Archon 32 Recap

This past weekend was Archon 32. I started Friday afternoon by making a trip to Office Depot to pick up name badges, folders and sheet protectors for the materials of the Kobolds Ate My Baby LARP. I arrived at Archon where I ran into a bunch of old friends and signed up for games with my buddy Jim.

We headed out to dinner at Applebees. There he filled me in on the latest goings-on in the world of politics. I must admit that I had been busy with convention prep and didn't spend enough time to understand the details of the recently signed $700 billion “emergency” financial market bailout bill. Jim told me that it felt like a stealth tax to subsidize mortgages for poor folks and to profit politicians. I agreed with him that some of the fundamental problems still exist even after the massive give-away.

After dinner I joined Jason's Circus Imperium game. We were joined by a group from Ohio. We teased two of the girls from Ohio by calling one of them the “nice” one and the other the “mean” one. Both played the game enthusiastically and were amusing.

Jason has a room party that night. His was the only party that night. Once he told folks that he wasn't giving away free alcohol, the foot traffic to the room died down. I played a little Rock Band and a dice game. I left around 1 AM to go home to print out all of the materials for the Saturday morning game.

The Kobolds LARP started at 10 AM Saturday morning. I was surprised that we sold out all of the slots for 15 players. I was even more surprised that all of them showed up. In 2006 we had a number of no-shows. I had writing help this year. Jason and Adam contributed a number of ideas I tried to incorporate into the game.

The LARP was set in a school of magic. The players were divided into two houses with three of the players having no house alignment at all. Each house had six players. During the writing process I drew influence from chess pieces. I realized that there are six different types of pieces: pawns, rooks, knights, bishops, kings and queens. So I spent some time thinking about high school archetypes and how they might correspond to chess pieces. For example I wrote a bureaucrat that corresponded to a pawn and a class president that corresponded to a queen.

Jim's two oldest boys joined the game. They are grade schoolers with little gaming experience. So I made with House Elfs. Their goal was to help their school house, much like a brownie or a billiken.

We ran three different contests for the House cup competition. The first was to write a drinking song. Since Adam decided to sleep in, we drafted one of the house elves to help judge. In a stroke of hilarity one of the players bribed him with a dollar bill to vote for his house.

The second contest was a competition called Snatch the Troll's Stash. We lifted ideas from the game Devil Bunny Needs a Ham. We laid out a grid on the floor using paper plates. We marked off a line using masking tape. The goal was to go from one end to the other on the plates. They draw cards for movements. If they drew a King or an Ace, then the Kobold that was furthest along was moved back to the beginning. Unless, of course, they were past the marked line in which case they drew against the Troll Cave Horrible Death Chart to determine their fate.

The last contest was Headditch. In our last brainstorming session Jason got the idea to set it up like fuss ball. We laid down six parallel strips of masking tape on the floor. Players had to stay on their strip of tape. We gave them sticks with nets on the end. We pulled the head off of a Kewpie doll and used that as the ball. The players moved the head to the end of the room to their goal to score a point. We did some improvisation, but it worked out.

Next I played a game of Living Greyhawk using Dungeon and Dragons 3.5 rules. The players were cool but the game was kind of a bummer. It ended by having us watch a village burn to the ground.

I headed to White Castle with Jim to pick up some carry-out. I wanted to make a 7:30 PM Arkham Horror game so we got the order to go. On the walk back to the convention hotel a mini-van pulled out of a parking lot. We thought the driver was slowing for us. Jim started crossing in front of him. But he lurched forward. Jim quickly ran out of his path. Then the van swerved toward me! I put a death grip on our sack of Slyders and spun around to deflect most of the force of the speeding van. Only then did the driver decide to stop. He opened his door and asked if we were okay. We were shocked but fine. The only damage was that the chicken rings that were sitting on the top of the sack were not strewn all over the ground. Ah well, another Archon, another White Castle adventure.

Will ran a game of Red Dragon Inn. It was a fun casual game and a nice change of pace from the inexplicably short Arkham Horror game.

Then, somebody started a game of Werewolves of Millers Hollow. This game requires eight players. So Archon is about the only place I get to play it. The game started with around 12 players. A couple of tables were added and the number of players expanded to somewhere around 30. I snapped some pictures with my cell phone camera and uploaded them to my Flickr account.

