Shadows of the Black Feather Part III: Zombie Smackdown

Three day weekends are great weekends for gaming.

So in our third session of Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, Garsome the ex-retired Dwarf Mercenary, Milo the Halfling Rogue, Cedric the Human Cleric, and Ashlyn the Human Paladin decided to travel up to the village church to see what had become of the village priest, and to investigate the rumored source of the necromantic infection. They were in for some surprises.

First they chopped thier way through some ghasts and zombies hanging around in the streets on their way with little difficulty. Garsim had one noteworthy moment where he Great Cleaved two ghasts and a zombie in one swing. Milo also got to try out his alchemical flare stake on a zombie and burnt it to a cinder.

Then they approached the church, which was clearly decrepit and had recently been defiled. They waltzed in guns a-blazin, sure in the power of whatever it is they believe in (deus ex machina?).

The Evil Priest surprised them as they entered with a hearty blend of mass inflict moderate wounds scrolls empowered by an earlier casting of unhallow. The PCs were not pleased. To their credit I got no whining about the lack of rolling for initiative before springing that on them (the adventure actually calls for a surprise Circle of Death casting, but that's just sloppy playtesting).

The priest won initiative, and the first order of business was to cast dispel magic on the pesky dwarf. Cedric likes to cast magic circle of protection on Garsome's beard, and that just isn't compatible with my preferences to make Garsome roll Will saves vs. domination, so that had to go. The protection spell was dispelled as well as all his magic items became dormant (except his ring of protection) for 1d4 rounds, which was nice for me.

A lack of magical arms and armor didn't phase Garsome though, and he still charged the priest as zombies and deathlocks (undead wizards) burst through the neighboring doors to surround the non-dwarf members of the party. Cedric re-cast magic circle of protection vs. evil while turning undead and the evil priest cast protection from good and later summon giant crocodile! Garsome eventually finished the priest off with his Dagger of Venom, which was the first weapon to regain its magical charge, and the priest fell through the hole in the center of the church, into the darkness below.

The players knew that the priest was wearing some good stuff (he was a high level NPC after all), so they healed up with Cedric's wand of cure light wounds and trudged down the steps to the basement to ransack the place, where they found the priest's son made into a huge franken-monster waiting for them along with some reanimated ex-companions of NPC paladin Ashlyn Lightbringer.

The PCs took it in stride and attacked the monster like the stalwart heroes they are, until they found out that one bite from the Blaspheme resulted in a psychic shock to the PC making him lose his next turn (no save!) if he was anything but evil, as well as a souped-up version of Necromantic Zombie Fever which even Garsome failed his save against!

Cedric made ample use of his Bolstered Quickened Maximized Turn ability and Milo rolled around and jammed exploding wooden stakes into every undead he could get to. The brave little guy even took a bite from the superbeast for the team, ringing a little bell he found to get its attention.

Between Ashlyn's 'Smite Evil' and Garsome's 'Smite Everything' the creature was eventually felled, and the magical plague that was animating the corpses around Barovia was eradicated. The PCs buried the ex-companions of Ashlyn and bid her farewell, and if they needed her help in the future they could find her at the Blood o' the Vine Tavern (backup PC).

For their trouble, the 3 PCs eventually hauled off 1416 gold each, a suit of magical full plate, a magical shield, a magical silver greatsword, an evil-looking tome about creating undead, a good-looking journal about fighting undead, a few scrolls, a few potions, and a hefty "thanks" from the villagers.

Now that the zombie plague is taken care of, maybe they can actually get to investigating the witches that are described in the letter they got from the dark and mysterious gypsy three sessions ago.


Cheesy video for the players:

Shadows of the Black Feather part II: Village of the Damned!

My players logged onto the server on Thursday and they continued their trek through the zombie-infested village of Barovia, on their quest to right wrongs and left rights.


The human following them around finally broke out of his teleportation mishap-inflicted amnesia and introduced himself as Father Cedric Finalrest, cleric of Kelemvor and general enemy to undead-types. He asked if he could join the party. With that introduction the role-playing gods nodded their satisfaction and two became three, as Cedric joined Garsome and Milo.

