GenCon 2010

From AE229

This is the convention write up, not the games write ups, which may or may not come in future zines.

Tuesday

I packed and Made A Plan: We would wake up at 7:30 am, leave the house by 8:30 am, arrive at Penn Station by 9:30 am, and hopefully the airport by 10:30 am for a 12:30 pm flight.

Wednesday

Josh arrived home at about midnight and made a New Plan. He would go to sleep asap, and I would set the alarm for 4:30 am, allowing us to be slow about waking up, showering, and, in his case, packing.

This worked. It meant that when my suitcase zipper failed messily, I didn't panic, as Josh had decided my suggestion that he pack his smaller suitcase wouldn't work, so he was packing the larger one, but had not bothered to put the smaller one back. I did a quick transfer, and we were on our way.

We arrived at the airport about three hours early, and we had a leisurely breakfast. Julian Lighton went through the security checkpoint about the time we reached the gate. We rested and got rerouted to a nearby gate, as our original aircraft developed mechanical difficulties of some kind.

I did not love the chokepoint security checkpoint. The space was bad and delayed things, and I'm a minor claustrophobe. I was amused at the latest TSA sign that stated that the TSA did not endorse any product or equipment advertised at the security checkpoint. This sign was not distinguished from any of the other signs, i.e., the ones which discussed security and what was and was not permitted.

The flight was quick, and we got our luggage and a cab. Now, while we always cab to the airport after the convention, we usually take the bus to the convention or our hotel, as the bus is a _lot_ cheaper, as in by a factor of twenty, maybe thirty. But, between the heat and humidity, the desire to hit both convention center and supermarket, and my knees, which are still overstressed from moving my parents' stuff into storage, I decided to splurge. Also, a cab goes right to the door of the hotel. Buses go to bus stops. I don't know where the nearest one to the hotel is.

We were staying at the Hilton across the street from the Embassy Suites, so it was a walk from the convention center, but a smaller one than the hotel we stayed in when we last attended GenCon, in 2007. It wasn't far from Le Peep. It was far from the supermarket, but by the time we'd done registration, dropped off stuff at the hotel, walked to the supermarket, and shopped, the temperature was starting to cool down.

It was also cooling down inside the room. It was 85 degrees when we came in, and it took a few minutes to figure out how to turn on the air conditioner and verify it was working. I don't think it ever got as cold as 70 degrees, which is what I set it to, but it did get as low as 71, and usually hovered around 72.

The room was nice. It was large, with a couch and table, as well as 2 queen sized beds. We requested and received a refrigerator.

Josh discovered that, while there was no official "We have searched your bag" note from the TSA, someone searched it and left his exacto blade extended. I am Not Pleased.

We did the Big Fancy Meal of the week at McCormick and Schmick's, which was in the hotel. We were glad we stayed inside as we saw the trees sway in the wind just before the thunderstorm blew through. The waitress spotted us eyeing the desserts hungrily, and offered to let us start with them. We took her up on that.

Then, I did my evening stretches and took a shower, a pattern I repeated each night. Each night, we wound up going to sleep around 1 - 2 am, and waking up at 8 am, which made for an oddly well paced GenCon.

Thursday

We went to Le Peep for breakfast after telling the front desk that the hot water had cut out twice when Julian was showering. Peter Hildreth spotted us and said hello, which was fortunate, as I don't think we managed to run into each other again that week. Then, we made our way to the convention center, arriving just after the initial rush on the exhibit hall, aka the dealers' room.

Normally, I either go up and down the aisles or I hit a couple of select booths and then go up and down the aisles. But, this year, as I did my prep work of annotating the dealers' room map and making my shopping list, I knew that I would hit about a half dozen, maybe ten spots, and that this would blow my budget for the con. I was correct.

Josh and I decided to have lunch, and, en route, we took advantage of UPS's conveniently placed booth to ship the bulk of my purchases to his workplace. We learned that this was not only more convenient than shipping them to our apartment, but also less expensive.

We ate at P.F. Chang for the first time. By our standards, it's overpriced, but one needs to factor in that we live in NYC, where it is trivially easy to get Chinese food as good for less money, and Chinese food for as much money that is better. That said, the food was certainly not bad! And the bowl of soup was a proper, family style bowl that could have served five.

We dropped stuff off at the hotel room and discovered we'd inadvertently left the Do Not Disturb sign on. We rectified this and told the front desk. Julian came by at some point after we left and also asked the front desk to make sure housekeeping arived.

Josh and I went back to the dealers' room, and I did a bit of networking, catching up with folks I hadn't seen in person for a while, like Greg Stolze, Richard Iorio II, Robin Laws, and Ken Hite. He was amused by my story of getting so caught up in his _Adventures Into Darkness_ that I started arguing with the text about the authorship of an imaginary work in his alternate history. (The narrator said that the prevailing theory is that it was Alfred Bester, but I think it has to be James Blish.)

At 6, I went to my first event, a Cthulhu Live larp called "Nyarlathotep and Miss Jones". It was set in the 1970s, and the premise was that a nice rich couple had volunteered their home as a shooting location for a porn movie. The scariest and most marvelous thing was walking into the room and back in time 4 decades. Most of the players were costumed perfectly, making me feel oddly underdressed in jeans and t-shirt.

Even with game wrap, where we found out what was going on, I had enough time to find out that the larp "Victim's Ball" was in the Canterbury, that the Canterbury was a hotel, and that it was a hotel quite nearby, if inadequately marked in the program book. The GM was happy to have me generic in, having told me before that it was fine to play it more than once. It's fascinating watching the game evolve over the years, and folks were well costumed. I do wish the "side room" we used a couple of times hadn't been an unairconditioned stairwell, but so it goes.

