It's the day before prereg opens, when all of us kiddies will get the group rate in the mail once we shell out our hard-earned ducats.

The Cantebury Hotel at Hotels.com right now is running a special. If you're staying more than 3 nights, it's 35% off. Near $200 rooms are going for about $120 right now - and the place is connected to the Convention Center.

Food for thought, anyway. I don't know if the group rate can top that.

My wife and I usually stay at a B&B right down the road from the center (2 miles / 3.22 km). And if I remember right it was right around $300 for 4 nights.

This year it looks like PCGen will be having a booth so I might end up with a room in the exhibitor's block.

BTW we should have a bit more organization this year for the meet & greet at Claddagh's

Should we all just meet in the back and take it over?

I have a fairly decent shot at making the meet & greet this year. I'll be checking in Wednesday night, leaving Monday morning.

I'll be there again.

My buddies and I got our room a couple months ago. I got tired of their servers locking up on the first day of reserving group-rate hotel rooms, only to wind up a couple miles from the convention center, yadda yadda yadda. Distance to the con wouldn't be so bad if so many of us weren't wargamers and RPGers, with so, so, much crap to carry from game to game. After one of my best friends had a case full of 40k minis walk away (while we were playing something else), we make a point of going to and from the hotel room every chance we get, to stow our stuff. The extra couple bucks in order to get a close room, and get it early, is worth it, to us.

Lookin' forward to it, though, for sure! After missing last year, it'll be great to be back for 2011. The hard part's gonna be trying to see how many of my favorite games I can get into in just four teensy little days.

Quoted for Truth.

Having a locking door with a bed within walking distance of the Con is well, well worth the price.

Ahh yes. Tis that time of the year again. Badge on order.

I'll be at the Meet and Greet again as well.

Looking forward to the game demo extravaganza this year. Devoting at least a day to it, possibly two. Still not sure what I'll sign up for gamewise, but I'm gonna try to finish up an arc to run involving the Auchwitz information and run it while I'm there for some pals.

No kidding. As much as I like SR, the opportunities for playing NEW games (often with the actual game designers running it) tend to dwarf playing a game that I've got a regularly scheduled gaming group for.

That said, I'm running 2 homebrew Shadowrun events already submitted and will be annoying spamming this forum with once event registration begins.

Color me intrigued. I can probably pull together a four-man team. Going to see if I can get in on some Paranoia this year as well.

Mmmmaaaaybe even get an Eclipse Phase character made. Ve shall see.

Did I just hear you allude to dragging me into something?

Ha ha! Yes you did.

My general rule of thumb has been to shoot for a 50/50 split. I could reliably be counted on to snag new Warmachine/Hordes stuff (since it was launching then and there), I'd always try to get into a game or two of a reliable old system I know I love, and I'd always try to sling some dice and play stompy robot Battletechy goodness...but then I also tried to jump into some random homebrewed LARP from a setting I like (two Shadowrun, one Serenity, so far), and to visit demos that I saw going on, and to make myself sit down and play a few hours of a new wargame or RPG.

On the one hand, you always want to play games you dig, especially if it means you get to play those games with folks that write the books, folks you know from forums, and that sort of awesome stuff. On the other...dude, it's Gencon. Where else you gonna get this many great chances to try something new?!

Wait? People have time to game at Gen Con???

Even for those brief, blissful couple years when I just was playing Tourist at the con, I still played maybe one or two games the entire weekend

Bull

Weirdo.

Heh. Yeah, I know. I'm a social butterfly though, so to speak. A very large, ugly, orkish butterfly, but still... Probably too many years stuck running things, honestly. There's never enoughh time to see everything, see everyone, let alone get to hang out with everyone I want to. Every year I leave the con regretting the fact that I only saw a bunch of people fleetingly, that I barely talked to some folks, etc. And hell, some years I never even get the chance to walk the entire dealer hall. Last year I was parked behind the Demo Table so damn much, I only got to wander about half the hall.

I've just made too many friends at the con over the years, and even when I'm not tied up with running events all day, there's still not enough time to go and see everything.