The trio marched their way down the streets of Barovia and came across a dead body being devoured by giant maggots. The cleric with his fancy detect evil ability could sense the zombie ambush waiting to happen from the doorways on either side of the house, and prepared accordingly. Two flying evil heads flew out of one of the windows but were immediately put down by a couple of throwing axes launched from Garsome. Then the zombies did their B-movie pop-out attack and between Garsome's Great Cleave and Cedric's Holification rituals they were put down pretty quickly. Milo managed to help the group by taking most of the hits and getting hurt pretty bad. But like a good rogue he was the first to loot the dead body.


They searched the body and found some papers detailing that the man was named Viktor Litmunova, and strangely he hadn't succumbed to infection. Well, they didn't really comment on this fact between healing themselves and looking for gold, but at least the cleric said some "Hail Mary's" for the guy after he did his battery-of-healing party restore. I swear Devin's on autopilot with the healing and protection spells, he throws them out so fast. I think I could hear him hitting "Alt-Q" every thirty seconds.

Continuing on, they barely got a sentence of descriptive boxed text after that battle before they "Heard the sounds of battle coming from the center of town!" They rushed to the town square and stumbled into a mass zombie rave. Barricades had been set up in the center of town but one of them was busted and the zombies poured in to get at the besieged villagers. A lone paladin was fighting off the zombies but was hard-pressed. One of the zombie-creatures was actually an Entomber, and could magically bury people alive, which it subsequently did to the paladin. So the party rushed in and Garsome's axe went a-swingin. Cedric flew over the crowd of zombies and started doing his turning-undead pulse attack, while at the same time casting protective spells on the land-based dwarf. Milo drank a potion of barkskin and sincerely wished we could stop fighting sneak attack-resistant zombies all the goddamn time.

When Garsome reached the Entomber he was not nimble enough to avoid being swallowed up by the earth, and Garsome was buried alive! Cedric flew down to melee range to give the Entomber a taste of some seriously channeled positive energy, but failed his cast defensively roll and the Entomber grabbed him by the ankle and overhead slammed the cleric into the ground, which sucked him under. Upon seeing his two kick-ass companions put into early graves, Milo, who was engaged with some very determined zombies, decided to "lead the zombies away" and took off running from the battle and off the map.

Holding his breath, Cedric tried to turn undead from underground but failed his concentration checks, while Garsome slowly clawed his way upward and back toward air. The zombies gathered around the sound of digging and as soon as his head popped up they all whack-a-moled the stout dwarf. Cedric, for his part, decided that being buried alive was for the birds and called upon his granted power from the Traveller domain, and the loose earth above him gave way as easily as if it were air and Cedric flew out of the grave to bathe the zombies in the 8 levels of glorious awesome that is the holy god Kelemvor. Six zombies immediately burst into flame at the sight of the quasi-resurrected cleric and Garsome took out the remaining zombie as well as the troublesome Entomber with some well-placed axe strikes.

After digging out the paladin, they learned her name was Ashlyn Lightbringer and she and her companions had arrived in the village just three days ago during the zombie infestation. Her companions went to the defiled church to find the source of the necromantic infection but never returned, and Ashlyn implored the adventurers to help her find them. This is where the DM misinterpreted the probable immediate goals of the party. I figured that they'd want to rest and memorize spells, as well as buy and sell some items at the shop as they had finally reached the center of town which was a respite from constant zombie attack, and up till now it just had been nonstop combat. So I prepared for a lot of role-playing and price haggling for such an event, as well as alchemical item preparation, rumor-dropping opportunities, and innkeeper surliness, thinking the players would want to actually prepare for another foray through the zombified village.

Instead, Garsome the dwarf, even though he had gotten pretty beat up in the last battle, was fully ready to go to the church and rescue her companions, immediately. And Cedric had no problem wrapping up any loose ends with his cleric buffing and healing spells. So I had to play her both ways, where she wanted to them to help her, but to wait until morning. Here's how the conversation basically went:

Ashlyn: I implore you good adventurers, my companions have not returned for three days from whence they ventured to the church, and I would have them saved! Will you join me in my quest to the church upon the morn?

Garsome: Sure, let's go lady!

