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I'll be there. Haven't even really begin to look at or think about the schedule/planning, but will certainly be trying to get in some 2 Rooms and a Boom/other social deduction games in at some point. Should be fun.
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Nov 16, 2017 07:19
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Got in last night, got a cheesesteak, eating breakfast at the market now, then off to do booth setup. Missing a bunch of friends that are in Dallas for BGG, but looking forward to this weekend!
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Nov 16, 2017 15:04
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Ive got a DM meeting with the D&D people at 630 pm, should be at the Field House right after that. I'm free this afternoon before then if anyone wants to meet up early or has philly questions or whatever. If you arent in the groupme yet get in there!
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Nov 16, 2017 15:25
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Yeah probably safer to say 7pm for meetup if nesbit isn’t gonna be there right at 6:30. My workday is slowly avalanching, we’ll see if I get out at 2pm. Also join groupme: https://app.groupme.com/join_group/33309759/qHSJ5d
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Nov 16, 2017 15:54
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I'm sitting at registration until 1:30
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Nov 16, 2017 16:21
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My first convention as well and unsure what to expect. Honestly most of the panels don't seem too interesting as I'm more looking forward to just open game playing as much stuff as possible. Hopefully the open area isn't too much of a cluster. I tend to be pretty easy going with board games and will usually play anything other people want as long as it doesn't exceed 3 hours per game. I'll never understand Through the Ages and how people do it.
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Nov 16, 2017 17:32
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Harlock posted:I tend to be pretty easy going with board games and will usually play anything other people want as long as it doesn't exceed 3 hours per game. I'll never understand Through the Ages and how people do it. Oh okay, cool *slowly pushes bag of 6 hour train games back under table* no problem dude E: the answer is you play enough games and you start seeing the eurogame code, matrix-style. Then you get into the hard poo poo to chase that game high, which unfortunately takes longer to do, sometimes. I just bought some real nerdy opaque boardgames which hopefully take under 2 hours though! Fellis fucked around with this message at 19:44 on Nov 16, 2017 |
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Nov 16, 2017 19:41
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Fellis posted:Oh okay, cool *slowly pushes bag of 6 hour train games back under table* no problem dude Pretty much this. It’s like reading a Dostoyevsky. It takes a while but it’s really fulfilling. Mind you, Of course this only for the good long board games. Risk is long but it’s Atlas Shrugged.
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Nov 16, 2017 19:58
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The problem is just usually the game nights we have are only 4-6 hours and I'd rather play as many games as possible than one game. If you enjoy those long games, more power to you. 
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Nov 16, 2017 20:11
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Harlock posted:The problem is just usually the game nights we have are only 4-6 hours and I'd rather play as many games as possible than one game. If you enjoy those long games, more power to you. I have these as well and enjoy them greatly!!! but then there are also the game nights where I say “we’re playing 18xx for 6 hours, i’ll cook dinner though. You can pet my cats if there’s any downtime”
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Nov 17, 2017 05:50
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Just some quick reminders. 1. The Philadelphia Marathon is this weekend so be prepared for it to mess with any Saturday or Sunday travel plans in the area. 2. You are in PA. If you want liquor go to a state liquor store, if you want beer go to a beer store. If you want both go to a bar or Jersey. 3. Just another restaurant recommendation but if you don't mind about a 10 minute drive north then Frankford Hall is a pretty good German style beer hall and they've never seemed to mind people playing board games on their giant tables. That being said I've never tried this on a weekend. A quick walk from here is also Barcade if you're missing video games. Excited to try some new games this weekend!
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Nov 17, 2017 06:36
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who's already in line
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Nov 17, 2017 06:57
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We went in some back entrance accidently, at like 10:05 and didnt wait at all
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Nov 17, 2017 19:55
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I walked in and was like “hey where is the playtesting stuff I can get in early” and they were like “no idea what you’re talking about”
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Nov 17, 2017 19:59
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Fellis posted:Oh okay, cool *slowly pushes bag of 6 hour train games back under table* no problem dude And yet I got you to play my copy of Batman Love Letters at the bar last night. So far this isn’t the train wreck I was expecting; feels a bit like a 1/3-scale Gen Con with actual space in the aisle and line discipline actually being kept the Enforcers so booths don’t impact other booths. Of course, I’m also trying to figure out what to do now that I’ve done the dealer hall once.
