Create Your Own Dungeons And Dragons Convention
In 2007, we skipped Gen Con.
You see, my Dungeons and Dragons gaming group is an interesting mix of folks. We’ve got small business owners, health care professionals, a college professor, IT professionals, fast food workers, an electrician, housewives, and even someone in the printing business.
Oh, and then there’s me, but you all know what I do. I’m a writer.
We have single guys, engaged guys, married folks with kids, and married folks without kids.
At any rate, the stars were aligned in 2007 such that most of us either couldn’t afford Gen Con or couldn’t attend because of work or family commitments.
We realized, by July of 2007, that we were really going to miss Gen Con. So, we came up with a stopgap measure: Cabin Con.
What is Cabin Con? Well, we decided that one of the best parts about Gen Con was the gaming. Specifically, gaming with our friends. So, we rented two small cabins at nearby county park for two nights in late August last year. We spent the better part of three days gaming. We played Dungeons and Dragons, Three Dragon Ante, and even some board games.
We cooked our food over a campfire, and made jokes at night about who was sharing a sleeping bag with whom.
We did all of this on the cheap; with food and everything, I think we all got away for about $75 a person.
Cabin Con was such a damned good idea that we’re doing it again this October. This time, we’re renting a vacation home for 4 days to the tune of $600. Split between a dozen or so of us, we’ll still be under $100 apiece including food. Gen Con or not, I think Cabin Con is going to become a tradition.
Why am I telling you all of this? Because it would never have occurred to us to do something like this if we hadn’t missed Gen Con in 2007. Maybe it’s something your group could do, too.
So, if you want to organize your own convention, here’s what you need to do:
- Figure out how many people you have going. Get as firm a commitment as possible.
- Find a good location. Depending on your budget, you could have your Cabin Con in tents in the woods, or you could have it at the Hilton. For me, I think the vacation home or hunting lodge type rental is the best way to go.
- Divide your weekend up into time slots for games. These can be 4-hour slots, or they can be shorter or longer depending on your group’s preferences.
- Get your friends to commit to running games. If you’re like me and usually are the DM, GM, or StoryTeller, a Cabin Con can be a nice opportunity to play on the other side of the screen.
- Send out the list of games, and have everyone sign up for the games they want to play.
- Plan a menu and buy the food. You can live on sandwiches and cereal all weekend, or you can cook full-blown meals. Here again, it just depends on your group’s preferences.
- Set up a KP duty chart. Give everyone a chance to help out with the cooking, cleaning, and whatnot.
I’d love to hear from others. If you’ve done your own gaming weekend, what advice can you offer?
How Does Indianapolis Feel About Gen Con?
You know, I lived in Indianapolis for a couple of years. I loved the city. There were plenty of resources for gamers, and the folks were, on average, just nice folks. My in-laws live in Indy, so when Gen Con moved to Indy I was stoked. It meant that, if we planned things right, I’d never have to miss another Gen Con.
You can imagine my chagrin when the infamous anti-Gen Con article appeared in the Indianapolis Monthly several years ago. What gamers failed to realize is that no one actually reads the Indianapolis Monthly except for bored, rich housewives in Carmel, IN. Still, it left the impression among many gamers that Indy hated them. (Strangely enough, that article isn’t available on the Indianapolis Monthly website any longer. Go figure.)
So, I thought it’d be interesting to see some of the news reports from Indy on Gen Con this year.
A couple things of note: 1)one article mentions that Gen Con is Indy’s biggest convention, now. 2) Several articles mention 85,000 attendees. If that’s true… HOLY CRAP. I know Gen Con was 35,000 the first year I went, when it was still in Milwaukee. That’s another 50,000 people in the last six years.
The one negative I could find was in the article from Anderson, I think, and it only talked about a conversation with one attendee who talked about gamer funk and the floor being “ripe” by the 4th day. Other than that, the article (and the rest) seemed pretty positive.
Indianapolis radio and TV coverage:
http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=8852885
http://www.wibc.com/News/Story.aspx?ID=97710
From the Star News, Indy’s newspaper:
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080816/LOCAL/808160486
http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080814/BUSINESS/808140430/1003/BUSINESS
A blogger from the Star News had several Gen Con reports. Here’s one cool one about dice:
http://blogs.indystar.com/geek/2008/08/rolling_bones.html
From indy.com, a feature of the Star News:
http://www.indy.com/posts/10627
From the paper in Muncie, about 30 minutes north of Indy:
http://www.thestarpress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080821/ENTERTAINMENT/808210336
From the paper in Anderson, about 20 minutes north of Indy:
http://www.theheraldbulletin.com/peopleandplaces/local_story_225223410.html?keyword=topstory
What’s my point here? Well, simply that Indianapolis doesn’t hate Gen Con attendees, by any means. They might thing we’re a bit odd (lots of folks do) but they like having us, and they’re treating us fairly in their media coverage.
Are there some jerks in Indy that treat con attendees poorly? Sure. There were in Milwaukee, and there would be in Chicago or anywhere else Gen Con might go. But as a city, Indy recognizes that it’s lucky to have us.