Ashyln: Uh, don't you want to look around the town square first? I mean, we should rest and pray to good Lathander for our spells, and there surely are merchants here who would trade their magic wares with you. I can introduce you to...

Garsome: But you said they were in trouble! We should head out right now.

Ashlyn: 'Tis true, good dwarf, they are in trouble, but we cannot help them if we are wounded and die en route! The church is on the other side of town and we may encounter many perils! Plus the villagers will need us here until the sun rises in case of another zombie onslaught during the night!

Cedric: No prob, we're not wounded. I cast three cure moderates on the dwarf, cured Milo's disease and channeled some hp to him, cast consecrate on the town square, plus our 10' magic circles of protection vs. evil still have 768 rounds left on them. I can cast hold portal on the building's doors to protect the villagers while we're gone. Oh yeah, and you get, *rolls,* 18 hit points healed. Let's go!

Ashlyn: Uh...do you not wish to see Bildrath's wares over at the Mercantile? He may have items that can help us in our quest...

Garsome: I just need this axe and a head to chop it into.

Ashlyn: ...

Garsome: I'm a fighter.

Fortunately they eventually got the hint (railroad) and resigned themselves to interacting with the NPCs. They bought some undead-hunting equipment, learned about a magic sword and magic holy pendant that are lost somewhere around here, questioned the burgomaster's son, found out about a gypsy encampment where some lady will read your fortune, and generally humored me until morning. Delp (Milo) had to go to work early the next day and he lives 3 hours into the future on the east coast so we wrapped up the game for the night.



UPDATE: While I was writing this post, Brando sent me a hilarious email on the same subject with his interpretation of the conversation:

Holy Avenger Lady: I fear my friends are in dire need of help.

Garsome: Well, then let's go get them right now.

Holy Avenger Lady: But there is a shop we must go to first, the situation is very dire.

Garsome: OK, after we go to the shop we can just head to the church and check it out. Like pronto.

Holy Avenger: Mayhap we aught to rest a spell at the Inn.

Garsome: C'MON! It's not complicated. The undead are over there. We're undead slayers. It's a match made in heaven. Just freaking point the way!"

Holy Avenger: But there is some lady that lives out of town that must be consulted.

Garsome: Christ! Look. I don't really care where we go at this point. Just as long as it isn't standing in the middle of the road where the ground is going to swallow me up again. You wanna go talk to the country lady? Fine with me. You wanna go to the church and kill heckavuas. Also just fine. If you want to go to the shop and buy ghost water, it's all gravy to me. But stop listing things that we have to do, and then immediately say that you don't want to do it.

Holy Avenger: The Burgermeister's daughter has had a very rough time recently.

Garsome: ..........

Holy Avenger: But we can't go there first. That just wouldn't be proper.

Video:

Ziggurat Con!

Alright you apes, listen up!

I just got forwarded some interesting info from the Eugene chapter of Browncoats.

Ziggurat Con: Where R.P.G. isn't just a
Rocket Propelled Grenade Any More!

To be held at Camp Adler/Kalil Airbase near the Ziggurat of UR.

That's their subtitle, not mine. Its a gamer convention put on in Iraq by the US soldiers! Since there aren't any FLGS's or anything up there they are asking for private donations to the event from gamer-patriots.

From the Ziggurat con staff/creators:

"We're pretty much looking for anything gaming related.
Source books for AD&D, Shadowrun, Gurps,Nrifts, Xcrawl, Magic
theGathering cards(9th edition sealed deck and boosters), miniatures, dice, dice bags, play mats(for the miniatures), mechanical pencils.
Anything vaguely gamer related.
The only thing you shouldn't send would be anything with pictures of topless or nude women."

It takes 8 to 11 days to get a package to Iraq so in order for things
to get there in time for the con; they need to be in the mail by May
26th. All involved (including me as I write the post) recognize the
time constraints on this. We implore you, DO NOT LET THE TIME FRAME DAUNT YOU. Stuff sent after the con will still be used, as the gathering will surly encourage new gamers.

You'll be boosting the morale of your fellow geek.

The ultimate goal of the Con is to give every coalition service
member, and civilian contractor in attendance at least one item to
take home and keep.

