Gaming time: Dragonfire & ICON 2009
Following on from my earlier post on ICON, South Africa’s biggest games and comics convention, this post focuses specifically on the gaming that I took part in. This excludes Magic: The Gathering, tabletop wargaming and the PC gaming tournament so I obviously can’t comment on those areas.
Before this though, let me take a moment to punt Dragonfire, South Africa's OLDEST and second biggest gaming convention, which is taking place in Cape Town this coming weekend (7-10 August). If you have any geeky tendencies and you happen to be in the picturesque Mother City over the next few days you are obligated to make an appearance at the Kramer Law Building on the University of Cape Town's Middle Campus, where the event is taking place (having been organised by the CLAWS society). Role playing, boardgames, LARPing, wargaming, fantasy card games, socials - it's all happening.
This year's Dragonfire theme is Middle East vs. Middle Earth and you can check out the Dragonfire events timetable here. Should be great fun! I must say, I would LOOOVE to get my hands on this year's beautiful official mug.
Anyway, back to the second part of my long delayed ICON report-back:
RPG (Role playing games)
If you’re curious about role playing, but have no experience, I don’t necessarily think ICON is the best place for you to start playing.
Friday, the first day of the con, is the only day where the role playing modules (self-contained little scenarios designed to be played out over a 3 to 4 hour period) were not competitive. In other words, Friday was the only day where the role playing didn’t come with stakes attached, and you didn’t have to fill out a score card afterwards, critiquing the module, your game master (the session overseer) and the “performances” of the other players. You see, some people take role playing very seriously – probably about as seriously as some card players take Poker and Bridge tournaments – especially when there are prizes to be dished out at the final evening's awards ceremony.
Anyway, looking back at my role playing experiences over the ICON weekend, I do feel that some of the game systems used were more noob friendly than others.
For example, Cthulu modules seem to be much better suited to a con environment. I’d never played a game that draws on the Lovecraft horror mythos before, but I picked things up quickly. Although your characters very quickly encounter monstrous, maddening things, the scenarios typically start in a reality closer to our own, and therefore are easier to immerse yourself in during a shorter game session – especially if you’re new to role playing. For example, instead of being a 400 year old wizard who comes from a gravity-free plane, your character is a detective in 1950s New York. Also, the character sheets and listed character abilities are streamlined and simple (Jump, Grapple, Search etc.). The dice rolling is just as straightforward. I felt happy asking a few noob-ish questions because my issues were easy to resolve and did not slow down the game flow at all.
Out of interest, Cthulu modules typically end with everyone mad or dead. In our session, my character, an adventurous young archaeologist, was choked to death by her father’s dismembered, demonically possessed hand... while we were attending an exhibit unveiling at the British Natural History Museum.
While I enjoyed the Cthulu module, the same can’t be said for the pair of competitive modules I took part in that used the Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 rule system. Despite the fact that I have played in at least 3 D&D campaigns over the years, I felt out of my depth here.
Bearing in mind that many of my complaints probably have to do with these specific, over-complicated modules themselves, I found the scenario set-up way too complex, I wasn’t entirely sure of my character’s motivations and I didn’t know the rules of half the spells on my character sheet. Given that I was playing with some apparently very experienced role players I also felt too embarrassed to stop the game just to find out how Magic Missile works exactly.
I didn’t find these D&D system games gratifying at all, even if in one hysterical moment we managed to “break” the game and transport our characters (all bog-standard traditional fantasy heroes), along with 500 armed centaurs, to the Starship Enterprise. Seriously.
In terms of other complaints I had about these modules, the characters’ goals tended to be hazy, leading to many static “Well, what do we do now?” moments, and the games ran well past their intended finish time - resulting in rushed, unsatisfying conclusions forced on players by the GMs. Worst of all, because the modules were competitive, friends were split into different groups to avoid biased scoring. And it’s always more fun playing with friends!
