Gen Con 2010

So I went! I had a great time. Contrary to original plan, I didn't actually do any Games On Demand. (Slept too late for the 10 AM session both days. Got there 20 minutes late for the 2PM one once, and nothing was open; people weren't obviously playing games I was super interested in. So I didn't end up making it the next day, since I really wanted to be in the dealer room that afternoon.) Did play Apocalypse D&D / Dungeon World with Sage, who's working on extending it from Tony's work. Rocking good fun. Drew one of the characters. By my own standards for my work, the drawing was kind of mediocre, but everybody acted like it was Picasso, which was a great reminder that evaluation of artwork is relative. (No worries about a swelled head -- I was surrounded by incredible art all over Gen Con.)

Met cool people like Sage, Shannon, Paul, and Daniel, who I played that game with. Got to talk a bit with folks like John Harper, Matt Wilson, Matt Snyder, Ron Edwards, and at least briefly talk to other cool people like Vincent, Nathan Paoletta, Keith Senkowski, Luke, Thor, and Alexander of Burning Wheel, Emily Care, and probably a few others I can't remember. I'm grateful to know such a great bunch of people, even through the internet and the occasional con sighting.

I had a lot of fun with my posse -- we had a smaller group than usual, and it was just me and 4 other guys in the room, all of whom are awesome folks. Had a great time on the ride down talking to Robb and braving storms, walking around with Jason, Greg, Dave, and sometimes getting to see Pat, Pat, Mike, Mike, and other less plural folks. Saturday night at Buca di Beppo's was great -- we ordered less than usual, spent less than usual, but were at least as satisfied as ever. I think substituting individual long island iced teas for those who partake, instead of bottle after bottle of chianti for everyone, probably helped. Driving back with Greg and Dave was great. Dave had a series of 200+ gigapan-style photos from New York that I helped stitch together over the weekend. I took a few pictures at Gen Con myself, not a ton. Left my camera in my room on Saturday, which is costume day -- bit of a bummer. Oh, highlight of the con -- we had a kitchenette in our room, and Robb made some delicious breakfast skillet mix stuff the first morning. There were complaints about the bacon smell lingering in the room, but for the record, I did not mind one bit.

We roomed at Staybridge Suites, which is a number of blocks from the convention center, and inbetween the two is the Factory That Apparently Only Manufactures Sparks.

I bought the following hotness, which is a fraction of what cool things were available but was enough for now --

• Apocalypse World. I was legally required to buy this because I attended Gen Con 2010 and like indie RPGs. There was no way around it.
• Magic Burner. Adventure Burner would have been even better, but it sold out before I could get to it.
• Mechaton. I have kids, why don't I own Mechaton?
• Poison'd! Why not? It's cheap and I didn't buy it last year.
• A copy of the blue-cover Holmes Basic D&D rulebook, which is the first one I ever played with.
• An AD&D DM's Screen, with the beautiful artwork from Dave Trampier on it.
  
• A copy of Monsters! Monsters! which Flying Buffalo/Blade just reprinted, and which I've wanted for ages.
• An old copy of The Space Gamer with lots of info about Tékumel, and an interview with M.A.R. Barker.
• Some more Gamescience dice, some more Death Dice from Flying Buffalo, and some extra dice bags.

That's all I can think of right now. There's a lot more I'd have loved to do, but I enjoyed it all. What a great trip.