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I'm going to lead by reposting from FB the real highlight of my weekend, the bit that had me bouncing off walls for a while afterwards.
~~~
So Saturday afternoon I ran my Pacific Rim game - full 6 players, all first-time tabletop gamers plus one of their friends who just watched. I was told by the people at the sign up desk that there had been a lot more interest over the day (possibly because I'd gone a little over top with supporting material next to the sign-up sheets ie photo-quality posters of the jaegers and an example of the character sheet) so I opened it up again for Sunday.
On Sunday two of the players from Saturday and their friend who had watched signed up to play it again and bought two other friends with them (again one just watched and offered commentary). This was a bit awkward - but I changed out kaiju so they weren't fighting familiar opponents.
The best part is they told me they enjoyed my game so much that not only did they sign up to replay it today they torrented the rulebook overnight and were planning to run a campaign of their own. I fully expect to see them at SAGA sometime soon.
As a GM (and (recovering honest) gamer evangelist) I feel this is the big score. Like hitting level 10, or going Epic. [insert simile from your preferred system here]. It's an amazing feeling.
[Aside: a more analytical part of my brain is noting that while I am pleased, I am not pleased with myself per se. I also like this, it suggests I'm not getting to big for my boots as a result.]
Other cool stuff particularly from the second game (because I can just copy-paste)
Game one had its share of moments as well - sooo many crit-fails on both sides .... but that's enough of that.
Saturday morning I was feeling rather disconnected from the world but still managed to get to SanCon by 9 - ahead of the organisers. As it turned out there was a shortage of volunteers to help out with setup so I rapidly found myself back in (one of) my element - running (literally in some cases complete with one very undignified tumble) around making myself useful, answering questions from people who were a bit lost and generally Getting Things Done. This all left me feeling much better.
Once things reached a state of equilibrium I was able to break off and take some photos. The event was rather less attended than previous years (down by about 50%); a combination of poor weather and organisational fail* so one thing I did was take photos of all the market stalls and spam them up to the Facebook event.
* I have some fairly strong opinions about the reasons for the breakdown this year based on patterns I've observed repeatedly through years of running and attending events - but they're the sort of thing which is difficult to express without individuals who may simply have been in a particular position this time feeling that they personally are being criticised. So I'm not going to go into more details in this post.
Then it was time to run my game - already covered that :) My efforts in the morning earnt me dinner (and a free SanCon Crew t-(red)shirt this morning), and I was unexpectedly called on to provide an accessory for the Fashion show. (Which ran well, photos tomorrow hopefully). Was home and in bed in good time.
What I didn't manage was to play any board games except for a very brief King of Tokyo (first-to-die) snatched around dinnertime.
~~~
Sunday (this) morning I had an unwelcome 6:20am wake-up call Antonio Hall alarm which (as only available responder) I was going to ignore but it was followed 5 minute later by another alarm indicating whoever it was was moving towards the siren rather than away from it ... hauled myself out of bed and over there to find the usually bolted door wide open but no other signs of disturbance, headed around back and found clear signs that someone had been in and had a hunt through the kitchen during the night, went down to check the back gate and happened upon a young couple curled up together in the dorm porch.
They denied having been in the building at all but said they'd heard what they thought was a car alarm (I'm about 85% certain they were being truthful). Chatted with them for a bit answering questions about the Hall until she obviously decided they weren't going to get their privacy back and they left.
Cut down the side alley and watched as they made their way fairly slowly down the driveway, arms around and a number of cuddle stops.
Made the best of things by cooking porridge+apple for breakfast, printed off some material Q needed for his game and arrived at Sancon only a little late. Managed to spend more time in the board gaming room today - which is to say a 7-player game of 7 Wonders with all-expansion boards this morning (respectable but lowest score) and a quick playtest of a friend-of-a-friend's card game later in the afternoon plus dead-time at various points.
I had been planning to stock up on birthday/Xmas presents at the market one or both days but didn't see anything which really stood out as suiting anyone I was thinking of. Picked up a little something for a someone on a whim.
Instead I bought several scoops of chips with my burger lunch and distributed them to sundry grateful con-goers.
Took photos at the cosplay, didn't take photos at the overall prize giving, and left about the time the quiz was starting. I've had a raspy throat and bit of a chesty cough all day, pretty sure I'm coming down with something and forsee working from home and maybe even a sick-day in the week ahead.
Overall for me a good weekend. For some others; not so much. Better luck next year.
~~~
So Saturday afternoon I ran my Pacific Rim game - full 6 players, all first-time tabletop gamers plus one of their friends who just watched. I was told by the people at the sign up desk that there had been a lot more interest over the day (possibly because I'd gone a little over top with supporting material next to the sign-up sheets ie photo-quality posters of the jaegers and an example of the character sheet) so I opened it up again for Sunday.