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Nov 17, 2017 22:04
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I'll be there tomorrow during the day playing x-wing, this lightseekers card game, and star wars destiny. If anyone likes those games shoot me a message and we'll goon out.
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Nov 18, 2017 00:43
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fordan posted:And yet I got you to play my copy of Batman Love Letters at the bar last night. I didn’t say I hate small simple games! They just don’t do it for me as much. I did buy a 30-min long racing game called Downforce, you can bet on the winner to win without actually doing anything! 1/3 gencon is exactly what this con is when you don’t do events, its pretty good and I’d definitely come next year. I hope they implement a event ticket system or something next year. Way more cool food options within walking distance here but its also way more crowded to go eat
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Nov 18, 2017 00:51
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I'll be there tomorrow around 2-3, hope to see you all!
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Nov 18, 2017 00:55
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This convention...is good
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Nov 18, 2017 03:26
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Kashuno posted:This convention...is good Any highlights?
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Nov 18, 2017 05:32
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Indeblue is the Haveli of PAX. Let it be known.
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Nov 18, 2017 21:07
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Been having a great time so far. The only real complaint I've noticed Is that RPG sign ups / interest has exceeded capacity and people getting upset of being turned away. Maybe next year a bigger section devoted to RPGs.
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Nov 18, 2017 21:58
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Harlock posted:Been having a great time so far. The only real complaint I've noticed Is that RPG sign ups / interest has exceeded capacity and people getting upset of being turned away. Maybe next year a bigger section devoted to RPGs. This has been the case for literally everything I wanted to do. Megagames, mini painting, RPGs, etc. If there is one thing that rankles me about PAX, it's the expectation that you show up at ?? time to queue to sign up for a thing. This was even worse for megagames where you can sign up yourself and 4 other people who aren't present, which made the "at capacity" line indicators completely useless. It's time we moved to pre-event registration, perhaps with a modest registration fee for some of this stuff so that events can expand to fill demand, or a least do a random draw to give you a chance at it. I do have some recommends for folks on day 3 though. Downforce is a pretty fun and quick little racing game that you can find in the demo part of the freeplay area.Also, we played "The Thing" which is a hidden identity game in the style of BSG, but it's way less complex and seems to play quite a bit faster than BSG. JerikTelorian fucked around with this message at 14:20 on Nov 19, 2017 |
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Nov 19, 2017 14:17
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I just posted my thoughts on PAX Unplugged to my facebook page and thought I would just copy it here. I was glad I could meet up with you goons a few times this weekend. I never seem to have time to do it at Gen Con. PAX Unplugged After Thoughts: General: Personally the convention was good for me as someone just starting out with a game I want to launch via crowdfunding in about a year. I was able to meet several people, pick their brains, and exchange contact info and hopefully that will all turn into a continued relationship with them. At the very least I definitely learned things. I also was able to get about 10 playtests of the game in on Friday which was great, I had very little downtime between playtests and people were generally pleased with it. There were a couple that didn't seem to love it but I also don't think they were that into resource management games so there isn't much I can do about that. I was only able to really play one game which was from 10pm to midnight on Saturday of Clans of Caledonia. I was really glad to have been able to get that one in since I have been looking forward to trying it out. Will definitely have to pick it up when its finally available on the general market in a few months. Cons: I am not a fan of lines in general, and this being a line con I didn't like that aspect at all. I took videos of the lines of people waiting to play D&D on Saturday and Sunday and that just seems nuts to me waiting that much. I am glad we were able to do some signups for some of the tiers so people didn't have to wait as much but it still seemed like a huge a chunk of the day for those people. I also generally don't like how crazy lines made things for us in D&D administratively. Mustering was a nightmare and everyone was just constantly confused. I also really don't appreciate how