Another great idea, they need some art! Very few things are
grimer than a military tent/hut.

They're also really happy to get snacks, DVDs and videos

Snacks have to be able to survive 120 degree heat

Mentioned specifically are:
Jerky
Caramel popcorn
Nuts
Drink Mix
Twizzlers
Ramen Noodles
Cup of anything nukeable"

Donations can also be sent to SPC Amberson directly at the following address:

SPC David Amberson
A Co 86th Sig Bn
APO, AE 09331

As soon as I got this I knew I had to donate some books I never get to play of games that are totally playable. For some reason the American Military produces the largest group of gamer jocks than any other profession. Unfortunately I'm just finding out about this on May 24th, and to get stuff in the mail by May 26th we have to quick-step into action (though you can send stuff after, I do want my stuff to be at the convention). Fortunately I'm a DM so I have two things in my favor to enable short-notice sending; 1) I buy loads of campaign guides and rpg books that I never get to play and 2) All my books are in immaculate condition (ever notice how player's books are always worn down and soda-stained yet DM's books are always mint condition?).

So Mary and I are sending the following to Ziggurat Con (plus snacks and pencils not pictured):


That's right, that's the Star Wars rpg campaign guide in the upper left. Fantastic book and great game, and it'll be better served with the soldier-gamers (warrior-poets?) in Iraq than it will be sitting next to the Autolycus mint-in-box action figure on my bookshelf. Along with that they're getting all my Star Wars minis with stat cards, the Star Wars Revenge of the Sith miniatures starter set (with two d20s), the two Lord of the Rings Dwarves of Khazad-Dum supplements, the super-excellent Goodman's Games' Dungeon Crawl Classics (I highly recommend all of Goodman's Games 3rd party stuff), and the Horizon Virtual rpg campaign book (kind of a matrix-y d20 rpg).

I got rid of a lot of my rpg books on ebay before I moved to Oregon, so only have my favorite books left to choose between to send. Also that's all that will fit in the biggest fed-ex box with some side room for snacks. Oh yeah, the post office back in late 2003-2004 whereabouts decided that flat-rate Fed-Ex boxes can be sent to APOs at the normal "within USA" rate, so it only costs $9.00 to send the biggest one of the flat rate boxes to Iraq! You may not know about this if you haven't sent anything to Iraq since Brando got back, as they started doing that after he was deployed, but its ultra-cheap to do it now. So to all you readers of Scantabulous, it will only cost you between $4-$9 to send food, games, or whatever for this very worthy gamer convention.


They're doing their part! Let's do ours and tell 'em thanks!


UPDATE: Mary just brought home two bags of turkey jerky, honey roasted peanuts, honey roasted cashews, a bag of 10 mechanical pencils, and a big bag of red nibs to throw in there. Score for gamer snacks!

Noodled!

So loyal long-time readers of the Scantabulous Technodojo will remember when I posted half-naked pictures of myself along with a nutrition log in the latter half of 2006. This is when I had lost a ton of weight by eating properly and exercising at the gym with Muncher.

Well then I graduated from chemistry school and went to Thailand for a three-month postdoc.



The Thai people like to brag that when American farang come to Thailand for a long time (3+ weeks) they always lose a bunch of weight eating Thai food (noodles). Now food poisoning not withstanding, this seems like a perfectly reasonable claim, as most farang that come to Thailand are seriously obese American businessmen who could lose weight by bagging their own groceries. At the time I, on the other hand, went to Thailand in the best shape of my life, and the only direction to go from there was toward worst-shape.

Leave for Thailand:
Weight: 164.4 lbs
Body Fat: 9%*

Return from Thailand:
Weight: 181.6 lbs
Body Fat: 23%*

Now, admittedly I was probably slightly underweight when I left, but that doesn't make up for the hideous body fat gain due to noodles. Lots and lots of noodles. I'm not going to post pictures, as the before picture isn't supposed to be better than the after picture, but you can imagine the terrible results of going from a high-protein diet to a noodle-only diet, even when you still work out.