I didn't make it home until around 5 AM on Sunday. I was exhausted and slept most of the day. So, this year was another great Archon. I met some new friends and spent some time with old friends. We are already talking about plans for next year's Archon and discussing writing games for next year's Die Con.

Tabriz School of Magick

Archon is a few weeks away. I have been putting together a Kobolds Ate My Baby LARP for the Atomic Squash gaming group to run there. The game is called "Tabriz School of Magick". All of the players are Kobold freshmen trying to avoid death and destruction to win the school cup for their house.

We learned a few lessons from the last game and are using them to make this year's game better. First of all, I expected all of the players to act as individuals looking out for their own self-interest and survival. What happened was amazing. The players joined together in a group leaving the group occasionally to pursue their own goals. This year we are grouping players in two houses to give them a group of which to be a part.

I gave everyone in the last game a goal of escape and did not give anyone a clear way to accomplish it. This year we have the school cup that one group of players will win.

A player familiar with the tabletop game suggested that we include edges and bogies. This rules are indeed hilarious and work well. But I haven't thought of a way of including them in the LARP without disrupting game balance. In LARPs it is important that no single player is overly powerful. If there is a powerful vampire for example, it is important to have a powerful vampire hunter. Last game I gave players special abilities taking care to maintain balance. I think it worked well but am thinking about how to improve them.

We charge money for the game. We ask the players to pay one dollar. We aren't in this to make money. We do this because we limit the game to twelve players and want to insure that players who sign up actually show up to play the game. By the way the money are got last time we gave to a group who came from out of state to run games at Archon.

CptSquash and Pancake have already given me some great ideas that I need to write up in our private wiki. I'm trying to organize a brainstorming session with them for this weekend. I think our players are going to love the great material and improvements we have made this year.

Kobolds on a Plane Online!

I posted all of the characters sheets and game master project files online. They are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License. If you use them, I ask that you give me credit.

The good stuff can be found at koboldslarp.com

Enjoy, you naughty Kobolds!

Archon 30 Report

This past weekend I attended Archon 30. It was good to see friends and have some fun gaming.

This year Cpt Squash convinced me to run a Kobolds Ate My Baby (KAMB) Live Action Role Playing (LARP) game. I named it Kobolds on a Plane! I stayed up late Wednesday night writing characters. In addition to the 9th Level Games KAMB books -- Kobolds Ate My Baby Super Deluxx Edition and Kobolds the Charades -- I drew influence from Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, Frank Baum's Ozma of Oz, White Wolf's Werewolf: The Forsaken and, of course, this summer's hit movie Snakes on a Plane!

:: THURSDAY

Since I pre-registered for Archon 30 I had a relatively short wait to pick up my badge. While standing in line the topic on most folks mind was next year's Archon. Convention organizers plan to host the 9th North American Science Fiction Convention (9th NASFiC) in place of Archon. They have also decided to hold it two months earlier than the normal Archon, on August 2-5.

I met up with my buddies Jim and Adam. We decided to to go to Applebees to grab some dinner. Adam showed us a movie of his new girlfriend out with him at dinner. Jim and I launched into talk about politics. We expect things to really interesting with some important elections only a few weeks away.

I decided to run back home to work on the Kobolds on a Plane! I put together a spreadsheet listing every character in the game, another listing all special abilities and finally a list of items in the game. Then I put together three pages of horrible death charts that the player might encounter. I put these in a binder for Cpt Squash to read in preparation for the Saturday game.

Cpt Squash threw a room party this year for his gaming club Atomic Squash. Adam was rocking out on a game called Guitar Hero. He showed off by playing with the guitar behind his head. Several of the Hex Games guys stopped by including Steve Johnson and Colin Thomas. Elonka also stopped by. She told me she had given a talk earlier about Archon's Wikipedia entry and noticed my picture. I took a picture with her and Colin Thomas, uploaded it to wikipedia and changed the caption to read "Patrons enjoy Archon 30".