PAX handled things for the TRI initiative (the main group handling D&D) and pretty much forcing them to run a crowdfunding campaign to fund running D&D at a convention. That is just insane to me and I am impressed they didn't just throw up their hands and walk away. There is no reason such a major draw to a tabletop convention should have so little support from the conventions parent company and be forced to pay for things in that stressful of a fashion for what is ultimately something that people expect at the convention. That is the biggest thing that frustrated me with this convention. PAX also didn't have much to do in the sense of scheduled things. It really needed more events, specifically games and special game related activities. Most things were just show up, wait in a line and see what happened. It really left a sense of ambiguity and that there wasn't much to do most of the time if you were a general attendee except try and find open space in the open gaming area and find others to play random board games with. There is a definite place for that at these cons but it shouldn't be the mainstay of your convention, and it felt like it was at PAX Unplugged. I talked to several vendors this morning about how they liked the show and learned that the RPG booths seemed to have decent sales but at least the board game exhibitors were not having such luck. They found that their demo tables were constantly packed but their sales were worse than just about any other con of this size (anecdotally). They postulated that this was because there was so little in the way of event planning that people were expecting to be entertained, so they just sat down to play demo games but really had no interest in buying and just wanted to fill their time. I don't know if that is really true or not but I heard it from multiple booths. I never thought I would say this but I really miss the carpets Gen Con has in the dealer hall after this show. They didn't lay down any carpets at this con in the expo hall and it just made walking that much more painful. This con was far harder on my feet than any other con of this approximate size I have been to before. I also didn't like that it just completely shut down at midnight. Something that went at least later, if not 24 hours, would have been much cooler and not feel as rushed. This isn't so much about PAX but the convention center. I have never seen a building more stingy with their power. Twist locks on all the outlets, really? Do you need to rent out those $5 phone charging batteries that badly??? Pros: It was busy but not super packed, which meant there was a lot of opportunities to seek out specific people you wanted to hunt down and talk to them which was great for someone in a position like I am in. The Unpub was great and I really appreciate all of the effort John and others put into and those that came over to playtest everyone's games. I didn't want to like it, but I did kind of get into the pin collecting aspect they do a little bit. The first look area was great, it was nice to at least see, if not play, games that were just out from Essen and haven't hit the states yet. It was wonderful to see so much demand for D&D as well as so many new players. One of the Philly DMs was telling me how he has a full table of players who had never played before and they didn't even have dice. Things like that are great to hear. Overall: I know there are a lot of cons above but I really did enjoy myself overall. It is not my favorite con, of the 8sih or so cons I attend regularly I would put it at about 5th place, but I hope they learned a lot from this year. My main gripes emit from them using lines instead of tickets and not having enough events planned and seeming to rely on some (in my opinion) generally lack luster panels and external groups (like the TRI initiative running D&D) to provide the main focus of things for people to do. They have said they will be back and I will look forward to it next year. Rumor has it the D&D area will be increased in size significantly. While I hope that is true, I have concerns about us being able to get enough DMs and they better have a significantly improved option for us to fund D&D at this con next year.
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Nov 20, 2017 00:04
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nesbit37 posted:PAX also didn't have much to do in the sense of scheduled things. It really needed more events, specifically games and special game related activities. Most things were just show up, wait in a line and see what happened. It really left a sense of ambiguity and that there wasn't much to do most of the time if you were a general attendee except try and find open space in the open gaming area and find others to play random board games with. There is a definite place for that at these cons but it shouldn't be the mainstay of your convention, and it felt like it was at PAX Unplugged. I'd believe it, since that was my behavior. Showed up to try and get megagames or model painting. Both full already? Guess I'll schlep around the exhibit hall and play some games! The lines just piss me off a ton. I want to know if I'm going to do a thing before I spend hours getting there and waiting for it, not to get in line and hope that I might be able to do it.