In any case, now that I'm back in the states with access to regular food, I decided to get back into shape. Unfortunately there were some unexpected factors that have inhibited my self-discipline in getting back into the groove. The first one is that I do not have the awesome gym a block away like I had in Champaign, as well as the very consistent workout partner Muncher to ensure I don't wuss out. Secondly, in Champaign I had coworker Ted who was doing the exact same diet/exercise method as me, and everyday at work we would discuss carb-loading and compare nutrition charts like two blueshirts fresh out of Intro to Biochem for Health Majors. I didn't realize how much that kind of positive reinforcement helps one stick with maintaining the workout and logging their nutrition.

So I decided to analyze what worked and try to simplify the dieting and exercising method so my lazy butt could maintain it without too much conscious thought. Reading various websites, Men's Health articles, and playing with the nutrition log math I have found a simplified solution that allows one to maintain the proper nutrition and fiber without logging everyday.

MEALS
Every Sun-Fri meal (4-5 per day) should contain 1 item from each of the 3 following lists:

1) Protein (2-4 oz)
Chicken breast
Ground Turkey (lowfat)
Organic Beef (lowfat)
Pork
3-5 egg whites + 1 egg

2) Legumes (1/2-1 cup)
Black Beans
Kidney beans
Pinto Beans
Lentils

3) Veggies (1/2-1 cup)
Spinach / lettuce
Asparagus
Mixed Veggies
Peas

No matter how you mix these meals they will be about 1:4:4 = fats:carbs:protein. Plus you'll get your necessary allotment of fiber without resorting to 3 bowls of Kashi a day. Toss in one protein shake in there sometime during the day and you're golden. I've been logging it for a few days now after I eat to check it and it works great. So I just load up on these things at the grocery store and I'm good to go. No need to log anymore!

Saturdays are cheat days, which means I can eat whatever I want. Pad Thai, Bagels, Ice Cream, whatever. This is actually an important part of the diet as I found out last year. You need one cheat day per week to maximize weight loss, because otherwise your body thinks you're starving and gets too efficient. Also by eating a ton of hot tomales on Saturday I can make myself sick of them for the rest of the week.

As for the lack of a Muncher and gym I have found this 30-minute Men's Health workout, which totally kicks my ass, and I can do it in my apartment with a folding chair, broomstick, and two dumbells. For the cardio section I practice Thai Sword, but that can totally be replaced by treadmill running for the nonjas out there.

Just thought if anyone else felt like cuttin' the old love handles they'd appreciate the company.



*Body Fat Percentage is based on a programmable electrode body fat scale. You put in your height and stuff so its fairly accurate.

Shadows of the Black Feather

Since I have no one to play Starship Troopers with out here in Eugene, I'm going to post about my recent DnD games that I play with folks all around the continent with the software Fantasy Grounds.

The Characters

Two of three players were fully available for the game, the third was desperately trying to get the Fantasy Grounds installer to work properly and spent the night correcting corrupt video files and such and finally got it working at the end so he could watch, but by then his character had been relegated to the "quiet guy with amnesia in the back" status. To be fair, had it not been the player it was, with the computer haxx0rz skills he had, the installer probably never would have worked and we'd be out a player for the future games.

Anyway, the first character was Garsim Cinderheart, recently un-retired dwarven mercenary and master of the waraxe. He took back up the axe to avenge his namesake for his clan from a less-than-reputable ancestor (who's actions were recently rediscovered in the Records of the Realm when the Dwarven Library was remodeled), and get his family's name crossed out of Citadel Adbar's Book of Grudges. He plans to do this by correcting the wrongs of his nefarious ancestor, so his dwarflings can live without shame.



The second character involved in tonight's game and accidentally caught up in events around him is Milo Nimblefeets, Halfling entrepreneur of dubious goods and services. On a quest to make as much capital as possible in a world ripe with creative investment opportunities, he finds himself on the run from large cities more often than he thinks is reasonable. Clearly the bigger folk of the realm often overreact at the slightest accidental market adjustment to their financial situation. He can also stab folks in the back really hard with his silver dagger.

The Game

The characters individually met at Durkon's Deliveries. A new and untested teleportation business in the realm of Faerun. They had each decided to sign up for the first attempted mass teleport of goods (chickens in cages, etc) and customers across the Anauroch desert from Sundabar to the realm of Damara. Some because they had specific business in the region, and others because they didn't care where they went as long as it wasn't where they were.



