I think my days of properly blogging about cons are over (I’ve not done it since pre plague) but here are some photos anyway.
Fists were bumped, fives were high’d and some (consentual) hugging and close quarters seflies happened, though as usual I wish I’d taken more photos!
Mothership RPG - I love this game and am really excited about the new edition. Horror games haven’t really been my thing up until this point so I feel like I'm
still learning how to pace them and build tension, but I think it was a fun session.
DCC RPG - Back in my comfort zone in the afternoon. Tomb of The Savage Kings was a ton of fun to run and for the first time in a while I ran my favourite game for a whole table of folk new to the system. A combination of great roleplaying and good dice rolls gave us crits, fumbles, deity disapproval, luck and spellburn. It was almost the perfect ‘demo’ game and a great way to close out my 'Road Crew’ games this year.
I was really pleased to be invited back to run some tabletop RPGs at a small convention in Burton on Trent on Saturday. Burton is about 40 minutes from my current home but closer in my heart as it was the town I was living in when I got back into the gaming hobby in the early 2000s. I have many fond memories of games in some of the real ale pubs (Burton is a famous brewing town) and of course it’s also home to the best FLGS I ever had, Spirit Games.
Last year’s event (the first) was a great success and I was kept busy running games all day. This year I recruited some friends to help GM as well as round up potential new players!
Here’s Jim evangelizing about Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG to a couple of Warhammer players!
John aka RedDiceDiaries running Greg Gillespie’s excellent Barrowmaze in an open session using the 5th Edition D&D basic rules.
This year we had a slower start on the gaming front, I think due too all the fun con stuff at the front of the library. With the cosplayers, authors and other activities it was a while before potential players started to make their way through to our tables, however we soon had three busy tables of gamers with myself running Whitebox Fantasy and Dungeon Crawl Classics, John running D&D and Martin (@StormHeathenRPG) running 13th Age.
The East Midlands Garrison Star Wars cosplayers were great fun. The Emperor made a couple of visits to my table, I swear he was whispering the force lightning spell into the ears of the folk playing wizards…
I ran three sessions in total, slightly shorter than the average con game but still long enough to give kids and adults at taste of my favourite RPG systems.
Just before I beat a tired but happy retreat to rainy Leicestershire I remembered to pick up a copy of our host and con organiser Angeline Trevena’s fantastic “30 Days Of Worldbuilding” a book aimed at writers but a very useful tool on any GMs bookshelf!
Here’s part two of my 2019 ‘Round Up’ blog, concentrating on the actual rolling of dice this year. For the first time ever this past year I kept a tally of all the ‘Public’ games I ran (Convention games or those in gaming stores, cafes and pubs) and in 2019 I ran 36 individual sessions. I haven’t counted the games I took part in as a player quite so accurately, but including our monthly 5E game at home (where I’m currently playing a feisty Dwarf Fighter called Dina) I reckon I’ve played somewhere between 15 and 20 sessions which probably taking the total to 50+ games this year.
There hasn’t been a lot of variety, almost everything I’ve run or played has been D&D based so maybe a goal for next year should be to shake that up a little? Oh and no, for long term readers I STILL haven’t run Savage Worlds, but I did get as far as picking up the lovely hardcover of the new edition this year!
I kicked off the year in January running the first session of the year for our pub game and also ran a funnel session at local club at short notice.
In February I arranged at game with some friends at The Dice Cup in Nottingham, running “The Hole In The Sky” DCC RPG funnel by Brendan LaSalle.
I also ran some RPGs at the first Burton On Trent Fantasy and Sci Fi Con. I used scenery and minis to run some ‘set piece’ games and they proved really popular. I’m looking forward to growing the gaming side of this fun little event with help from some fellow gamers in 2020.
In March I made a return trip to Gary Con, Lake Geneva, WI, USA. It felt a little less like a pilgrimage this year but was every bit as fun rolling dice with good friends. I celebrated my birthday there and was suprised by friends with an awesome cake. All being well I’ll be back in 2020!
In May I met up with some twitch mini painting streamer friends at Warhammer Fest. I’m still #NotaWarhammerGuy but so many good friends makes this a great day out every year!
