Eric at GenCon -- the Special Collector's Edition Thread
- Thread starter EricNoah
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BOZ
Creature Cataloguer
Nightfall said:So you stopped at all these booths and didn't stop at the S&SS booth?!Shame on you Eric!
i spent more time there than anywhere else in my (grumble grumble) 3 hours at gencon. i got to meet bill webb breifly, and i almost met clark peterson (i think i spotted his name badge out of the corner of my eye, but he scooted away before i got chat him up). wound up buying necropolis by gary gygax.
on the off chance that anyone spotted me there, i was the guy with long dirty blond hair, wearing a t-shirt with "Blinky" (the three-eyed fish) from the simpsons on it.
but in the end, i was there way too briefly to have really met or talked to anyone in any way that i would have liked.
Trevalon Moonleirion
Explorer
Wow. That's quite simply the only word that I can ever use to describe GenCon and this year was no different. I'll just post me entire GenCon story just because I can...
My mother took myself, Fayredeth (Ed), Nathan, and Sticks (really his name is darren...but we'll just call him sticks) up there this year. We loaded up the car, wielding our 64 oz. Mountain Dew mugs and set off on our adventure at about 3:30. Game Ho!
So we got up to Milwaukee, settled into our rooms--rooms at the Hilton somehow got just last week--I think my mom offed someone to get those rooms--ate, and then headed off on our merry way over to the convention center. Nathan and Sticks went off on their own to watch some anime while Fayredeth and I stayed on to watch the ENnies and meet everyone afterwards. The gathering afterward, like the one last year, was great since I was able to put faces to names and just in general chat about D&D. And of course, it was very cool to meet Morrus, even though I basically just shook his hand before the gathering just dispersed. I did feel sorry for poor Mrs. Noah though--she got trapped in a conversation with Fayredeth and I for quite a while
And of course, any chance to say "hey" to Piratecat, Mr. 18 Charisma himself, or Eric, is an honor! I had wanted to wear the costumes to the ENnies, but no one else wanted to...
Saturday morning at 8 a.m. was our only event--the D&D Open. A late start and a forgotten badge later, the 3 of the group that actually made it to the event and played in it--Nathan, Sticks, and I--finished it in roughly two hours. Our judge used candy for the monsters, so I got a light breakfast of cherry twizzlers and M&Ms, too. For the first time ever, a table I was at advanced to the next round. Now THAT was just crazy! We didn't realize we advanced until after about 6 straight hours in the exhibit hall. I was really excited to see us advance, but the offer of a very nice dinner made by my mom sounded a bit better than playing again, so we didn't make it. If any of my tablemates from 712 reads this, i'm sorry for ditchign the second round!
The exhibit hall was fun, the first purchase were some nifty foam weapons to complete our costumes, and then just went on from there. Here was my completed shopping list:
E-Tools
Another Midnight Syndicate CD
A sturdy case for my minis
I also just had to pick up City of the Spider Queen because it looks so good. Sure my oldest party is 12th or 13th level, but there's only two of them...oh hell...they have followers now. Ye gods I hate the leadership feat...lol. But I digress....
After the nice dinner, we suited back up into costume and ran amok in the convention hall. We started a veritable Fight Club down near the main enterance with our foam weapons. People gathered to watch, then joined in, left, came back for more...Och! Twas glorious! Things got a little bit too wild for our taste after quite awhile of battling, so we collected up our weapons and got the hell out of Dodge, then roamed the hall more. The night ended with a battle with just the four of us outside in the open--we had quite an audience there. I have a feeling that my friends and I are really going to get into this foam fighting thing now.
In summary, GenCon was as always a wonderful weekend--though it was far too short. I'm quite excited about next year--my friends and I will be going down for the full four days, and I DEFINATELY want to try my hand at judging. Hell maybe I could go to Winter Fantasy and do some judging...
I hope everyone had as much fun if not more fun that we all did!
My mother took myself, Fayredeth (Ed), Nathan, and Sticks (really his name is darren...but we'll just call him sticks) up there this year. We loaded up the car, wielding our 64 oz. Mountain Dew mugs and set off on our adventure at about 3:30. Game Ho!
So we got up to Milwaukee, settled into our rooms--rooms at the Hilton somehow got just last week--I think my mom offed someone to get those rooms--ate, and then headed off on our merry way over to the convention center. Nathan and Sticks went off on their own to watch some anime while Fayredeth and I stayed on to watch the ENnies and meet everyone afterwards. The gathering afterward, like the one last year, was great since I was able to put faces to names and just in general chat about D&D. And of course, it was very cool to meet Morrus, even though I basically just shook his hand before the gathering just dispersed. I did feel sorry for poor Mrs. Noah though--she got trapped in a conversation with Fayredeth and I for quite a while
And of course, any chance to say "hey" to Piratecat, Mr. 18 Charisma himself, or Eric, is an honor! I had wanted to wear the costumes to the ENnies, but no one else wanted to...Saturday morning at 8 a.m. was our only event--the D&D Open. A late start and a forgotten badge later, the 3 of the group that actually made it to the event and played in it--Nathan, Sticks, and I--finished it in roughly two hours. Our judge used candy for the monsters, so I got a light breakfast of cherry twizzlers and M&Ms, too.
