Mortaine’s Blog

The short version (sort of) of my ConQuest weekend:

RPGA games (I played 3): full of piss-poor GM’s, munchkin players, and modules that are waaay too long for the amount of time allotted to them. Today, I stayed checked into my hotel extra late so I could hit one more game, this one without a player who had irritated me as a GM and as a player. In the game, everyone was just about the same level of experience, but four of the 6 players play together all the time in RPGA events (they are a family of 4). The other new player and I ended up being almost completely useless, though his character’s animal companion did all right in the combats. My character, however, was not. Never even got close enough to a melee to take a swing (I play a fighter). When we were going into a demolitions section (a boobytrapped pile of gunpowder), I told the party that I knew how to handle gunpowder, and should be sent in. The rest of the party agreed, and then a few minutes later, the rogue (one of the family of 4) turns primarily to me and says “when we get in there, nobody touch the device– I’m the only one who can disable it.” I was speechless. Utterly speechless. I just kind of looked at him, because I literally had been 100% useless throughout the entire adventure. I couldn’t really parlay with anyone in the town, because they were all dwarves and apparently I must just piss dwarves off all the time because even though I speak the language (also, why bother: the rogue in question is a dwarf), I can’t talk to them. Since I don’t know any magic or healing, I couldn’t help with the injured people, and because I couldn’t get a word in edgewise, I stopped bothering to try to talk to anyone else or gather any information (if you know me as a gamer, you know this means I’m having a rotten time or am so bored I’m about to fall asleep). Though, I *did* keep talking with the garrulous wagonwright, and ended up getting more information out of him than the rest of the party was really looking for.

Sigh. This really was going to be the short version. I guess the short version is that the best RPGA game I participated in this weekend left me feeling useless and resulted in a 0-fun factor for me. I think I’m going to have to email the Master DM and let him know my thoughts, but I don’t want it to sound like sour grapes whining– I just didn’t have any fun, and if that’s what RPGA games are supposed to be like, I think it’s really Not For Me.

Star Wars d6: WAAAAY fun with the right group of players and GMs, both of which were in force last night. Stayed till 3 AM. GMs live in Santa Cruz, so we’re just going to have to hook up sometime.

FUDGE RPG (the one I ran): I thought it was fun; thankfully, I wrapped it up when players began to lose interest.

Fluxx Demo: Great, but 2 hours is too long to play Fluxx in one sitting.

Other games: I got a freeebie copy of Wingnut’s Cargo with the promise to demo it next year at DunDraCon. I also bought a game called Elvish Chess which was tremendously fun and an easy table game to learn (2-player chess-like game, but without the competitiveness). I played in the Button Men tournament today, which means I learned how to play Button Men. I didn’t win very much, but I learned the game and it was kind of fun.

Auctions: I raised about $40 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society at the auction. ’s Paranoia games sold for $26– Go, Lise!!!!

Hammer: Able to “hold it” for 5 hours, but 6 is too long. 5 hours too long near mealtime, though. But, overall, good dog.

Staff at San Francisco Airport Marriott, especially Bell Desk staff who took my bike and stored it all weekend every time I came and went back and forth to my hotel: Beyond excellent. Friendly, but also amazingly competent and always present and attentive. Must be hard work.

Food at con: Too much salty snacks cause I left my fridge food at work. Am dehydrated.

Exercise: I rode my bike back and forth two hotels about 4 times a day this weekend. Riding at midnight is weird. Riding at midnight (or later) when there are still people out on the bike path is just outright bizarre.