Yes, I know it's May...

That is, I'm quite aware of the fact that it's been a long time since the GaryCon V and almost as long since I last posted about it. Life is what it is...

But I do want to get the remainder documented, so I will push on...

GaryCon V - Day 4, Part 1

Saturday is always a bit of a mixed bag for me. I want to squeeze in as much as I possibly can. But there are several conflicts battling with my old age need for sleep. For example, I know Saturday night is going to be the annual Night of the Walking Wet game which runs until the wee hours of the morning, so I’ll need to get some sleep in during the day.

Saturday was also to be the day the kids were to participate in the For Kids, By Kids game run by the oldest son of a friend of mine Rich Franks. His son ran a game last year for kids and my two had a blast. This was one of the games which they were really looking forward to with anticipation. Alas, due to some scheduling issues, Rich’s family was not able to attend this year.

But in the true nature of GaryCon and SIGPUP, one of the parents of the participants picked up the ball and ran a game for the kids - so total props go to Patrick for taking over and running The Haunted Keep for this group. Colin and Storm had just played The Haunted Keep with Paul Stromberg running it the previous day. So this GaryCon, my kids got to hone their skills in separating player knowledge from character knowledge!

So while they were off exploring the Haunted Keep, I got to play in another DCC game – it’s like an addiction! This time it was The Croaking Fane, run by the stellar [url=]Michael Curtis…again! The Croaking Fane is a third level adventure written by the very same Michael Curtis. It focuses around the disappearance of the followers of The Lord of Evil Amphibians.

There were some additional folks around the table, some who had never played DCC before. Because Michael had added folks beyond the original number (something that happens often at GaryCon), we were short of third level characters. Michael offered to have multiples of the same character, or, almost sheepishly, a sheet with three zero-level characters.

I jumped on the zero-level characters. I figured I’ve played a bunch of DCC at various levels, and some of the folks that were trying out the system might get a better feel using third-level characters. Zero-level characters are pretty weak and don’t actually have a class…and so can’t really do the class specific things – like Mighty Deeds for Warriors or spell-casting for Wizards. Better to let those who want to take the system for a spin get a better feel for it while I delighted in seeing if I could get my barbarians Og, Gog, and Dog through the adventure.

It was a great adventure; in the vein of DCC modules, very atmospheric and fun…so much so that I don’t have a single picture. Alas, two of the three zero-levels did not make it – ironically both dying due to losing their hands and bleeding out. I don’t want to say much more specific about the adventure for spoiler reasons. I did get to play alongside the talented gentleman Jim Wampler again and we had fun pushing the action with our inquisitive characters. I’ve yet to play in a bad session of DCC.

Both the kids’ game, and my DCC action, ended around 2 PM. So we grabbed some food and chilled in the room for a bit. Then I wanted to take some time for one of my favorite things – the Auction. Every year there is an auction held for benefit. Last year, if I recall correctly (and If you’re out there Luke Gygax or Chris Hoffner feel free to correct me!) it was to help Jim Ward. This year, it was to assist Ernie Gygax after a fire in his residence claimed almost all he owned. In the first couple of years, GaryCon II and III, it was to help build the Gygax Memorial. One thing is consistent; it’s always a good cause.

It starts with a raffle:

Then there is an introduction and then Frank Metnzer and Tim Kask start the bidding. It is amazing what goes up for auction and for how much some of the items are purchased. The biggest sellers are usually original art work. And watching some of these collectors go after things is…impressive. I've bid a few times over the years, only to be completely blown out of the water by folks with much deeper pockets than I.

But truly one of the coolest things is the collection of stories of people who pay top dollar for an item, and then turn around and donate it for the auction the following year. The gaming community, especially the portion that goes to GaryCon, can really be quite generous. As in years past, I hung around and wished and dreamed about being able to pay the going rates for some of these things. And as in years past, I left early with nothing. Ah well, such is life….

I took the opportunity after the auction spend a bit of time with the kids, then grab a little sleep, knowing, as I said, that it was going to be a long night...