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Nov 20, 2017 01:52
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Thoughts! My friend and I are both longtime Gencon attendees as well as having attended Origins and other PAX cons between us. I had an idea of what to expect after having attended PAX South and getting feedback from friends who've attended East and West. My expectations were, frankly, rather low; there'd be lines for everything and there wouldn't be as many events/activities as one might expect; we'd have to make our own fun. PAXUP met my expectations. I think the folks organizing PAX need to rethink the organizational issue of lines and to reconsider the structural issue of being a convention versus a trade exposition. I know 'expo' is the X part of PAX and when it comes to the video game industry, that's fine. I was at South when Nintendo launched the Switch and if you wanted to play Zelda before anyone else in North America, you waited in line for 3 hours. That's fine, that's their prerogative. It's not like you could hop over to another booth and play games on an unreleased system, right? Why is the distinction important? nesbit37 posted:I talked to several vendors this morning about how they liked the show and learned that the RPG booths seemed to have decent sales but at least the board game exhibitors were not having such luck. They found that their demo tables were constantly packed but their sales were worse than just about any other con of this size (anecdotally). They postulated that this was because there was so little in the way of event planning that people were expecting to be entertained, so they just sat down to play demo games but really had no interest in buying and just wanted to fill their time. I don't know if that is really true or not but I heard it from multiple booths. This is precisely what the difference is between a con and an expo. With that said, people don't need to wait hours and hours in line to play Dungeons & Dragons. People don't need to wait hours and hours to register for a board game or miniatures tourney. The most precious thing any of us have at a con is our time. We have 3 or 4 days to play games and then we head back home. The biggest sin that one can commit is wasting it. It's why we tell people coming to Gencon to get up and leave if they're in a game that they deem lovely, even if it cost a few tickets to get into. There was the issue before the con started of how to get in touch if we wanted to run games in the RPG freeplay area. How do we get a table? How do we let people know ahead of time what games we'll be running? What times will be available for us to run the games we wanna run? It was exceedingly difficult to discover information on any of these questions because the RPG activities are, essentially, subcontracted out. For example, TRI was doing D&D and it felt like PAX largely washed their hands of having any further involvement. My friend and I had a good time at PAXUP because we met up with internet friends and played games with them in the freeplay area. We did a couple panels, we did a couple tourneys, but waiting in lines to do those things ate up hours that could've been much better spent. We likely would've had more fun if we hadn't signed up for any events and that's something of an indictment, I feel. We had fun in spite of the con, not because of it. It was a weekend well spent, in the end, but if they persist in having lines and don't take an active hand in organizing RPG events, I can't see myself returning.
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Nov 20, 2017 01:57
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I was looking forward to the megagames but got closed out of both days by like 9 15. I used to like just wandering around and seeing what would happen, but now I like playing games. Probably going to switch back to gen con whenever I do another thing.
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Nov 20, 2017 02:22
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My suggestions for next year: Make the unpublished room bigger and advertise it better. I had a lot of fun playing these games and in speaking to some of the developers - most people didn't know the room existed / found it hard to find. Crazy how a room with doors on the side will do versus a door that looks right into the room. I think this applied to Classic Cardboard too. Too many people wanted to try new games with nobody to teach them. This was a common complaint I saw on the app and in speaking to people. Maybe have a sort of PAX Enforcer (or call them something different like Game Masters) who run/facilitate games instead of hoping someone in the community comes to your LFT cone. This could be in a separate room/hall space to not clog up the Expo Hall and give people something to 'sign up for' or to schedule. I only attended 3 panels and I rather enjoyed them, but you could notice attendance was sparse. Generally, I think what most people told me what to expect held true - its up to you to make your own con experience/make your own fun. If you go by yourself, it may be daunting to integrate yourself in a gaming group or to find new players. An expected and sizable portion of the open gaming area were people just playing with their friends, which is fine and expected - but maybe a little hard for 1-2 people to find a bigger group. My friends and I utilized LFG cones and the people who joined our games were grateful to see one because they said they hadn't noticed too many of them and wasted a good bit of time walking around waiting for something to happen. Anyhow, I had a blast and was never really hurting for more content. There's things I may have wanted to check out, but after seeing how fruitless it was to sign up for things after Friday - I just didn't bother. nesbit37 posted:I talked to several vendors this morning about how they liked the show and learned that the RPG booths seemed to have decent sales but at least the board game exhibitors were not having such luck. They found that their demo tables were constantly packed but their sales were worse than just about any other con of this size (anecdotally). They postulated that this was because there was so little in the way of event planning that people were expecting to be entertained, so they just sat down to play demo games but really had no interest in buying and just wanted to fill their time. I don't know if that is really true or not but I heard it from multiple booths. All in all I'd go again because I'm local and likely wouldn't spend the $$ to travel to something like Gen Con when all I want to do is play board games with friends/strangers and be exposed to new and cool games.