Bull

We definitely need to get a Dumpshock meet n' greet thing going. I was going to the card get together we had a few years back, but ended up with a *very* tired significant other who just wanted to sleep. So I'm hoping that this year - now that I'm living in Kentucky - there'll be an opportunity for me to meet some of you fine folks. I swear, I don't bite!

And let me be a good buddy and recommend that if you haven't heard of Kentucky Fried Gamer's Wednesday Gaming At the Ram, well, now I'm telling you about it. Organized by the good folks of the KFG (of which we are friends and members of, my fiance and I) we basically take over the backrooms of the Ram and spend all of Wednesday playing random board and card and roleplaying games. There's going to be some good events coming up; a fellow Lexington-ian friend of ours is going to be running a zombie themed Dukes of Hazzard game that I'm looking forward to.

I'm hoping that's a tad better than the last type of gathering like that I went to last year. Red Dragon Inn took over one of the restaraunts in the...Mariott I think, only the staff took it as an excuse to be total a-holes and overcharge us for no service and bad food.

We usually do the Claddagh on Wednesday, but unfrotunatly we';ve thus far been unable to get them to "Reserve" us a section or anything.

How crowded does the Ram get? The Meet n Greet tends to be a chance to relax, hang out, and chat and get to know each other before the craziness and gaming of the con starts, so I'm hesitant to try doing something like this at an actual gaming event.

Goddamned Rolando.

Ram gaming tends to be very casual, if a little noisy. But if you like just coming in, putting your stuff down, and messing around with some good natured folks, it's a good time. Also, the staff and crew seem to be very happy and excited to have them all there, and I've never heard about the folks in charge charging too much. So. Like I said, it's just a casual get together to get some gaming going on Wednesdays.

What about a Dumpshock meet n' greet though, Bull? Gonna kick those of us that have mebbe protested too loudly on here out?

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu

I know what you mean Bull, the I'm a very social person at Con's also. And for the last couple of years I've been running the booth for PCGen, then last year we ran into some issues (mainly lack of some volunteer's to help the booth, and the application for the booth got messed up by the fax) and I just wandered around trying to figure out what to do with myself.

BTW, we're going to have a booth again this year. I'll be at the meet & greet , but stop by and say hi.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/rpg-industry-...n-con-year.html

Yet another thread I killed

I'm sure it'll pick back up in another few months.

I've got my passes for Gencon, My hotel I reserved a couple months ago, and I"m hopefully gonna be down there in time Wed for the M&G. It was nice meeting some of you last year, and this year hopefully we can all get an area together instead of being spread out all over the place.

If, by the way, Bull wants to bring those Shadowrun decks he had last year...

I'll be there because it's only a few hours drive away! I can go to Gencon and Origins this year! Yayyyy!

Think we'll only be spending one night though. Money is still, unfortunately, tight

Speaking of which...a buddy of mine recently uncovered a trove of old gaming goodies that he'd packed up once upon a time and largely forgotten about (with law school, getting married, adopting a kiddo, all kinds of busy stuff) -- and when he found some Shadowrun cards, he ended up making them a "Welcome to Texas" gift to me. I've got a couple starter decks and a couple boosters, and no idea what the heck to do with them (besides enjoy the artwork, so far).

I'll try to remember to haul 'em off to Indy with me this year, to see about getting in a game or two.

Take 'em off your hands for a good price

Unless you don't wanna. Then I'll just use 'em at the meet

As to the meet and greet did we want to find another location? I had no real complaint about Cladaugh's from a food or drinks perspective but the layout was less then wonderful for a large group.

The problem is finding someplace close to downtown that we can make a nebulous reservation for. Most of the places downtown don't do reservations during large events like this.

Probably for very good reasons. We can't all remember to be good ambassadors..

Nah, I'd prefer not to just casually sell a gift, y'know?

