muertog
Journeyman Douchebag
Posts: 147
|
Post by muertog on Feb 19, 2012 23:53:23 GMT -8
Home and tired, but had a great time this weekend. Yes, I know it still goes on tomorrow. I have to work in the morning, so for me, it is over. Friday's bar gathering was fun, although I was exhausted from work, so couldn't join in any late-night games. Saturday was full of win, with Laser Ponies! (I see a rainbow and I want it painted it black.... No colors anymore I want them to turn black...) followed by Phreque Show (Behold the power of the mammaries!), finishing up with a great podcast. Sunday was rather relaxed, but I stuck around for an 8:00pm game demo and managed to win an advance copy of Thunderstone Advance. All in all, I consider this a weekend well spent.
|
|
|
Post by jazzisblues on Feb 20, 2012 6:20:35 GMT -8
For me the con started by riding with Gina up to North Hollywood to pick up Mook so we could all ride to the con together. Once here and quickly settled into the hotel it was down to the rpg rooms to play in Maire Bourke's Hero game "Family Ties" with Gina, Mook, Will H, Phil and Michael Hall. So many Robins or Robin derivations in a Steampunkesque setting. Loads of fun. To the bar for a beer and some great conversation. Back to the gaming rooms to run "Voyages of the Starship Loki" my sci-fi (Star Trekish) game in Hero. I had 8 players which seemed to set a theme for my games for the weekend. (A theme I liked very much) After my game ended I settled down to watch the tail end of Casey and Bruce's Fantasy Hero game. Stumble into bed about 2:30 - 3:00 (I forget which) Saturday morning after coffee with Gina, Mook and Joe Baxter, G and I played "Top Secret Lives" run by CADave and HosierRob. Ok, I don't disagree that it's a heinous system but it's not the system that makes the game it's the gm(s) and the players and of that we had; WillH, Mike Olson, Sam Thomas, Joe Baxter, Gina and m'self. I had fun with the game despite being utterly ineffective which is no fault of the game system or the gm's sometimes a game just turns a direction different from what your character was designed to be good at. Saturday afternoon and it's time to run "Strangers (in a Strange Land)", the sequel to "Sleepers". In this game the characters are trying to integrate into the Mars colony and end up on the run again from the agents of Earth and the MegaCorp. In a rare occurrence this game went almost (97%) exactly the way I envisioned it when I wrote it. Fabulous group of players who really jumped into their characters. Quick dinner and then to the podcast recording. I'd never seen the live cast from the perspective of the table before and that was a ton of fun. Bill Roper's side comments kept me in stitches the whole time. Sunday morning I ran my Pathfinder game with a seven person table including Michael Hall, Patrick "Mouser" Rowley, Krystel Rowley, Aaron, Nicole, (a guy who's name I am so sorry I cannot remember as I'm writing this), and Bill Roper. Good little game made spectacular by a group of wildly fun players. Photos will be posted shortly. Sunday afternoon and time to run my Savage Worlds kid's game. Sadly only one young lady came for the game so that one didn't happen. So, I split the time between the dealer room where picked up some gaming books, and Gina bought me a copy of the Hero System Grimoire and some much needed dice bags, and watching Bill Roper's Grimm game. They looked like they were having a metric fuckton of fun. Sunday evening grab some dinner (It's not a con if you don't have Subway at least once.) Highlights of the weekend for me: 1. Getting to game with my girls (Gina and my daughter Hannah) 2. Getting to see and talk with members of the podcast community that I don't get to see at all often enough 3. Getting to play in awesome games 4. Getting to run games for amazing players Bummers of the weekend 1. Having to back out on Kurt Hanna's Vampire game but the way things played out it was for the best anyway I literally passed out in mid conversation with Gina about 9:30. 2. Having a significant misunderstanding with a player in one of my games that caused him to leave the game. But, it got sorted out and I think we're all good now. All in all a totally awesome wonderful weekend. When is the next con? For everyone who was not there, you were missed and thought about many times and we wished for you to be there. Cheers, JiB
|
|
clanhanna
Journeyman Douchebag
The Muffin
Posts: 221
Preferred Game Systems: Storyteller, O.R.E, Mongoose Traveller
Currently Playing: Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire: The Dark Ages, D&D 5e
Currently Running: Vampire: The Dark Ages
Favorite Species of Monkey: Peanut-buttery Rhesus
|
Post by clanhanna on Feb 20, 2012 9:09:22 GMT -8
This Con was the weekend of reprises for me, as I played in three games in which I had played in previous sessions at previous cons.
