All Hail the Wookie Messiah

Mick Bradley thinks about the PTA game we played on Friday night at Gen Con and raises some interesting points.

Read the Wookie Gospel!

Gen Con: Jeff Speaks

Over at his livejournal, Jeff talks about Gen Con.

EDIT: And when I say he speaks, I mean that he recorded his voice and talked about his experience at the con.

The Indie RPG Awards

When Luke Crane got his Origins Award he wasn’t there to accept it because he was gaming, running Burning Wheel.

When Mu got its Indie RPG Award for Best Supplement, I was in my hotel room, eating chicken nuggets shaped like dinosaurs, adding a touch of horseradish sauce to make up for how dry they were.

Thursday someone had told me that the awards were Saturday. Shit, I even wrote it down on my schedule. I am so sorry that I missed it.

Here’s the Selected Peer Feedback from the Indie Awards Site:

“This disturbing and detailed dictionary paints a demonic world waiting to be explored. It put Sorcerer back at the forefront of players minds again, and rightly so.”

“Great writing, great feel. I’m a sucker for the format.”

“It’s like the perfect storm: Luke Crane on design, Jennifer Rodgers at the easel, and Judd Karlman on the keys, creating what has been, for me, the most evocative setting in RPGs of the past ten years.”

“Judd’s world of Marr’d gives a world of horrific wonders in which to delight anew in Sorcerer.”

“Fun, pulpy, and full of ideas ready to explode off the page without a single one mandating its use. MU is a really interesting setting that allows players to do what they would with it, rather than having to abase themselves before it.”

“One of the best Sorcerer supplements to come out in a long, long time. The concept just begs for it to be picked up and run.”

And for runner up for Best Production, meaning that Luke has two of the three Best Production books:

“This takes the concept of book as physical artefact usable in the game and drop kicks it to the next level.”

“Page after page of stunning imagery and prose, pregnant with possibilities.”

“I vote third on Mu only because there have been visual extravaganzas like Burning Empires and HEX this year. (I’d love to give a couple points to Mortal Coil as well, for that matter.) Jennifer’s art… dear god, Jennifer’s art.”

“Holding Dictionary of Mu is holding a piece of Marr’d. The book captures mad Oghma’s blood, sweat and tears.”

I’m honored and I had great artists and talented people all around me throughout the process, without whom, the book would still be a Word file in my computer, or even just another lost thread with a cool idea in it.

Thanks.

Gen Con Take Homes

My game shelf has a few games that are absolutely taunting me to play them and have done so for years. With Great Power…, Nine Worlds and InSpectres come to mind. With that power trio in my head, I bought few games this year.

Here’s what I walked home with:

Campaign Coins: This was the most frivolous purchase I made but they are so pleasing to the fingers that I had to go in on a deal with Jeff and Kevin. I think I will make a game for them.

Podcaster t-shirt: Got it for free at the Geeklabel podcaster par-tay along with free drinks and good conversation. That party was also the staging area for the Episode LV PTA game.

Poison’d by Vincent Baker and Shock: 1.1 by Joshua A.C. Newman: I got these two items from my booth-mates at the Playcollective. I need to play Shock: with my father. Remind me to talk about the middle aged men who were really into the Shock: demo’s we did for them.

Psi Run by Michael Linger and Christopher Moore: This is the only ashcan I bought, where you play a psionic on the run from the government using Otherkind-inspired mechanics.

Dirty Secrets by Seth Ben-Ezra: This was the only game I bought at IPR based on Seth’s demo. The white/non-white differentiation on the back cover makes me uncomfortable but maybe that’s a good thing. Its noir murder mystery gaming; I’m intrigued.

Giants by Jeff Lower: Jeff gave me a copy of his ashcan. I can’t wait until this game is ready to roll finished and polished. The world creation is suh-weet.

Black God’s Kiss by C.L. Moore: I was at the Paizo Publishing booth and saw their line of pulp fantasy novels. This one grabbed me. I had just found out that Mu won the Indie RPG Award and decided to treat myself.

40 Years of Gen Con by Robin D. Laws: We got a free copy to the booth and I took it, assuming no one else wanted it. If a collectivist wants it, let me know. I’m quoted in it three times, which is immensely satisfying.

Hobby Games: The 100 Best: ENnie Award Winning Paul Tevis showed me his copy and I was hooked in by the Table of Contents.

GameMastery Dragon’s Trove Item Cards: I have an idea for running a Burning Wheel scenario using these cards, more on this later.

I will add in links to each product and edit in the stuff I forgot later.

Exhausted Gen Con Post

I’m back.

Highlights and thoughts before I pass out.

I won the Indie RPG Awards: Supplement of the Year. Yay!

We interviewed Monte Cook again, a 4 year running tradition, back from when we were crouched against a wall with an iPod mic between us and the interview was over. Monte turned to me and said, “So, tell me about the Dictionary of Mu.” Aaaaw yeah.

We played P.T.A. Star Wars, Episode LV: Revenge of the Jedi was a fantastic session of gaming, the first game I played at the con.

We played Kingdom of Nothing and gave Jeff Himmelman helpful feedback.

We played Dogs in a town about Sex and Violence.

Long car rides with good friends are nice but next year they will be even better.

I lost every ENnie I had a shot at but the ceremony was fantastic fun and we got great interviews after the show was over from the attendees.

Jeff and I got some fantastic interviews.

When Storn is tired he puns even more.

Rob is a mensch.

I miss Malcom.

I didn’t get to sit down and talk to enough people.

A Shock: game must be played with my father and a few of his friends.

I’m in the 40 Years of Gen Con book 3 times that I could find and in one of the interview bits, I mention the Sons of Kryos. That’s right, Sons of Kryos are now a part of Gen Con history. Suck on that, Tevis!

Paul Tevis is no man to be fucked with when he has a mic in his hand.

Julia, Joshua, Jonathan and Emily are curled up on various horizontal surfaces in my house, crashing out and I don’t have to be into work until 2 p.m. tomorrow.

The Playcollective Booth was fun.

There are too many Nazi-related t-shirts in Gen Con; its disturbing, man.

Next year I want to look into getting a place with a kitchen.

And now, the passing out but first:

The Ashcan Front

This Gen Con’s Forge Diaspora has begun.

Here’s the Ashcan Front.

I’ve been speaking on the phone and instant messaging with Paul lately and he’s a super-cool guy, another instance in which I am glad to transition from online handle to aquaintence to friend. I wish I could tear myself into more pieces so that I could participate in more booths.