Intercon Post-con report
Went to Intercon after missing last year due to travel. One thing that felt noticeably different this year was that I felt pretty well-connected - like the con suite was full of folks I knew and could talk to if I were so inclined. That said, there were tons of folks I wanted to chat with and didn't get the chance - including some I knew were at the con but just never ran into or saw only in passing!
Public Memory: When History Isn't Universal: My first game (and the only one I got to play with
desireearmfeldt) was about how we deal with monuments from the Confederacy. Act-structured games are usually not my bag. In this game the act structure worked quite well, opening with a talk back to the City Council where we played members of the public expressing our opinions about the Statue of Crowe, the Great Slaveowner and Benefactor. In act two we played the City Council itself, debating the issue in closed session and making a decision about what to do. Finally, in act three, one poor councillor is chosen to lead the press conference and the rest of us played the Press - including the wacky nutjobs. I got to start as the high school senior who circulated the petition to take down the statue (but who also has a scholarship next year from the Crowe Foundation), and then switch to the long-time city councillor who's from another old family and vacations with the Crowes every summer. Switched back to the high schooler for act 3 as they were the school newspaper editor. The game had nuanced characters with nuanced opinions and pressures on them; it could have been written as a "tear down the statue" story but that wouldn't have been nearly as thought-provoking - or half as fun to play.
Dance of the Dragons: I played Robert Reyne to Eddie's Tyrell Lannister. We're in Game of Thrones prequel world as written by Alison, and the Royal house of Targaryen is about to start the in-world War of the Roses (and, luckily for me, the Rains of Castermere are a generation or two in the future). Lots and lots of marriage plots, and an interesting mechanic for pairing off your out of game vassals - each vassal has an envelope with their name on it, and lieges swap envelopes and open them, gaining some resources. Plus a really simplified wargame mechanic, which we didn't use because the two houses improbably declared peace at the last possible second.
I had a lot of fun in this game, a 23-page character sheet, and a 13-bullet summary of goals that left a goal off. But I expected that - Alison's games tend to be goal heavy and a mad scramble (really about as close to a classic assassin game as you're ever likely to see at a con outside Guild imports). This was the first run, though, and I think there are still some problems that need to be addressed. Eddie realized on reading his sheets that his best course was going to be to try to make nice with me and take the hit of losing one of his banners in the name of keeping me out of open opposition. That in turn sort of resolved my most central plots early. Except, of course, that if your central plot is "marry, possibly for political gain", both sides have to be willing to commit to that. Meanwhile a number of folks (like the dowager queen) were left feeling like they didn't have enough resources to actually play the political game themselves (all her kids were PCs, and she felt her ultimate re-marriage to Eddie was on the rails). And I felt like the game was lousy with Targaryens, of whom I had connections with exactly one. Sure, it was Nuance playing the opposing queen (never a bad connection to have, but always a dangerous one). But I'd have liked to have been better hooked in to the part of game where the most serious scheming was going on, especially as my character had been set up as someone who was nominally for the greens but secretly working with the blacks.
Victoria Junction - all change, please, all change! This is a goofy hoarde LARP; since I was deep on the waitlist for my original game I went and played hoarde. The Royal Train will be arriving soon, trains are being delayed left and right, and the station hotel is overbooked. Chaos, of course, is the goal. Kind of blew my voice out in a couple of turns leading a group of soldiers in Marching Up and Down the Square and other such nonsense. Need to be more careful about that. Other turns involved throwing a pig from the flying trapeze, and trying to get into my hotel room as I desperately needed to find a toilet after tasting the chef's curry.