Friday evening: returning once again to Land's Heart and Casey & Bruce's Fantasy HERO game. I was in one of the first sessions of this Con-to-Con campaign, and while I didn't have the same character as before, and the players were different, there was a continuity to it simply due to it being the collective genius of Casey and Bruce. I feel bad that I fell asleep 2 or 3 times during the 5-1/2 hour game... especially since I was the defacto mission leader... But it was 1am on Friday night and it had been a long couple of days.
Saturday morning: Back into the twisted mind of Tyler King and the Dead Presidents game. Dead Presidents vs. the Kardashians! Oh Yeah! Hilarity, of course, and wildly inappropriate quotable comments, which are the stock and trade of any Tyler game, as far as I'm concerned.
Saturday afternoon: Once again, back in action as the Illustrated Man in Stork & CADave's PHREQUEshow game. This was also the third game in a row that both I and Christina Cook were in together, and we were having a blast carrying certain themes with us from game to game. Powerful mammaries, indeed! I have to say that Stork and CADave had managed to really get a feel for their world, and this sequel was actually better than the first one. It had more suspense and more even distribution of opportunities for every player to be useful.
Saturday evening: the podcast. Also known as the All-Tappy-is-on-Acid show.
Sunday morning: Ran my D&D4e game with initially six players. Came up with what I thought was a GENIUS mechanic to ENSURE that my game ran exactly 4 hours. The players walked away from the table, post-epilogue, at 1:01pm.
Sunday afternoon: Played in a non-Happy Jacks game (What? I know!) of GURPS TruBlood. This was another Con-to-Con campaign, with four regular players and four newbies to the universe, including myself. We out-pranked Coyote by "outing" him to the locals, but making them think he was Raven. Well played, good times. One brief moment of "Oh shit, this could get awkward" right at the beginning, but that was quickly moved past.
Saturday evening: Ran my Dark Ages: Vampire game, "Seeing Through the Prince's Eyes." Powerful Malkavians are SO. MUCH. FUN! A great group of five players including Maire (playing her first-ever combat-monster), Shelley (playing the requisite Lore-monkey), Anna (playing as best she could what I feel was an inadequately-written Toreador), Rodney (playing a Salubri healer with True Faith), and I-CAN'T-REMEMBER-HIS-NAME (playing a wonderfully sadistic Lasombra Bishop). Threw them up against a Lamia and a Niktuku, ran long by an hour (sorry about that), but much fleshcrafting-, shadow-tentacle-, and Mortis-withering fun was had.
Good times. I hope to run another Vampire game at the next con. It is the system I am the most familiar with, and I seem to be developing a reputation at these cons as "the guy who runs Old World Vampire." That's a rep I'm happy to cultivate.
Much thanks to everyone for all the games, all the characters, all the fun. Really hoping I can make it to at least one day of Gamex in May.
|
|
|
Post by hoseirrob on Feb 20, 2012 17:38:44 GMT -8
My highlight: Conning CADave into running Top Secret. I got him good!
Fri night just hanging out with the smokers.
Sat am: finally running the dreaded Top Secret. It was great when anyone with a camera walked into the room and immediately took a picture of the group with all the mouse ears.
Sat afternoon: Playing one half of the Orc wonder twins with Stephen in Tyler's game.
Sat night: In-n-out run with Molly and meurtog, the podcast, then playing a horrible (awesome) VHS game about Star Trek with Bill, Elspeth, CADave, Clockverk, Bruce, Casey and Molly.