Eh, it was said sarcastically with a hint of honesty No worries

I shall be attending my first gencon this year. (Finally!) Now that I've got the cash and the car to take me there. I've only attended some local smaller michigan cons. Any tips or pointers? Aside fromt he simple stuff, get passes early, ect. And if the meet n greet is still going on, I'd love to meet the (in)famous dumpshock members.

Get good walking shoes. Don't have a huge backpack.

Don't be late to a True Dungeon Event.

There's a couple of different philosophies on registering for events:

Option 1: Register yourself for events from 8am to midnight (or whenever you sleep), and if you don't feel like going to something, skip it.
Option 2: Register only for stuff you REALLY want to do, and just wing it, i.e. get into pick-up games, or just wander the vendor-halls.
Option 3: Somewhere between 1 and 2


Option 1 works as tickets are rather cheap - it's usually $1 per hour for an event. Skipping an event means you lose-out on $4. No big whoop.
Option 2 works great for people who are meeting big groups of folks who tend to run pick-up games. My wife did this with her AmberMUSH group when she went to GenCon.

This from someone whose first Gencon was in Kenosha, Wisconsin, but hasn't gone the last few years:

1) You can play in slots from 8 am to midnight 3 days and Sunday till 4pm. Don't. Give yourself breaks.. for eating, resting, shopping, kanoodling... whatever. Your inclination the first time is to go all out. Don't.

My buddy and I used to keep Saturday night free to go out drinking. In Milwaukee there were The Safe House and Bogie's. Don't know about Indianapolis. Then we played RPGA finals hung over on Sunday morning, FTW.

1-2-3 is a basic rule: 1 shower a day, 2 meals a day, 3 hours of sleep a day. I vote for more on the last one.

2) Make time to meet friends. We used to have a group that would schedule the same event on the second slot on Thursday, and all play together. 3 different nationalities making a team for 6 or 7 years in a row.

Get to know the faces behind the icons.

3) However much money you budgeted, you will dearly want to spend more. No matter how much money you have, the vendors can take it all. Budget and stick to it. Your marriage may depend on it.

4) Every year try something completely different. You never know.

5) Pickup games can be fun. And can make new friends.

6) Carry as little as possible. Count on someone else bringing the suitcase full of manuals.

7) Convention food is expensive and sucks sh*t through a straw. Bring your own and be nourished. And save your money for the vendor's hall.

That's a good start.

No kidding. I found that the food-court in the mall that's attached to the convention-center has reasonably fast service and since there's the usual big-chains, it's usually the same quality level as everywhere else.

The other big strategy is to NOT eat during the peak-times. Don't eat lunch at noon, bring a granola bar, and hold-off on lunch until 2pm or so.

I second (or third) that. The normal meal times also tend to overlap with the times when game slots end, so people flood the restaurants at those times trying to get a "quick" bite before their next event. Just don't carry so much that you get caught with your food in the convention hall. I've never seen it be a problem, but officially the Con has an exclusive contract for concessions with the Convention Center. But a couple of small snacks and a bottle or two in your backpack work fine. If money is tight--or if you don't like paying $2+ for a bottle, or if you don't like what they have--bring a case of soda or water from home and store it in your hotel room. Same goes for anything special you like to eat for snacks.

I'm the guy with the suitcase full of Shadowrun books--but then that's all I've generally done the last two years. But I try very hard to avoid dragging that case through the dealer room--it's crowded enough that the case presents a navigational hazard. If you're playing SR, there's always a set of books somewhere nearby.

If it's a new game you're interested in, check out the dealer's booth, especially if it's a board game. Most dealers run frequent demos of their new games.

I found for my first few years that I would only feel like going to about one event per day. The rest of my time was spent in the dealer room, in a hotel room gaming with friends, or in one of the fine drinking establishments. At the same time, I'd register for a bunch of events and come home with unspent tickets.

Another tip: Don't count on using the ATM at any time late in the con. The banks try to keep them filled, but I've seen some ATMs empty on Saturday. A lot of dealers take plastic, but it's something to keep in mind. It's not as bad as it was in Milwaukee, where the only ATM in the convention center some years would be empty from Friday evening through the end of the con.