The highlight of this year I think has to have been
It's Everybody's War. Like the previous game it was co-written and co-GM'd by Sue Lee from the UK, but couldn't have been more different except for it's very deep Englishness. It's 1940, and the War Department is filming home-front propaganda in a village outside Leicester (in the Midlands). I was a kid evacuated from Norwich (a port) to escape the bombing. The two evacuees exist in part to stir things up and make sure secrets get out - we discovered the stash of The Countryman's Diary (lots of information about rail lines and digging holes!), letters from a lover in the RAF, and other such nonsense. I got the local pig into the film to keep her from being slaughtered (for a few days, anyhow). We scanned the skies for Jerries. And I cried. Far more than I expected to given my task to be a goof. Some heart-wrenching tales and some heart-wrenching decisions over the course of four hours. And telegrams. So many telegrams. Great set of fellow players - didn't get the name of the gal playing Hilary (the other evacuee), but Kathleen dS was fantastic as Lady Lavinia, with a soft spot for childish antics and a costume that was spot on as always. Play this game if emotional play is your thing.
Kindling: After the Yellowstone Caldera blew, your ancestors retreated into Davis Square Station and can only venture out to other stations with a gas mask on. You live on mushrooms and pork. Downtown tunnels are intact, and those stations trade indoors, but the tunnels on either side of Davis Square have collapsed. Meanwhile humanity has regressed into suspicion, and we now know that most of our problems are caused by witches. Time to kill a few. Game could have been as emotionally fraught as Everybody's War, but never quite hit its stride. From my perspective I think this was because too much of the information in game required "exploring" and that was all GM mediated. So I spent way more time talking to GMs in this game than I've spent in any game in a long time - and that includes Alison's more mechanics-heavy games. This game could run really well in a space like MIT with some open areas combined with long stretches of corridor and signs on the walls. The GM team runs a destination LARP that sounds rather like it's structured that way (they specifically referred to hiding stuff around game for players to find). I do still suspect they may have more graphic arts skills than game polishing skills. Also, bold move setting a con game in the Davis Square station, for a Boston-area audience, when you live in the Midwest and haven't ever been to Davis Square.
On Sunday morning I had every intention of getting up and playing one of the Iron GM games, which vary wildly in quality from "we shall never speak of this again" to "this will be revised and become a classic." Sounds like
dcltdw found a game that was totally up my Deep Feels alley, and got to roleplay with Quinn who's fantastic. Let's hope I get the chance to play it some day. But I ended up in a 15-minute chat that turned into a 2-hour late night series of conversations and couldn't quite get up in time to make the 10AM slot - and the later slots were after we wanted to head home. So I hung out in the Con Suite and caught up with more folks before heading off for lunch.
Public Memory: When History Isn't Universal: My first game (and the only one I got to play with
desireearmfeldt) was about how we deal with monuments from the Confederacy. Act-structured games are usually not my bag. In this game the act structure worked quite well, opening with a talk back to the City Council where we played members of the public expressing our opinions about the Statue of Crowe, the Great Slaveowner and Benefactor. In act two we played the City Council itself, debating the issue in closed session and making a decision about what to do. Finally, in act three, one poor councillor is chosen to lead the press conference and the rest of us played the Press - including the wacky nutjobs. I got to start as the high school senior who circulated the petition to take down the statue (but who also has a scholarship next year from the Crowe Foundation), and then switch to the long-time city councillor who's from another old family and vacations with the Crowes every summer. Switched back to the high schooler for act 3 as they were the school newspaper editor. The game had nuanced characters with nuanced opinions and pressures on them; it could have been written as a "tear down the statue" story but that wouldn't have been nearly as thought-provoking - or half as fun to play.
Dance of the Dragons: I played Robert Reyne to Eddie's Tyrell Lannister. We're in Game of Thrones prequel world as written by Alison, and the Royal house of Targaryen is about to start the in-world War of the Roses (and, luckily for me, the Rains of Castermere are a generation or two in the future). Lots and lots of marriage plots, and an interesting mechanic for pairing off your out of game vassals - each vassal has an envelope with their name on it, and lieges swap envelopes and open them, gaining some resources. Plus a really simplified wargame mechanic, which we didn't use because the two houses improbably declared peace at the last possible second.