GaryCon V - Day 3

Here’s the thing about GaryCon…it just keeps getting better….

Friday, Day 3, and we were up and at ‘em again. The kids and I were registered to play Tower of Gygax – a real death machine where you are lucky to last 15 minutes. It’s meant specifically to chew characters up and spit them out in a never-ending march of death.

But I knew about this Aliens game from previous years. AllanGrohe (grodog) has this amazing setup in which he runs several different scenarios from the Alien movies. Remember that friend I mentioned who was supposed to run a game on Thursday but who had to back out? Well, I knew he and his kids were signed up to play…and that he wouldn’t be there. Three of them…three of us…

So I lit a fire under my kids, got them up, fed them, showered, and out the door in the miniatures room by 9:30 for a 10 AM game. I would not be denied!

I should also mention that Allan, who is also (in)famous for his Grodog’s Castle Greyhawk games that run every year, is one of the nicest gentlemen I’ve met at GaryCon and I’d already mentioned my desire to take these spots on one of the message boards. So I was pretty confident I and/or my children would get to play, but I wanted to be sure.

Sure enough, getting there early was a good thing. Allan needs to clone himself (and his setup!) and run a while slew of slots of this game. Everybody seems to want to get into it, and they are right to want to do so; it is a blast. And this is why…

If Allan wants to jump in at any point and comment, it would be an honor. What I understand is that each of these three setups is a different scenario…and that you can essentially walk through the entire Aliens movie using these setups.

Colin inspects the setup while Storm anxiously waits to see if we get to play.

We lucked out and got to play. It was a full table, I think eleven in all including three kids under the age 13 – two of them mine. One of the gentlemen playing was very familiar with the game, so we let him kind of set up who took what roles and what our overall strategy would be. He really set us up nicely and made one of the most important decisions off the bat – we’d all stay on the same side and move up (as opposed to splitting around the “stairwell” opening in the center of the board).

I could, really, go on and on about this game. We were very lucky to be playing with a few experienced players who really knew how to take advantage of the various tactical abilities of the different characters.  In the end, I think I’ll just post a bunch of pictures…

In the end, we were extremely, surprisingly lucky. We only lost Apone, my son’s character… and that only about 20 minutes from the end – from an acid splash! Everyone else made it out OK. Somewhere I have a picture of the brave colonial marines that made it out that day.

After such a harrowing event, we rushed back to our room for chow. We brought a microwave with us. I know, crazy, right? But we live so close and it’s not that difficult to just throw it in the van. This way, we saved some money by having simple lunches every day. And it’s quicker than driving into town which, while it isn’t far, doe eat up some time. And we only had an hour or so before…

The Haunted Keep.

The Haunted Keep is an introductory adventure using the Moldvay Basic Dungeons & Dragons rules. This event is suitable for all age groups and welcomes players 8 years or older to come and explore the Haunted Keep. Adults must be accompanied by at least one kid! Pregenerated characters will be provided, so just bring a writing instrument and your dice

I wanted to provide the actual description of the event because this is becoming very common at GaryCon…games geared towards kids. And I love it.

The second thing about this game that really needs to be given a shout out is the gentlemen running it – Paul Stormberg.

It was Friday afternoon, and I can tell you that Paul was already making CON checks. He runs events for something like two or three hundred players across all the days of the convention. One of the things he runs that gets tons of people involved – even wives and girlfriends and kids of your standard attendees – is the jousting tournament. And this is tough because anyone can walk up and play at just about any time during the convention. I have not done it to date, but I’m in it next year for sure.

Paul also runs Battle for the Brown Hills, the original Chainmail…in a sandbox…

Most amazing, Paul is the same nice guy whether he’s dead tired or spry as spring, running the Haunted Keep for me and my offspring, or the finals of the Jousting Tournament. He’s just one of the Nice Guys who also happens to be keeping the memory and legacy of those seminal games alive.

