I was a bit on the mend so decided to drive down to Gencon Friday and see what for. I got to indy about 4PM and had only a couple hours to wander around before the main hall (the MONEY SUCKING HALL) closed. Before I even got in there BAM right in front of me was the BOLT ACTION demo area with an amazing Riechstag set up and a bunch of other boards. Sat around talking about it for awhile but the demos were full– then ran into the MONEY SUCKING hall before it closed up and bought a couple things, but didn’t take the bite on the Bolt Action deals (yet). Wandering around after the hall closed sucked as I couldn’t find anyone I knew so I wandered into a showing of Trailer Park JESUS. Not sure about it but it killed time and featured a girl with breasts that started at the lowest level of the chest that I’ve ever seen.
Got up Saturday morning and played Shadowfist, and Shadowfist, and Shadowfist.. and a demo of Bolt Action and that was it. I took third in the yearly invitational using one of Mouth’s decks but didn’t make the final in the world championship. All good though as I got at least 9 games in.
Bolt Action plays like a combination of AT-43 and Epic 40K and I dig it and dumped 100$ in to get some figs and the rulebook. While I didn’t spend a lot of time shopping, I did get some finds in the hall– not as many as I’d like to have picked up, but solid stuff. No more Crazy Egor but plenty of other places that have gaming trash for cheap.
Stuff I saw of interest:
- Fantasy Flight was rocking– big game was Netrunner which I will eventually pick up, but no rush. They demo’ed the prototype of RELIC– the 40K Talisman game and it looked OK.
- Confrontation Phoenix edition was on display and I listened in for a bit but didn’t get a demo. While the miniatures are great, they have some work to do consolidating the rules from 3.0 to 3.5. Great highly detailed miniatures game that I would love to see ‘alive’ again in the 3.5 form as opposed to the simplified mass produced version.
- Forgeworld at the Con. I mistakenly thought it was Games Workshop returning after many many years, but it was Forgeworld–who has never been to Gencon before. They were showing off their awesome stuff and with 40K 6th edition out, that was the focus. They did have the Chaos Dwarf army in full effect for 8th edition.
- Not much for D&D. There was an area, but it was pretty toned down. Cool Drow strider sculpture but other than that– nothing on the impending 5th edition that I saw at all.
- In contrast, Pathfinder everywhere. That brand is hugely on the rise, not just for PNP roleplaying, but spreading out to everything else.
- The new Fate core version was around but I didn’t get into any demo’s of it.
- The new Marvel RPG was huge, but they had these little demo tables and the entire table was covered with dice dice dice. I was pretty silly. You play the game with no screen for the DM so it can work, but it was funny to see. While the rulebook is pretty economical, the first campaign book is pricey and huge. While I’ve gushed about the initiative system, I’m not sure the dice mechanic is all that great overall.
- No White Wolf. Sadly I didn’t even find the White Wolf booth and didn’t even know if there was one. So no perusing the Exalted books or asking questions about it. I don’t think there’s much to tell there since version 2.5.
Shadowfist of interest:
- Dragons + Lotus is still the best combo of factions FTW
- Great Walls were everywhere, so even less reason to play straight Ascended. If you hit a front site in a tournament, it’s going to be the Great Wall.
- Monarchs were everywhere (as usual with all the love they’ve been getting in sets)
- There were no Ascended decks in the tournaments at all
- Syndicate still did nothing (but at least people played the faction)
- I played against a very good Jammers deck a couple times. It had some glaring weak spots, but wasn’t the usual shite you usually get from Jammers.
I have a feeling the absence of White Wolf has a lot to do with the fact that CCP owns them and their focus is 1st on DUST and 2nd on the World of Darkness MMO. It’s almost as if they are shelving pnp for a time to synchronize the last ruleset within the game. Lameness… or as you would say “Gay!”
I don’t give a shit about anything but Exalted from them–or if they put out new IP stuff like Aberrant or Trinity (good sci fi there). World of Darkness has had it’s time, but if you look SYSTEM wise, Dresden Files is better (FATE). It’s just a big change from the 2000’s and late 90’s when White Wolf was one of the main reasons many people went to the Gen Con.