I had a lot of fun in this game, a 23-page character sheet, and a 13-bullet summary of goals that left a goal off. But I expected that - Alison's games tend to be goal heavy and a mad scramble (really about as close to a classic assassin game as you're ever likely to see at a con outside Guild imports). This was the first run, though, and I think there are still some problems that need to be addressed. Eddie realized on reading his sheets that his best course was going to be to try to make nice with me and take the hit of losing one of his banners in the name of keeping me out of open opposition. That in turn sort of resolved my most central plots early. Except, of course, that if your central plot is "marry, possibly for political gain", both sides have to be willing to commit to that. Meanwhile a number of folks (like the dowager queen) were left feeling like they didn't have enough resources to actually play the political game themselves (all her kids were PCs, and she felt her ultimate re-marriage to Eddie was on the rails). And I felt like the game was lousy with Targaryens, of whom I had connections with exactly one. Sure, it was Nuance playing the opposing queen (never a bad connection to have, but always a dangerous one). But I'd have liked to have been better hooked in to the part of game where the most serious scheming was going on, especially as my character had been set up as someone who was nominally for the greens but secretly working with the blacks.
Victoria Junction - all change, please, all change! This is a goofy hoarde LARP; since I was deep on the waitlist for my original game I went and played hoarde. The Royal Train will be arriving soon, trains are being delayed left and right, and the station hotel is overbooked. Chaos, of course, is the goal. Kind of blew my voice out in a couple of turns leading a group of soldiers in Marching Up and Down the Square and other such nonsense. Need to be more careful about that. Other turns involved throwing a pig from the flying trapeze, and trying to get into my hotel room as I desperately needed to find a toilet after tasting the chef's curry.
The highlight of this year I think has to have been
It's Everybody's War. Like the previous game it was co-written and co-GM'd by Sue Lee from the UK, but couldn't have been more different except for it's very deep Englishness. It's 1940, and the War Department is filming home-front propaganda in a village outside Leicester (in the Midlands). I was a kid evacuated from Norwich (a port) to escape the bombing. The two evacuees exist in part to stir things up and make sure secrets get out - we discovered the stash of The Countryman's Diary (lots of information about rail lines and digging holes!), letters from a lover in the RAF, and other such nonsense. I got the local pig into the film to keep her from being slaughtered (for a few days, anyhow). We scanned the skies for Jerries. And I cried. Far more than I expected to given my task to be a goof. Some heart-wrenching tales and some heart-wrenching decisions over the course of four hours. And telegrams. So many telegrams. Great set of fellow players - didn't get the name of the gal playing Hilary (the other evacuee), but Kathleen dS was fantastic as Lady Lavinia, with a soft spot for childish antics and a costume that was spot on as always. Play this game if emotional play is your thing.
Kindling: After the Yellowstone Caldera blew, your ancestors retreated into Davis Square Station and can only venture out to other stations with a gas mask on. You live on mushrooms and pork. Downtown tunnels are intact, and those stations trade indoors, but the tunnels on either side of Davis Square have collapsed. Meanwhile humanity has regressed into suspicion, and we now know that most of our problems are caused by witches. Time to kill a few. Game could have been as emotionally fraught as Everybody's War, but never quite hit its stride. From my perspective I think this was because too much of the information in game required "exploring" and that was all GM mediated. So I spent way more time talking to GMs in this game than I've spent in any game in a long time - and that includes Alison's more mechanics-heavy games. This game could run really well in a space like MIT with some open areas combined with long stretches of corridor and signs on the walls. The GM team runs a destination LARP that sounds rather like it's structured that way (they specifically referred to hiding stuff around game for players to find). I do still suspect they may have more graphic arts skills than game polishing skills. Also, bold move setting a con game in the Davis Square station, for a Boston-area audience, when you live in the Midwest and haven't ever been to Davis Square.
On Sunday morning I had every intention of getting up and playing one of the Iron GM games, which vary wildly in quality from "we shall never speak of this again" to "this will be revised and become a classic." Sounds like
dcltdw found a game that was totally up my Deep Feels alley, and got to roleplay with Quinn who's fantastic. Let's hope I get the chance to play it some day. But I ended up in a 15-minute chat that turned into a 2-hour late night series of conversations and couldn't quite get up in time to make the 10AM slot - and the later slots were after we wanted to head home. So I hung out in the Con Suite and caught up with more folks before heading off for lunch.