GenCon wrap-up (Pt. 1)

Despite my knee being a real pain during the convention, I still had a ton of fun at GenCon. As I mentioned before, I just had to listen to my body and pay attention when I knew either the pain or the normal exhaustion of being around people all day was getting to me. I've had Fibromyalgia for more than 15 years now, so that second part gets easier all the time.

We drove up Wednesday, a pretty easy drive all things considered. It's about an eight hour drive, and we only stopped a few times for breaks and food. We rented a car this year in order to save our new car on the mileage. We also learned our lesson last year and had our tickets shipped to us in advance. Matt's event tickets didn't come in the package though, due to something he likely didn't check when buying them so after we arrived at the hotel he went up and had to stand in line for them. It's a hella long line though, even on Wednesday night the end of the line was all the way outside the convention center. I was just thankful not to have to stand there. Last year I was sick as a dog when we arrived, but you can only get your badge with a license so I had to stand in line for my own badge and I was miserable.

Anyway. If you want descriptions of the games I had lined up, I did a little of that over in this post. There were only three of us for Thursday morning's game of Illimat but the benefit was that we got a pretty personal and in-depth explanation of how the game plays. It's a pretty easy game to pick up and I enjoyed having time to play a few rounds kind of stress free. We spent just an hour or so playing so afterwards I had enough time to meet up with a friend and wander the dealer's hall for a little bit. My knee wouldn't take too much wandering and my friend went to gather some food for her friends who were in a game so I went outside the dealer's hall to the massage booth and had myself a nice, relaxing massage. It was great. It at least let me relax a bit before my afternoon Honey Heist game.

The afternoon game of Honey Heist was... chaotic to say the least. There were two pre-teens in the game without parents, and a married couple, me and another guy. The GM was clearly pantsing the story, which isn't abnormal for that kind of game, but he didn't do the best job of keeping the group together or on task. He did try and make us all feel involved in the story, but there was a lot of plots at odds and about halfway through, I was kind of wondering why we kept going because we'd more than met the goal of our mission. It was an okay game, but I'm not sure I'd say I had a good time. The funniest part though was that at the table next to me was a guy I work with. I didn't really get to talk to him for more than a few minutes, so I look forward to chatting with him this week to see what he did with his GenCon. I know his table was playing Dark Heresy, which is a game I've always been interested in trying out.

While I waited for Matt to finish the fencing class he signed up for, I stepped into the Hacking in Media panel I had a ticket for. I didn't stay for the whole thing, but it was a definitely interesting take on how the media portrays infosec and hacking, and if they do it again next year, I absolutely want to go back. Once Matt was ready though we headed back to the hotel room and while I tried to stay up for a little while, I inevitably fell asleep watching YouTube and just crawled in bed.

Friday I only ended up going to my morning game, which was a game of Masks called Phoenix Academy. We had a full table for this one. It's a game where everyone plays a teenage superhero. I played a archetype called The Janus, the kind of hero that's doing their best to keep their real identity a secret, even at their high school for superheroes. This was a really fun adventure, we had a great GM and everyone at the table was really nice, accommodating and willing to work within the story. Once we got going, I really enjoyed this one and while I don't think it's something I'm likely going to play again, it was definitely worth trying out.

After my morning game I just knew that there was no way I was going to make it through my afternoon game, I was tired and a little overwhelmed by how many people were in the room I was in at other games. Plus, Friday night was the Critical Role live show and I figured it'd be a great time to rest before that, because it's SO LOUD and there's SO MANY people in that theater. So I took a nap at the hotel before meeting my friend for dinner and then heading to the live show.

THAT LIVE SHOW THOUGH. It was really good. Of course my knees hated the balcony seats, but other than that, the show was amazing. I love seeing the cast live and listening to the audiences reactions to what's happening in the game, which I feel like just heightens the exciting moments. If I could go to more of their live shows, I totally would. Since I can't I just have to hope they keep doing the ones at GenCon every year. I was dead tired after the show though and in a good deal of pain, so getting back to the hotel and getting to sleep.

So the first two days were pretty great. This is a long post though so I'll cover the second two days later, in which there are more game shenanigans. I also want to talk about the games we grabbed while we were there and when I thought I won something. Look for more soon.