alien was my favorite game, Geist has me as my favorite setting from the convention. Playing someone who nearly died, you end up making a deal to fuse with a Ghost. This provides you with some supernatural abilities, a way to observe the Underworld, and a voice in your head from time to time. Now your job is to help those ghosts who cannot move on.

The setting reminds me of Angel, Dresden Files, and The Frighteners (especially the Frighteners). As we were playing the session (where an acquaintance of our characters had been falsely executed for a series of murders he did not commit), I couldn’t help but write down ideas for a potential game. Later that night, I pulled out my notebook and filled 3 pages with various bits and pieces and questions for myself. I’d love to build a campaign for the world (heck, I’d love to write books in the world!).

Dragon Age

I’m a big fan of the video games, and while we’d played one session with the rules, I was interested in seeing how things played out when you were with others who really knew the system. This was a session with level 16 characters (I believe that is correct), which was cool since I don’t normally play in campaigns that last until those power levels (normally the story is over around level 10ish). The one hiccup is that when you have the more powerful folk, it means you have more options… so there is a little bit of a learning curve.

Regardless, the GM was full of energy (even if she did occasionally lose her train of thought – then again, it was Saturday evening at Gen Con, we were all losing our trains of thought). She ran a great session, did a great job of laying out the scenes. And was obviously a big fan of the video games (and the written material of the world). To top it off, the other player running around with us was a writer for the “Faces of Thedas” supplement – Jamie Wood.

 

We had another gaming session scheduled for 8 to midnight, but we made an executive decision to bail on the game. It isn’t something we like doing, but we were completely worn out from the late-night sessions going over… and we had the handy excuse that Dedren Snead (who is a comic book writer/creator of Sorghum and Spear as well as about 50 other projects – he makes me feel very lazy) had found us and was experiencing his first GenCon, so we grabbed dinner and walked around for a bit, soaking up that last night.

Day 4

A final trip to the Dealer’s Room had us run into Danny O’Neill (of Hammerdog Games). Danny had run a Call of Cthulu game for us at my first Gen Con and we’d been friends ever since. He was on a mission to secure artists for his next project, so we followed him around for a bit, gleaning what we could, and seeing the world through his eyes for a bit.

The last trip through the room is always a bit sad. You know it is only a small amount of time before you’ll be back on the road and then back to your normal lives. And so, in keeping with tradition, I did end up buying a game on Sunday: Shipwreck Arcana. It is a cooperative logic and math-based card game that I bought mostly on a whim after watching about 2 minutes of a demo. The artwork is very cool, and, in the days since the convention, I can actually say I’ve played about 5 or 6 games with Courtney and we really like the game!

***

Another year of way too much laughter and fun (well, you can never have too much). I’m still glad that Egg and Lee convinced me to start going to this convention. Makes me wonder what possibilities we missed all those other years!

***

John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

Gen Con 2019 Recap – Part One

For a third year, I managed to make the pilgrimage up north to the great state of Indiana and another installment of how many hours of sleep does a person truly need.

Also known as Gen Con 2019!

This year we stayed at the Westin, which was amazing as we were directly across the street from the Convention Center. It meant we could sleep in another 10 minutes or so, and when it came time to walk back to the hotel, it wasn’t a 15-minute walk, but more like a 5 minute one.

Day 1

Heroic Dark

Thursday began with a 10 AM game of Heroic Dark, which was developed by the same guy who did the Sythicide game (of which I ran a short campaign of around 10 to 12 sessions last year). Heroic Dark comes with an interesting premise in that the group gathered to play end up coming up with the setting and genre that they are going to play. The Creator mentioned that he’d game mastered a previous game where it ended up being Sailor Moon style girls fighting the big bad. Basically, each person has the opportunity to add something to the game based on some categories laid out before you: Monsters, Magic, Races, etc. So you could end up with anything from a Fantasy world to a world where, due to the development of some wickedly awful technology, humanity is now using demon parts in order to build their mechs. And the Angels have had enough, vowing to terraform the planet in order to start over.

We’d laid out a bunch of thoughts: Demons, zombies, mechs, terraforming, angels, and so on, and that’s where we ended up. Then, the GM had about 10 minutes to come up with some kind of story to run us through. Talk about putting yourself under some pressure. But he managed to bring together an adventure where the spare demon parts were disappearing, and it was up to us to figure out what was happening to them (turns out the Angels were purifying them and then using the now holy parts to fuel their own war machines).

