I’m always advocating attendance at game conventions, especially the ones in your home state, or even in the town where you live.
Today’s podcast talks about UCon and Gamehole Con, and shares links to websites that list known conventions. I include the past two posts on the blog, plus one new to me site. If you know about a convention listing site not listed below, please let me know.
I attended all four days of the expanded Gamehole Con. This year, expansion to a 4 day convention that started on Thursday night was a test. As I arrived to pick up my badge and tickets, I saw Alex Kammer out front. I greeted him and he was trying to work out what was the only problem they had being ready for the con. Some laptops hadn’t been delivered that they would need for controlling some monitors the next day. Very minor. He was very calm and collected. He said that sign ups for Thursday this year were so strong, that it was already decided that they are now a four day con.
I ran three games and signed up to play in three, but only got into two of them. I kept my schedule fairly light. I went prepared to possibly run pick up games, or get into some. I enjoyed just visiting with different people, and enjoying watching people having fun. The food trucks were excellent. I favored the taco truck. Their burritos are awesome! The same truck as last year. I believe they are all the same ones as last year. I tried them all last year, and all were good.
One cool thing is if you buy the soda cup, that may just be for GM’s, I don’t recall, they had two soda fountains set up with free self-serve refills. Since I ran official games, I got to use the GM/Vendor lounge. There was water, coffee, snacks, and a few tables with chairs.
Gangbusters – Thursday
Thursday I ran Gangbusters – Mark Hunt’s new variation that is compatible with the original. (I proofread the current version of the rules he’s working on, and let that inform how I ran the game.) I ran a scenario Mark wrote, called The Con Game. A fitting double meaning, as there was a con involved in the scenario. I had 4 pregens from Mark, and made 4 more since I signed up to run for 8 players. The only issue that I encountered were that they varied from the templates, and it was the second session group that pointed it out to me. I’ll fix it when I run this in almost two weeks at Ucon in Ann Arbor. I made up maps for the locations, just squares on the provided Chessex battlemats, with indicators for doors, stairs, streets, alleys, and vehicles.
I had 5 players most of whom had not played it or not since back in the day. They were quite trigger happy as they shot a couple of the fleeing customers at the speakeasy they raided at the beginning of the session. I had them pick a number between 1 and 15 and for the first I counted out from the front of the list of templates and the rookie cop gravely wounded Claude Arbukle, the beloved vaudeville star. One of the FBI agents on the task force shot another. Counting from the back of the templates, he severely wounded John Marlow, a private investigator. When he found Marlow had a gun in a shoulder holster, he put it in the hand of the unconscious Marlow.
The rookie cop got fired for shooting the beloved Arbuckle, it was all over the papers. The FBI agent who shot Marlow rolled his presence to convince the station chief to take on the rookie cop as a emergency provisional agent, and kept the former rookie cop out of jail. Everyone wondered when they’d get Tommy guns. They finally got enough evidence to do a final raid, and then one of the players got a Thompson. The party gave it to the player with the highest agility. They took out the bad guys, and solved the case. The rookie cop got shot up and narrowly avoided death. I think a couple other characters in that session had minor wounds.
Gangbusters – Friday
Friday night I ran The Con Game again, this time with seven players. They fired into the ceiling at the speakeasy raid, but this time I threw in some hoodlums coming out of the basement leading into the alley. One with a chopper and the other a .38. They killed the crooks, so they didn’t learn anything from them. Again, they wanted access to Thompsons, but until they got to the last location, didn’t have anything to warrant their distribution. Being a bigger group, I put more gunmen in the location and let the players have two Thompsons. They had a different plan, but got spotted on their approach. In the end, the players prevailed. I believe 3 were seriously wounded, and one received a kill shot but made his luck check to have 1 HP. He had another kill shot and failed his luck check, so 1 kill.