On Sunday two of the players from Saturday and their friend who had watched signed up to play it again and bought two other friends with them (again one just watched and offered commentary). This was a bit awkward - but I changed out kaiju so they weren't fighting familiar opponents.
The best part is they told me they enjoyed my game so much that not only did they sign up to replay it today they torrented the rulebook overnight and were planning to run a campaign of their own. I fully expect to see them at SAGA sometime soon.
As a GM (and (recovering honest) gamer evangelist) I feel this is the big score. Like hitting level 10, or going Epic. [insert simile from your preferred system here]. It's an amazing feeling.
[Aside: a more analytical part of my brain is noting that while I am pleased, I am not pleased with myself per se. I also like this, it suggests I'm not getting to big for my boots as a result.]
Other cool stuff particularly from the second game (because I can just copy-paste)
Other notes from todays game - kaiju #1 wound up basically glued around Valiant Prince's shield and carried to containment, but kaiju #2 managed a x4 crit and cut Demon Wrangler off cleanly at the knees (one pilot fled in the escape capsule before the other had regained consciousness, pissed off pilot #2 then managed to operate the jaeger upper-half single-handedly to grab the escape pod and stuff it back in the launch tube). Kaiju #2 was then systematically carved up by VP and used as a giant flail to beat on kaiju #1 redux who was engaged with Kea Ascendant.
Game one had its share of moments as well - sooo many crit-fails on both sides .... but that's enough of that.
Saturday morning I was feeling rather disconnected from the world but still managed to get to SanCon by 9 - ahead of the organisers. As it turned out there was a shortage of volunteers to help out with setup so I rapidly found myself back in (one of) my element - running (literally in some cases complete with one very undignified tumble) around making myself useful, answering questions from people who were a bit lost and generally Getting Things Done. This all left me feeling much better.
Once things reached a state of equilibrium I was able to break off and take some photos. The event was rather less attended than previous years (down by about 50%); a combination of poor weather and organisational fail* so one thing I did was take photos of all the market stalls and spam them up to the Facebook event.
* I have some fairly strong opinions about the reasons for the breakdown this year based on patterns I've observed repeatedly through years of running and attending events - but they're the sort of thing which is difficult to express without individuals who may simply have been in a particular position this time feeling that they personally are being criticised. So I'm not going to go into more details in this post.
Then it was time to run my game - already covered that :) My efforts in the morning earnt me dinner (and a free SanCon Crew t-(red)shirt this morning), and I was unexpectedly called on to provide an accessory for the Fashion show. (Which ran well, photos tomorrow hopefully). Was home and in bed in good time.
What I didn't manage was to play any board games except for a very brief King of Tokyo (first-to-die) snatched around dinnertime.
~~~
Sunday (this) morning I had an unwelcome 6:20am wake-up call Antonio Hall alarm which (as only available responder) I was going to ignore but it was followed 5 minute later by another alarm indicating whoever it was was moving towards the siren rather than away from it ... hauled myself out of bed and over there to find the usually bolted door wide open but no other signs of disturbance, headed around back and found clear signs that someone had been in and had a hunt through the kitchen during the night, went down to check the back gate and happened upon a young couple curled up together in the dorm porch.
They denied having been in the building at all but said they'd heard what they thought was a car alarm (I'm about 85% certain they were being truthful). Chatted with them for a bit answering questions about the Hall until she obviously decided they weren't going to get their privacy back and they left.
Cut down the side alley and watched as they made their way fairly slowly down the driveway, arms around and a number of cuddle stops.
Made the best of things by cooking porridge+apple for breakfast, printed off some material Q needed for his game and arrived at Sancon only a little late. Managed to spend more time in the board gaming room today - which is to say a 7-player game of 7 Wonders with all-expansion boards this morning (respectable but lowest score) and a quick playtest of a friend-of-a-friend's card game later in the afternoon plus dead-time at various points.
I had been planning to stock up on birthday/Xmas presents at the market one or both days but didn't see anything which really stood out as suiting anyone I was thinking of. Picked up a little something for a someone on a whim.
Instead I bought several scoops of chips with my burger lunch and distributed them to sundry grateful con-goers.
Took photos at the cosplay, didn't take photos at the overall prize giving, and left about the time the quiz was starting. I've had a raspy throat and bit of a chesty cough all day, pretty sure I'm coming down with something and forsee working from home and maybe even a sick-day in the week ahead.
Overall for me a good weekend. For some others; not so much. Better luck next year.
