GenCon 2018

Welcome to GenCon 2018

Last year I broke the GenCon wrap up post into a multi-part series.  This year I'll try to do it in one shot.

First, some shout outs to: the Dog Might Games Viking Crew, the Miniature Monthly crew, Panda Cult Games, TTCombat, Ninja Division, Flying Frog, HipLein Industries, and the filthy casuals in the Council of Moo gang.

OVERVIEW: 
This was our 5th GenCon.  Which doesn't sound like a long time, but it means half a decade of travelling to downtown Indy.  It's been long enough that the years are starting to blur together a bit, and I actually had to go look up whether this was year 5 or 6.

Each GenCon is a little bit different for us.  Each year tends to compound a little bit more on the ones prior, like rings inside a tree.  There's a foundation of earlier years forming the layers of our experience, and each year we build another layer.

Early on, GenCon was about meeting up with old friends, mostly from our college days, and investigating new products, new ideas, and absorbing as much knowledge as we could about various product lines.  Since we were new to the scene, nearly EVERYTHING was new and GenCon was almost overwhelming in scope.  But with repetition, we're now looking for the deltas - the differences - from prior years and focusing more on the new growth.

Last year was a pivotal year; in 2016-2017 we continued to step away from PC games as our primary hobby and Games and Painting took on a more prominent role in our free time.  Through Kickstarter and online news venues, we started to understand the people and stories behind the companies we loved.  So, GC2017 was about meeting as many of our "heroes" as we could, and just being fanboys a bit. GenCon became a place where we were within a few feet of people we had read about, and that became a little surreal.

In the 12 months since last year's event - thanks to the classes we've taken and online groups we've joined - we've continued to build new relationships and have met more people "in the industry."  I don't mean to convey by any stretch that we're "important people" but a big change this year was that at several booths we had people recognize us on sight.  Or we would see them in the hall after hours and they'd flag us down to chat.  My point is that a big part of 2018 was about gabbing with new friends face to face, as well as spending time with our old friends, and overall that changed the tone of the event for us, in a good way.

THURSDAY:
Thursday was a shopping day.  Thanks to a huge traffic jam in Indy, we arrived later than expected, but still well ahead of the vendor hall opening.  We found our place nearest the Kingdom Death and Ninja Division booths and happily chatted with people around us.  It was apparent that everyone around us was heading to either KDM or Steamforged.

Obligatory "sea of nerds" photo. This was taken a few minutes before doors opened on Thursday.

My initial line position for the Kingdom Death booth.  A bit worse than last year. The end of the line is (I think) near the far wall.

The doors opened and we surged forward; I went straight to the KDM booth.  My line position was a little worse than last year, but I landed between two guys that I stood in line with last year.  We chatted our way to the front of the queue.  Unfortunately, the early line was full of people with shopping lists for themselves and their friends and the line moved slowly as people moved to the cash register with (quite literally) armloads of Kingdom Death.  And I mean armloads ... boxes balanced in a big heap and tumbling off the top of the stack while the person carrying them tried to use their chin to stabilize the pile. Insane amounts of money changed hands.

GenCon Kingdom Death menu.

Some beautifully painted (and based) KDM minis in the booth.

I finally got to the front of the line - about an hour and forty five later - and managed to snag a few hard to find resins (Ringtail Fox Survivor in particular).  I landed in the cash register line behind a young man and his girlfriend apparently buying everything in the store.  Nothing about their transaction was easy or fast.  They had a long conversation with the cashier about other items they may have missed.  Then they insisted every box be opened to ensure all figures were molded properly.  Then they paid in cash - in $100 bills - prompting every bit of currency to be checked, and there was a question about whether one of the $50 bills was counterfeit.  After 20+ minutes of waiting for this one transaction I was ready to give a mighty war cry and commit bodily harm upon them, but finally they were done and I was on my way.

KDM Loot:  TOP (L-R) - Dragon Armor Kit, Dark Elf Variant, Dark Elf, Sci-Fi Savior.  BOTTOM (L-R) Echoes of Death, Percival, White Knight, Ringtail Fox Survivor, Death High Whitespeaker

SoB and Broken Token Loot:  LEFT (top to bottom) Lost Army Hell Cannon, FoFo Deapth Track, Bone Eaters, RIGHT (top to bottom) Trederran Raiders, and two Broken Token Paint Racks

Dropfleet Loot:  LEFT:  Scourge and UCM Destroyers, UCM Battleship, UCM Battlecruiser.  PLASTIC BAGS:  UCM and Scourge Kickstarter Exclusives, Remnant Centurion, and Princess Liner.

I met up again with Mrs. Zoxe, and the rest of the day was random hopping to specific booths.  Of particular note, I went to the TTCombat booth to pick up just a couple of Dropfleet ships to round out my collection but walked away with a bag full.  They were selling off the Kickstarter and Web Store exclusives that I'd quite possibly not see again.  We paused briefly to line up for a book signing with James S.A. Corey of the Expanse series.  We were 2nd in line and got a little bit of 1:1 interaction.  Then we hit the food trucks for dinner and then collapsed.