Josh met me after the game, and we grabbed dinner at Noodles and Co, which was extending its hours to 3am for GenCon, and which was not crowded that night. Then, we went back to the hotel to sleep.

Friday

I rearranged this day from the original plan. Originally;

• Noon-4 game in Crowne Plaza
• 4-8 game in Embassy Suites
• 8-midnight game in Crowne Plaza

The Crowne Plaza and Embassy Suites mark just about opposite ends of the gaming hotels, and I decided I was not up to a double hustle, so I turned in my ticket for the 4-8 game, which was an experiment anyway. The other two games I really wanted to make.

But first, I went to the dealers' room where I chatted with the GM from "Nyarlathotep and Miss Jones", and then went to a GM demo of Trail of Cthulhu, by Steve Dempsey, taking notes. I still don't quite have the full picture, but I've got a couple more of the pieces.

My noon game was "Keeping Up Appearances", set in the post-seventh season Buffy, but with none of those characters. Nope, just a family of demons trying to fit in, and their perfectly normal human friends, yep. We managed to wrangle a quieter room for this, and we turned it into a semi-larp. It was fun.

Then, I went back to the dealers' room until almost closing time. I did my first meal at the mall food court. I used to do most dinners there. Julian thinks the food quality dropped, and he may be correct. I had the omnipresent bourbon chicken and a chocolate peanut butter shake from Johnny Rockets.

Then, I made my way through the twisty overground passageways of the skywalk to the Omni, made my way down to ground level, and went to the Crowne for "Obsession", an 8 pm game of Ghosts of Albion. During this, I got a few phone calls, as my mother made her 5th hospital trip from the nursing home this year. Everyone was not only very understanding about me ducking out of the room a lot during the investigation part, but also very good about giving me the _short_ summary when I returned. "We're talking to the actress in her dressing room" really is all I need to know to jump back into things.

I met Josh in the convention center, and we went back to our hotel.

Saturday

I dined on the food we'd gotten during my two games. The 10 am was Unhallowed Metropolis, in the Embassy Suites, right across the street. But, I had no idea where the entrance was, so I asked the woman at the front desk of our hotel. I'm glad I did, as it's rather unobvious.

The game was slotted for 6 hours, but, as we expected, it ran about 5 1/2, leaving time for me to get to the Crowne for a game of Grim War, gm'd by Greg Stolze. He's very smooth with the One Roll Engine. As a player, I appreciate that. As a GM, it meant I still didn't quite get how to run it.

When the game ended, I went to the convention center, looking for Josh and Julian. I found Julian where I expected, the Rio Grande room, and discovered there was free ice cream with various yummy things to sprinkle atop it. I headed for the table where Julian and two other people were about to start an all-Prosperity game of Dominion, figuring I'd watch and see about getting into the next one. But, when he saw me, Julian said, "Oh good -- come play."

It turned out that the rules for playing with that set were: Get a full four players (it doesn't scale well past that), and no one gets to play two games in a row, as everyone wants a chance. So, I got to play with the new set, which has some wacky options. I largely don't like board games, and I don't like collectable card games (which Dominion isn't), but I do like Dominion, which plays like a Good Parts Version of a CCG and which has rules that let me hold my own. I came in third, in a fairly close game, despite several mistakes. Julian won.

We got in touch with Josh, who was starting a Shadowfist game, and figured we'd go back to the hotel room to drop stuff off, then back to the convention center to meet him. Julian left before I did, and I got distracted by the Fall of Cardhalla 12, aka Cardnarok. I couldn't see much over the crowd, even standing on a bench, so next time, I should try to remember when it is, and arrive an hour early to take pictures of it in all its glory.

Then, after some confusion, I got to Hall F and found Josh and Julian. We went back to the hotel, and Josh and I did dessert and a drink at McCormick and Schmidt's before settling down for the night.

Sunday

Josh and I did the hotel's breakfast buffet, which was quite good, even without the salmon. I'm sure they brought more smoked salmon out after we left, as they were preparing it, but we'd been feasting on smoked salmon all of Saturday, having bought some for that purpose, and were a bit salmoned out.

I went to the Crowne and managed to generic my way in to Benjamin Baugh's "Alien Agents" for Monsters and Other Childish Things, earning $5 off an item at ArcDream's booth and making people laugh a lot. Benjamin's a good GM, but not as smooth as Greg, which meant that I had a blast and learned a little more about how the system works, a good deal all around.

Then, I went back to the dealers' room, and when it closed, Josh, Julian, and I went back to the hotel for our luggage and a cab to the airport. The passengers were, I think, 90% returning gamers from GenCon.

From AE233

Thursday night, I had a ticket for one Cthulhu Live larp and genericked into another. The first was set in the 1970s porn industry. Far scarier than the monsters was walking into the room and seeing everyone dressed in perfect, awful 1970s clothing. The second was Victims' Ball, as the GM had said it was fine to play in it more than once. The proppage was even more impressive than last time, although the room was not ideal.

Write Ups

Trail of Cthulhu: Seminar (ae234)

Buffy Unisystem: Keeping Up Appearances (ae234)

Ghosts of Avalon: Lesser Shades of Evil (ae234)

Unhallowed Metropolis: Part 3 of 3 (ae236)

Grim War: Saving Major Rogers (ae237)

Monsters and Other Childish Things: Alien Agents (ae237)