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Summer Stabcon 2019
10/7/19 19:00 Stabcon this year just hit the spot for me. I always enjoy it, but this year it de-stressed me nicely.
Friday: I played the worker placement game Evil High Priest. Liked it a lot and may buy it. There was enough variety of stuff to do that I never felt I got stuck, or had to waste workers on pointless actions.
I then scooted off to run Vampire the Masquerade 5th ed. Only 2 players*, but that made little difference to the scenario. They steamed efficiently through the investigation, recruited some supernatural assistance and headed off for the big showdown. Lots of comments from one player about how he liked the new VTM5e system - hunger dice, 3 round combats and so on.
Saturday: In the morning, I ran Summerland 2nd ed, using the published Fire scenario. I was worried that the scenario was a bit rail-roady in places, so I'd added a few extra elements to diverge from the main thread, and I rolled with the flow and let the players invent a derelict Little Chef to pillage for supplies. While the 2nd ed system (Open d6) is far better than 1st ed, I'm not convinced it fits Summerland's mood. Twice Roger's character killed someone with one punch, which feels more martial arts/superhero genre than 'eerie post apocalypse with mystical elements'.
In the afternoon I chatted with folk, but lack of sleep on the Friday night (too much caffeine, too much heat) meant I wilted mid afternoon and retreated to my room to grab an hour's sleep.
Saturday evening was the fantastic Valkyrie 9 adventure for The Cthulhu Hack, run by Simon Burley. We were all maintenance robots on a moonbase, wondering where all the humans had gone. This is hands down the most fun I've ever had in a Cthulhu adventure.
Sunday: The morning session I ran United Earth Defence: You are the Resistance, with one no-show out of 5 players.** I was worried that a resource based game mechanic (if you roll a dice it is spent) might be troublesome if the players didn't grok it and ran out of dice. However, they pounced on the opportunities to do tactical stuff and rack up bonuses before they rolled, so they made every spent dice count. Plus they scavenged for more supplies etc, to refresh some of their dice pools.
A lunchtime chat with one of my best friends, then I scooted off to play the military science fiction Operation Felix run by John Parr. I was the only player to turn up, so it ended up being a one on one game. I had a whole platoon to myself, so it played out as part RPG, part skirmish wargame, and was great fun.
I was staying the Sunday evening after the con was over, so I met up with Peter and we went to a local pub - the Puss in Boots - for an evening meal. Good food, nice staff and a nice chat about roleplaying, Ancient Greek mythology and a novel Peter is writing.
I love Stabcon. The organisation is a well oiled machine. Michelle and Hammy who run it are lovely folks. A good pool of RPG players and a metric ton of boardgames to play if none of the RPGs take my fancy. The hotel delivers pub food with very generous portions to your gaming table and the staff are all great.
*Lack of players seemed to be a feature of this year's Summer Stabcon - several RPG games with few or no players. Perhaps fewer RPGers are coming? I think it clashed with Volcon, so that might be a reason.
** No-one had signed up in the reserve slot, which again makes me think there were fewer RPGers than normal at Stabcon.
Friday: I played the worker placement game Evil High Priest. Liked it a lot and may buy it. There was enough variety of stuff to do that I never felt I got stuck, or had to waste workers on pointless actions.
I then scooted off to run Vampire the Masquerade 5th ed. Only 2 players*, but that made little difference to the scenario. They steamed efficiently through the investigation, recruited some supernatural assistance and headed off for the big showdown. Lots of comments from one player about how he liked the new VTM5e system - hunger dice, 3 round combats and so on.
Saturday: In the morning, I ran Summerland 2nd ed, using the published Fire scenario. I was worried that the scenario was a bit rail-roady in places, so I'd added a few extra elements to diverge from the main thread, and I rolled with the flow and let the players invent a derelict Little Chef to pillage for supplies. While the 2nd ed system (Open d6) is far better than 1st ed, I'm not convinced it fits Summerland's mood. Twice Roger's character killed someone with one punch, which feels more martial arts/superhero genre than 'eerie post apocalypse with mystical elements'.
In the afternoon I chatted with folk, but lack of sleep on the Friday night (too much caffeine, too much heat) meant I wilted mid afternoon and retreated to my room to grab an hour's sleep.
Saturday evening was the fantastic Valkyrie 9 adventure for The Cthulhu Hack, run by Simon Burley. We were all maintenance robots on a moonbase, wondering where all the humans had gone. This is hands down the most fun I've ever had in a Cthulhu adventure.
Sunday: The morning session I ran United Earth Defence: You are the Resistance, with one no-show out of 5 players.** I was worried that a resource based game mechanic (if you roll a dice it is spent) might be troublesome if the players didn't grok it and ran out of dice. However, they pounced on the opportunities to do tactical stuff and rack up bonuses before they rolled, so they made every spent dice count. Plus they scavenged for more supplies etc, to refresh some of their dice pools.
A lunchtime chat with one of my best friends, then I scooted off to play the military science fiction Operation Felix run by John Parr. I was the only player to turn up, so it ended up being a one on one game. I had a whole platoon to myself, so it played out as part RPG, part skirmish wargame, and was great fun.
I was staying the Sunday evening after the con was over, so I met up with Peter and we went to a local pub - the Puss in Boots - for an evening meal. Good food, nice staff and a nice chat about roleplaying, Ancient Greek mythology and a novel Peter is writing.
I love Stabcon. The organisation is a well oiled machine. Michelle and Hammy who run it are lovely folks. A good pool of RPG players and a metric ton of boardgames to play if none of the RPGs take my fancy. The hotel delivers pub food with very generous portions to your gaming table and the staff are all great.
*Lack of players seemed to be a feature of this year's Summer Stabcon - several RPG games with few or no players. Perhaps fewer RPGers are coming? I think it clashed with Volcon, so that might be a reason.
** No-one had signed up in the reserve slot, which again makes me think there were fewer RPGers than normal at Stabcon.
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