The things I recall about this game focus in my mind around how carefully my kids explored this place. I don’t want to give away spoilers (heck, I hadn’t even played this!) but they were cautious and thinking their way around obstacles like seasoned veterans. I was so proud. But I also know that as a convention game, that can sometimes get in the way of moving things along. So there ended up being some hand-waving and such as we neared the end of our time.>

And I hope we weren’t too much trouble for Jason Azze.

This event ran right up until 6PM and I was the only one scheduled for another game. Though my game was scheduled for 6PM, there was a note that it was starting and ending later. So I was able to squeeze in a bit of time with the family before they headed off towards the pool and I hustled to the next game, “Quondam Fount”, run by none other than Frank Mentzer.

Frank runs a great game but here’s the thing. You have to be prepared for a crowded table and a certain amount of…well, I wouldn’t call it gawking, but there’s a definite novelty thing going on. And Frank is gracious to everyone – which is the way we’d all want it or there would be nerd rage all across the Internet about how Frank dissed someone at such and such table of Whatevercon.

The game itself was pretty cool and had some really interesting things to figure out – only time was limited, it being a con. So just when things were starting to heat up (or cool down as the case may be), it was time to call it.

It was still early, so I trundled off to the Open Gaming area and ran into Doug Kovacs who was in a game of The Red Dragon Inn with some friends. They allowed me in, but it was clear early on that for various reasons we would not be ending the game in the normal fashion. So we packed up and got everyone home safe and sound and then it was off to bed to get some sleep for Saturday’s adventures…

GaryCon V - Day 2

Note to Self: Do Not Schedule 8AM games for Thursday at GaryCon.

Thursday morning did not creep up on me, it hit like a sledgehammer to the back of the head. It wasn't that I was gaming until the wee hours of the morning – we finished around 12:30 AM or so, if I recall correctly. No, it’s that I can’t fall asleep in hotel rooms, particularly not on the first night of a stay and certainly not without my wife and family. Add into that the fact I felt the need to get up by 7 AM and, well, it was only a few hours of sleep when all was said and done.

Why so early? Two reasons, the first of which is rather innocuous. I had an 8AM game to learn how to play Hackmaster. This would give me time to shower (first rule of gaming as my kids can recite – always shower) and grab a bite to eat before the game.

The second reason is something I really should talk to the Powers That Be about – souvenirs. You see, each Thursday morning of the convention, for the last four years, I've fretted about souvenirs. I want to make sure to, at the very least, get a t-shirt for myself and each of my kids. I also knew they had glass beer steins on sale and I could not remember if I pre-ordered that with my platinum badge. Some years they have these really sweet commemorative coins…like this…

GaryCon I and II:

GaryCon III and IV

In past years they've had commemorative dice and mini figures as well. And in past years, I was lucky/persistent enough to be around before they sold out of things in which I was interested…sometimes just barely.

So on Thursday morning, before the 8AM game, I wanted to be ready and in line just in case. Only, they didn't have any of it out an available. I understood – they wanted to sort through all of the pre-ordered stuff as well as anything that people were to receive as part of their badge purchase. I checked periodically in the first couple hours of Hackmaster to no avail. Of course, by the time my 8AM slot of Hackmaster ended, they were in full sales swing. Again, this year, I was lucky to get the shirts I wanted. Also, this year, they seemed to have a lot more of stuff so there were even coffee mugs available on the last day. So maybe it’s not something I should concern myself with…though I think I’ll offer to volunteer next year to help get that all going. Onto gaming…

My 8AM slot was, as I mentioned, Learn to Hack. I’d never played Hackmaster before, but was well aware of the system. One of the mantras for me, personally, at conventions like GaryCon or GenCon is to try at least a game or two of things with which I am not so familiar. So I did as the event catalog described – I brought my dice and no experience.

A gentleman named George Fields ran the slot and, as described, he walked us through the basics of character generation. It was complex, but with years of experience in the various forms of OD&D/AD&D/D&D it was pretty easy to pick up. Once we all had our characters, we ran through a couple of combats to get a feel for the system. It was fun and interesting, though I’m not sure I’m sold on Hackmaster as a system.