I'm also looking forward to the Meet and Greet. I've been to all but one Gen Con in the last decade, but I've never made it to the M&G.

This is one of the best parts of Gen Con. All your gaming friends in the same city at the same time, and everyone's there to have some fun.

Also, a word on the progression of days:

Tuesday is the calm before the storm. If you're staying in Indy, getting in on Tuesday is very convenient.

Wednesday - the hordes arrive, there is -some- free gaming events at the convention-center.

Thursday - First official day of Gen-Con. The vendor-hall opens. Hardcore gaming 24 hours a day

Friday - Hardcore gaming continues.

Saturday - Gamers who didn't take Thurs/Friday off join in the fun. Other gamers are starting to get tired after 2 days of Con-ing. Folks who didn't follow the 1-2-3 rule are starting to become noticeable. By nightfall, the gaming is shifting slightly more towards drinking heavily.

Sunday - Massive hangover. Stumble towards your last game all the way over at Union Station. Realize you don't have your dice. Then realize you actually ATE your dice last night in a drunken dare. Vomit-up your dice. Problem solved. Try to survive until you need to drive/fly/boat home. Wonder if your friends have already posted pictures of you from last-night on Facebook.

Monday - AKA Black Monday. Pray that you took this day off of work. Otherwise, you spend the whole day dreaming of next-year.

We're a bunch of folks who play Shadowrun, and we can't smuggle more than a few granola bars around? I'm disappointed in us.

I'm going to work on at least concealing a Camelbak this year - I have an insulated bag that doubles as my 'doctor's bag' when I'm actually physically IC. That's where the sammiches go.

Thursday is likely to be my major Vendor Room day. Got my federal tax return back and all of a sudden I have substantial money. The trip's already paid for, so now I have a great deal of disposable income to my name.

I'm going to try to get in more games this year. Only did Who's Run and did one Eclipse Phase in which I was a space octopus with a thermite charge (I named it Chekov). Think I'll shoot to get into at least one SR game and possibly the Scramble as well.

There's a "no outside food" policy in place in the convention center... However, I've never really seen it enforced. I know I usually bring along a dozen 32 oz. bottles of Gatorade and a couple boxes of those fruit snack bar thingies, and haul a couple of each around with me every day. We've also had Pizza delivered to the convention center before. I think so long as you're not too overt with things and aren't setting up shop and selling food, no one really cares.

In the gaming halls, we usually try and keep some water bottles on hand for the Shadowrun (and A Time of War) GMs, and plenty of gamers bring along bags of candy, pop, and other snacks for during the game.

And yeah... We need to figure out what we're doing for the meet n greet at some point. I'm a bit busier this year, as I'm back to organizing the events, but still... We'll have to see what we can come up with. I love the Claddagh, and they've been good about putting up with us the last few years, but we haven't been able to get them to accomodate us as far as setting up a section just for us. I'm still open to suggestions if anyone knows someplace that would be willing to set aside space for 2-3 dozen Shadowrunners (we get more people usually, but they filter in and out over the evening).

Bull

Dear lord, please follow the 1-2-3 rule. It is the smartest, smartest rule of any convention.

You will get tired. You will collapse from not eating. You will (sigh) stink. And it's not good for anyone involved. Pace yourself; don't overbook things, and don't go crazy rushing from one place to another to make time for games. It's a convention - it's the country's largest gaming convention - and you're not going to get to do everything you'd like to do. Trust me.

Also, budget like mad; I was proud that at my last Gencon, I spent exactly $125 dollars and still managed to pick up a ton of great stuff. The best stuff isn't necessarily at the publisher's booth. Saving five dollars is saving five dollars - or in my case, ten, and WildFire lost a sale because one of the folk's at their booth my last year was a jerk about me reading the book at their booth (I was off to the side, out of the crowd) and I took my business elsewhere. You are still a consumer at a con, so act like it!