Dm fiat, fantasy cliches, and Cory's love of slapstick comedy being what it is, the teleportation cast by the absent-minded wizard went awry and the characters ended up in the middle of a forest with chicken feathers fluttering down everywhere. The halfling was particularly distressed by the teleportation and lost both of his previously-eaten breakfasts to the ground as he hung upside down from a tree. The dwarf quickly retrieved him from his perch. The caged chickens had not survived the trip.



After getting their bearings and looking around, they found themselves near a road in a dark and mysterious forest. Traveling in the direction they figured was "North-by-North-railroad," a mysterious gypsy rode down the path toward them. After making sure he wouldn't put a mysterious gypsy curse on them, they allowed him to hand them a mysterious letter, given to him by a mysterious man looking for adventurers. With all the mystery in the air it was clear that their narrator had taken a creative writing course.



Even though I had pre-typed out eight box responses to questions I felt they would ask the gypsy, who they seemingly randomly met on the dark road who just randomly had a note for them, upon receiving the note they simply turned their backs on the gypsy without a word and started discussing future plans between eachother, instinctually knowing the gypsy's plot role had been fulfilled without ever even asking his name.

With that, the gypsy rode away, his plot role fulfilled.



The adventurers then knew that the teleportation had at least gone somewhat correctly, as Barovia was in the realm of Damara. Also, since Garsim had found evidence that his ancestor had once traveled to Barovia, and that was his destination in the first place, he had no trouble deciding to visit the town and meet the Burgomaster. The promise of wealth enticed the halfling to join him. The mute and unassuming human followed them without a word while he attempted to fix the corrupted dlld20.xml file in his FG Data Application folder. The demihuman duo continued down the road in the dark and mysterious forest.



Eventually they came to an old rusty gate that opened on its own to let them through and then slammed shut after they passed it. They went through the haunted self-opening gate without even blinking. Soon, they came upon evidence of a horrible mauling by some enormous beast of a fellow adventurer on the road. As experienced investigators and righters of wrongs they were, they took his stuff, left the body, and continued on their way.

After that they came to the Village of Barovia.



But instead of being greeted by buxom beer-carrying barmaids, the village was strangely quiet and covered in a dark and creepifying mist. Also many of the buildings looked abandoned and the windows were boarded up from the inside. Soon they found out why, as they stumbled upon a group of flesh eating zombies! (I also remembered at this point to take a few screenshots.)



Not only that, but they were also beset on by large rat-dogs and a necromantic wizard who retained his magical skills even after undeath, and who quickly held the halfling in a magical vise with eldritch words of dark power. As the dwarf battled frantically with the beasts, the halfling was nearly brought down by the dark creatures as they clawed at his motionless body. Suddenly, more zombies erupted from the doorways to the north! The dwarf, thinking quickly, grabbed the paralyzed halfling and threw him in an empty building, blocking the doorway himself so he could '300' the horde of zombies as they staggered toward the party. While this protected the magically paralyzed halfling for a time, it also trapped them in the small abandoned house surrounded by zombies!

Soon the magical holding spell wore off as the dwarf valiantly protected the doorway, and the halfling got his bearings just as the rat-dogs slithered between the dwarf's legs to attack the party. Being living creatures rather than undead flesh, the rat-dogs were susceptible to the halfling's sneak attack, and the little ruffian made short work of the beasts with a few stabs to the spine.



Eventually the dwarf finished off the remaining zombies as they could only squeeze together three at a time to attack him, and the battle was concluded. But what of the village and the people of Barovia? Has everyone succumbed to the zombie plague? Was there anyone left alive? And what of the note from the gypsy who, if they had bothered to ask, would have told them he got the note from the Burgomaster just the day before?

We'll find out, in the next installment of...

Shadows of the Black Feather: Expedition to Castle Ravenloft!

The Letter

The following video is for the players in the game I'm DMing.

Pi

Oh man. This little video from a Boston PBS kids show is awesome. Make sure you watch up to when the red wizards come out around 3:04 (when counting down) and after that you won't be able to stop watching it, and it only gets more insane after that.