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Nov 20, 2017 02:43
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Generally after a PAX there is a "Constructive Criticism" thread on the official forums. Penny Arcade staff do read it and use it to make teaks to the show. I'll cross post it here once it is up. I can tell you that from an Enforcer perspective, there were many things we were not prepared for, and we've already spotted many areas for improvement. Remember this was the first PAX held in this venue, the first one focused solely on tabletop, and the first one held less than a month after the previous one (that also happened to be on the opposite side of the globe). Also understand that we were shorthanded on the Enforcer front (tbh, I am not a big tabletop gamer and came down mostly to help run the show. I still had a great time.) Tomorrow night I get to celebrate all the hard work put into the show by myself and the other Enforcers before climbing onto the bus for the trip back to Boston.
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Nov 20, 2017 02:45
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Got to hang with SUSD folks when they casually sat down next to my group starting up a game and chat with them for a bit, as well as Tom Vasel. That was cool. I have more thoughts but just got back so I am going to sleep and type poo poo out in the morning
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Nov 20, 2017 02:48
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Kilonum posted:I can tell you that from an Enforcer perspective, there were many things we were not prepared for, and we've already spotted many areas for improvement. Remember this was the first PAX held in this venue, the first one focused solely on tabletop, and the first one held less than a month after the previous one (that also happened to be on the opposite side of the globe). Also understand that we were shorthanded on the Enforcer front (tbh, I am not a big tabletop gamer and came down mostly to help run the show. I still had a great time.) As far as the issues I felt at the con they were mostly due to things that had been planned for ages for this con and not things I would attribute to being a first time con (other than first boardgame con for them) or being one held close to other cons/first at this venue. Other than the exhibitor badge snafu (I'm a little salty about not having a proper badge as a souvenir) and some occasional conflicting info from enforcers I thought they did a fine job. I also worry about them ditching lines in favor of tickets due to the legitimate egalitarian comment that was made about them in the AMA from a little while back. That reads to me as a philosophical opinion they may be reticent to change more than a logistical one, though I hope I am wrong.
