This time, it’s stuff I did at Gen Con.
Showed up Thursday afternoon. It’s really nice to have Gen Con within a reasonable distance from where I live; much better than when I lived in California. Not losing two days to travel greatly increases the chances that I’ll go back next year. The cab from the airport to the hotel was quick, checkin was easy, etc.
I hit the dealer’s room first. Assume that filled in a lot of the excess time throughout the con, and you’ll be right. Much hellos, hiyas, good to meet you face to face, and so on. The dealer’s room was enormous, but poorly laid out. Upper Deck had a huge chunk of the room, in which they erected some kind of a mini-mountain. Absolutely nobody visited it and they cut off a third of the room, dramatically reducing traffic in that neck of the woods. Ooops.
Thursday night I played Fulminata with a very good group, including the semi-legendary Lisa Padol and Nick Wedig, who I just remembered I recognized from the UA group. In the first big coincidence of the show, Jess Banks (who I’d never met face to face) showed up to take the last slot. As always, the secret to good gaming at Gen Con is to play obscure games; the only people who show up are dedicated. Mike Miller, who wrote Fulminata, GMed an excellent humorous game. I had a blast.
Friday morning I played Buffy with Mike Grasso GMing. The plot was tres cool; 80s girl band crisscrosses the country and fights vampires. Some really nice roleplaying, a good group, and a fun time was had by all. The second big coincidence was sitting down at the Buffy table next to Jeff Wilder.
That was it for formal roleplaying, although I also got into a pickup game of D20 Modern that Mike also ran. Very Shadowrunesque, and amusing as all getout. I ran a drow who was fond of collecting family pictures from the desks of companies he, um, visited. I like quirky characters; what can I say?
I played a ton of Shadowfist. I still suck. My weekend record in tournament games was 1-6.
The recommended Indianapolis bar is the Claddagh. They treated a fairly inebriated group of gamers very well indeed. It takes a strong man not to blink when someone orders a Guinness with a shot of butterscotch schnapps. (I would also be remiss not to mention Nicky Blaine’s if you want a pricy martini bar.) The Alcatraz brewpub was merely OK.
Finally, the White Wolf end of the world party was about what it was. While waiting to get in, I did get a cynical laugh out of the guy behind me who was whining that he shouldn’t have to wait in line because he knew Steve Weick. “Dude, that’s Stewart Weick up there keeping you from getting in; why don’t you complain to him?” No coherent reply ensued.
6 Comments
“It takes a strong man not to blink when someone orders a Guinness with a shot of butterscotch schnapps.”
I’m not strong. I blinked. I was strong enough to keep from covering the inside of my car in vomit, but only barely. That’s… quite a drink.
‘Wieck’.
Hey, he’s allowed to spell his name wrong if he likes.
Guinness and butterscotch schnapps is not as vile as it sounds, but I’m not sure why you’d drink it over pure Guinness.
I was wondering the same thing, only I was wondering why you’d drink it over pure butterscotch schnapps. I figured it wasn’t as vile as it sounds – I don’t think anything could be that vile. Which reminds me, I left some eggs in my car. I should go put those in the fridge.
White Wolf threw an end-of-the-world party? Gah, they truly need to get over themselves. Perhaps they truly should stop manufacturing roleplaying material and start a line of goth fashion instead.
In all fairness, it was the end of their world, rather than implying the world would end now that WoD was going away.
But yeah.