The game is currently available in playtest form, with a Kickstarter likely due next year. You can find the game here!

Mutants and Masterminds

Normally when it comes time to pick the games, I leave it mostly to Egg, as he is the game guru. However, since the very first year, I’d wanted to find a way into a Mutants and Masterminds game. I’d read and heard, over the years, that if you wanted to play a superhero roleplaying game, it was the one to go to. This session ended up being a jaunt back in time to the Golden Age of comic books. A time when the Flash was not Barry Allen or Wally West, but a man named Jay Garick. A time where Superman leaped over buildings rather than fly.

Running as the Justice Society, Superman, Green Lantern, The Flash, Aquaman, Hawkman, and Hawkgirl (yours truly) attempted to save a woman wrongly convicted of murdering her husband… but we only had a handful of hours before she would be sent to the electric chair. Mobsters were rattled, giant robots were battled, a train was stopped from going over the edge of a ravine, and the mastermind foiled!

Using a pre-generated character was interesting, but it also meant there were TONS of stats to navigate through. All three of us liked the game but wondered how easy it would be to pick up if you were starting a new character using the system.

 

It was finally time to sneak over to the Dealers Room, which was just as enormous as it had been in previous years. It always seems like the first time in that room you are just trying to get a foothold on where some things are located. Throughout the weekend, Lee and I managed to make it through the whole thing probably twice, which is our best run at it so far.

After dinner, we ventured over to Lucas Oil Stadium to play on the field.

Amber

I kid Egg about diceless games, saying that they are Communist. Mostly I prefer games with dice… then again, I don’t have the horrible luck he does (seriously, it is odds defying). Amber is one of those diceless games that’s been around for decades, but none of us had ever played. Based on a series of novels I learned a few things about the game.

First, the people who are into Amber, are REALLY into Amber. Think of your favorite series of books (probably Game of Thrones or Dark Tower for me) and then multiply that love you feel for them by a hundred… and you’d still be short. They know everything about the world… everything…

Which can make it a little bit to penetrate such a thick history. The story seemed to trump everything throughout this session, which I’m not sure if that is how most Amber games go, or just more of a GM preference. I must admit that this one didn’t work for me. In addition, it ran over by 2 1/2 hours, so we didn’t get done until 2:30 in the morning, which threw off our schedules a bit for the remainder of the weekend (that lack of sleep starts here).

 

Day 2

Song of Ice and Fire

Sleeping as late as we could, our next game was to see the Song of Ice and Fire game system. However, when we arrived we realized that this game wasn’t exactly what we thought it would be when we selected it. Using the roleplaying game’s rules as a base, it was really a LARP (Live Action Roleplaying) which meant that you moved around the room and interacted with other players while a Jousting tournament was going on.

I just wasn’t in the right mindset for this one. Maybe it was the experience from the night before or just not getting locked in with my character, but I wasn’t feeling it. The session was interesting enough though, and some of the moves people did during the game turned out to be very interesting. The final recap at the very end opened my eyes to some of the possibilities I might have been able to explore had I been a little more engaged.

***

That’s the end of Part 1, next week I’ll finish up Day 2 and reveal the best game I played all weekend (by the same company as a Best game of Gen Con from a couple of years ago!).

***

John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

On the Road Again

This weekend is one of the largest gaming conventions, Gen Con, takes place in Indianapolis, Indiana. Along with Egg Embry and Leland Beauchamp, it will be my 3rd year of playing way too many games, walking all over downtown Indy, and trying our best to get a couple of winks of sleep in there as well.

I never know what is going to happen. I have a couple of predictions though:

If Lil’ Egg Embry has to miss a gaming session, it will either be the “Best Game of the Weekend” or at least feature “Some Cool Mechanic that we need in our games!”.

We will be cramming our faces with food because we don’t know how to schedule a true “break”.

We’ll all be very sad and tired on Sunday to leave…

Since I’m in the process of packing tonight, one of the things that this blog has provided is to help remind me of the moments that might get lost in the maze of my mind:

Gen Con 2017 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

The Best Game I Played at Gen Con – Tales from the Loop

Gen Con 2018 Reviews – Part 1 and 2

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John McGuire is the creator/author of the steampunk comic The Gilded Age. The Trade paperback collecting the first 4 issues is finally back from the printers! If you would like to purchase a copy, go here!