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Nov 20, 2017 02:55
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Kilonum posted:I can tell you that from an Enforcer perspective, there were many things we were not prepared for, and we've already spotted many areas for improvement. Remember this was the first PAX held in this venue, the first one focused solely on tabletop, and the first one held less than a month after the previous one (that also happened to be on the opposite side of the globe). Also understand that we were shorthanded on the Enforcer front (tbh, I am not a big tabletop gamer and came down mostly to help run the show. I still had a great time.) I get what you're saying and I can certainly see what you mean, but this isn't the first ever PAX and this isn't the first tabletop con by a long shot. This was the first con in Philly, true good point. There are tabletop conventions out there that have been running for years that can provide some excellent examples of how to do things but PAX has steadfastly refused to recognize that. PAX Aus is immaterial and irrelevant. BlackIronHeart fucked around with this message at 04:32 on Nov 20, 2017 |
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Nov 20, 2017 04:20
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Warning: Effortpost incoming.... Right, so I think that if I were a PAX veteran who was looking to do something a little cool and different, this would have been a great show. But for a veteran of many a different gaming convention under my belt, this was kind of a clusterfuck. Let me give you a few examples: I wanted to play in the 7 Wonders tournament. OK, cool, that's "Tabletop Tourney," so we head for there. This being my first PAX, I had been warned about standing in lines, but whatever. First problem - the line for Tabletop Tourney? Not actually at Tabletop Tourney. Nope, that line forms in the "Queue Room," the Enforcers keeping the doors closed at Tabletop Tourney inform us. OK, where's that? We get directions and off we go. On our way to the Queue Room, we pass a different group of Enforcers leading a line of people, and I almost asked them, "Hey, what line is this?" I should have, because that was the Tabletop Tourney line departing the Queue Room - where by the time we arrived (and had to ask someone else where we should line up), we discovered that the line area was...empty. WTF? I know we're not the first ones here, because there are people everywhere. So we find some other Enforcer who tells us the line we want just left. Keep in mind, we've been told the place opens at 10:00 and it's still like 9:40 - and our line has vanished. WTF? One Enforcer told us to just wait in the main Expo Hall line (which is loving massive at this point), then once we're in the hall just hang a left and head to Tabletop Tourney. My curt response was, "gently caress that." Right, so we go back to the doors outside Tabletop Tourney and we're like, "Hey, they've taken our line in already, can you let us in so we can join it? The poor Enforcer holding this door was now by herself and said, "I can't, but your line shouldn't have left already. I can't open these doors until the Queue Room is empty." I know how many people are in that room, and I know this is utter madness. She continues, "And I'm by myself, so I can't leave here to check it for you. Can you go find someone, ask them what I should do, then come back here and tell me?" Aside: I was tempted to leave her line of sight for about 30 seconds, return, and say, "Yeah, 'John' said you should just let us in now." By Saturday, I would have used this ploy without hesitation. End of aside. But whatever, it's my first PAX, I figure some initial confusion is normal. So we head back to the Queue Room to find someone who knows what the gently caress is going on. On the way, we pass another line of people. This time, I'm smarter: "Hey, what line is this?" I ask some random dude in the line. "Tabletop Tourney" is his reply. Apparently, "enough" people had reformed the line in the Queue Room that they decided to lead in a second group. Awesome, we find the tail of that line and fall in. Of course, between the Queue Room and the entrance to the Expo Hall are Will Call, Merch, and Information, all of which have SCADS of people sort of milling around them. So they're leading this (rather loose) line through a big crowd. At one point, the line sort of splits - had there not been a dude in a Gretzsky hockey jersey about 12 people ahead of me, I'd have gone the wrong way and been hosed once again. But whatever, we successfully follow the line into the expo hall (past some Enforcers arguing about whether we should be going in), we hang a left, head over to Tabletop Tourney registration, and get tacked onto the line that had come in previously. Whew. Made it. To another line. Where we wait. Now this line is moving pretty slowly. Turns out they only have like 3 or 4 people working the tourney registration desk. We stand in line until 10:45, at which point we're close to the front. There's like 4 people ahead of us. Then an Enforcer comes out and says, "Who here is trying to register for an 11:00 tournament?" A bunch of people raise their hands. "OK, all you people step two steps to your right and form a new line, we're going to trying to get you through first." So now I've gone from being 4th in line to like 64th in line. At some point I think the people