Game Conventions in 2016

Its a new year, and just like every year in early January its time to take stock of all the gaming conventions coming up so one can properly allocate and request their days off from work. Here's my expected convention list for 2016 below:

GaryCon - March 3-6, 2016
- Located in Lake Geneva, WI, which is the birthplace of D&D. I don't usually run anything at GaryCon, as its the first convention of the year I attend to purely game around the old guard without having to worry about toting around minis and terrain. Plus all the relaxed gaming helps prime the creativity-generator for new campaign ideas for the rest of the year.

ScanCon - March 19-22, 2016
- This is the personal convention I put on annually in Madison, WI, which usually hosts about 15 members (one or two new attendees are invited each year). I send out puzzle invites a couple months before the convention that the attendees have to solve. Here is where I first reveal any new games I've made up, and where the individual game production values can be maxed out (blacklights, dry ice, etc) because I am in total control of the gaming environment.

BrandonomiCon - May 12-15, 2016
- A convention put on by the illustrious Brando, master of running the all-weekend MEGADUNGEON! He runs a weekend-long convention full of various physical challenges for the attendees on Friday through Saturday morning. Winning these challenges translates into rewards and magic items one can take with them into his 10-hour long megadungeon session starting on Saturday afternoon. I couldn't make it last year because I was officiating a wedding (fun fact: State law allows level 10 DMs to marry people in Wisconsin), but I've been lucky enough to be invited back this year and am looking forward to once again facing the numerous deathtraps in the caverns beneath Waterdeep! I also might try and run one of my RPG events there before the Megadungeon starts.

Nexus Game Fair - May 27-30th, 2016
- Nexus takes place in Milwaukee, WI, everyone's favorite previous home of GenCon. I was invited there last year to run my He-Man vs. Cthulhu RPG event, and met a lot of really cool folks. This time they've asked me to come for the whole weekend and run more of my RPG events (Back to the Future, Tron, etc), which I'm going to try make work. It doesn't hurt that this year Nexus takes place over Memorial Day Weekend, giving an extra free day off from work for gaming!

GenCon - Aug 4-7, 2016
- Ah the giant mega-con of them all. Bloated and simmering in its own dominance. GenCon is a must-go to for many folks, but for me its allure has really started to fade. Its become so huge and ComiCon-like that its lost a lot of the luster it once had for me. The past few years I've just gone for mostly True Dungeon, but with Gamehole Con getting TD that's less of a concern. Nevertheless I'm going to try to make time for it this year and try to recapture the spark. I've never actually run anything at GenCon because I have to cart around so much stuff to run them properly. They are also not cool with people bringing in laser pointers or coolers of dry ice and sublimating it at the gaming table, so I don't push the subject.

Gamehole Con - Nov. 4th-6th, 2016
 - The rising star of the D&D convention scene, Gamehole Con has been dominating ever since it came on the scene 3 years ago. Now for this year they're even going to have True Dungeon for the first time, making them the real upstarts against GenCon's otherwise monopoly on fancy gaming conventions. I ran Back to the Future RPG at Gamehole Con 2015, which went great, but I don't know what I'll be running for 2016 yet. I'd really like to return to running the Tron RPG, but its really hard to run that one well without a lot of blacklights set up all around and daft punk playing in the background...

Conventions! If you've never been to one I recommend trying one out! They are a great place to meet new folks who happen to be exactly like you, or to meet other weirdos who are nothing like you but are fascinating to talk to. Either way just about everyone is nice to each other because they're all there to game!

Game on!

The Packers of Catan

Its happening. Nerdyness is becoming mainstream. There was a time not so long ago when even playing boardgames was considered either childish or geeky. Especially complex boardgames, which were viewed with suspicion by all red-blooded American sports bros. Now we have NFL players admitting to the press that they regularly play games of Settlers of Catan in the locker room. Not only that, but as those players play for the best* NFL team in America, and as true nerds, those Catan games are hyper-competitive.

Go Pack Go!

*Wisconsin man here. YMMV

Back to the Future RPG I - What Characters to Use?

So its 2015, year that the Cubs win the World Series and Griff runs his PitBull powered hoverboard into the Hill Valley Clock Tower. That's right, its the year of Back to the Future II!

I have an annual convention each March and always have some sort of themed game built and run for a select few attendees. This year it makes perfect sense to run a game based on Back to the Future, but I'm already behind on planning and building so I've got to kick it into gear. In the next couple months I need to create, build, and run a single-shot rpg (with props/terrain) based on Back to the Future. I figure for rules I'll just use the newest 5th edition D&D rules, just to have that decision made and move on.

Gaming DIY: Secret of the Laser!

Like many of you, I like shooting lasers at stuff. In fact, I'd wager to guess that all people like shooting lasers at stuff, at least a little bit. Lasers are just inherently great. I also have started using them in my tabletop RPG games, with mirrors and all that. But there is a secret to using lasers in your games. Something you may not have considered, and will only encounter when you've built the whole damn thing and it doesn't work right. Fortunately, we here at Vorpal Chainsword Productions were able to solve this dilemma, and in our generosity we will share with you...