Given my pen-and-paper role playing experiences at ICON 2009, I doubt I’ll bother with competitive modules again. I’m more than happy to participate in con RPG modules, regardless of what rule system they use (I’m always up for trying new things), but I’m looking for a relaxed, fun experience with friends. That probably means modules where the characters and central scenario are easy to wrap your mind around. Even if that means seriously dumbing down the normal game system rules. Within 30 minutes I want to be playing confidently, instead of still nervously consulting my character sheet 90 minutes into the session.
My personal suggestion for convention role playing would be to run at least one relaxed “RPG noob” session every day, at the same time the serious playing is underway. Although the game premise should be simple, and the character goals clearly outlined, any rule system could be used (however complex), because participants would be encouraged to ask questions throughout the game.
LARPing (Live action role playing)
I thoroughly enjoyed my LARP experience, despite the fact that it required I wear a tiny little skirt on one of the coldest nights in Johannesburg this Winter.
LARPing is probably what non-geeky types think of when you use the words “role playing.” It’s people dressing up in scenario-appropriate clothing (and typically wearing all-important character name tags), wielding character appropriate props and even donning some very dodgy accents. Think improvisational, amateur theatre, or murder mystery evenings – where everyone is playing a different character with a complex past, multiple secrets and a personal agenda to accomplish. Before the LARP everyone receives a character sheet outlining all this information, as well as the various other characters you have relationships with, or connections to. Fortunately you can carry these notes around with you during the LARP should you need to consult them.
While our LARP was more Agatha Christie in setting (a party in a posh 1930s Cairo hotel, with many scheming British diplomats, treasure hunters and German explorers present), LARPs can take place in pretty much any location you can imagine – feudal Japan, outer space, a mage’s academy. The Friday evening LARP at ICON was a full-on Tolkien-esque The Council of Elrond, re-enacting the famous gathering of leaders in The Fellowship of the Ring. I even saw Gandalf the Grey wandering around a few times.
LARPing requires both quick thinking and subtlety as you interact with the other characters while all the while staying true to your character, and their personal goals. A couple of game masters are integrated into the LARP as servants or other background characters to enable you to act out certain intentions – such as having a meddlesome rival threatened by a street thug in your pay. The “rival” would then be pulled aside at some point and informed of what they were subjected to, although they do not know who is behind the bullying. Combat, meanwhile, has to always be simulated in front of a GM, with play generally stopped (everyone freezes unless they’re involved in the action) to accommodate it.
Like all gaming at a con, the LARP comes with a time limit for obvious reasons. After a few hours events have to be wrapped up. Some story arcs seem to easily resolve themselves within the time limit, with characters dying, leaving etc, although others can require a little interference by the GMs to push things towards resolution. In our case, the game escalated to its conclusion quite rapidly after a certain point, as events outside the hotel became increasingly strange (scarab beetles devoured the British military headquarters), and characters inside the hotel became increasingly frantic.
Alas, my character, a prim British secretary – who also just so happened to secretively head up a massive criminal empire – died along with the majority of the cast. And most of Cairo! This occurred when the arrogant Egyptian prince accidentally detonated a nuclear device during a meeting that sought to resolve the issue of Egyptian nationalism versus British military interference. Boom, it was all over – even if the ending wasn’t entirely satisfying because of its abruptness.
The LARP was followed up by a very enjoyable debriefing session in which the players got to reveal their characters’ true motivations (most people were very surprised to find out I was the infamous Scarlet Pharaoh), how successfully they think they achieved their goals, as well as any problems they encountered. In my character’s case, I wanted to maintain the politically unstable status quo, and therefore stick around in Egypt to oversee my criminal network. However, the Earl, my elderly employer, and also lover (for blackmail reasons), wanted to flee to Kenya with government funds. I was running out of excuses to prevent this happening.
This LARP epilogue event really was a lot of fun.
Finally it’s worth noting that LARPing does come with one unique, particularly strange after-effect. And that’s when, the next day, you bump into your fellow LARPers out of costume and character. It’s a very weird feeling; something that I imagine is similar to passing someone on the street that you met at a swingers’ party, or seeing a superhero out of costume.