I saw Kelly, formerly of Memphis and now in Seattle. She looked cute. We talked about her weekly game out there. It was funny when she apologized to me for being too geeky. Sorry to say, most of the rest of the year it usually is me apologizing to an uninterested female for gamer dorkiness.

I made ribbons for the badges that say "I Hugged Gazpacho". I gave out a bunch during the convention to the brave who actually hugged me. I have lots left over. Oh well, I guess I have some for Gen Con next year.

When I left the Atomic Squash Party about 4 AM, Britt was laying on the bed in there asking why the ceiling was moving. Uhm, he was drunk.

:: FRIDAY

I slept through the Fury of Dracula game but made it for the Elasund game at 2 PM. It was my second time playing the game and the first time I actually finished one. I won! I think I'll have to play it again.

After running out to try a Mexican place with Adam, I found my way to the Mississippian Room for the SLUGS Vampire LARP briefing. They gave me character by the name of Michael Collins. There was a Father Collins in the game a few years ago. This character was an excommunicated priest. My goal was to protect a character named Rev Teddy and see the end-times Apocalypse happened. The most serious problem I had with the game was the negativity I got from a player (name isn't important). I had my holy symbol out Friday night. "Do you have that holy symbol out?!", she asked. "Yeah. You can see my holy symbol.", I responded. "Is this your first year or something?", she had a look of contempt. In fact it is my ninth year playing the game."No, this isn't my first year.", I responded. I secretly hoped she didn't treat any first year player this way. She was not friendly. I did not care for her role playing at all. I role played away from her group. I didn't want the confrontation on the first night.

Before the LARP began I wandered into the Monroe Room where the Visioncon group were holding their Mojo Tasting Party. They had samples of their namesake drink which that drink after saying this salute: "Quick! Before it eats through the cup!"

Seanta Claus was DJing the dance hall again this year. He and his crew decorated two conference rooms like the Carousel scene from Logan's Run. It was quite remarkable.

I left the convention around midnight to go back home and do more work on Kobolds LARP. I printed out character badges and item cards. I put together the booklets and printed out copies of the character sheets. I wrapped up around 4 AM and managed to get some sleep before I had to get up to get to the game.

:: SATURDAY

I had about 12 players for the Kobolds on a Plane! LARP. Everyone seemed to have a great time. I was blow away by how enthusiastic and creative all of the players were at 10 AM on a Saturday. There was a good mix of new players and veterans. In the game you could save a hit point by barking like a Kobold. The bark, though, had to be better than the last player's bark. I will never forget the attractive purple-haired werechicken hunter. She let out a high pitched bark that I think broke glass! There were also some great one liners. For example when asked where a Kobold had put his dead snake, he responded by pulling out the folded item and saying: "My snake is right here! in my pants!" Vux, the elderly Kobold, had a spell which would summon water from cupped hands. I had no idea how hilarious that would look when he held his cupped hands just below waist level. The Kobold that jumped from the plane actually got the "Undesirable High-Speed Air-Ground Interface!" from the Random Horrible Death Chart!

Here is some news. I plan to release PDF versions of the game files on koboldslarp.com as soon as I proofread them. I can't release the horrible death charts because I borrowed them from the Kobolds the Charades book. I will make my own charts if I write and run another game the year after NASFiC.

At 2 PM Ed of BYOV ran Ill Met by Moonlight, a Fey LARP. It was a beautiful game. There was a ton of background information. Even though we were short players the game turned out great. I had a great time playing it. I am looking forward to more playing more BYOV LARPs at Gen Con next year.

The second night of the Vampire LARP was a wreck. The character playing Rev Teddy did not show up. I was a little surprised to find out that a new player was playing him. The refs did not let me know. I had spent three hours pestering any judge I could find if Rev Teddy had made it back into the game. Eventually I found the character and played the rest of the night. The game ended with my character living; only the second time I've managed to do that.

The Zombie Squad crew was back with a room party. I had traded emails with one of the hosts on MySpace. He promised that this year's party would be bigger and better. They delivered! They had three hotel rooms converted into an entrance area, a dance hall and a refreshment room. It was awesome. I wish I had more time to enjoy it.