I ran both sessions with a simplified combat method. Roll to hit, then roll a d10. 1 = minor wound, 10 = dead. So I let players take up to two 4s or 5s for damage before death. I also used the rule that if they take damage equal to half or more of their HP, they will die without getting to a hospital within the day. In both sessions everyone had fun, and I recall that in the second session there were comments that they liked how fast the combat went.
I had a lot of fun with both sessions and enjoyed how each group had their own approach to solving the case. Until the last Gary Con, I had not played Gangbusters for 30+ years. I don’t believe I ever ran it back in the day. I don’t think we played it very often. So Thursday was the first time I ran Gangbusters. I didn’t find it difficult, since I have ran lots of other games.
I started off explaining the stats, punching score, hit points, and that one can take twice the HP in bruise damage. There weren’t any real questions. All the players had roleplaying experience. I had a blast and enjoyed the surprises and laughs from the players’ actions. I showed off my second round of Mark’s box set, and let everyone take a look. Some thought it might be from the Kickstarter, so I explained that it hasn’t gotten to the point of Kickstarting yet. I did hold up the 100 pages of the current rules I printed using my suggested edits. I only had to refer to them in the first session to figure out who the wounded speakeasy customers were. Also, I clarified the damage rule using the d10.
Saturday night I ran a weird WWII scenario I developed called The Kiel Experiment, using The Front – also by Mark Hunt, based on The Black Hack. I first ran that scenario last November at Ucon for at least ten people, since several GMs were laid low by the flu. Saturday night I only had two show of the four that were signed up. I gave them each two PCs that they rolled up. The one with leadership, I let roll a d10 and get 4 NPC soldiers to help out. The players were a father and son. To set the mood, I asked if they had seen The Philadelphia Experiment – they had not. So I had to explain it very briefly, and that this scenario was my take on the German version. They really enjoyed the session, and since there were only two of them, they finished it in two hours. The next day, the father saw me in passing and let me know that they looked up The Philadelphia Experiment the night before and watched the first ten or fifteen minutes, and really liked it. My bad – I forgot to take a picture of the players at the table.
MCC Friday
Friday morning I played a 0 level funnel of MCC (Mutant Crawl Classic) with Jim Wampler. It was a lot of fun. I was amazed – I’ve never had all 4 characters survive a funnel. Out of 7 players, 5 had no deaths. One person lost two and another lost one of their characters. We only got to the penultimate boss monster. It is basically Gamma World with DCC rules. Of course, with DCC type rules, it gets really interesting. We got an MCC button and a pick from a bag of pewter minis based on the original Ral Partha Gamma world minis. I got a rabbit with a submachine gun.
MCC Satruday
Saturday morning I played a 1st level MCC adventure, again with Jim Wampler. Again we got an MCC badge and a pick from the minis. My character was a mutant with bat ears that gave him echo location. He had a delusion that his dazer gun talked to him, so I had fun with that. His last power was the ability to control anything with iron in it, i.e. magnetism. Another player was way into roleplaying, he said, “That’s my superpower.” He plaid a mutant plant, basically a tree person, that he named Larch. He was in character and wow, I would play with him again!
We got transported away and these robot “gods” wanted us to retrieve an object. The night before they sent us off, each of us had a visitation from a different one, promising us even more gifts if we gave the item directly to them. Jim took each of us into the hall, so no one else knew what we knew. I have never been in that situation, so I decided, “This is a con, I’m going to go for it.” We finally got to where we could see the object. As soon as Jim was done describing it, I said, “I’m going to run and grab it.” The whole table was a bit surprised I did that. Two other players tried to intervene. One rolled a 1 trying to grab my beloved dazer since my hands were full with the object. Another tired to shoot me with his dazer, and rolled a one. I was amazed and had a good laugh at my luck. I then “spell burned” to use my control ferrous metal, and rolled high enough that I go the maximum result. My manifestation was that I was cold to the touch, and with the max result, I looked metallic and could control any number of objects. (In hindsight, I could have really betrayed the party and just killed them all….) I crushed the guy’s dazer and threw him across the room. We were then transported back, and I tried to run towards the “god” who promised me wealth and power. The other gods and their gated in minions and the rest of the party rolled initiative. I rolled a nine and the player on my left rolled a 20 for initiative. I laughed. He then declared he would use telekinesis to take the object from me, with spellburn. He then rolled a second nat 20! My ability to resist was ruined as my strength was weakened by my prior effort. My magnetic control only lasts 1 round per level. Being 1st level, I blew my chances. He then sent the object to the “god” he was working for. He lived and got all the power and riches and the rest of us were rended by demons. I had a great Magneto impression, but it wasn’t good enough. I had a blast being the betrayer who was himself betrayed. What a way to go!