What I Learned From Gen Con 2008 - Part 1
Well, Gen Con it’s done for another year. I can truly say I already miss it. Only 361 days to go, I suppose.
I want to share some of my Gen Con thoughts over the next few days. I know the D&D blogosphere has been hopping with Gen Con posts, and that makes me slightly late to the dance. I’m OK with that; I leave the cutting edge to folks like The Game and Bartoneous at Critical Hits, leaving me to sort of hang back and give more of a hindsight view.
So, what did I get out of Gen Con this year?
I really miss playing Magic: The Gathering.
I haven’t played regularly in a couple of years, and so I jumped in to a sealed tournament on Friday. It was a blast. I was eliminated in the second round to a kid half my age, as is usually the story, but it was still fun. I won a booster, which had cards in it that I sold for $16 - enough to pay for the draft. All in all, a good deal.
While I was playing, some friends played a round or two of the World of Warcraft TCG. That’s not a bad game either, and I’m hoping that the bug will really hit the guys back home. A TCG is one of the best group games in that you only need 2 of you to play and they’re extremely portable. We’ll see if it sticks.
You can make a killing at the Gen Con auction.
I sat in line on Thursday morning with a bunch of guys waiting to check in their auction goods. While my auctions made me a mere $200, there were folks there making $10,000 or more, all from games they collected at garage sales over the past year. Very cool.
The Chatty DM is, well, Chatty.
I had the privelege to meet several other RPG bloggers at a seminar on Saturday. I was humbled to be there, honestly. I felt a little bit out of place. I was like the dopey little geek that the cool kids let hang around because they feel sorry for him.
At any rate, I want to take a minute to send you all away from here with some great links from my fellow RPG bloggers from the Gen Con panel:
The Gen Con 2008 Rambling (Semi-Live blog) from Phil at the Chatty DM. It was very cool to meet Chatty, mainly because we’ve talked so much online about not just gaming, but writing, as well. Check out his
post for a play-by-play of his Gen Con 2008 experience.
The aforementioned boys at Critical Hits have all sorts of GenCon 2008 Coverage. Checkout Dave and Bart’s exclusive interviews and astute observations.
It’s not live yet, but Stupid Ranger and crew will have a full Gen Con round-up on Tuesday or after.
A special congrats to Yax at DungeonMastering.com, as he won an Ennie this past weekend.
Next time, I’ll offer some thoughts on my gaming experience at Gen Con 2008, and how things look going forward from here.
Gearing Up for Gencon
Hi all,
Just a quick post today to let you all know I’m still alive!
I’m getting totally geeked for GenCon. We’re less than 40 days, and this year could be awesome. Out of curiosity, who all is going? Also, if you’re going, did you sign up for one of my games? Let me know in the comments on either or both of these questions.
I’m thinking about some slight changes to the catalog description, and wondering if any of you are reading the blog these days. I’m curious if it’d be worth discussing those changes here.
Look for more posts soon!
Wizards of the Coast WILL be at Gen Con 2008!
Graham from Critical Ankle Bites, in his awesomeness, has discovered this post from the Wizards Message boards, from Chris Perkins:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=15876256&postcount=1
Here’s the relevant Gen Con excerpt:
“I learned that we are, indeed, goin’ to Gen Con! Clearly, one of the big thrusts of the show will be 4E. We have a cap on the number of R&D people we can send, and I *did* attend last year, so I’m not sure whether I’ll be attending this year. I should know in the next few days, one way or the other.”
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
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Now, as important as that news is, don’t forget to give me your thoughts on these last couple of posts:
and
Building a New Dungeons and Dragons Campaign Diary #15 - Specifics
Hooray for Gen Con!
photo credit: Templarion
This is the part of this campaign setting I’m excited about. As you may or may not know, I’m going to be running the very first game in the world of Lenryn at Gen Con. Event registration for Gen Con begins next Sunday, April 20 at 1:00 PM, PDT. I’m running four identical sessions so as to accommodate as many of my readers as I can. Here are the four sessions, along with their event ID:
Thursday, 6:00-10:00 PM, RPG00402
Friday, 12:00-4:00 PM, RPG00403
Friday, 4:00-8:00 PM, RPG00404
Saturday, 8:00 AM - 12:00 PM, RPG00405
Here’s the description, from the GenCon catalog:
Be the first to play in The World of Lenryn, the newest campaign setting designed by Bob Younce of dndreviews.com. Bring your own characters, as per guidelines on the web site. Role-play heavy. Free book, “How I Developed my New Campaign World, and How You Can Develop Yours” provided to each participant. Prizes will also be given for best role-playing, and best character concept.
As is always the case, spots will fill up quickly. Be sure to register early to reserve your seat.
For my local group, you guys can sign up if you want, but my hope is to run the same game for you all (after Gen Con, of course.)
Starting next week, I’ll be posting guidelines for character creation, and begin providing you with some of the back-story specific to the GenCon adventure. In the meantime, if you’re just arriving here for the first time, feel free to start at the beginning of the new campaign diary, and get a feel for what you can expect at Gen Con.
Also, check out my archives page if you want to pop through each of the campaign diary entries.
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Updates