For the first time ever, a table I was at advanced to the next round. Now THAT was just crazy! We didn't realize we advanced until after about 6 straight hours in the exhibit hall. I was really excited to see us advance, but the offer of a very nice dinner made by my mom sounded a bit better than playing again, so we didn't make it. If any of my tablemates from 712 reads this, i'm sorry for ditchign the second round!The exhibit hall was fun, the first purchase were some nifty foam weapons to complete our costumes, and then just went on from there. Here was my completed shopping list:
E-Tools
Another Midnight Syndicate CD
A sturdy case for my minis
I also just had to pick up City of the Spider Queen because it looks so good. Sure my oldest party is 12th or 13th level, but there's only two of them...oh hell...they have followers now. Ye gods I hate the leadership feat...lol. But I digress....
After the nice dinner, we suited back up into costume and ran amok in the convention hall. We started a veritable Fight Club down near the main enterance with our foam weapons. People gathered to watch, then joined in, left, came back for more...Och! Twas glorious! Things got a little bit too wild for our taste after quite awhile of battling, so we collected up our weapons and got the hell out of Dodge, then roamed the hall more. The night ended with a battle with just the four of us outside in the open--we had quite an audience there. I have a feeling that my friends and I are really going to get into this foam fighting thing now.
In summary, GenCon was as always a wonderful weekend--though it was far too short. I'm quite excited about next year--my friends and I will be going down for the full four days, and I DEFINATELY want to try my hand at judging. Hell maybe I could go to Winter Fantasy and do some judging...
I hope everyone had as much fun if not more fun that we all did!
Eridanis
Bard 7/Mod (ret) 10/Mgr 3
Eric defintely gets the 2002 award for "Best Microphone Stand". The whole thing seemed to go off without a hitch, at least from the perspective stage right. (Good heavens, is Ryan Dancey a tall man, or what?) The recipients retained good humour about handing off their 'temporary' award to Kara while exiting the stage, as there were only two prototypes on hand to hand out (Eric did an excellent job pantomiming how not to pick up the award. It's one of those things that you needed to see for yourself. ).
And thank you, Eric, for taking a few minutes to talk to me about librarian matters - I really appreciated it.
Looking forward to next year in Indianapolis!
).And thank you, Eric, for taking a few minutes to talk to me about librarian matters - I really appreciated it.
Looking forward to next year in Indianapolis!
EricNoah
Adventurer
Eridanis said:
He is, and with a little shorty like me or to a certain extent Peter standing next to him, well, I think we had problems getting him and me into the same photo, let's just put it that way.
Hey, little trivia question for you -- anyone know how old Ryan is?
Re: library stuff, no prob! Hope it was informative.
Duncan Haldane
Explorer
That would be "Spy's Demise", if you are talking about the drink at the Safe House.Well I really should get to bed... or try to find a game
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Mark
CreativeMountainGames.com
RangerWickett said:
It was a pleasure to meet you, as well, RW. You're a gentleman and a brilliant young man who I suspect will go quite far with your writing.
Just got back. I'll post some more after I get a bit of rest though there are a couple of Brits invading the Windy City and I think they have nefarious plans for my time the next couple of days...
w00t!
Gargoyle
Adventurer
A great time...
Just got home.
I was happy to meet Morrus and see many of you from last year. The Ennies simply rocked. I was pleased to see many very deserving publishers win, and also happy at the turnout by so many big names in the industry, not to mention the support and praise from Peter Adkison, Ryan Dancey, and so many others for ENWorld and the Ennies.
Highlights of the Con for me:
- Talking to Peter Adkison in the elevator on Saturday evening. Great guy. He's really interested in making the Con better and is excited about it. GenCon is in good hands, folks.
- Talking to James Wyatt, Monte Cook, Ed Stark, and other great game designers about various stuff.
- Clicking on the ENWorld messageboards link on the free GenCon terminal, then, when the link didn't work, turning to Morrus at the next PC and asking him to fix it.
- Accidently walking in front of Nemmerle in the exhibit hall while he was getting his picture taken, then offering to sign it when he scolded me.
- Finding a nearly perfect boxed set of Torg, complete with the original red and blue die.
The only really newsworthy things I collected this year were from the D&D Q&A seminar. Some of this stuff you probably already know or suspected (all quotes are actually paraphrased, hopefully I didn't misquote anyone):
- There will likely be a book of spells in the near future. ("Not really soon, but not really far off") I'm guessing late next year or early 2004 by the way they were talking around the subject.