Again, I'll recommend Wednesday Gaming at the Ram Brewery. Free to attend, goes all day, held by some really great friends of mine, needs a Shadowrun GM, because it'll be a lot of fantasy gaming and board games. Unfortunately we may not be able to go this year (I need a frickin' job) or else I'd volunteer. A player in my campaign is talking about running Shadowrum; I'm not sure if / when he's going to do that, but he's also running a twelve hour Ravenloft game sometime that weekend as well (the original version, by Hickman).

There is lots of good food outside of the convention center. If you're not aware of Steak n' Shake, become aware of Steak n' Shake. They have amazing burgers, fries, and shakes. There's lots of other chains around as well, including a Dunkin' Donuts (amazing coffee and doughnuts, better than Krispy Kreme, no lie). You might have to walk for 'em though.

Whoo. Big list.

Couldn't we hold the get together at a hotel room or something? I thought you guys did that one year. I would love to meet some of you fellow Dumpshockers at one point; like I said though, if I don't get a job and soon, I don't think I'm going to be able to go now :/

The most important thing about going to GenCon is to actually go.

Don't most of you know some people who you know should go, but they never get to do it? Don't be them.

Claddagh Event Reservations

You can get an area set aside. I suggest the cocktail party, $13 a guest, an array of appetizers. You can also go with a full dinner event. There's also options for how to run the bar tab. All you need is an accurate head count 48 hours prior to the event.

What is the 1-2-3 rule?

That requires a semi-accurate headcount (tough to get), and it also depends on whether the Claddagh Indy is doing this during the convention. A number of restaurants that normally do reservations won't do them during larger events.

SInce I'm going to be busy with SR EVent Registration and GM wrangling this year... Anyone else want to volunteer to take point on the Meet n Greet planning and see what they can run down?

Bull

1) Wear comfortable, broken in, shoes.

2) Take advantage of the fridge in your hotel room to cut down on some food costs, along with the fact that every gamer an' his grandma is lugging around a big honkin' backpack all day. I've had MRE's for at least one meal a day my last couple Gencons. Cheap breakfast in the hotel room, MRE around lunch, and then "splurge" by going to an actual restaurant for dinner (and that, for the socializing as much as the food).

3) It's sad it has to be said, but keep an eye on your stuff. A friend lost his entire army case worth of miniatures a few years ago, another friend had his dice bag go missing, and the filching of pens and pencils and the occasional dice can all happen innocently and completely by accident, when gaming with strangers. Not everyone is out to kill you and take your limited edition books or anything, but stuff goes missing with 30,000+ people around.

4) Try not to get sick, and if you do try not to get me sick. "Con funk" isn't just a joke about how gamers smell, it's a medical issue caused by 30,000+ people from all over the country (or world) suddenly breathing the same air. Start popping vitamins, especially vitamin C, before you go to the con, and while you're there, and for a while afterwards.

5) For pete's sake, have fun. If you're having an awesome time in a pick-up game or chatting with a game developer or eating lunch with someone you only know from on-line forums...screw your next game. Don't feel like you HAVE to be somewhere just because you signed up to play, or at least don't do so to the point you're working instead of relaxing. If you're supposed to run shit, then yeah, take it more seriously. But remember that, as a plain jane attendee, you're on fuckin' vacation. Don't let the complicated timetables and maps and all that turn it into work or something to stress about. If you don't show up for a game, it just means you're opening up a slot for someone else. The world won't end if you relax.

6) Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate. If you love a little Mt. Dew to get yourself up for the early games, or coffee to stay up for the late games, or the alcohol of your choice for hanging out at the restaurant, more power to ya. Just don't forget to drink some water while you're at it. The last thing we need is for gamers to be passing out in the middle of a session and knocking over the miniatures or making someone drop their dice or something. It's not quite as bad as Dragon*Con (down in friggin' Atlanta), but Indy can still be plenty hot while we're there in August. Drink water. Don't die.

7) The shoes thing, again. Seriously. Most folks do a LOT of walking during GenCon, coming and going from the hotels, walking from game to game in the convention center, going to and from meals, and strolling around the dealer's hall. Don't make yourself miserable. Wear good shoes.