Want to read the first issue for free? Click here! Already read it and eager for more?

Click here to join John’s mailing list.

His other prose appears in The Dark That Follows, Hollow EmpireBeyond the Gate, and Machina Obscurum – A Collection of Small Shadows.

He can also be found at www.johnrmcguire.com

 

PRESS RELEASE: Crafty Games: Gen Con 2019 Special Edition

Gen Con 2019 Special Edition

We interrupt our usual broadcasts to bring you news of the Best Four Days in Gaming!

Crafty Games will once again be making the annual pilgrimage to Indianapolis, and this time we’re bringing so much great stuff with us! There’s a lot to cover for this show. Here are the highlights…

New Booth Location

We are no longer in the Studio 2 block. This is our first year in Gen Pop. You can find us in Booth 2439, near the Family Fun Pavilion.

Mistborn Metal Dice

We are so excited to finally announce our next big Mistborn product…

This luxurious set includes 20 all-metal dice, each featuring a different Allomantic symbol on the 6 face PLUS a unique metal plating and finish hand-picked to represent a magic metal from the Mistborn universe. 

Down to the smallest detail, these dice are designed to be the crown jewels of your collection. We’ve worked for months with the master metal workers over at Die Hard Dice to ensure they absolutely dazzle on your gaming table.

Come by our booth and see the dice for yourself! Near-final production proofs of all 20 dice will be on display all weekend, along with a custom Mistborn dice tray we’ll be offering in the upcoming Kickstarter campaign!

Storm Hollow

Just as exciting for us: we have acquired the rights to the wildly popular roleplaying game…

Created by Escapade Games and originally Kickstarted in 2012, Storm Hollow isn’t just ENnie-nominated. It isn’t just one of the finest coming of age roleplaying games we’ve ever seen. It’s one of the finest all ages family RPGs we’ve ever seen, full stop. We can’t be happier to bring it into the Crafty Games family alongside our best-selling kids’ title, Little Wizards.

Our acquisition of Storm Hollow came with a very limited supply of the existing edition of the game – a title that’s been out of print and unavailable for some time. We’re bringing a very small quantity of the game with us to Gen Con, and the rest of this short supply is available through our webstore right now. 

Simply click on any of these images to go straight to the product page!

This isn’t the end of the story, either. We’re currently working with Escapade Games and members of their original creative team to bring an all-new edition of the game to game stores everywhere! Once again, watch this space for news as we approach this exciting relaunch of one of the most deserving games out there.

The Siege of Luthadel

We’ve been busy with the continuation of Mistborn: House War as well! Just this week we released a backer-only print and play version of the expansion, The Siege of Luthadel, and we will have full, gorgeous demo copies of it with us at Gen Con!

Yup. Vin and the Koloss are joining the party, too! Hope you can make it.

Mistborn: House War Promo Card

What’s that now? Free stuff? Yes indeed. Swing by the booth for a demo of anything and get a copy of this upstart miscreant to spice up your copy of Mistborn: House War!

Visit the Crafty Games Lab

Want a glimpse even further ahead for Crafty Games? Stop by our Lab where Alex Flagg will be testing new games we have in development. This is your chance to get directly involved in the development process. Pick the brain of one of gaming’s greatest luminaries! Lord it over your friends that you got to play their favorite game months or years early! Or just hang out with us and talk shop over a diamond in the rough for half an hour. We not picky about your motives, so long as we’re all having fun. 😃

Complete Your Collection!

Crafty Games will have its full current catalog for sale in the exhibit hall as well. Stop by for special show discounts on nearly everything, from Little Wizards Second Printing to the Mistborn Adventure Game to Mistborn: House War and more! We’ll even have the Mistborn novels there, one of which is signed by Brandon Sanderson!

Where to Find Us

Anytime you need a Crafty fix, you can find us at…

…and at retail stores worldwide!

How to Reach Us

Have a question? Missing a game component? Need a digital high-five? We got your back…

Thanks for subscribing, and for reading! We hope we’ll see you at the Best Four Days in Gaming!

Stay Crafty!


Alex, Ed, & Pat
Crafty Games

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