UK Games Expo 2019 was, as always another highlight of the gaming year. Once again we played host to Brendan LaSalle from Goodman Games and together with fellow UK Road Crew judges we ran and played over 100 hours of our favourite games!
That same weekend I was also really excited to see my first every RPG product published. Small Niche Games published Operation Peardrop, a ‘mission’ module I’d written for Pete Spahn’s fantastic World War 2 RPG WW2:Operation Whitebox.
I carried on evangelising my favourite game, Goodman Games’ Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, specifically the new Lankhmar rules, with a couple of games at some fantastic one day mini conventions hitting the aforementioned Owlbear and Wizards Staff in lovely Lemington Spa and making a trip up to Manchester for ‘BurritoCon4′
I also got to play in a lot of memorable games this year, both at conventions and at home but one that really stands out was my old school mate Paul, a regular in our DCC pub game who ran a game on his birthday using Whitebox: Fantastic Medieval Adventure Game It was a really fun session, Paul puts a lot of heart and soul into his character description and roleplaying and I loved the laid back atmosphere.
The last convention of the year was as always Dragonmeet which I’ve covered in a previous blog entry. Always a good day out.
And finally, another mention for our monthly Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG session at a local Loughborough pub which has been a huge highlight of my gaming year. We’ve grown to two tables and I’m really excited to kick off a couple of new campaigns in 2020
As I’ve said before on my blog once I’ve done something twice I consider it a tradition so here, for the third year, is my ‘traditional’ round up for tabletop RPG shenanigans for 2019! Here are links to 2019 and 2018′s posts as comparison, though last year you’ll note I didn’t set any goal or resolutions!
Painting and Modelling
I started 2019 with regular painting streams on twitch on a Sunday morning but once again I fell out of love with the platform in the summer. Looking back at my painting output this year I completed some really fun projects for tabletop and for display.
Not strictly gaming related but I’ve had this 3D Printed Star Wars Stormtrooper Helmet kicking around unfinished for nearly two years so it was great to finally wrap it up and wear it on Halloween!
Also in the Sci Fi prop department ‘Farscape’ one of my favourite TV shows turned 20 years old in 2019 and whilst I watched the whole show again I printed and painted some fun stuff to display in my hobby room.
I also finished some long overdue gaming minis
The Games Workshop Forgeworld ‘Dread Maw’ which was a generous gift in 2018 finally finished, in Purple Worm or DCC Purple Planet ‘Orm’ guise!
A 3D printed Giant that had been waiting in the long queue. Speaking of 3D printing this year I also started trading on Etsy, printing and painting miniatures and models from a store front there with the aim to make a small profit to offset my gaming hobby.
Here’s a model I’m particularly proud of, a Reaper miniatures Halfling, painted to represent my friend Becky’s Halfling Druid character.
Another 3D printed model, this time a custom Owlbear from Fat Dragon Games I printed 40+ of these models to celebrate the second ‘Owlbear and Wizard’s Staff’ convention (more on that later!)
I also printed and painted another batch of Fat Dragon tiles, this time from the ‘Cavern’ set.
As well as adding the rather epic ‘GM Screen Of Doom’ for my setup at home.
Well, that’s Dragonmeet done for another year, the last convention of 2019! I didn’t take a ton of photos this year but it was great to game with this bunch of people.
DCC Lankhmar was, once again a big success as a con game. I’m really looking forward to getting stuck into a running a campaign in the city next year.
My Operation Peardrop for WW2: Opeeration Whitebox also got another run out and it was pretty awesome to have a copy of the finished, printed module in hand rather than running from my primitive play test notes. Thanks again to Pete Spahn for making that happen this year!
Dragonmeet is always a good social occasion too and whilst I didn’t get to awkwardly hug or high five everyone it was great to meet some folk in person for the first time. See you next year!
Well, it’s been a few months since my last post which was my annual UK Games Expo write up. I’ve been busy running games both home and away so here’s a brief catch up. I won’t go into detail about recent convention games because I recently put a few words together for Goodman Games website about some of the recent UK ‘mini cons’, so please check out that article!
