| Origins 2002 |
| Unlike Dragon*Con and MarCon, Origins is a business convention more than a party con. That doesn't mean it wasn't fun; it was. I got to meet several of my freelancers, hang out with my co-workers a bit (though I did not take part in the drunken debauchery that some of them prefer; I'd rather be gaming) and spent money on some new books. What I didn't do, however, was get a lot of pictures. Ah, well. Be content with the ones I did snap, and wait for Dragon*Con, which I'm sure will have more interesting stuff. So, I drove to Ohio with my friend Susan (Heather couldn't take the time off work, dammit) and we got to Origins Thursday evening. After discovering that my co-workers had already cancelled the second room, we settled in to suite that they'd rented. I had a room rented in my own name, but not for that night or Friday, just for Saturday night. And, of coure, the place was booked solid. Nuts. So, no matter. We had dinner and hung around. Nothing much going on Thursday, except my co-workers stumbled in drunk at about 3 AM and woke me up. (I have nothing against drinking or even acting like a ding-dong while drunk, but I don't like waking up to it). I would like to mention, though, that getting my badge was a snap. Walked up, told the Exhibitor badge guy that I was with White Wolf, and lo and behold, there's my badge. Would that it were always so smooth. Next day, I actually had gaming to do. I ran two games at Origins, both Dark Ages: Vampire (since we were there promoting the release of that game and all). The first one was Friday afternoon, and revolved around several Cainites sent to hang out with a Malkavian Baroness in England (that'll make more sense when you read Dark Ages Europe). Anyway, the characters discovered what they needed to and decided to flee the city, since they knew too much (it was pretty open ended; they could have taken a more active role, but instead decided to run to Mithras and inform him of goings-on. Smart decision, probably). The nice thing about running sponsored con games is that I get a million prizes to give away, so I think everybody got one. Below is the picture. |
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| Snow and Madness, Origins 2002. |
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| That night, gaming was still afoot. I had never played Fading Suns, from Holistic Games, before, but I'd read it and it looked cool as hell. Plus, my co-worker Bill Bridges (the Mage developer) was part of the creation of said game, so I was pretty keen to try it out. I liked it. The Storyteller was a little sleepy and a little out of his element (he was used to running the d20 version of the game, not the original rules) but the game has lots of potential. I was playing a psionic guy and crushing the heads of aliens with the power of my mind! (I love stuff like that). Susan played, too, and had a good time with it as well. Picture at right: |
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| This picture isn't out of focus, the people actually are blurry. Really. |
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| They woke us up again that night, or rather, Saturday morning. Justin was pretty hung over the next day. As witness, him on the floor at our booth, at left. |
| Well, as I'm sure you know, Adventure! won the best RPG Origins Award, so that was cool. I worked the booth a while on Saturday, shopped a bit, and generally hung out and chatted with people (and pimped Dark Ages for all I was worth). Come 2 PM, I had another Dark Ages: Vampire game to run. Never fails. The game you think you'll have a million people for, you get nobody. As it was, I had three, which was enough. I ran the same game I did at MarCon, which played out very differently with only three players as opposed to six. Again, lots of prizes to give, and my buddy Chris had come in from Chicago and played in the game, which was very cool (Chris will also be at Dragon*Con, and I'll get a better picture of him there, heh, heh). The one I have from that game is at left. |
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| Skirmish, Origins 2002. |
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| So, Saturday night was the White Wolf party in the suite, of which I got no pictures. I suck. Anyway, lots of folks, hanging out and drinking and chatting, and I met some cool people, which is always good. Sunday, Susan and I got up, worked the booth for a while, bought some more stuff, and left for Atlanta. The way was long and the road winding, but we made it. The next con I'll be attending is the Big One, Dragon*Con (I'll not be at GenCon, unfortunately). So come play in one of my games and you, too, can wind up on this site! (Big incentive, I know....) |