How D&D Changed the World
Friday night I sat in on a seminar by Michael Witwer (Empire of Imagination – AFF), and Jon Peterson (Playing At the World – AFF), and hosted by David Ewalt (Of Dice and Men – AFF) – How D&D Changed The World. It was a great seminar. One participant Christoph, is from Germany, now living in the U.S. He asked about the non-North American aspect of RPGs & D&D. Jon Peterson immediately had answers and talked about games Christoph had not heard of. I got a chance to visit with Christoph afterwards, and more later on Sunday. It is pretty obvious that without D&D computer RPGs wouldn’t exist, or not with levels and hit points. All of those in the entertainment industry who were influenced by D&D, etc. make it seem that we are in a post D&D world, since we can’t avoid mentioning it, and those who never played it know what we mean by many terms.
I was nice to visit for a bit with Michael, but being a busy man with a young family, was only there for the day. Jon meets so many people, I’m not sure he recalled meeting me at Gary Con in the spring. I met David for the first time. He is the only one of the three that I don’t have his book. I’ll have to correct that once I get through Jon’s tome. (My backlog is far too large….)
I also spoke with Pat Kilbane a couple of times, and he is making progress on the D&D History Project documentary. I back the Patreon and last week he showed us a portion of the trailer. All I can say is, it’s cool and I can’t wait for more! I am humbled that he thanks me for my support every time I comment online, or each time we are at a con. I do far more getting the word out than I do finance wise. If you can help out, join the Patreon. The interviews are done, it is down to shooting stills,finding some historical footage, and then the editing.
Stephen Chenault Signing My C&C PHB
Stephen & I with My C&C PHB
One of the guys I game with on Roll20 backed the latest Troll Lord Games Kickstarter and got each of us a C&C PHB. I asked Stephen Chenault to autograph it. I told the guys last Wednesday night that I would. Stephen is very gracious, and easily agreed to do so and pose for a picture.
Satine Ruty & Me
Sunday, I didn’t get the game I wanted. I signed up for Top Secret: NWO by Merle Rasmussen, and ran by him, but didn’t win a spot. I was going to sign up for D&D, but I offered to give Ruty and Satine a ride from their hotel to the con. We were staying at the same hotel. So I got to visit a bit more with them. I offered them a ride to the airport so they didn’t need an Uber, and got them there with just enough time to catch their flight. I did actually get to finish a conversation with Satine Thursday night instead of being interrupted by people walking up wanting to talk to her, etc. I didn’t get to talk much with Ruty. They are both a whirlwind of activity. Satine mentioned a couple of things I don’t think I can talk about. She hinted at more awesomeness to come in 2018. I have no specifics, that all she said.
The dates for Gamehole Con 2018 are November 7-11. The website has already been updated for 2018. Alex and crew are on top of things, and the preparations for next year have already begun. I have been told that UCon in Ann Arbor, MI is the same weekend next year. This is out of control for both conventions as they are dependent on the college football schedule. This affects at least three of the regular cons I attend. If they are the same weekend, I will be attending UCon, since it is only two hours away, and in the same state.