The Party Hard Corps was out in force. They were playing their games, roaming the halls and patronizing the various room parties. Babypants was giving out Jelly Bellys. I wish she had warned me about the popcorn ones. It was great to see General Dissent again and have the opportunity to social with him for a bit.

I talked with Tom J about Hogwarts LARP. He assured me that this year's game will be different. He also told me that the player with whom I had an issue was actually a decent fellow. I trust his opinion and agreed to try the Gen Con Hogwarts LARP again next year.

:: SUNDAY

Well, three days of sleep deprivation caught up with me. I slept through the SLUGS Vampire LARP debriefing and awards ceremony.

Sunday is also the day I usually register for the next year's Archon. Unfortunately, I just couldn't bring myself to spend $90 for a convention which is a week before Gen Con and is probably not going to be attended by the regular group.

My only regret is that I did not make it to the dealer hall this year. Perhaps that is a good thing. I didn't spend any money on new games. I wanted to pick up QAGS 2nd Edition and Munchkin Impossible. Perhaps I'll ask for them for Christmas.

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More Archon 30 Pictures

I'm home from Archon 30. I'm recovering right now but will write an update soon. In the meantime enjoy the updated set of Archon 30 pictures.

Archon 30 Pictures

I'm up too late. I have an early game. I'll write more later. But for now here are Archon 30 pictures.

Wanna Be a Loser Just Like Me

I have been overwhelmed with work lately. I am having a difficult time finding time to finish writing the characters for the Kobolds Ate My Baby LARP I plan to run at Archon this year. I discovered I lost some artwork I did for the game. Why does this feel like I'm writing a college paper?

The wireless router has been working great since the firmware upgrade. I also relocated it against a wall closer to the room where I keep the laptop. More goodness soon. I'll post pictures from Archon if I take any.

Italian Fest 2006

Last weekend Jason called to invite me out to Collnsville's Italian Fest. Once I arrived I spotted Joe and Bob. It was nice to see friends. We chatted about the upcoming Archon 30, old role playing game systems and new science fiction shows. I had an excellent Italian Beef + Sausage Combo sandwich from a vendor known as the Two Fat Guys. Adam spotted a mullet and snapped a picture for me.

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You Are My Deathstar

Hello friends. It has been a while since I have made a sizable blog entry. Back on Labor Day my mother came to visit. I have mentioned before that I lost my father earlier this year. Mom brought an old PC from my late father's business. I plan to take the hard drives out and browse through them for anything important. She also brought some JRR Tolkien books I had bought Dad as Christmas gifts. Somehow I did not expect to see them again. You never give a gift expecting it to show up again on your kitchen table. I have an idea. Since I was a teenager the first time I read and enjoyed the Hobbit, I want to take the books to Archon and give them to a teenager there. It feels like the right thing to do.

Mom and I went to St Louis Bread Company. We tried their Crispani pizza. I had the Sausage and Apple. Mom had the Three Cheese. All in all they were pretty good. I'm grateful too that we didn't have to sit in the waiting area of a restaurant.

Last weekend I had dinner with a friend at Plaza Frontenac. It was nice to catch up. Funny thing is I used drive by that mall every weekend for three months. I never stopped by to check out what it had to offer.

I have a personals profile on Yahoo! Personals. So far the only date I have managed was with a woman I already knew. I just do not get responses from women in which I am interested. I have responded to women in whom I am not even interested. I wanted to see if they would respond. Nothing is more like a Deathstar to my ego than to get the virtual cold shoulder. I hear folks say that they have had luck. But, sadly, my experience has been different.

Well, I got fed up with sub-par performance of my Linksys WRT54G wireless router. I bought a replacement in case I wanted to hack the ROM on my current router and bricked it by accident. Fortunately, that was not necessary. I reset it to its defaults and tweaked parameters. I changed settings one at a time and examined performance changes. I learned the following:

• Enabling burst mode is not good
• Changing the channel from 6 (the default) to 11 helped considerably
• Anytime a 802.11b device uses the router the performance of my 802.11g devices drop
• Increasing the value of beacon interval to 360 milliseconds improved performance on my laptop two rooms away

I upgraded the firmware on my Playstation Portable (PSP) to version 2.81. This allows me to download and play game demos. I downloaded the Loco Roco Demo from Sony's site. It is a cute little game. You control a gelatinous blob by tilting the screen left and right using the shoulder buttons. Pressing both buttons at once bumps the screen causing your blob to bounce. The goal is to collect fruity looking widgets while avoiding the spiky looking whatzits. It is very entertaining but can be frustrating. The graphics are brightly colored and interesting. The soundtrack is a hauntingly sweet Japanese tune.