At noon I was originally scheduled to play in an AD&D game with one of my friends running it – a kind-of continuation of a game we play every year at GenCon. Unfortunately, he had to back out a few weeks before GaryCon, so I had an eight hour opening in my schedule. But this is GaryCon…no worries.

Just before I finished the Learn to Hack slot, Doug Kovacs came around and we decided we’d have lunch together when my slot was over. So after we finished the slaughter I went out and purchased my t-shirts (yay!), Doug and I went to his car (at this point I was without a car as my wife had not returned with the kids in tow) and drove into Lake Geneva proper.  Again, one of the great things about GaryCon is an opportunity like this to just sit and talk with someone like Doug for an hour or so…about like, parents, siblings, and what make us tick.

When we returned, I went back to my room to gather myself. I returned to the restaurant to find Doug along with a couple of his friends already playing a board game….actually more of a card game.  It is called TheRed Dragon Inn. I’d never played before (imagine that!), but it was a lot of fun. Essentially you are the adventuring group back from a successful plundering and you are sitting around the tavern in the midst of drinking and debauchery. You have an alcohol counter, a constitution counter, and some gold. The first two, alcohol and constitution, are on a circular track heading toward each other – so as you gain alcohol and or lose constitution, the two markers head towards each other, one clockwise, the other counter clockwise. When they meet, you’ve passed out and lost. All the while you are trying to keep the gold in your pocket from being taken in drinking contests, gambling contests, or the party illusionist tricking you out it…because if you are out of gold, you are out of the game.

I’m seriously going to be looking into this game. It was simple, fun, and could change each time you played depending on the character you chose and the luck of the cards. All in all it was a blast and I made it to the end, only to be beaten by Doug in the closing moments.

After The Red Dragon Inn, we decided to try a reprint of a game from, I believe, the 60’s – called NuclearWar. To be honest, I can’t really tell you much about this game. The rules were very difficult to follow so we just made stuff up for a while. Add to this the fact that about half way through the game, I got the call from my wife that she and the kids were pulling into the parking lot of the hotel.

By the time I unloaded the family and their stuff, it was about 7PM. I took the opportunity to grab a quick nap, and by 8PM my son, daughter and I were downstairs getting settled at our table for our first game of DCC – the Dungeon CrawlClassics Role Playing Game.

In the Court of Chaos is apparently a forthcoming DCC adventure written by Michael Curtis. You remember Michael – the GM for Day1’s impromptu Gamma World game. Oh, and he was running this game of DCC as well! Unfortunately, I don’t want to say too much about this adventure as it is still officially in development. But I can say this…

In a nicely written and well delivered opening scene, we the adventurers were swept into the courts of chaos. There were met several Lords of Chaos who “requested” our aid in retrieving an item from the Lords of Law. After giving us some time to consider their offer, and a moment to add a great little twist, we were on our way.

 I can say one of my favorite moments was when my son, the wizard of the party, tried to cast a Comprehend Language and rolled a fumble on his spell check (the second fumble in row, the previous being a Color Spray that shot bursts all over the place). He then rolled to see the results of the fumble and got a misfire. For almost the rest the game, one of our party spoke in dragon tongue…completely incomprehensible to everyone else in the party….and the target played it to the hilt, doing nothing but grunting and gesticulating to communicate.

Oh…and I died!

Michael ran a great game. It was a bit loud in the room at the start, but we were the late game and the room cleared after a while. After, Michael handed out ribbons to both survivors and victims that were added to our convention badges. And we get to have our names as play-testers…even Colin!*

The kids and I stumbled back to the room and crashed at about 1 AM. We had to get our rest for Day 3…

*Harley, he literally crossed his name off the player list and wrote in Colin….I kid you not.

GaryCon V - Day 1

It’s that time of year again; the time when winter is grasping desperately, but no less effectively, with its frigid, desiccated caress. Yet spring tries with the temerity of a newborn foal to stand. And one of the first signs of spring for my family and me is GaryCon.

