Reapercon 2019

It's been almost 3 weeks, I guess I should post a ReaperCon Report!

First, let's rewind the clock even more.



GenCon came and went in early August, and in the aftermath I had a lingering case of 'con crud.  Now, I'm no stranger to sinus infections - I get them at least 2-3 times per year.  Sometimes I limp through, sometimes I go into full shutdown mode and sleep for a couple of days.  In hindsight the GenCon crud needed me to do the latter, but every day I felt like "this is the last day" and so I'd carry on.  So, most of August I wasn't quite healthy, wasn't quite sick - at the time it just felt normal but looking back I was well off my game.

At work, many planets aligned suddenly and each day seemed to bring a new demand without relieving any of the prior requirements.  A new project.  A new customer demand.  A schedule moving earlier.  It got so bad that me and my team would just look at each other and laugh that mad/giddy laugh of "you've got to friggin' be kidding me."  Fighting required more energy than we had, so we'd just nod and say "well, we'll do what we can."

On the Sunday before Reapercon, we were getting the house ready and starting to assemble our stuff.  We were set to depart Tuesday after work and drive.  In between other tasks, I kept hearing the pipes in the utility room "sing" as if there was a faucet on in the house.  I tried to troubleshoot, found nothing, and assumed it was the washing machine or dishwasher.  But Sunday night, we went to bed and I could hear the pipes singing again - water running somewhere in the house and I know that everything is down for the night.  I should have stayed home Monday, but went to the office anyway, got home and triple checked everything again.  Finally, I got down in the crawl space (which requires me to move the washing machine - some genius put the hatch under it) and immediately I see the mist of spraying water in my flashlight.

At that moment, with less than 24 hours before we were supposed to leave, I didn't know if we were still going to Texas.

I'm reasonably handy, but with no time to troubleshoot and not wanting to make things worse, I called in an expert.  Two hours later and with a much lighter wallet, our pipes were secure again.

So I typed all that to say this:  We went into Reapercon tired, stressed, and pretty much wiped out.

We left a little later than planned on Tuesday, but we got on the road and headed towards our overnight stop.  As we crossed state lines, the worries of home and office began to become muted, and we were in vacation mode.

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Ok, about the actual convention.  Reaper holds their annual event at the Denton (TX) Convention Center, which is an Embassy Suites that's about a year old (first convention held at the facility was the 2018 Reapercon).   It's a small convention compared to most - 1500 people - and has a friendly/family vibe.  It is of course centered around the Reaper Mini product line, but other industry partners have joined in to make for a reasonably well rounded weekend.  The focus is DnD and mini painting.  If your need is for wargaming, this ain't your thing (tho if you organized it, Reaper would probably welcome it!).

We split our drive and after an overnight stop arrived onsite on Wednesday, in time to get our badges and attend the pizza meet and greet.  We joined the Miniature Monthly table and reconnected with the crew.  Road weary, we crashed fairly early, but with our accumulated fatigue this would become our normal evening routine.

I'll do a picture dump and then talk some more.  Cya on the other side!

WaterFX Class - Super fun.

Fort Wappel on (I think) Friday. Everyone is very serious and trying to get their entries done.  (I was sitting smugly on the side because mine was already turned in!)

Sculpting class with Bob Ridolfi and Julie Guthrie.  I made a belt and pouches for "Gandolf."  This picture was maybe 1/3 of the way thru the class.  

Stray shot of the main ballroom.

Stray shot of the vendor area.

Bones conversion class with Jason Wiebe. I started by mocking up a diorama.

In the class, students mashed the two models together to make a Zombie King!  (Yes, he's about to throw a severed head)

Main table of the painting entries.

Wider angle of the painting entry room.

We had a total of 5 classes through the weekend.  Reaper's class format is fairly short at 1 hr 45 minutes of class time.  Slice off some time for usual startup shenanigans and winding down at the end, and it's barely 90 minutes of content.  I won't bore you with a class-by-class review, but I'll just say that the classes very good.

We had no game sessions through the weekend (last year we played a bit of Pathfinder).  Instead, we hung out at Fort Wappel and chatted, did a little bit of casual painting, or wandering around.  I also spent more time in the hotel room, just vegging out (and playing a little WoW Classic since it launched the same weekend).

And I slept. A lot. We were back in the room reasonably early, and I crashed hard each night.  After running on fumes for August, it was the break that I needed.

My DGS Games polar bear cavalry won a Bronze and I took 3rd place in DGS' inaugural painting competition.  They provided me a nice certificate and a bronze "challenge coin" to commemorate my win.

We left on Sunday after the raffle/auction and started our way north.  Last year we drove home in one day and it was a LONG time in the car.  We broke it up and spent Sunday night in Tulsa.  This was the right way to go, and we arrived home safely on Labor Day Monday.

Had a wonderful time.  We've done more than a few conventions over the years, and Reaper is towards the top of our list.  We can't go everywhere and do everything but we're already talking about ReaperCon2020.