working the desk realized that those of us in the "slow lane" were sharpening our pitchforks and readying our torches, because they threw us a bone - one person was working our line and 2 were working the other line. Finally, I get to the desk, and grab a slot in the 7 Wonders tourney. The first one runs at 11:30 (which is only like 15 minutes away by this point), but we haven't seen any of the con yet, so I opt for the 1:00 round and get a slot. Whew. So we gently caress around the dealer hall for a while, and eventually it's getting close to 1. So I go to my event. Or do I? Where the gently caress is it? I go back to the reg desk and their super helpful advice is, "Go to those tables over by the wall and look for the one with the 7 Wonders boxes on it." Are you loving kidding me? Aside: If I sign up for an event at, say, GenCon, not only do I know months in advance that I actually have a confirmed slot, I know what building it's in, what room it's in, and what loving table it's at. And just in case the table numbers get mangled, lost, or ganked, virtually every room has a handy map outside that says which table is which number. End of aside. Whatever, I find the right table and get there with a couple minutes to spare. At this point, I would like to praise the Enforcer running this particular event. This dude was on point, all business, and had us separated into groups and playing in very short order. Kudos to that dude, because he knew what the gently caress. I meet some rad folks, play a rad game, have a good time, and finish out a mere 2 points from advancing to the next round. Curses! But I had fun, so it's good. Except... Playing 7 Wonders with people who know how to actually play 7 Wonders is awesome (I spend a lot of time playing with newbies). Everyone knew what to do, there was almost no hesitation, and the cut-throat camaraderie was fun. But we cracked out this game (that I had stood in line for all told about an hour and a half) in 30 minutes. That's a 3:1 "line-to-game" ratio. Unacceptable. Further, there were people who showed up to that round with "alternate" tickets, which is not surprising considering how many people had been in line behind us that morning. They stood in that gently caress-off long line for even longer than I did and showed up with the mere hope that they'd be able to play the game they wanted. Had I gotten to the Tabletop Tourney registration desk after standing in line for an hour and a half and been told, "sorry, that event is full up," I'd probably have flipped the table in a fit of rage. See above under, "unacceptable." This was something we heard from people over and over at the con: they wanted to do stuff and spent a ton of time in line, only to get turned away once they got to where they were going. By chance, we met some dudes in the airport on our way out who'd come all the way from South Dakota, just wanting to play some D&D. They spent most of their con in line and got into precisely one event, which was not one they really wanted. Their line-to-game ratio was even worse than mine, and they'd come from even farther away. Aside: They also demoed Starfinder at the Paizo booth, only to be told by the people at the booth that there were no copies of the rules there for sale, which left both of them really scratching their heads. End of aside. More line shenanigans: Main Theater. I went to the live Shut Up & Sit Down show. There was this huge loving line queued up against the wall outside. In front of us, there is an empty Main Theater. Like, no one's in there. The chairs are all empty. We can see this. What are we waiting for? And the Theater has been empty for at least a half hour (because that's at least how long I've been in line, and there's been gently caress-all going on in there the entire time). Here's a pro-tip - if you have a room full of empty chairs that you're going to let people sit in at some arbitrary time, DON'T STAND THEM IN A GOD DAMNED LINE, JUST LET THEM IN. People who get there sooner will get better seats, just like being at the front of the line. Like seriously, what the gently caress? And lest anyone think this is a crack at the folks busting their asses to make the con work (specifically the Enforcers), the issue is not one of organization (though you could tell there were some hiccups, especially on Friday); the issue is one of paradigm: Lines. Are. Dumb. I gamed my brains out at GenCon. You know what I waited in line for? Absolutely nothing. I even spent the extra  to get my badge and tickets mailed to me, so I faffed past Will Call too. I understand that getting into the Auction Hall at GenCon can involve lines, and that's part of why I don't do it (sorry, Dr. Quarex, I hope we can still be friends). If you're going to run events, make a schedule and sell tickets ahead of time. All this line bullshit is just a borderline criminal waste of peoples' time.Speaking of time, for gently caress's sake don't close the convention hall. Sure, wall off the dealer room, close down the board-game library (something that it should be pointed out was run exceptionally well - they clearly have experience doing this and it was a super-smooth, wholly enjoyable part of the con), whatever, but let people game 24/3 because that's why they're here - to play and run games. Speaking of running games, it's pretty clear that RPGs were a last-minute add-on to this show. Unless you were part of some established