- The upcoming 2003 miniatures game will have some established relationship/compatibility with D&D. They feel that Chainmail failed because it was like D&D but wasn't really part of it. Mum's the word on details, as they haven't decided a lot of it. If you're interested in the game, you may want to post your opinion on these boards or at wizards.com, as it seems they haven't made up their minds about certain aspects of it.
- There will be a book that has as one of its primary features a codified list of special abilities, such as prestige class and monster abilities. This will make it easier to build prestige classes/monsters/etc. and reduce some of the confusion about how these abilities interact. This was in response to a question about how ninja/shadowdancers use fast sneak and hide in plain sight together...or something like that. That's not all the book is going to have, but we were told that was a "major part of it".
- The first round winners of the fantasy setting search will be notified by the end of the month. As mentioned elsewhere, they are really happy about the quality of the entries and want to take their time selecting the winners.
- I asked how long it would be before a 3.1 edition of D&D or a 4th edition will be out. It looks like they're in favor of doing a 3.1 edition at some point, but are certainly against doing a major revision that would warrant a 4th edition set of books until around 2009 (I'll hold you to that date Anthony!! ) . Their reasoning, and I agree, is that 3E is a solid system that should last a very long time.
Anthony Valterra asked how many in the audience would be interested in a leatherbound Player's Handbook with errata applied and annotations in sidebars that explained design decisions and generally gave more background information about the reasons that things are the way they are. Looked like most people were interested.
I think (and this is my speculation based on his questions and responses) Ed Stark, the lead D&D design guru, is interested in doing a 3.1 version with errata applied plus some minor changes that will impact the way the game is played by some. He mentioned they have a file with all the inconsistancies and problems of the game that pop up, and asked if we'd be interested if they fixed those problems with a newer set of core rules. (Things like spells not being at the right level, etc.)
Overall, the design team did a great job of listening to our questions and answering them as best they could.
(edited to make it more readable)
Just got home.
I was happy to meet Morrus and see many of you from last year. The Ennies simply rocked. I was pleased to see many very deserving publishers win, and also happy at the turnout by so many big names in the industry, not to mention the support and praise from Peter Adkison, Ryan Dancey, and so many others for ENWorld and the Ennies.
Highlights of the Con for me:
- Talking to Peter Adkison in the elevator on Saturday evening. Great guy. He's really interested in making the Con better and is excited about it. GenCon is in good hands, folks.
- Talking to James Wyatt, Monte Cook, Ed Stark, and other great game designers about various stuff.
- Clicking on the ENWorld messageboards link on the free GenCon terminal, then, when the link didn't work, turning to Morrus at the next PC and asking him to fix it.
- Accidently walking in front of Nemmerle in the exhibit hall while he was getting his picture taken, then offering to sign it when he scolded me.
- Finding a nearly perfect boxed set of Torg, complete with the original red and blue die.
The only really newsworthy things I collected this year were from the D&D Q&A seminar. Some of this stuff you probably already know or suspected (all quotes are actually paraphrased, hopefully I didn't misquote anyone):
- There will likely be a book of spells in the near future. ("Not really soon, but not really far off") I'm guessing late next year or early 2004 by the way they were talking around the subject.
- The upcoming 2003 miniatures game will have some established relationship/compatibility with D&D. They feel that Chainmail failed because it was like D&D but wasn't really part of it. Mum's the word on details, as they haven't decided a lot of it. If you're interested in the game, you may want to post your opinion on these boards or at wizards.com, as it seems they haven't made up their minds about certain aspects of it.
- There will be a book that has as one of its primary features a codified list of special abilities, such as prestige class and monster abilities. This will make it easier to build prestige classes/monsters/etc. and reduce some of the confusion about how these abilities interact. This was in response to a question about how ninja/shadowdancers use fast sneak and hide in plain sight together...or something like that. That's not all the book is going to have, but we were told that was a "major part of it".
- The first round winners of the fantasy setting search will be notified by the end of the month. As mentioned elsewhere, they are really happy about the quality of the entries and want to take their time selecting the winners.
- I asked how long it would be before a 3.1 edition of D&D or a 4th edition will be out. It looks like they're in favor of doing a 3.1 edition at some point, but are certainly against doing a major revision that would warrant a 4th edition set of books until around 2009 (I'll hold you to that date Anthony!!
) . Their reasoning, and I agree, is that 3E is a solid system that should last a very long time. Anthony Valterra asked how many in the audience would be interested in a leatherbound Player's Handbook with errata applied and annotations in sidebars that explained design decisions and generally gave more background information about the reasons that things are the way they are. Looked like most people were interested.
I think (and this is my speculation based on his questions and responses) Ed Stark, the lead D&D design guru, is interested in doing a 3.1 version with errata applied plus some minor changes that will impact the way the game is played by some. He mentioned they have a file with all the inconsistancies and problems of the game that pop up, and asked if we'd be interested if they fixed those problems with a newer set of core rules. (Things like spells not being at the right level, etc.)
Overall, the design team did a great job of listening to our questions and answering them as best they could.
(edited to make it more readable)
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