Low point: Sunday AM GURPS game. I enjoyed most of the people i played with, but had issues with the DMing. I will prob make a post about this later.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2012 0:52:39 GMT -8
Saturday evening: Ran my Dark Ages: Vampire game, "Seeing Through the Prince's Eyes." Powerful Malkavians are SO. MUCH. FUN! A great group of five players including Maire (playing her first-ever combat-monster), Shelley (playing the requisite Lore-monkey), Anna (playing as best she could what I feel was an inadequately-written Toreador), Rodney (playing a Salubri healer with True Faith), and I-CAN'T-REMEMBER-HIS-NAME (playing a wonderfully sadistic Lasombra Bishop). Threw them up against a Lamia and a Niktuku, ran long by an hour (sorry about that), but much fleshcrafting-, shadow-tentacle-, and Mortis-withering fun was had. . *ahem*! I was your Lasombra Bishop! (joemorf aka Frank) and I had a great time in your game - thanks very much! I'll have a more detailed post-con report after some much-needed sleep. But the tl;dr version goes something like this: Epic Awesome Happy Mars Rocks Time!
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2012 16:04:56 GMT -8
I had a great time at Orccon. It was definitely the busiest I've been at a Con in a long time.
Friday night: Took surface streets from Burbank to LAX and I'm pretty sure I made it there 2 hours faster than if I had tried to stay on the freeway system. Got there in plenty of time to settle in, briefly say hello to Stu, Patrick, and Kristel in the lobby, and eventually made it to my OWBN oWoD MeT LARP. Highlight there was securing a teacher for Vanish, which will come in handy for the email scene duel I have to take care of this week.
Saturday Morning: I ran my first ever Savage Worlds game! (Space 1889: Red Sands) Everyone seemed to have a great time. Although the big bad guy got away and they slaughtered the only people who could tell them why the train got hijacked in the first place, they managed to stop the train inches before it impacted with the domed crater, so I call that a win! I'll definitely be running subsequent chapters of this game at future cons.
Saturday Afternoon: Starship Valkyrie LARP. My first Sci-Fi LARP since Arcanacon in 1983! (And a very different feel to that gigantic Traveller LARP.) This was was very cooperative, involving various teams (Science, Engineering, Medical, etc) of Cadets in the same ship going through drills, and then a "milk run" that turned out to be anything but (natch!) We relieved the Captain in a rather mutinous way... but we boarded & brought back an enemy Battle Cruiser... so everyone got a reprimand... and a promotion! Their regular games are a little expensive for my tastes, but I would definitely play again at a con (they'll be at WyrdCon and future Strategicons.)
Saturday Night: I missed the podcast because 2 of the players from my Savage Worlds game wanted to try Mind's Eye Theatre LARPing for the first time, and they needed help with character creation and etc. The highlight of that game for me was RPing with a 10 year old boy who had wandered in not knowing what game he was in. We ran him downstairs to make sure his Mom was cool with him playing in what was normally and 18+ game, and then took him through his first feeding scene - which involved rabbits, not people. He turned out to be a pretty bitchin little RP'er, and I have no doubt we'll see him at future games.
Sunday Morning: I had to bail on the Con and go to work for a half-day down in OC.
Sunday afternoon: I made it back in time to observe a little bit of whichever game that Patrick and Kristel were in, which was amusing. Also stopped in to some other friend's D&D game - they were dealing with some very bloodthirsty kids who ruined any attempt at parley, which was also amusing. I stopped in to see part of the talk with Dirk Henn, guest of honor, and won a copy of the New York edition of Alhambra on account of tweeting about the session, which was a nice surprise.
Sunday Night: Kurt Hanna's oWoD Dark Ages Vampire game, which was a lot of fun. I was a little out of my element playing a Lasombra, since I normally gravitate to Nosferatu, Gangrel, or Ravnos, but it was a great time playing the "bad cop" to our Salubri's "good cop." Lessons learned here: always always always bring a Cappadocian Lore Monkey. Also, never never never botch your Obtenebration roll...
Monday morning: Lesson learned, if the bellmenm have a super secret freight elevator for luggage, take them up on the offer. I watched 7 full elevators go by before I was able to get all my crap on board. Almost made me late for work, which would have sucked.
