Yeah, I know I've sort of let the B5 posts fall off. I really mean to get back to this. I have a post about cavemen half-way finished (yes, yes, I know I can just finish it off but it led to some research that I hope will bear some really interesting fruit), and I still want to talk more about the witches, so there's definitely more coming.
However, it's GaryCon time around these parts.
That means a few things.
First, it means that I'm rushing to get every order of the Metal Gods zine and Black Sun Deathcrawl that I'm delinquent on out the door in the next few days. We even opened up BSDC to a few more sales (I found 20 "reserve copies" I had on hand and made those available for sale) in anticipation of the 3rd printing (absolutely no difference between the 1st through 3rd printing as far as I know). Once that's all done, I'm going to start implementing a new strategy for keeping better track of orders and how many copies of zines I have on hand to hopefully tighten a few loopholes in my attention span that some things seem to fall through.
But that's not what you came for, is it? You wanted to hear about GaryCon before GaryCon is GaryCon, right? Cool, 'cause that's what I'm here for.
This year, the Muszkiewicz family hope to leave our fair city of Ypsilanti, MI, at the crack of 8a. We'll be accompanied by our friend +Brooke Schuette (who's totally +Kathryn Muszkiewicz's "mini me," even though neither will admit it) to help Katie & I keep an eye on Stan during stuff. Brooke was one of my original Quasquetherion players and even was part of the Iron Coast crew for a time and is really excited to hit up her first gaming convention.
After stopping in Chicago for lunch (because), we plan on getting to the Grand Geneva in the mid afternoon, giving us time to unpack, unwind and maybe go for a swim before the obligatory "meet up with everyone at the bar" thing that happens every year on Wednesday. If you're going to be there, stop by and say howdy. I'll be the "hulking Pole" with the baby.
The only event that I have planned -- as in "on the books" -- is the podcasting seminar that takes place some time on Thursday. I should really find out exactly when that is. I'll be repping +Drink Spin Run - An RPG Talk Show Podcast despite being the more abrasive of the show's hosts. Apparently, there will be a happy hour event after this, too. So, good stuff. Let's hope they have good beer on tap.
The only "off the books" thing I have planned is co-DMing the Saturday night DCC "DougKon" nonsense with +Doug Kovacs and other folks. I'm sure I'll get roped into running stuff other nights, but this is the only night that running shit is a lock, and here's why: Last year, +Jobe Bittman lamented to me that we just kept playing the same games over and over. We play DCC every night. We might play Metamorphosis Alpha during the day. That's fine and all, but there are so many other goddamn games out there that get neglected. At a convention, you've got this ready and willing collection of folks who show up to this specific gaming convention precisely because they're amenable to playing disparate games, particularly old school ones. Last year, we managed to get in some Traveller as run by the ever-awesome +Todd Bunn, but other than that, it was pretty much just DCC & MA.
It's time to get some different shit in.
I talked to Jobe about what he wants to run/play, and compared it to my own list. There's not a lot of overlap, but there is some. Some of the overlap, though, was of a "if you run that, I will play," variety. Jobe plans on running Rolemaster at some point, now, which is pretty cool. +Jason Hobbs (or, if you prefer, "Scott Hubbs") also requested some games, and I liked his requests, so they're on my list of "yeah, I can run that" stuff.
Without any further ado, here's the stuff that I'll have "on deck" and gtg at a moment's notice:
- +Pearce Shea's excellent awesome adventure "In The Woods" for his Monsterparts RPG. You're kids at camp and everything gets all Silent Hill/creepy-ass fairytale/horror movie on you. Deal. Survive. Solve mysteries and uncover secrets.
- Beyond The Wall is quickly becoming my "man, I really want to play X" game. Quick but flavorful set up, rules that make sense and a fast way to turn "maybe it's like this" into an adventure.
- Dwimmermount. Hobbs requested that I run this classic. I'm not sure what system (probably Delving Deeper or Whitehack for simplicity), but I ran this as an "off night" game when I was running my Cradle of Sin DCC RPG campaign a year or two ago (two years? Jeez!) and it was a lot of fun and I ended up building myself a little Dwimmermount tool kit that I should probably talk about in a future post.
- Quasquetherion. My B1 hack that will not die! I ran this at GenCon 2014 and U Con 2015 and it was a hit both times, building on my successes of running this as a home campaign. This session could be either Whitehack of Delving Deeper, but it definitely needs to be an OD&D-ish game.
Other stuff I want to play or run:
- +Dan Domme and I were talking about playing some World Wide Wrestling. I'd happily either play or run this. I can do a mean Mean Gene.
- I would never poo-poo a chance to play a game that no one 'round these parts ever seems to want to play. Stuff like Torchbearer or Dungeon World could be a really fun way to spend an afternoon.
- Honestly, I'd play anything that folks got really, really excited about. I pick up on excitement easily. If you're planning on running something off the books, hit me up, I might be super into it.
There's no way I plan to play/run all of these things. If I get three or four games in all weekend, honestly, I'll be happy. I'll try to keep folks in the loop about stuff I'm doing so you can either live vicariously through me or so you can participate, but I don't hold out a lot of hope for it.
Hope to see you at GaryCon 2016!