Black Label Society recently released their new CD entitled Shot to H-ll. Amid a collection of mellow meandering songs with aimless lyrics these songs stand out:

• Concrete Jungle - a grinding metal song. this is where BLS shines
• Blacked Out World - another heavy song. a little softer but still a decent tune with some good riffs

Saw "American History X" last night. I noticed that Ethan Suplee, the actor that plays Earl's brother Randy in the sitcom "My Name is Earl", played a skinhead in the movie. The dude has a huge range of acting ability.

You may have had some problems accessing gazpacho.net lately. Dreamhost, my web hosting provider, has been suffering network issues for a number of weeks now. The past couple of days they struggled with router issues that resulted in intermittent loss of access for my web friends. Just today they replaced the router and promised that things are better. Here's hoping.

I have toyed with the idea of producing a podcast. I'm thinking about doing something funny. I am considering spoofing commercials, mocking liberal politicians and so-called public radio, doing man-on-the-street interviews with America on current events, giving treatment to ridiculous social mores and perhaps producing an episodic radio play. Are there any female friends who want to lend voice talent? gratis? I'll buy pizza.

Kobolds on a Plane

Archon is three weeks away, friends! As part of the Atomic Squash gaming group I plan to run a Kobolds Ate My Baby live action role-playing game (LARP) tenatively named Kobolds on a Plane!

Here is a description of the event I submitted to the gaming manager:

KOBOLDS ON A PLANE!
A Live Action Role-Playing Game for Kobolds Ate My Baby

Short Description
Rival kobolds have kidnapped you and your clan. They sold you to a strange traveling gnome who stows you onboard his airship. You escape your crates to raid the cargo hold and unleash some pathological and gastronomic mayhem. Newcomers welcome. Young children will be eaten.

Description
Rival Kobolds disguised as the famous Kobold chef Emerald and his kitchen staff visit your cave. The sneaky bastards arrange a cooking demonstration where they take your entire clan by surprise capturing you in a huge wooden cage. While dining on your clan leader in an epic-level BBQ and contemplating tasty new recipes for their Torg Foreman Grilles(tm), a strange Gnome arrives. He is Phil T. Olaf, an entertainer and entrepreneur. In exchange for two pairs of shiny boots, a bag of cheesy doodles, three Atomic Squash T-Shirts and a yummy Human baby, he acquires all of you! His plan is to transport you to a human zoo where you will be caged and put on exhibit as a rare type of prairie dog.

You are prisoners aboard Olaf's Gnomish airship, the Pike Maiden. Most of you have managed to claw through your crates and chew your way through the dunnage. You are ravenous and angry (well, that's normal). Find a way to escape your captivity while managing to live.

Archon 29 Report

This past weekend I attended Archon 29. I had a great time. I met some neat folks from the Party Hard Corps and The Dragon's Keep.

Zombie Squad

This year's Archon brought a group named Zombie Squad. What a great idea! These folks combined a civic organization with their love of science fiction. I spoke to one of their members from St Louis. She said other organizations do not know what to do when they call. Imagine that phone call: Zombie Squad? You want to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina?

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Zombie Squad Truck

Dancer with Glow Lights

Another Picture of Dancer

Zombie Squad Detains Tom

Vampire LARP

As previously mentioned this year's LARP was set in the town of Carthage in the year 300 BC. I played a senator with several goals. First of all I wanted to marry my twin daughters. They did a great. I'm happy to say both their characters met the goal by the end of Saturday night. The other goal was to take care of my assistant's debt problem. We achieved this goal by the beginning of the second night. Overall, I had fun. I think the first year players who played my daughters and assistant had a great time, too.

Tom and Nick

Adam and Tom with a Mad Scientist

Carla told me that she played several player's god in the game. She shared a story where a player was praying to her. She appeared, waved her hand and said, "I'm your God! I'm all sparkley!"