That con was definitely a win! Even considering I was sober the whole damn time - what was I thinking?
|
|
willh
Journeyman Douchebag
Posts: 220
|
Post by willh on Feb 22, 2012 7:55:42 GMT -8
Thing the first, I want to thank Gina and others for their amazing generosity this weekend providing beer and snacks.
Thing the second, it has become clear is I need to be able to duplicate myself during the con. There are so many cool games going on it's almost always a tough choice what to play. Plus I now have two circles of friends attending the con and I have to divide my time when not gaming. Science, get on that for me.
Friday afternoon: I played in Maire's Family Ties HERO game. It was great to play HERO again. I got to play steampunk Rorschach. I was actually supposed to be one of the Robins, but I'm not up on my Batman comics and Maire said the Robin I was based on had a lot of Rorschach in him.
Friday dinner: The BarCon crowd and I made our traditional pizza order from Papa John's.
Friday evening: I played Psi Run. I had fun, but the system was a little meh.
Saturday morning: I played in CADave and Rob's Top Secret. I had a blast. I loved the former PBR pilot with PTSD operating the Jungle Cruise. I'm looking forward to their next installment of clunky systems from yesteryear, Rolemaster. That is, I hope I can talk them into it.
Saturday afternoon: I played in Stu's SW SMERSH game. I played a hard core Stalinist sociopath wrapped in a bad Russian accent. One neat thing about this game was it had the tone of a group of bumbling B movie spies, but we were actually fairly competent and neither aspect interfered with he other.
Saturday Evening: I attended the live podcast. It was awesome as always.
Sunday morning: I played in Maire's Fantasy Craft game. I really owe Maire an apology here. It was a really late night for me and I was tired as hell. I feel I was just dead weight in this game.
Sunday afternoon: I played Void Vultures. VV is a gonzo sci fi game of raiding derelict space stations and killing mutants so you can keep your community alive. It's a fairly simple system and the game is mostly about reveling in the genre. I had a blast.
Sunday evening: I was supposed to play in the Marvel game, but food took too long and I missed it. I ended up playing in Jediville. It's a Star Wars hack of the Smallville RPG my friend runs. I played a Han Solo analog and shot first, several times.
Sunday night: I played Cards Against Humanity up at BarCon. CAH is Apples to Apples, for horrible people. It's hilarious.
Monday morning: I didn't play anything. I just hung around and chatted with some folks.
Monday afternoon: I had lunch at Three Flames Mongolian BBQ, another BarCon tradition.
|
|
clanhanna
Journeyman Douchebag
The Muffin
Posts: 221
Preferred Game Systems: Storyteller, O.R.E, Mongoose Traveller
Currently Playing: Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire: The Dark Ages, D&D 5e
Currently Running: Vampire: The Dark Ages
Favorite Species of Monkey: Peanut-buttery Rhesus
|
Post by clanhanna on Feb 27, 2012 8:13:52 GMT -8
Also, never never never botch your Obtenebration roll... Words to live by, Joemorf.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2012 4:05:02 GMT -8
I just want to give some major props to DM Sam and his Savage Worlds/Deadlands game, The Gatling Decision. He really did an exceptional job, from the table setup (shot glasses, .44 caliber shells as bennies, stacks of poker chips for cash) to the character sheets ("Wanted" posters with the key skills/attributes, character description, and illustration all on one page!) to the props (covering the table with green felt to make it look like a poker table, replica old-fashioned cards for poker and initiative, modular train car/battlemat for combat). The game started with an in-character game of five-card stud (or as I like to call it, real poker), progressed to a shoot out on a speeding train, and ended with a standoff/shootout on a dusty, deserted street: basically everything you could want in a western. The characters, PCs and NPCs, were interesting (bonus points for letting us pick our own disads) and the players were a fun group (including Sam's beautiful daughter in her first-ever RPG experience) who played their characters to the hilt, silly old-west accents included (mine the silliest of all ). All in all, it was a great experience and I had a wonderful time. Great work, Sam! I'm sorry I let my crippling fear of public speaking prevent me from giving you the credit you deserved at the podcast.
|
|