My home game continues! It remains the longest gathering of a regular group I’ve been involved with, I think we’re closing on six years of various campaigns and one shots. For a few months now we’ve been playing 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons. DM’d by a friend who is running us through ‘Temple Of Annihilation’ I’m enjoying the game very much, it’s nice to be able to relax, not have to worry about game prep and just hit things with Dina, my Dwarf Fighter’s axe!
My monthly open table Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG game in a local pub (usually the ‘Organ Grinder’ in Loughbrough, Leicestershire) goes from strength to strength. Most months we have enough players to warrant a second table and I’m hoping to recruit a few more regular players in the coming months. Drop in/drop out players will always be accommodated though so if you ever find yourself in the area on the last Wednesday of the month please come by and roll some dice! Actual dates and times are always posted as public facebook events and listed on Goodman Games Event Page
The ‘Loughborough Crawlers’ pub crew!
Painting and 3D printing for the tabletop RPG hobby continues, though I’m taking another break from twitch streaming and this time it’s likely to be the end of regular, scheduled streams. I just don’t have the time, confidence or inclination any more, though at the back of my mind I’d still like to realise my ambition of streaming a live RPG game some time. Maybe that’s a goal for 2020?
Another extended UK Games Expo weekend has been and gone in the blink of an eye, so here’s how it went for me!
Once again I was playing host to my friend Brendan LaSalle, author of XCrawl and convention out reach dude for Goodman Games ( who publish Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG ) Brendan arrived on Tuesday fresh from Momo Con in Atlanta so it seemed fair to give him a few hours to recover before fueling him with ale and curry.
On Wednesday we kicked off the trip proper with the obligatory ‘touristing’ at the Battle Of Bosworth Heritage Centre, a local spot for me which is full of photo opportunities, some of which will no doubt show up in forthcoming articles on Goodman’s website!
On Wednesday evening we headed out to Board & Swords, a relatively new gaming spot in Derby that I’d been meaning to check out for a couple of months. Brendan ran ‘Hole In The Sky’ his zero level funnel adventure.
Thursday was setup day at the Expo so we met up with Brett and Alyson who were running the booth to help run some errands for them before heading into Leicester to Bean Gaming, a gorgeous gaming cafe. Sadly the cafe had suffered a break in a couple of weeks ago but Goodman Games were kind enough to provide some raffle prizes for fund raising towards the costs of the damage.
Before the game we met up with Neil (@OldScouserRPing) for a pint and a catch up
Brendan ran ‘The Inn at Five Points’, this year’s ‘Convention Exclusive’ module for a packed table of nine players.
Friday was day one of the Expo and we had an early start to get to Birmingham and pick up our GM’s packs before the first games started at 9AM
First up was my Umerican Survival Guide session ‘An Umerican Adventure In Engerlund’ which ran really well. I’ve tweaked a couple of encounters since I last ran this at Gary Con and really enjoyed playing with a mixed table, some of whom had no experience of DCC - it’s always fun showing off that magic system! The terrible pun I’ve worked into one of the encounters also received a very satisfying groan!
I hadn’t scheduled an afternoon game so managed a quick dash around the trade hall where I bumped into Pookie who was chatting with Brett and Al at the Goodman Games booth.
Friday night’s game was my Dark Trails RPG zero level funnel adventure ‘A Westward Journey’. Like my Umerica adventure this is still a ‘work in progress’ but I’ve had a couple of decent play test sessions and some really useful feedback, so I was looking forward to running it. Sadly the session bombed pretty hard, mostly due to poor time management on my part, though there are plot/design issues that I also need to address if I’m going to run the adventure again. With hindsight I should have hand waved a scene change at the two hour mark to ensure we could at least complete the scenario and show off more of the game mechanics, but doing that felt like a cheat, and consequently I didn’t address it until was too late. I try to treat every con game as a learning experience, this one more than most, but I’m disappointed that it happened whilst I was trying to promote a game that I’m pretty excited about!
Despite it all Jules got my vote for MVP just for turning up in duster, waistcoat and hat - thanks mate!
Saturday morning came around and I’d committed to running a full day of two hour ‘Games On Demand’ sessions for Lloyd.
Brendan and I had brainstormed a simple Dungeon Crawl Classics scenario to fit the two hour time slots, planned carefully to show off level zero play before boosting characters to level one to demonstrate the higher level DCC mechanics (mighty deeds, luck, magic etc)
Having dropped the ball with time management the previous evening I was worried about having to condense so much into a relatively small time slot and the first session felt shaky to say the least, but having a table with mixed level of experience helped me get into it.