Tom and Carla

A character who called himself Dave the Jew messed up. I wasn't part of his stoyline but inserted myself into it when he mistook me for another player. Last year he was a Rastaman character.

Tom with Dave the Jew

As a retiring senator I tried to get my nominee elected to take my place. I chose to support a player named Vince. Unfortunately he did not win. But he did marry one of my daughters in the game.

Vincent Lost the Election

Costumes

I met a woman named Kate. She wore a Jessica Rabbit costume. She was sweet and agreed to take a picture with me. Later she joined our Werewolves game. She has a great sense of humor and a sexy smile. I totally dig her. My biggest regret is that I didn't ask for her phone number or email address. If anybody who know her reads this, can you help me contact her? My email address is tomc@gazpacho.net. Please help a single fella out.

UPDATE: Found her. She responded to my Live Journal

Tom with the Sexy Kate

Elvis is not dead. He is an alien or something. There was a movie about it.

Bubba Elvis

C3P0's Female Robot Companion

Green Latern

Mickey and His Wife

Sniper Scope

I met a woman who was wearing a hologram outfit from Red Dwarf. Her name badge read: Michelle. I did not want to freak her out but I think I responded to her online personals ad last year. She replied then that she didn't think we were a good match.

Tom and Michelle as Rimmer

Sarah was there with her boyfriend promoting his comic books. I missed her in the LARP game this year.

Tom and Sarah

Tom and Skip

Colin Thomas Presents Rasslin

My buddy Jim and I played a game of professional wrestling as a role playing game. It was great. My friend Laurie, the Vicious Vampire Vixen, took me out in the first round of the Royal Rumble. But she agreed to take a picture with me. To my suprise she gave me a playful vampire bite on the neck. What a kidder!

Tom Gets a Bite from the Vicious Vampire Vixen

Jim and Triple V

Werewolves of Miller's Hollow

At this year's Die Con I picked up a game named The Werewolves of Miller's Hollow. The game requires at least eight players. Archon was a perfect place for a pickup game though. Over the course of a few hours we had a dozen or so players playing the game. New players would sit down as others left. We played well until 5 AM Sunday morning.

Pat and Tom

Skip and the New Guy

Brian and Jason

Karen and Ron

A Blog by a SLUGS LARP Player

Somebody who plans to play the SLUGS Vampire LARP has a Blogspot Blog. He answers like "What is a Suffete?" (pronounced show-feet) and "Should I Grow a Beard?".

Yeah, Archon!

Archon is Next Week

Archon is next week! This sci-fi/gaming convention starts Thursday the 29th and runs through October the 2nd. Just as last year it is four days of gaming, drunken geeks and entertaining costumes.

This will be my sixth year playing the the SLUGS Vampire LARP. I noticed the following description of the game on an Archon 29 gaming page:

"Set in the ancient city of Qart-Hadasht, ~350 BCE, political, religious, and moral intrigue run rife through the city. The kindred are in disarray. With a new Suffete being elected on Saturday, everyone has a role to fill. What will become of one of the largest trading centers on the Mediterranean Sea?" Player briefing will be held in Gateway Center Mississippian Room at 7pm. All players are required to attend this briefing. This is a multiple session event beginning with Sessions 4 & 5 on Friday. The game will restart in Sessions 8 concluding in Session 9 on Sunday morning. Debrief will be held on Sunday afternoon.

Archon is like a homecoming. I get to hang out with friends, many of whom I only see once a year. I'm looking forward to taking a break and letting my hair down so to speak.

Archon 28 Report

This past weekend I attended Archon 28. Regular blog readers may notice that I attended a number of conventions this year. In fact this is my fourth sci-fi/gaming convention this year. In addition to Archon I attended the following: CloverCon, GenCon (entry) and DieCon (entry).

At this year's Archon someone asked how many years I had attended the convention. So I did some checking. It wasn't difficult since I have all of my convention badges hanging in my cubicle at work. My first Archon was Archon 20 (1996). Ray Bradbury was the featured Guest of Honor that year. Incidentally, this is the first and only convention to which I brought a date. I took two years off and did not attend again until Archon 23 (1999). I have been attending every year since then. As far as I can tell I first played the SLUGS Vampire LARP in 2000. So the short answer is: for eight years I have attended seven Archons and have played the Vampire LARP for five years (including this year).

