After A-kon 26
Posted: Tue Jun 09, 2015 8:47 pm
I honestly cannot pick a event over any other from this weekend that I can say was my favorite to start with...so I will start this post thusly.
It begins with a book.
Not a small, drabby, pocket book. Or a hard cover, fancy book full of someones high opinion advice.
But a Gaming Book, and that means good adventure. Good friends, and a nearly a life time of good memories.
For My wife Jenn, love shirley and girl Rachel A-kon 26 began for us in April. Hours of planning, days of typing, hundreds of pages printed, thousands of dice rolls, 3 reloads of color ink, and several days that rolled over to late mornings.
The the week before involved salvaging two rolling crates, finding every dolly we own and even one my parents purchased to load their moving van this weekend. Then loading the cars till they became low-riders.
The Anatole hotel is beautiful, filled with amazing antique art and even a piece of the Berlin wall. The Coronodo room where roleplay gaming was set is big enough to play soccer in! We had the back left corner with 4 tables and the Lt of Gaming made sure we knew when the doors would be locked and unlocked and the names of con-security who would be working the room.
They then provided us with two complementary hotel rooms, and the compliment of 'We'll leave you to it because we know your some of the hardest working gamers here.'
From there things just continued to get better....EVERY game filled...and not just filled, filled with 2-3 alternates just waiting for someone to not to show up. Even then most of them stayed to watch.
Each game had 2-4 players new to Palladium and in 3 cases a parent & teenager.
In the case of Shirley's game two sons who only ever played AD&D and Pathfinder convinced their mother, a single mom, to play. Shirley had her take the seat right next to her and over the 4 hours helped her learn to play.
Afterwards the Mom declined a invitation to Pathfinder society to return and play with Shirley.
At 11am, 4pm, and 9pm our sign up sheets for each set of games went out....and 10-20 minutes later...they had no open slots and both alternate slots as well.
Saturday I ran a additional game for player who missed the sign up but hung around to ask for a additional game. My fan-kit Bioshock using the Palladium rules had them jumping; mixing plasmid powers, weapons and trying to keep from drowning alive.
Saturday night both 10pm to 2am filled, will observers and the players in my Heroes Unlimited had them 'cheering', and absolutely head over heels. Battle cries and all.
On Sunday again both games filled and RIFTS China was a sleeper hit that each player never expected.
Through the convention we had people coming to see and meet us. 'That Palladium family' is what they called us. People we had never meet, but through the convention had heard of us. We had folks asking to sit and discuss the Palladium game system. People who watched our games for just a few minutes or hour waiting for our 'break' to ask questions. People who played AD&D or Pathfinder asking what made us think Palladium was better..asking 'why should we play it over Pathfinder?' Our answer.....
Play the games you love.
Not the answer or argument they where looking for.
Frankly, we didn't care.
The Head of gaming remarked that unlike other people running games we made ours 'Gold'.
So many new friends. So many friends we only see once a year and some who desperately wish we would run games in other states.
A amazing weekend
..End report
BB
It begins with a book.
Not a small, drabby, pocket book. Or a hard cover, fancy book full of someones high opinion advice.
But a Gaming Book, and that means good adventure. Good friends, and a nearly a life time of good memories.
For My wife Jenn, love shirley and girl Rachel A-kon 26 began for us in April. Hours of planning, days of typing, hundreds of pages printed, thousands of dice rolls, 3 reloads of color ink, and several days that rolled over to late mornings.
The the week before involved salvaging two rolling crates, finding every dolly we own and even one my parents purchased to load their moving van this weekend. Then loading the cars till they became low-riders.
The Anatole hotel is beautiful, filled with amazing antique art and even a piece of the Berlin wall. The Coronodo room where roleplay gaming was set is big enough to play soccer in! We had the back left corner with 4 tables and the Lt of Gaming made sure we knew when the doors would be locked and unlocked and the names of con-security who would be working the room.
They then provided us with two complementary hotel rooms, and the compliment of 'We'll leave you to it because we know your some of the hardest working gamers here.'
From there things just continued to get better....EVERY game filled...and not just filled, filled with 2-3 alternates just waiting for someone to not to show up. Even then most of them stayed to watch.
Each game had 2-4 players new to Palladium and in 3 cases a parent & teenager.
In the case of Shirley's game two sons who only ever played AD&D and Pathfinder convinced their mother, a single mom, to play. Shirley had her take the seat right next to her and over the 4 hours helped her learn to play.
Afterwards the Mom declined a invitation to Pathfinder society to return and play with Shirley.
At 11am, 4pm, and 9pm our sign up sheets for each set of games went out....and 10-20 minutes later...they had no open slots and both alternate slots as well.
Saturday I ran a additional game for player who missed the sign up but hung around to ask for a additional game. My fan-kit Bioshock using the Palladium rules had them jumping; mixing plasmid powers, weapons and trying to keep from drowning alive.
Saturday night both 10pm to 2am filled, will observers and the players in my Heroes Unlimited had them 'cheering', and absolutely head over heels. Battle cries and all.
On Sunday again both games filled and RIFTS China was a sleeper hit that each player never expected.
Through the convention we had people coming to see and meet us. 'That Palladium family' is what they called us. People we had never meet, but through the convention had heard of us. We had folks asking to sit and discuss the Palladium game system. People who watched our games for just a few minutes or hour waiting for our 'break' to ask questions. People who played AD&D or Pathfinder asking what made us think Palladium was better..asking 'why should we play it over Pathfinder?' Our answer.....
Play the games you love.
Not the answer or argument they where looking for.
Frankly, we didn't care.
The Head of gaming remarked that unlike other people running games we made ours 'Gold'.
So many new friends. So many friends we only see once a year and some who desperately wish we would run games in other states.
A amazing weekend
..End report
BB