Friday Night Shots – Convention Game Behaviour

Welcome back for another week!

I’ve been keeping the seat warm for you, since it’s starting to get a little colder out.

Yes, I’ve added heaters!

Hasn’t brought in anymore customers, though, which is too bad.

Maybe I shouldn’t have started testing these heated seats in July?

Anyway, we’ve got the bar to ourselves, so let me get you a drink of whatever you like, booze or just something lighter.

I’ll turn down the music (and I apologize for my Vanilla Ice phase…I’ll adjust the jukebox on Monday).

Let’s talk about convention game behaviour!

Since SHUX would have been happening this weekend (if it followed the same dates as last year, anyway) if they were doing it this year, it felt like an appropriate topic.

What does that mean?

That means basically how do you plan your games when you go to a convention (if you go to a convention).

For those of you who don’t, how about “how do you plan your game days/nights?” Do you decide on games in advance? Or do people just bring a bunch of games and you decide in the spur of the moment?

That’s what we do.

But for those of you who do go to conventions, how do you do it?

Most conventions (that I’m familiar with, though maybe the big ones like GenCon and the like don’t do this) have scheduled games where somebody hosts a game they want to play with other people (or they want other people to play and they will teach it).

I’m actually not sure whether that’s for smaller cons or not, because I don’t remember this at Dice Tower West the one year I went.

But it’s definitely a thing in the cons I go to in Washington!

That’s where I played Dokmus for the first time, in August at Dragonflight.

That being said, I was recruited for that one. I hadn’t signed up for it.

Truth be told, I didn’t sign up for any games at Dragonflight, though I have in the past.

But I have at Bottoscon in November!

I am going for four days (November 2-5) and three of those days, I have a scheduled game going.

It will be my first chance to finally play Caesar: Rome vs Gaul and The Last Hundred Yards on the table!

Not my copies, but at least I will learn the games and then maybe can actually break my copies out.

I’m also in a friend’s scheduled game of Dominant Species, a game I haven’t played since the very early days of my gaming career, when I really couldn’t appreciate it.

While it is a game with friends, it is a scheduled game that will take place in the main game room.

Which leads into the second part!

Another option, and one I do use quite a bit, is just using the multiple days to play a lot of games with friends.

Some would say “but can’t you do that at home?”

And the answer to that would be “yes, but…”

Sometimes conventions are just a great place to play a bunch of games, some longer ones that might not get to the table in your normal meetings. It’s a more relaxed atmosphere, everything’s dedicated to games, and it’s just kind of peaceful.

And it’s a good way to bring in friends who don’t live near you as well.

For a while, this wasn’t me as I didn’t really know anybody else other than my local people.

I now have a Seattle contingent of friends who go to the two cons in Bellevue, Washington, and it’s nice to get some games in with them.

I’ll never get to do it otherwise!

That’s where I got my one and only play of Great Western Trail: Argentina in.

I think it would be cool to just set up a long game day with friends, making it feel like a convention, without the expense of actually getting a hotel room and stuff.

There is a third way to play at conventions, though.

Most conventions (and this did happen at Dice Tower West) have open gaming tables and you can just grab one of the “Players Wanted” flags to invite people to stop by and play with you.

Or you can wander the room and look for these flags and a game that you might want to play.

At Dice Tower West, that was my primary way of playing games except when I was playing with my wife (and we even set up a game and invited others with a flag).

I wandered the room looking for flags, and got in some great games of Gizmos, Wingspan, The Isle of Cats, Paladins of the West Kingdom and many more!

And met some really nice people.

I don’t think there was a bad player in the bunch.

I admit, playing random people at a con does give you the chance to meet some terrible people, though I hope that there wouldn’t be too many terrible people at a convention (yes, I know that is too optimistic).

I’ve been lucky.

What do I do?

I think it’s pretty obvious that I kind of do a little bit of all of those three options, depending on the convention.

And whether my friends have gone to it or not.

At my first Orcacon, I didn’t know anybody so all I did was wander the room and look for games.

And that’s where I met Sean (from Thing 12 Games) and his friends.

That’s made other conventions a lot easier on me.

I am kind of a mix of a social person and an introvert.

I love being among people, I love talking to them, gaming with them.

But I’m also really hesitant to just go up to people and talk to them, especially in a group setting.

Gaming gives us all something to focus on!

And seeing the “players wanted” flags means that these people actually want you to come up to them.

It makes things so much easier.

Anyway, enough rambling about all of that.

What do you do for conventions?

And if you don’t go to conventions, how do you set up your game days/nights?

Let me know in the comments.