GenCon 2011 Day 1: Evening

It’s well after midnight, and I’m ready for bed. But first, an evening update.

After dinner I wandered the convention center a little bit more. The vendor hall closes at 6:00 PM, but lots of games keep going well into the evening (maybe all night).

I asked about what I need to do if I want to try some new board games and was told to either buy a ticket for a specific game or check out a game from the game library and play with friends. Hm. Not super-conducive to just learning a new game that people are wanting to spread the word on, but I might give it a try later.

I wandered up to the Sagamore Ballroom where D&D 4e was happening. I saw people playing the new Legend of Drizzt game. I already own and enjoy Castle Ravenloft and Wrath of Ashardalon, so I’ll try to play Drizzt sometime this weekend. I also asked about the Saturday Neverwinter Game Day event, and it’s sold out. However, they might have room for generic ticket holders… and they also might have need for someone who’s willing to run the game instead of play. I’m considering that option.

I then caught up with my friends from dinner and played a board game that one of them is at the con to demo. It’s called Syndicate, and it’s sort of similar to Settlers of Catan in space (I’ve never actually played Starfarers of Catan, so I don’t know how it compares). There are five different resources, and each hex tile has a planet with a moon, each of which can produce one of the resources. You start with markers on two planets. There are six different actions you can take on your turn, including mining resources from a planet/moon pair, expanding to one more planet and getting resources from it, expanding to several planets at once, and then doing various things with “contract” cards that give you points if you have markers on the planets on the cards (think of the cards from Risk). It was a fun game, even in a play test form, and I enjoyed it even though I tied for last place.

After that I tried to follow Twitter posts from people I know in the online D&D community, meeting up with them in pubs. I tried to meet Morrus (the Brit who runs EN World) but got to the pub in question after he had already left – and I also had the problem that I’m not quite sure what the guy looks like! I then tried a different pub where NewbieDM had said he was doing karaoke with others… but wow, that place was way too crowded! I have much to learn about nightlife at GenCon.

Time for bed. Day 2 awaits tomorrow!

2 thoughts on “GenCon 2011 Day 1: Evening

  1. Hi! If you get any chance to do so, could you please take some clear pictures of the Legend of Drizzt Board Game? I’d LOVE to see some character cards, power cards and see how the game mechanics for Guenhwyvar (the panther figurine) works.

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