I built the skeletons for four posts about my experience at Gamehole Con IV last year, but I never posted it. Rather than trash all the posts, I consolidated them into one post. I wanted to post it for memories to look back on.
I highly recommend Gamehole Con. It is well organized and well ran. the staff is very helpful. The venue is laid out and that was used in a way that made sense.
I only had minor niggles for complaints, none of which caused any problems.
I am signed up to run games at Gamehole Con V, November 2-5, 2017 in Madison, WI.
So now let’s get to my write up for last year’s GHC:
Day 0
I arrived, checked out the venue, found will call and picked up my stuff, and got settled at my hotel. I didn’t get the hotel on site, but the next nearest hotel. It was quite a distance, too far to walk with all the books I brought to get signed.
Day 1
I had 3 games:
Fri 10 AM – A Stay at the Warden Hotel x 1 Metamorphosis Alpha with Jim Ward himself!
Fri 02 PM – DGS Presents: One In the Gun, Four On the Floor x 1
Fri 08 PM – Mythus Tower with Bill Webb x 1 Swords & Wizardry
A Stay at the Warden Hotel – Jim Ward This was AWESOME! Jim is a quiet and easy going guy. However, he is not a GM to challenge. He tells you what you can do, and if you try to push it, you can do one or more less than the first thing he said. Erol Otus showed up and Jim said, “Ah yes, Mr. Otus will be your illustrious captain!” Erols eyes got big, he was hoping to show up and just play. He did fine, but alas, died. He is very cool! (I didn’t have the books with me I wanted him to sign! I didn’t realize there was an autograph table with a schedule until the last day when I had walked by the sign multiple times. I just had too much to take in, and kept running into friends to catch up with.)
Of course most of us died, including me. Here’s a picture of Jim tearing up my character sheet. Two players made it to the end and got limited edition MA minis.
This was a Gamma World 2e game ran by +Chad Parish himself. I had met Chad at Gary Con 8 in the spring, so we knew each other a bit. It was a fun game. During a brake we got to talking and he mentioned that he was from a small town in Missouri. I asked the name, he said, “Oh, you’ve never heard of it, it’s really small.” I said, “I grew up in Missouri and know a lot of people from all over Missouri, and know a lot of places.” He humored me, and said the name of the town. I rattled off the zip code, (There are actually four towns in Missouri with that name, but the one where I grew up is the one with a zip code.) He said, “Panther?” I said, “Orange & Black?” He then said, “Do you know Robert Hamilton?” I held up my name tag. “Are you related to Robert Hamilton?” “He’s my brother.” “He;s like the best DM ever!” I said, “I know right?” It turns out that I was about 7 years ahead of him in school, thus the reason I didn’t know him. That was very odd.
Chad and I were telling that story the rest of the con and for a while after. Chad even shared it on an episode of the DGS Podcast.
Chad had another interesting encounter, it turns out his father is from the same town +Stephen Chenault is from in Arkansas.
Mythus Tower with +Bill Webb – Swords & Wizardry – I played in a Day 0 pick up game and a regular game with Bill at Ucon last year, and had a lot of fun. I have a dwarf character that survived that session that he said I can use in any game he runs. (He might get tired of me, since next weekend at UCon, I signed up for another of his games.) Unfortunately, that dwarf died so the next game I play will be a new 1st level character.
Day 2
I had two games I signed up for:
Sat 10 AM – The Cave of Wisdom AD&D 1e with +Luke Gygax as DM. This was a great game. A player not knowing to not throw fireball underground killed half the party, so we had a delay while some new characters were rolled.
The only thing I didn’t like about this game is that autograph seekers came up and interrupted the game. The same thing happened in Jim Ward’s MA game. I wait for a break or between game time to get autographs. I don’t care if the GM says it’s OK. I will NOT be one of those who interferes with the fun of others.