group, it was totally opaque for how you could actually come to PAX and run a game. I would happily have run a couple of sessions of Apocalypse World or whatever, but the RPGFreePlay was extremely space-limited and Games-On-Demand was run entirely by volunteers who to all appearances enjoyed basically no support from the con organizers. Never did the organizers solicit attendees to submit events, so absent being part of TRI, you were basically boned. Unless you wanted to, you know, stand in line and hope for some table space and some random players who were also sick of standing in line and would take the first game they could get whether it was something that interested them or not. PAX has gotten a couple of things right. The fact that they have an app that has the schedule and lets you check what's going on when and sends you text notifications that your thing is about to start is loving genius. I want to see more cons do this. What made this con enjoyable for me was, well, goons. Whether it was hanging out at FieldHouse on Thursday night just shooting the poo poo or getting fantastic restaurant sugggestions from Nesbit or playing goofy games with BlackIronHeart and Dr. Quarex, meeting like-minded goons and putting faces to names was the highlight of the weekend for me. As BlackIronHeart and I discussed on our way back, unless something changes radically for next year, I'm not sure I'd drop the cash to do PAX again - which is a shame, because Philly seems like a cool town with a lot to offer. tl:dr - if you thought PAXUnplugged was super-cool, it's probably because you've never been to an actual gaming convention. Try it and see.
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Nov 20, 2017 04:46
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1) why do they think that utilikilts are at all acceptable 2) better ways to sign up for games 3) i dont understand pins 4) the worst part about penny arcade expo is the penny arcade people i dont give a poo poo about them and it kinda bummed me out that i'd have to buy the dumb animated dudes if i wanted the cool pennsylvania symbol pin with the pax-u info on it
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Nov 20, 2017 05:40
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Bogart posted:1) why do they think that utilikilts are at all acceptable The Pinny Arcade thing is this whole pin trading subculture at all the PAX conventions. There are a bunch of rituals around the pins and you're probably better off not getting involved. Even wearing one of the trading pins when you're otherwise uninvolved can get you unexpectedly hassled just waking around.
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Nov 20, 2017 05:57
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Midjack posted:Even wearing one of the trading pins when you're otherwise uninvolved can get you unexpectedly hassled just waking around. I went all three days, played a few board games from the lending library, watched a few seminars, browsed the stores. Overall I enjoyed myself, but I live within walking distance of one of the trains into the city. I certainly wouldn't fly out here for this. The dragon and dire rat theaters also had you waiting in line next to an empty theater. Baffling. The guy demonstrating the Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) mini game, I poo poo you not, did not know what cavalry was. I still don't know if the base game includes any. Oh, and if anyone from Wyrd miniatures reads this site; What the gently caress dudes, do you just not care anymore or what?
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Nov 20, 2017 07:14
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StuG Jeebus posted:
What about Wyrd's presence did you find lacking?
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Nov 20, 2017 14:27
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Constructive Feedback thread on the official forums is live
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Nov 20, 2017 16:04
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Cool effortposts on the state of the convention! I personally decided I would not engage with the toxic line culture endemic to the pax experience. So instead I just sat at a fixed location (pillar c7 crew) and broadcast that constantly till people came to me to drop their stuff for a bit, and eventually play games. (I forgot to post that here though  )And it mostly worked out! I got to play all the nerdy economic games I usually don’t get to play and had a great time. It was awesome meeting people from here as well! Staying with a friend in the city was nice for a budget con experience but carrying stuff around sucks, I think I might spring for a hotel room next year. Hopefully PAX gets the idea with event registration like a civilized convention next year, every time I saw a massive line I just shook my head in sympathy. Does anyone know what the omegathon games were? I can’t imagine it was boardgame/tabletop related aside from dexterity games or something and that’s lame.
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Nov 20, 2017 16:17
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Bogart posted:1) why do they think that utilikilts are at all acceptable yeah what the heck was with al lthe dudes in skirts
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Nov 20, 2017 16:25
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