If you ever receive a chance to take part in a LARP with a scenario that appeals to you, seize the opportunity! Particularly if you, like me, like your gaming guided by very clear objectives, and you enjoy working towards set goals.
Boardgaming
I thoroughly enjoyed the boardgame side of ICON. For one thing, Boardgames.co.za had brought a lot of demo games which were completely free to try out. I thought this was a excellent move on the e-tailer’s part in terms of building customer goodwill, as you rarely get to try out a boardgame before purchasing it, and today’s top boardgames can involve a substantial financial outlay.
I became a rapid fan of party game Wits & Wagers, which is known in Britain as (rather cryptically) Gambit 7. Basically the game is Trivial Pursuit with financial stakes attached. Each game consists of 7 rounds where each round the players answer a numerical question (e.g. how many Academy Awards did Walt Disney win?) and then lay their answers out on a board. At this point players place betting chips on the answer they think is right, or closest to being right, and that definitely doesn’t have to be your own.
In my personal opinion boardgaming is one of the most social and accessible types of gaming. It encourages people to interact and it isn’t long before complete strangers, of all different ages and backgrounds, are happily chatting. This was true even during the Settlers of Catan national tournament that I took part in. What was most surprising was that even during this “serious” tournament, people were not vindictively competitive. There was a lot of intelligent play by the participants, but no ganging up against people who were ahead. The placing of the robber piece, and trade, was at all times fair.
I had a very enjoyable time in ICON’s boardgaming section, and if I hadn’t already signed up for role playing games, I would have played during all qualifying sessions of the Catan tournament. At least the weekend reminded me how much I love the game – even in its basic non-expansion form.
Out of interest, apparently at next year’s ICON a proper mahjong tournament will be taking place for the first time.
-------
And that’s my complete ICON 2009 report-back. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading it, and for non-attendees and non-geeky types it provided some much needed insight into the curiosity that is a games convention.
Before this though, let me take a moment to punt Dragonfire, South Africa's OLDEST and second biggest gaming convention, which is taking place in Cape Town this coming weekend (7-10 August). If you have any geeky tendencies and you happen to be in the picturesque Mother City over the next few days you are obligated to make an appearance at the Kramer Law Building on the University of Cape Town's Middle Campus, where the event is taking place (having been organised by the CLAWS society). Role playing, boardgames, LARPing, wargaming, fantasy card games, socials - it's all happening.
This year's Dragonfire theme is Middle East vs. Middle Earth and you can check out the Dragonfire events timetable here. Should be great fun! I must say, I would LOOOVE to get my hands on this year's beautiful official mug.
Anyway, back to the second part of my long delayed ICON report-back:
RPG (Role playing games)
If you’re curious about role playing, but have no experience, I don’t necessarily think ICON is the best place for you to start playing.
Friday, the first day of the con, is the only day where the role playing modules (self-contained little scenarios designed to be played out over a 3 to 4 hour period) were not competitive. In other words, Friday was the only day where the role playing didn’t come with stakes attached, and you didn’t have to fill out a score card afterwards, critiquing the module, your game master (the session overseer) and the “performances” of the other players. You see, some people take role playing very seriously – probably about as seriously as some card players take Poker and Bridge tournaments – especially when there are prizes to be dished out at the final evening's awards ceremony.
Anyway, looking back at my role playing experiences over the ICON weekend, I do feel that some of the game systems used were more noob friendly than others.
For example, Cthulu modules seem to be much better suited to a con environment. I’d never played a game that draws on the Lovecraft horror mythos before, but I picked things up quickly. Although your characters very quickly encounter monstrous, maddening things, the scenarios typically start in a reality closer to our own, and therefore are easier to immerse yourself in during a shorter game session – especially if you’re new to role playing. For example, instead of being a 400 year old wizard who comes from a gravity-free plane, your character is a detective in 1950s New York. Also, the character sheets and listed character abilities are streamlined and simple (Jump, Grapple, Search etc.). The dice rolling is just as straightforward. I felt happy asking a few noob-ish questions because my issues were easy to resolve and did not slow down the game flow at all.