Autographs from the pair of guys that write under the pen name James S.A. Corey.

FRIDAY:
Up early, and attended a podcast recording session with James S.A. Corey.  This was interesting to watch - sound checks and a live interview environment - but it was apparent that the authors were uneasy and there was zero interaction with the audience.  So while we learned some things, it still felt sort of false/artificial and wasn't much different than watching a youtube video.  I came away vaguely disappointed.

James S.A. Corey doing a podcast recording. The bandannas are holding their mics. The recording went well but at points this was brutally awkward for the guys and there was near zero audience interaction.

We hit the show floor and walked the entire venue from row 100 to 3000.  Did the KDM Black Knight demo.  The Black Knight is my single most favorite KDM figure, and I'm really excited by the gameplay his expansion will offer.  But the encounter was intentionally overtuned and completely gored us in 2 rounds.

KDM Black Knight demo. In production, the terrain will likely be cardboard. One of the mechanics is he picks you up and throws you through the pottery and columns and generally smashes the place to bits.  Super fun (and deadly).

Better shot of the KDM demo.

In late afternoon, we met up with friends and walked to the JW Marriott to find an unused ballroom.  A couple of us taught an another how to play X-Wing and I gave him a core box that I had abandoned.  Someone produced a copy of Unearth and taught us to play; really enjoyed this game.  Then assembled as a larger group of old friends at a local hipster taco bar (for lack of a better descriptor) and had too many margaritas and some really excellent tacos.  Returned to the same JW ballroom to play Fallout.  We stayed until well past midnight, but had a 20 minute walk to the car and a decent drive to our bed since we don't stay downtown. My head hit the pillow at 1:30 am and we had to be up early the next morning.

SATURDAY:
Up too early and still feeling the margaritas, I skipped breakfast and we ventured down for our Q&A Session with James S.A. Corey.  This was the interactive session I was looking for and really enjoyed them.

Q&A with James S.A. Corey. This was a lot more fun than the Podcast.

We putzed around most of the day and tried to find things we'd missed on Thurs and Fri.  In late afternoon, the winners for the Shadows of Brimstone painting contest were announced, and I'm happy to say that I won the Brimstone Bounty (squad) category (!!!!).  This was the super-secret GenCon Project #1, and I'll post some pictures later on.

My minis in the Flying Frog case (mine are on the right on the wooden stand).  I'll post separately on the theme and execution of the project.

We again met friends again at the JW for after hours gaming and Dead of Winter was brought out.  We played the intro scenario, had the win condition met, but lost in the final accounting of the round due to the order that certain things triggered.  I liked this game but I spent a lot of resources at the start that I might have held onto longer.

SUNDAY:
Back for the final day.  We had no events, and sat in the gamer hall and talked with friends until about 11.  We went over for the winners of the Ninja Division painting contest, and I'm proud to say that Mrs. Zoxe took 3rd in their diorama division (!!!!).  We then wandered around and  demo'd the Screaming God expansion for KDM and really loved this encounter as well.  This one was tuned to be winnable and while I died horribly my party was successful.  We finally called the convention done and departed around 2pm.

KDM Screaming God demo. The setup is that the horde of angry antelope are stampeding and chasing you (and the boss) as you hunt.  The terrain walls move to the left 6 spaces every turn, so part of the challenge is playing Frogger to avoid hitting a wall.

Victory!  I was impressed with this; the demo served some nice future content but also required the players to use some advanced gameplay (spending survival) that normally isn't demo'd.

OBSERVATIONS and CLOSING REMARKS:

The Blizzard Booth in the back of the Gamer's Hall was a new addition. Each year this area has a few more "content" booths, which is blurring the lines between the Vendor Hall and the Gamer Hall. It's not a bad thing, just a trend I've noticed. 

The booth was popular all weekend, though there weren't any events, it was just straight up Blizzard merch and a small area to play Hearthstone.

Observations and comments in no particular order.

1. The gamer hall felt a lot more packed.  GenCon is sneaking more content in here each year (most notably, Blizzard Entertainment this year).  In years past there would be acres of empty tables where groups could sit and play a pickup game of whatever, have lunch, or just veg out.  This year you had to hunt to find empty tables. (Not a complaint, just ... different).
2. I had a lot harder time getting into the KDM demos than last year. Could be just my dumb luck, but they were very busy all 4 days.
3. The vendor hall never really got gridlocked like it has in the past, at least that we saw. Yes it was busy, yes there were lines galore, but the full-on gridlock from row 100 to row 3000 that we've seen just never happened.
4. Friends that have stayed at the JW multiple years said that the downstairs ballrooms were more occupied this year than in years past.  The bleeding edge of GenCon continues to creep and expand each year.
5. I had just a hint of the GenCon crud on Saturday but took some Zicam and thwarted it.  It's now a week later and no crud. Hooray.
6. There were fewer Harley Quinn cosplays.  Thank you.