Game two on Saturday had a lower overall experience level but I hit my stride with the adventure and I think we may have had a couple of new DCC fans!
After a lunch break it was great to see some familiar faces from one of my DCC adventures last year - and they brought friends!
For the final table (who I completely forget to grab a photo with!) I decided to run ‘Portal Under The Stars’ the classic zero level adventure from the DCC RPG rulebook. It’s quite a challenge in a two hour slot but we proved that brand new roleplayers can pick up DCC RPG really quickly!
Games on Demand was a really fun challenge and something I’ll definitely consider taking part in next year, without doubt a highlight of this years Expo for me!
Saturday night was kept free for socialising and once again we (over)indulged in the delights (slow service and horrendous prices!) of the Hilton bar. I called it a night at 2AM, already regretting signing up to run a 9AM game…
The alarm call came around all to soon and after a subdued breakfast I got setup to run my final game of the expo. ‘Acting Up in Lankhmar’ is an adventure by Michael Curtis for the soon to be released DCC RPG Lankhmar rules.
I ran what I’d consider to be a pretty accurate ‘literary’ Lankhmar setting (sticking with just three classes (Wizard, Warrior Thief) and the new, but very popular ‘fleeting luck’ mechanics. It was great to see familiar faces at the table, all of whom brought their ‘A’ game and soon had forgetting my hangover! Whilst not a complete success for the characters (the adventure ended in a riot!) it was a really fun session and a fantastic high note to end my DCC Judge duties this year!
In the afternoon I played my only session as a player, taking the role of a Thief on the Purple Planet in Andy’s ‘The Rock Awakens’ game. Andy ran a really engaging session, the last of six games he ran over the weekend!
On the Monday night we squeezed one more gaming session in at The Dice Cup in Nottingham, with enough players for two tables and solid reports from the shop this week that they may need a restock of DCC rulebooks!
Once again the UK Games Expo weekend has flown by and I’m left plotting and planning next years shenanigans. See you there!
'Operation Peardrop’ the adventure/mission I wrote for Small Niche Games‘ WW2: Operation White box role-playing game is now for sale as a PDF on DriveThruRPG.com
Any profit I receive from sales of this go into my Gary Con fund! Thanks again to Pete Spahn and everyone who playtested and helped out!
This is a tabletop RPG set in the ‘Weird West’ written by my good friend David Baity I’ve been lucky enough to see this grow from an early draft to a fantastic complete game and this Kickstarter will take that game to a beautiful published book. Please check it out and support it if you can!
I’ve had the pleasure of playtesting Dark Trails. Dave is a good friend and has the dubious honour of being the first person to pay me for any RPG related writing (so I’ve made a tiny contribution to this game)
Please check it out, back it if you can or at least help get the word out on social media
(Here’s a month old post that didn’t get any further than the draft stage until today!)
Burton Sci Fi and Fantasy Con (16th February 2019)
I was asked to run some demo games at a new convention at a library in Burton Upon Trent recently. I really didn’t expect much given that is was a brand new convention which had grown out of an author event, but my wife works for our local library service so I’m keen to support libraries everywhere, and of course I’ll take any opportunity to promote the tabletop RPG hobby!
I set up my table with some Fat Dragon 3D Printed Scenery and character sheets and settled down to wait for any potential gamers.
To cut a long story short I didn’t stop running games all day, with a seemingly endless stream of folk, mostly brand new roleplayers, wanting to sit down and play from anything between 30 minutes to a full 3-4 hour game slot. In the morning I ran a couple of short sessions using Whitebox: Fantastic Medieval Adventures for kids and adults.
In the afternoon I ran the Dungeon Crawl Classics adventure The Jeweler That Dealt In Stardust with the scenery I built for last year’s UK Games Expo session.
When I looked up during the final encounter I found we’d gained a big crowd of folk watching. With 8 players at the table, including my old mate Gareth who I got to roll dice with for the first time in years, it was a fun game.
The event had been a big success for everyone and I’m looking forward to going back next year.