Out of interest, Cthulu modules typically end with everyone mad or dead. In our session, my character, an adventurous young archaeologist, was choked to death by her father’s dismembered, demonically possessed hand... while we were attending an exhibit unveiling at the British Natural History Museum.
While I enjoyed the Cthulu module, the same can’t be said for the pair of competitive modules I took part in that used the Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 rule system. Despite the fact that I have played in at least 3 D&D campaigns over the years, I felt out of my depth here.
Bearing in mind that many of my complaints probably have to do with these specific, over-complicated modules themselves, I found the scenario set-up way too complex, I wasn’t entirely sure of my character’s motivations and I didn’t know the rules of half the spells on my character sheet. Given that I was playing with some apparently very experienced role players I also felt too embarrassed to stop the game just to find out how Magic Missile works exactly.
I didn’t find these D&D system games gratifying at all, even if in one hysterical moment we managed to “break” the game and transport our characters (all bog-standard traditional fantasy heroes), along with 500 armed centaurs, to the Starship Enterprise. Seriously.
In terms of other complaints I had about these modules, the characters’ goals tended to be hazy, leading to many static “Well, what do we do now?” moments, and the games ran well past their intended finish time - resulting in rushed, unsatisfying conclusions forced on players by the GMs. Worst of all, because the modules were competitive, friends were split into different groups to avoid biased scoring. And it’s always more fun playing with friends!
Given my pen-and-paper role playing experiences at ICON 2009, I doubt I’ll bother with competitive modules again. I’m more than happy to participate in con RPG modules, regardless of what rule system they use (I’m always up for trying new things), but I’m looking for a relaxed, fun experience with friends. That probably means modules where the characters and central scenario are easy to wrap your mind around. Even if that means seriously dumbing down the normal game system rules. Within 30 minutes I want to be playing confidently, instead of still nervously consulting my character sheet 90 minutes into the session.
My personal suggestion for convention role playing would be to run at least one relaxed “RPG noob” session every day, at the same time the serious playing is underway. Although the game premise should be simple, and the character goals clearly outlined, any rule system could be used (however complex), because participants would be encouraged to ask questions throughout the game.
LARPing (Live action role playing)
I thoroughly enjoyed my LARP experience, despite the fact that it required I wear a tiny little skirt on one of the coldest nights in Johannesburg this Winter.
LARPing is probably what non-geeky types think of when you use the words “role playing.” It’s people dressing up in scenario-appropriate clothing (and typically wearing all-important character name tags), wielding character appropriate props and even donning some very dodgy accents. Think improvisational, amateur theatre, or murder mystery evenings – where everyone is playing a different character with a complex past, multiple secrets and a personal agenda to accomplish. Before the LARP everyone receives a character sheet outlining all this information, as well as the various other characters you have relationships with, or connections to. Fortunately you can carry these notes around with you during the LARP should you need to consult them.
While our LARP was more Agatha Christie in setting (a party in a posh 1930s Cairo hotel, with many scheming British diplomats, treasure hunters and German explorers present), LARPs can take place in pretty much any location you can imagine – feudal Japan, outer space, a mage’s academy. The Friday evening LARP at ICON was a full-on Tolkien-esque The Council of Elrond, re-enacting the famous gathering of leaders in The Fellowship of the Ring. I even saw Gandalf the Grey wandering around a few times.
LARPing requires both quick thinking and subtlety as you interact with the other characters while all the while staying true to your character, and their personal goals. A couple of game masters are integrated into the LARP as servants or other background characters to enable you to act out certain intentions – such as having a meddlesome rival threatened by a street thug in your pay. The “rival” would then be pulled aside at some point and informed of what they were subjected to, although they do not know who is behind the bullying. Combat, meanwhile, has to always be simulated in front of a GM, with play generally stopped (everyone freezes unless they’re involved in the action) to accommodate it.
