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Sunday was the last official day of Gen Con 2016 and I’m always a little lost on what to do. The Dealer Hall is a good option to find last minute deals or get in that last demo of a game you’ve been eyeing. This year, I was trying something a little different- I was running a few events.
I’ve run events in the past and swore I’d never do it again but those events were a huge chunk of time and very taxing. The events I had planned this year were just an hour each and playing some of the games I enjoy most.
First up was a Loopin’ Chewie Tournament. I had some ideas on how to run one based on how A Gathering of Friends runs their Loopin’ Louie tournament so I was ready to go with 7 sets of Loopin’ Chewie and some fun prizes. Unfortunately, only 4 people showed up.
the few, the proud
We still had a bit of fun putting the players through a gauntlet of various play styles and much to my surprise, our youngest competitor came away with the most wins and the Golden Paddle award.
judge me by my size, do you?
We had set up the tables early and I had a lot of people checking out the game and quite a few families stop by to try it out. We also left a few games up while we tore everything else down. More families joined in and played a few games. Even though the overall turnout for the event was small, there was a bit of interest in the game and so I’m confident next year will have more people.
Next up was my pimped out Thunder Road. We had 3 out of 4 players show up so this event was a little better attended than my tournament. The guys enjoyed the game and my road variants and so it was definitely worth running.
The location the Con gave me was perfect as it was situated down one of the main event hall walkways. I had quite a few other attendees stopping to talk about the game and the nostalgic memories it brought back as well as gawk at my pimped out components.
After my events were done, I dropped off my stuff at the hotel and came back to the convention center to finish out the rest of the dwindling hours, checking out things I missed earlier.
River Dragons was a cool simultaneous action game where players are trying to get their pawns across the map via river planks that you set out during the game. The publisher only had the Giant version pictured above available to buy but I’ll definitely check the regular version out when it is reprinted.
Mantic Games had their retail copy of The Walking Dead: All Out War miniatures game available for demo. The bits look great and I can’t wait to get my full Kickstarter copy.
Earlier in the Con, there were some pretty epic set ups including this massive Warhammer 40k battle.
Or this great looking Age of Sail homebrew game.
Privateer Press always has some of the most amazing board set ups for their demos and tournaments.
While not known for its cosplay, Gen Con still caters to that crowd to good effect.
Greeting the Sunrise, Marike Reimer
Marike Reimer had a submission that won Best in Show in the 2016 Painting Competition. There is some amazing freehand work on that model.
Homebrew add-ons like this massive Space Station for Firestorm Armada are all over the Con event hall. It’s great to see just how many players love to go to extremes to create immersive environments for the games they love. The essence of pimping games.
Gen Con wrapped up with a trip to the airport and a last relaxing meal before the flight. I got home and unpacked and found that I actually had a pretty good swag haul.
I was able to pick up the Flick em Up expansion and some new Wave 9 X-wing ships. I was able to grab some Mantic Walking Dead promo zombie figures and some Event exclusive Dropzone Commander packs. Then there was the annual Gen Con die and some Catacombs and Stellar Conflict promos. My Duke tournament “medallion” (Flava Flav style), some CMON exclusives and some fire/smoke tokens from Broken Token round out the goodies.
All-in-all a great convention and I can’t wait to see what happens next year.