Sat 06 PM – Gaming & BS Presents: Relagul’s Quest & The Secret Temple of Bast This was an AD&D game ran by +Nicholas Abruzzo. It was an interesting game with higher level pre-gens. A few interesting concepts. There was a castle model that involved a sheet to hide an interesting secret. I’m not much for terrain and models, but this fit the GM’s style and the tone of the game. He also had some assistants portray some NPC wererats in full costume.
Day 3
I had signed up for two games on Sunday, but one got cancelled.
Sun 10 AM – Escape From The Purple Planet. It was supposed to be ran by Jon Hershberger, but we had a woman, whose name I can’t find. She did a great job running the game. The players came together, and none of us had played this one, but we managed to make the right decisions and got done an hour early. I know I wasn’t disappointed. I don’t think anyone else was either.
In yesterday’s post, I wrote about the most unexpected coincidence. Today I write about another unexpected thing that happened on Sunday.
On Sunday, I had a game of DCC’s Excape from the Purple Planet from 10 am to 2 pm. I was in a group of experienced players and we all made the right choices and were done in an hour and a half.
I went downstairs to see what was going on, and I ran into Michael Witwer, author of Empire of Imagination. I did a mini review here. Michael and I first met back at Gary Con 8 in March. I wrote about how I ended up being the only person present for his presentation Genesis: Unexpected Journey of Gary Gygax.
Michael was at the autograph table outside the vendor hall. He was talking to a couple of people. Michael just finished talking about Empire of Imagination. Then mentioned his next project: opening day at Disney Land.
That was my queue. When the people he was talking to left, we exchanged pleasantries and then I said, “I have to tell you this because you mentioned Disney.”
My paternal grandmother was a first cousin of Disney’s chief sculptor, Blaine Gibson. My grandmother’s generation, my father’s generation, and many of my own first cousins were all born in the same town. I went into detail about my cousin.
Michael then said, “That’s incredible, I just finished reading about him the other day.” He then pulled out his book and showed me all the underlining about Blaine. “Can I contact you later for some background?” I had an article when Blaine died in July, 2015.
I said, “Sure! I can probably get you in touch with his son.”
Michael then signed a few more books and then started making preparations to leave. He was only there for a short time. If my game had not wrapped early, I would not have ran into him.
As Michael and I were approaching saying goodbye, +Chad Parrish, of Dead Games Society, walks out of the vendor hall, and I call him over and introduce the two of them. Of course, we had to tell the story of being from the same town. Then Michael and I share the Disney connection. Chad then says he wants Michael on his podcast, and they exchange contact information. Michael and Chad are both in different suburbs of Chicago, so they will be getting together for that podcast soon.
Now I just need to figure out how to monetize this newfound role as a broker of information/connections….
By way of explanation (and burying the lede): I had hoped to be able to do a running blog post for each day of Gamehole Con, unfortunately, the available WiFi was not up to the task. I could not even stay connected to my blog long enough to get to the drafts using my cell. I’ll do a wrap up post later today.
On Friday, after dying in Jim Ward’s Metamorphosis Alpha game, I had a Gamma World 2e game with +Chad Parrish of the Dead Games Society podcast.
Chad also does a podcast with +Satine Phoenix, Gameschool, under the new TSR. (See here for all of the TSR Podcast Network Podcasts.) I write for Multiverse, which is also part of the new TSR. Chad and I met back in March, at Gary Con 8.
At one point either before we started or after a break, he mentioned to another player at the table that he went to the University of Missouri. My ears perked up at that, and I asked him if he was from Missouri.
Chad said, “Yes, but it’s a small town, you’ve probably never heard of it.”
I replied, “That’s OK, just tell me the name.” (I have lived in 6 different places in 4 different parts of the state, and driven through a lot of other places, and know people from small towns all over the state. So I’m thinking I might know the name of the town.)
Chad said, “OK, it’s a small town called Oak Grove.”
My eyes got big, I said, “Jackson County?” (There are at least 4 towns in Missouri with the name, the one I’m from is the only one with a zip code.)