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Archon 28 badge

Archon 27 badge

Archon 26 badge

Archon 25 badge

Archon 24 badge

Archon 23 badge

There were plastic ducks sitting everywhere. For some reason they had the word "Boot" written on the bottom. I think it had to do with the children's programming. Of course when the ducks turned up in the hospitality room, they became festive decorations for glasses of beer.

Ducks in beer? Boot!

I played the SLUGS LARP again this year. I'll elaborate on my role a little later. Unfortunately, one of the people playing the LARP overdosed on an undisclosed drug. Every year the game judges have to handle drunk players. But this was frightening; the affected player had to be taken away in an ambulance. At this year's recap the judges asked that nobody use drugs and try to play the game.

Hotel staff tends to a drunk guest

This year in the LARP I played Jack Steele, the leader of the Cam. There are two factions in the Vampire game. I was leader of one faction; a lovely woman was the leader of the Sabbat, the other faction. My gang was eager to fight. When a group of Sabbat visited our base of operations and menanced us with threats, I couldn't hold the blood-thirsty bunch back. Most disappeared right away. We managed to assemble again and invaded their HQ. It was exciting; I've never played such a powerful character. I think the judges wanted me to play my character more like the Terminator; I played him more like John Connor.

After the game I stayed up until 7 AM talking to the woman who played the leader of the Sabbat. We shared leadership experiences and exchanged bad jokes. Does it get any better?

Archon is like homecoming for me. I don't see many of the people there except for once a year. It was better this year than last. I had fun in both the organized tabletops games and spontaneous pick-up games.

I was sad to see it end. But I did need to get some sleep. Cheers! See y'all at Archon next year!

UPDATE: Pan sent me a copy of a picture of myself from Archon's Fan Photo page.

Me in a Jean Jacket. Courtesy of Archon's Fan Photo page

Ready for Archon

Archon is this week! This sci-fi/gaming convention starts Thursday the 30th and runs through Sunday the 3rd. It is four days this year. It has been extended by a day so that they can be a contender for the 2007 World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon).

A number of friends have already told me that they will be attending. See y'all at the SLUGS Vampire LARP.

Archon 2000

Another year, another Archon. Archon is a science fiction convention held yearly in Collinsville. I have been attending it off and on for the last few years. This year was the first time I actually got a hotel room and participated in the night-time activities. Oh yes, the party gets going when the sun goes down.

Archon took place in the Collinsville Gateway Convention Center. They also took over of the nearby hotel. That is where all of the fun is centered. They had Japanese anime showing in the video rooms and a Klingon dance room complete with a bartender serving up frosty beverages with names like: Romulan Ale and Spock's Blood.

I signed up for live-action role playing (LARP), another first for me. This year's LARP was live-action vampire! I was randomly assigned the role of a human, a Teutonic Knight diverted from the Holy Crusades to investigate the strange things happening to a town in Transylvania. It was fun to run through the hotel asking fellow LARPers to "touch my holy symbol". No, lower! Ha ha!

This year featured an addition to the schedule: Robot Wars. I was expecting so much more than what I saw: two radio-controlled cars that appeared to have been bought from Radio Shack. One of them, the apparent victor, still even had its stuffed purple Barney stapled onto the roof. Puh-lease. ;)

I attended a lecture given by Larry Elmore, the Artist Guest of Honor. He produced most of the TSR Dragonlance covers among a number of other book covers. He was down-to-earth and entertaining. I was drawn into his discussion of being an art student in college during the 60s. He also discussed how he overcame a deep depression after a serious illness.

My artist friend there with me worships Elmore. It was cool to see Elmore take time to talk with him when he got his book signed. Later he bought several hundred dollars worth of Elmore prints, which Elmore graciously signed.

Check out next year's Archon. I had a blast this year. The rumor is some Hollywood people will be Guests of Honor (GoH). That means you probably can add +1 to the average convention attendee's Charisma value. If you know what I mean.