ZAP PRESENTS 'Pi'


Did they say "Then man will know the death of God where wonder was before..."?

----------------------------

PS: Here's a vid that Paul posted in the comments that I felt was worthy of a main post position in case anyone missed it.

ROLE PLAY TOURNAMENT - BE AGGRESSIVE

ScanCon: GenCon edition

UPDATE#2: Delp and I ransacked the GenCon server simultaneously and snatched True Dungeon tickets for Thursday 8/16/07 at 8:49pm-10:49pm (TDA00262), which is perfect. This means we'll play through TD on Thursday night, spend the rest of the night drinking in the True Dungeon's "Ye Olde Tavern," and have the rest of the 'Con to get swag from the publisher's floor. Delp says he wants the $35 for the ticket when we meet at GenCon along with our hotel money for him in small, untraceable bills. Preferably in an attractive leather European carry-all or canvas bag with $$$ printed on the side.




UPDATE: I've signed up for the events I want to go to I expect to fill up first. It took me 1.25 hours to finish the transaction (refreshing the page very six seconds), as the servers are majorly busy. I may need help at 4pm PDT to get True Dungeon tickets if anyone wants to sit on their computer and try to log in continuously with me I'd appreciate it. In any case, here's the events I signed up for:

Thursday 8/16/07 2pm-4pm - Tannhauser board game (released at GenCon!) - BGM00259 - got 2 tickets so first who calls dibs can go with me. --> Delp called it

Thursday 8/16/07 4pm-8pm - Hollow Earth "Lost World" - RPG00135 - bought last ticket

Friday 8/17/07 1pm-5pm - Godlike "Trial by Fire" - RPG00996 - bought last ticket

Saturday 8/18/07 3pm-6pm - 40K RPG "Illumination" (this is a sneak preview game) - RPG00527 - got 2 tickets so Brando you can go too.

Paranoia was filled up by 12:10 pm, so I couldn't buy tickets for a game of Paranoia. Sorry Devin. :(

Also, Adventurepan Paul is still in Japan and won't be attending GenCon this year so we won't need to put up with this again:



No, that's not actually Paul. I kid, I kid.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As probably 90% of my readership will be attending GenCon with me this August for the first time, I felt I could post some important GenCon-specific info on here pertaining to events going on. So break out your fanny-packs and mountain dew, its time for a GenCon update!



First of all, events. You need to register for events if you want to make sure you have the optimal time at GenCon. The registration for events goes online at 12:00pm (noon) PDT on Monday, May 7th. The catalog is now up and in html form so you can peruse and search the available games and times here.

To actually register for the events you'll have to login on the GenCon site with your username and password you chose when you pre-registered for GenCon. If you haven't actually preregistered for GenCon and were waiting for some unknown reason DO IT NOW! You don't want to have to go through all the confirmation BS when there is only one game of PARANOIA you want to sign up for. Also go ahead and login right now to make sure your username and password is on the up-and-up and nothing will prevent you from registering for events on Monday (waiting for a password reset from GenCon when everyone else is can take a day or so).

Now you can purchase up to 2 tickets per event (most events seat 7-8 people) in case you think someone else will want to go with you. If you don't think someone out of our group will want to go don't buy the second ticket as you'll be taking away a spot for someone else who wants to go (decreasing YOUR fun at the event, because it won't be a full party). There are also generic tickets you can buy that can be used for any event as long as it isn't filled up. That said, I will likely buy 2 tickets to a number of events, because I can always count on Delp to game. Generic tickets you can buy anytime between May 7th - July 9th so no need to stress about those. I'll probably wait to buy any until I know what everyone else is already going to and maybe we can pool some generic tickets for the group or something.

As for True Dungeon, I will be purchasing those tickets for everybody in the group, and you guys can pay me back. The price of each ticket is $35, so if anyone is going to bail out on GenCon and TrueDungeon, they should email me immediately. As for the other events, everyone is on their own.



So look through the html catalog this weekend and decide what games you'd enjoy playing while we're at GenCon. As soon as I have True Dungeon tickets (they go on sale around 4pm PDT Monday) I will send a mass email or post it here so you can plan register for events around it.