“Yes.”
“[zip code]?” “Yes”
He says, “Panthers?”
I say, “Orange and black?”
“Yes.”
Then Chad says, “Do you know the Hamiltons?”
I just hold up my name badge.
Chad almost jumped out of his seat and says, “No way, you’re Robert Hamilton’s brother?”
My turn to say, “Yes.” “He’s the older of my two brothers.”
Chad says, “Robert Hamilton! He’s like the best DM ever!”
I said, “I know, right?”
It turns out that Chad was seven years behind me in school. My brother Robert and I are only ten months apart, and went through school in the same grade. I didn’t know Chad because after graduation, I went off to college and wasn’t around.
When he was in middle school, Chad tried to get someone from my youngest brother’s class, Michael, to get him into Robert’s game. So Michael took this 13/14 year old kid over to my parent’s house (I can only imagine the interaction with my father, who did the whole dad thing to anyone who stopped by.) Robert would have been like 20 or 21.
Michael told Chad he didn’t get in because Robert said he was, “Kind of a spaz.” I can just see it now.
I confirmed that Robert is still running the same campaign from back then, just not as often. If we manage to coordinate our schedules we still play.
Chad was telling this story to everyone at the con, I did too.
Chad had a similar thing happen later that same day. He was talking to Steven Chenault of Troll Lord Games, and it turns out that Chad’s father is from the same town where Steven is from. I was amazed something like that happened once to me, I can’t imagine having two such instances on the same day at a convention.
I had met Steven and mentioned to him that I was the one from his hometown, so we talked about the oddity of that for a bit.
After all these years, Chad still wants to play in a Hamilton’s D&D game. I tried to get him to let me pull together a game Sunday afternoon, but he had to leave before my Sunday morning game finished. So he’s talking about some Roll20 action with some DGS fans and himself.
I made the decision to go to Gamehole Con for the first time.
I am looking forward to all the games. I’m even a bit anxious to start the five hour drive.
If I have the bars/wifi access, I’ll attempt some live posting via Twitter and Periscope. I’m sure Twitter will be easy, since it’s just a few characters.
I’ll do a wrap up post for each day here on the blog.
GHC has rented the conference rooms in the two nearby hotels to accommodate 24 hour open gaming. I don’t know if they are the only con to do that, but for those who are too pumped to sleep, they have something to do besides channel surf in the wee hours.
Well, time to load up the car and hit the road. I want to be there in time for will call so I can get my stuff before my first game and not have to rush in the morning.
Well, I did it. I got registered for games at Gamehole Con. I didn’t pay attention and tried to do too many special events, so I didn’t get the Hobby Shop Dungeon. Well, maybe at GaryCon….
The list I have will keep me booked solid all day Friday from 10 am to midnight. I probably better make sure I’m well rested before then…..
Saturday I’ll be going from 10 am to midnight again with two games, but with a two hour break between them.
Sunday I’m in in two games from 10 am to 4 pm.
I thought about bringing stuff to run impromptu games, but not sure when I’d fit that in.
Here’s what I’m signed up for below. I hope I get to interact with those I so far only know from online. (With affiliate links to games at DriveThruRPG.)
Fri 02 PM – DGS Presents: One In the Gun, Four On the Floor – 2nd Ed Gamma World with Chad Parish (I only ever played 1st edition. I have a copy of 2nd edition I picked up a while back, will have to look it over. I can compare to a 1st edition copy I picked up.)
Fri 08 PM – Mythus Tower – Swords & Wizardry with Bill Webb (I played in Bill Web’s game at UCon last year and have a dwarf character he said can be used in any of his games, I just need to find it….)
Sat 10 AM – The Cave of Wisdom – AD&D with Luke Gygax
Sat 06 PM – Gaming & BS Presents: Relagul’s Quest & The Secret Temple of Bast – AD&D with Nicholas Abruzzo