GaryCon is a gaming convention held in the honor of the Father of Roleplaying Games, E. Gary Gygax. Gary Gygax passed away in March of 2008. After his funeral many of his friends and family gathered informally and gamed in his honor. The following year, in 2009, Gary’s son Luke Gygax, along with many of the Old Guard of gaming, decided to continue this tradition. In the intervening years, GaryCon has become a kind of living memorial to a man who influenced many lives.

Every year it’s been run publically, from 2009 until now, I’ve attended GaryCon. The first year it was a mad dash to Lake Geneva’s American Legion Hall to spend a Saturday gaming with a hundred or so others…treading the creaking wooden floors gamers once tread to attend early GenCon. This year there were over six hundred people filling the rooms and halls of the Geneva Ridge Resort in Lake Geneva.

I arrived on Wednesday afternoon. For my family and me, one of the great aspects of this particular gaming convention is that it takes place about 50 minutes from our home. This is very handy for several reasons. On Day 1 it is convenient because my wife can drop me off and then return home. This allows me to start my convention on Wednesday night while my family doesn’t join me until later – thus avoiding school absences and keeping us at one vehicle when Day 5 rolls around.

Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men…

I was settled into my room at about 2PM only to have my boss call and request some things. Since I wasn’t officially on vacation yet, I had to fire up my laptop and get some work done. I thought this would be a bad omen, but the work went quickly and I was done by 4:30 PM. I wondered downstairs to pick up my badge, as well as those of my family.

At this point you can tell it’s a pretty low key affair. Some folks are just arriving; many do not arrive until Thursday or later.

But it is clear there’s still important work to be done…then again, it seems Chris is always busy during this convention.

Registration took all of about 5 minutes and I was back in my room checking emails to ensure my boss didn’t require any last minute changes…and taking a nap. Yet another sign I’m getting old.

I woke about 6:45 PM or so. One last check of emails and then I was going to head down to the bar to hoist a couple. As luck would have it, the inestimable Doug Kovacs sent me a text message about 7:15PM to see if I was around. Next thing I know, I’m in a Gamma World game with Michael Curtis running it, Doug Kovacs on my left, and next to him Jim Wampler.

I had not played Gamma World…well, non 4e Gamma World…since 1979. I grabbed some d6’s and was off to the races. Michael used the 4d6-drop-the-lowest, and I rolled pretty well except for Dexterity. Some random generation of Mutations and my basic character looked something like this…Vico Din Fenrik (a note on names – people were batting about the idea of using chemical names from the various drink bottles on the table…I went with a different chemical I sometimes have to ingest):

Now those random mutations were awesome, in the powerful sense, for some in the group. For me? Well, I got physical mutations of Attraction Odor, which attracts carnivores 30-90 kilometers away – and Narcolepsy, which gave a 2% chance to fall asleep for 6-60 minutes in a stressful situation….awesome in a completely different way. I did get one mutation that turned out to be really quite powerful – Intuition. That mutation provides a +3 per die of damage.

Then Michael rolled us some random weapons and tech equipment– I got a stun rifle with one...that’s right, one...charge and an energy cell charger. I’m still not quite sure what the latter does. After that it was random gold and a bit of shopping. This took me a while due to not being as familiar with the equipment list as I am with the standard fantasy setting’s list. Given my mutations, I figured that Vico was kind of the feral outside. Who wants to hang out with a guy that attracts carnivores? So I went with a kind of barbarian-in-apocalypse feel…except for one purchase.

Remember that Intuition mutation? Well, I found I could afford an Energy Mace. This weapon does 10d6 of damage. Intuition gives me a +3 to each damage die. So I figured if/when I hit with this weapon the results will be quite spectacular…at least 40 points of damage (if I roll one on 10 dice)!

The last thing I purchased was something called a Neutralizing Pigment. I’m not sure what these are (some kind of salve you put on), but Michael ruled I could find one (gray) that cut down on the aforementioned Attraction Odor enough that existence wasn’t a constant battle with swarming carnivores – it was a one shot after all.