The Secret of the Laser!

At the end of this post, that is.

Black Friday Dungeons

Normally I avoid other people like the plague. Other people have things you don't want: Responsibilities, questions, germs, morals, opinions. I prefer just staying inside with my can of Easy Cheese and my 100% Ancient Aliens Netflix queue and let other people stop around under the burning sky orb. This goes double for those places where other people tend to congregate: the DMV, "Downtown," Grocery Stores, Malls. Yes, even with the advent of the internet, Malls still survive, and they still seethe with endless masses of humanity. And the dreaded worst day of all one could be at one of these Malls, be they 'West Gate-' or 'Strip-', is on Black Friday. They call it Black Friday because if you dare go out into the world on Black Friday, the sheer amount of forced human interaction will make it seem as if the very sun has been blotted out into an unholy eclipse, and will crush you under and endless parade of Ugg boots and flat-brimmed hats with the stickers still on them.

Tron 2.0 on Steam!

It finally happened! An excellent old-school PC game (a game you've likely never heard of) just got released on Steam and is now playable on all computers. This is one of my favorite PC games of all time, and I group it on my mental PC gaming mantle alongside Baulder's Gate, Thief, and Fallout. It is the only first-person action RPG that actually brings the Grid to life. That game is Tron 2.0.

Dark Dungeons: The Movie

Had movie night last night and watched the D&D-is-Satanic 1980's-Parody movie "Dark Dungeons" with a couple of buds. Its a brought-to-life adaptation of the old Jack Chick anti-RPG pamphlets handed out by concerned Churchgoers back in the 1980s. You know, the ones that promised you eternal damnation in hell if you dared to roll up an elven cleric under the watchful gaze of Jesus (who evidently hates Gamers, but loves Jocks). It was made by the crew who made "The Gamers: Dorkness Rising" via Kickstarter, so you know they take a firmly tongue-in-cheek approach to it.

 

GameHole Con 2014! - Shadows Over Eternia pics

Just got back from the last day of GameHole Con and have been up way too late for too many nights for an old man like me. Its Sunday afternoon which means its time to put the books and minis away and get things ready for the work week, but I figured I'd throw up a few pics from my game of Shadows Over Eternia: He-Man vs. the Cthulhu Mythos that I ran on Friday. It went incredibly well, thanks to some great players and plenty of Zip-fizz in my water bottle. And for me this game was only the beginning of an awesome weekend, because after running this I got to speak with the real Elminster in a game run by Ed Greenwood himself, died horribly in the Tower of Akbaba run by Luke Gygax, and even won one of the two open spots to play the Dungeon Bastard's World's Worst Dungeon Crawl!

Simply put, I can't wait for next year.

Beastman's jungle ambush!

Skeletor killed Beastman's pet T-rex, Evil-Lyn re-animated it, and then had it devour Beastman.

Digital Talisman

As any modern board-gamer knows, boardgame cleanup can be a real pain in the ass. When you were a kid the most complex cleanup boardgame you likely owned was Monopoly, and that cleanup was no problem because no one wants to play that game anyway. But for the advanced gamers out there, for the 8-year olds who saw "For ages 12 and Up" on the side of the box and were undismayed, there was a boardgame of epic fun that you could play with your more studious friends. This is a great game, with tons of expansions available, and was my first foray into a boardgame with lots of cleanup. That boardgame was Talisman.

GameHole Con II is less than a week away!

That's right! It snuck up on all of us, but the second annual GameHole Con is just around the corner. This Friday, November 7th, the best public games convention in Madison will be back! I have a group of friends coming down to Wisconsin from around the U.S. for it, because the opportunity to meet and play games with some of the TSR alumni is just too good to pass up.

As previously mentioned, I'll be running my He-Man vs. the Cthulhu Mythos game (3.5e): Shadows Over Eternia at 10am on Friday morning. There are still a couple tickets left in the 6-person game, so come on down and help Man-at-Arms blast Deep Ones with his Eternian Freeze Ray. Yes its a Friday so one has to take Friday off to play a game on the first day of GameHole Con, but will people at work really miss you that much on just another Friday? Miss you more than the amount you'll kick yourself for missing the chance to meet Ernie Gygax, The Dungeon Bastard, or the creator of the Forgotten Realms himself: Ed Greenwood?

Ed Greenwood says that those TPS reports can wait until Monday.

Game On!

ScanCon 2012!

Scanpocalypse Now!

Once again, buds from 'round the world (including Australia) came to Madison, WI to engage in epic gaming for four days straight.  There was board gaming, wargaming, video gaming, rpgs, tron disc-throwing, delicious food-eating and possibly some spontaneous firebreathing.  What follows are some pictures that were captured of the mercurial event.