Like all gaming at a con, the LARP comes with a time limit for obvious reasons. After a few hours events have to be wrapped up. Some story arcs seem to easily resolve themselves within the time limit, with characters dying, leaving etc, although others can require a little interference by the GMs to push things towards resolution. In our case, the game escalated to its conclusion quite rapidly after a certain point, as events outside the hotel became increasingly strange (scarab beetles devoured the British military headquarters), and characters inside the hotel became increasingly frantic.
Alas, my character, a prim British secretary – who also just so happened to secretively head up a massive criminal empire – died along with the majority of the cast. And most of Cairo! This occurred when the arrogant Egyptian prince accidentally detonated a nuclear device during a meeting that sought to resolve the issue of Egyptian nationalism versus British military interference. Boom, it was all over – even if the ending wasn’t entirely satisfying because of its abruptness.
The LARP was followed up by a very enjoyable debriefing session in which the players got to reveal their characters’ true motivations (most people were very surprised to find out I was the infamous Scarlet Pharaoh), how successfully they think they achieved their goals, as well as any problems they encountered. In my character’s case, I wanted to maintain the politically unstable status quo, and therefore stick around in Egypt to oversee my criminal network. However, the Earl, my elderly employer, and also lover (for blackmail reasons), wanted to flee to Kenya with government funds. I was running out of excuses to prevent this happening.
This LARP epilogue event really was a lot of fun.
Finally it’s worth noting that LARPing does come with one unique, particularly strange after-effect. And that’s when, the next day, you bump into your fellow LARPers out of costume and character. It’s a very weird feeling; something that I imagine is similar to passing someone on the street that you met at a swingers’ party, or seeing a superhero out of costume.
If you ever receive a chance to take part in a LARP with a scenario that appeals to you, seize the opportunity! Particularly if you, like me, like your gaming guided by very clear objectives, and you enjoy working towards set goals.
Boardgaming
I thoroughly enjoyed the boardgame side of ICON. For one thing, Boardgames.co.za had brought a lot of demo games which were completely free to try out. I thought this was a excellent move on the e-tailer’s part in terms of building customer goodwill, as you rarely get to try out a boardgame before purchasing it, and today’s top boardgames can involve a substantial financial outlay.
I became a rapid fan of party game Wits & Wagers, which is known in Britain as (rather cryptically) Gambit 7. Basically the game is Trivial Pursuit with financial stakes attached. Each game consists of 7 rounds where each round the players answer a numerical question (e.g. how many Academy Awards did Walt Disney win?) and then lay their answers out on a board. At this point players place betting chips on the answer they think is right, or closest to being right, and that definitely doesn’t have to be your own.
In my personal opinion boardgaming is one of the most social and accessible types of gaming. It encourages people to interact and it isn’t long before complete strangers, of all different ages and backgrounds, are happily chatting. This was true even during the Settlers of Catan national tournament that I took part in. What was most surprising was that even during this “serious” tournament, people were not vindictively competitive. There was a lot of intelligent play by the participants, but no ganging up against people who were ahead. The placing of the robber piece, and trade, was at all times fair.
I had a very enjoyable time in ICON’s boardgaming section, and if I hadn’t already signed up for role playing games, I would have played during all qualifying sessions of the Catan tournament. At least the weekend reminded me how much I love the game – even in its basic non-expansion form.
Out of interest, apparently at next year’s ICON a proper mahjong tournament will be taking place for the first time.
-------
And that’s my complete ICON 2009 report-back. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading it, and for non-attendees and non-geeky types it provided some much needed insight into the curiosity that is a games convention.
Comments
You don't have to go as far as Joburg to try one out though. A couple of LARPs are normally held every year at Cape Town's Dragonfire Con. I'm not sure though if the UCT Claws role-playing society stages other ones at other times of the year.