By this point, we were all set to go. I took about an hour and a half to gather and build our characters so we took a quick break and then settled in.

What follows make shake any collectors to their very core. As we started, Michael pulled out the original dice from this set. How did we know they were the originals? Well, for one thing, they were still in the plastic bag…

Then he proceeded to tear the bag open. I’m not kidding when I say we were surprised…not in the sense that we didn’t know what was about to happen, just that he’d do it. So, of course, I had to get pictures of him tearing open a bag of dice that probably hadn’t seen fresh air in 30 years…

With all the preparations behind us, we played…

According to my notes, our little party was made up of:

Skell  (bony arms) – Jeff

Ash (The Flammable) - ??

Badge (The Honey Badger) – Zach

Gigantor (6M Tall) – Jim W.

Frictos (Pure strain human) – Doug

Vico (The nervous savage) – Me

Our tribal leader of the Fenrik clan was Benzoate. Since it was a good year and we, the “warriors” of the clan, had some down time, Benzoate was sending us to the Palace of the Ancients. It was a tribal tradition to send boys there as a rite of passage, so we knew something of it – its location being the most important at the moment – but also that it held artifacts of The Ancients.

Off we trudged to the Gorge of the Dead Worm and scaled the western edge to find the Arrow of the Ancients that would take us to the Enters and from there into the Palace. There, lying in the shadows was the massive metal Worm for which the gorge was named. We were tempted to climb down to investigate, but Frictos used his magic speaking device to consult with Benzoate who told us to forge ahead (Doug’s character had a communicator but no matching one, so he would “communicate” with our chief, who did not have a communicator, to determine what to do on occasion).

The Arrow was not so much a road as a straight path with these strange metal stands that stood about a meter and a half in height and were capped in a u-shaped manner (think mini American football goal posts). They were pretty consistent, though they did change in height as the terrain changed, thus keeping their tops on a straight and level path. We followed the Arrow until we finally came upon The Enters, a dark cave into which the metal rod path led. I fired up a torch and into it we delved…

After a few dozen meters of trudging into the wide cave, we noticed that the metal stands seemed to veer slightly to the right, and that the slight echoes seemed to indicate a larger area ahead. Sure enough,  we soon came upon stair case on the left the led to an open cavern of sorts, complete with pillars and a yellow line painted on the floor along the edge of the raised area (think underground railway station – because that’s what it was). There were large planters that contained massive albino killer plants with shooting thorns.

After some positioning and an initial foray against the grotesque horrors, Vico finally decided to rush in. the energy mace, as expected, dealt serious pain, smashing the creature into a pulpy mess. At which point, while raising his weapon to rush the second planter, Vico’s narcolepsy (with a whopping 2% chance) kicked in…and he crashed to the floor, asleep.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the rest of the group, our fearless leader, Frictose, had wandered off towards a darkened opening strewn with small bits and pieces of the see-through metal the Ancients used. After killing the remaining creatures and slapping the shit out of Vico to wake him up, the rest of the group noticed Frictose’s absence. One of the other character’s mutation let us know there was something nasty in the darkened corner in which Frictose was last seen, so off we went. On the ground just beyond the once-upon-a-time-store-window lay Frictose, his mouth and nose glowing with a bright blue fluid substance.

Vico immediately leaped into the room to try and aid his companion, only to have the bright blue icy fluid quickly extricate itself from Frictose and hurl itself at Vico’s face. Vico dodged just in time as Skell let loose a blast from his energy weapon – just missing Vico but hitting the creature. Vico was saved; but alas! Frictose was no more – felled by a slurpee.

Vico stripped the body of anything useful, as well as the communicator, and off we went, following the sense of radioactive mutations one of the characters could pick up. Past a door and down a hall we came upon small curved half wall (think reception desk) that filled a portion of the next corner. Behind it were three humanoid creature with crossbows. Without much in the way of ranged weapons – at least not many charges in them – Vico decided to rush them and let the energy mace have its way with them. Once again, the Intuitive mutation paid off and soon the opponents were so much slime on the walls and floor…at which point the GM reminded me he was keeping track of how many charges were being used. Heh.

At this point we decided to call it a night. It was after midnight, and many of those involved had been traveling for a lot longer than the 45 minutes it took me to get to Lake Geneva; not to mention that everyone had busy days ahead tomorrow.

So there you have it. This is the kind of thing that makes GaryCon so special for me. The convention hadn’t even officially started. I had planned nothing for Wednesday night other than perhaps catching up with folks over a couple of beers. And yet here it was, 12:30 AM, and I was finishing up playing in a game I hadn’t played in 30 years with some new friends. That is why GaryCon rocks.

Oh…and I found out later that we are looking to now make this game a yearly event – that is, we’ll keep the same characters and next year on Wednesday night we shall continue their adventures in the Palace of the Ancients.

Many Kudos to Michael Curtis who ran the game and did a fantastic job of making the unfamiliar easy and had a great way of describing the scenes in a way that made something so familiar seem wonderful and mysterious. Thanks to Doug Kovacs who invited me to play and who made Frictose so funny. And thanks to the folks who let me play and who I hope to see next year.

Gary Con V - Thanks

I’m starting with this aspect because knowing me I’ll fizzle out in posting about GaryCon and this is too important to leave until the end…only to get left out due to my own laziness.

Thank you.

Thank you Chris and Luke and Dale. You have created a convention and atmosphere that is second to none. I am thrilled to bring my family every year. If I had one convention a year to go to from this day forward, it would be this one.

Thank you to all the volunteers who setup, breakdown, and in between try their very best to make everything run smoothly. Those who bring drinks and snacks to the people running games so the rest of us can enjoy playing; those who help registration and those who sort out souvenirs; those who spent countless hours figuring out how to get us places to play…it may not be said as much as it should, but thank you.

To the hotel staff who did a fine job and seemed to be all over the place this year…Thanks! And Well Done!

Thanks to all the people who ran games…for me special shouts out to Michael Curtis who ran three of the seven games in which I played; to Tavis Allison who came to this convention, even though he had recently-born twins at home and a broken ankle, because he made the commitment to do so and then ran Night of the Walking Wet well into Sunday morning when he had a hell of a travel day to follow; and to all those that were so kind in running games in which my kids played – they had a blast.

Thanks to all the other attendees who, year after year, are so nice and friendly and welcoming that my kids have said repeatedly, “Everyone here is so nice.”

Last, but never least, thanks to my lovely wife who puts up with this nonsense every year and supports it so much that we’re already planning next year. She truly is one in a million.

The Stickmen of Arosa

I've been writing down ideas for a world (toying with calling it The Broken Earth) in which I would like to run a DCC campaign or two (maybe one for the kids and another for a group). The binder is getting full and I wanted to start to get something out here in case folks have ideas/feedback/etc.

There will be no particular order - for example, this one is one of the more recent jottings...

The Stickmen of Arosa

• Think tiny ents, though more humanish than tree...
• Each wudj, or individual, is a short, thin humanoid with narrow shoulders, long limbs, long, thin fingers and knee joints that are reverse of most bipedal creatures.
• The skin of the wudj is bark-like, though more soft and flexible/pliable.
• Nobody knows if there are males or females or how they reproduce.
• Each brundle is made up of 10 – 40 wudj.
• Each brundle of wudj is essentially a kind of hive-mind of a single tree.
• Each wudj "worships" the tree with which it is associated.
• All wudj of a brundle form a kind of commune.
• Wudj warriors carry long sharpened sticks, the equivalent of spears.
• some carry one in each hand, two-weapon fighting.
• The specific coloring and look of a brundle is determined by the species of tree the brundle "worships".

Even here you can see how I have some ideas still being worked through. For example, is it a hive mind, a commune, or worship...or something that somehow blends the three?

In this case, I've even asked my nephew to throw some drawings together based on the above. We'll see...

(As a side note, I originally wrote most of this post around Christmas but the holidays then got in the way of finishing.)