Okay, okay, Mark. I'll send in my trip report. :-)
Friday went pretty much as Richard and Mark described. One thing I can
mention is, if you ever send art to GDW, make sure you either send along
a frame and matting, or a return envelope :-).
One thing the Con reminded me about gamers (since I've been away from
playing games for about 6 years) is that gamers get really carried away.
And when they get carried away, they sometimes get rather loud... Not
only was Clay-O-Rama loud ("The Flaming Eye" was interrupted by a loud
20-player cheer of "STOMP! STOMP! STOMP! STOMP! STOMP!" from the
Clay-O-Rama table), but at one point in the day a handsome fellow at one
of the AD&D tables, who had a penchant for standing as he played,
brought me straight out of intense character playing for "Total Recall"
at the table next door, with a ear-splitting primal scream. Apparently
it affected everyone else in the room similarly, because the room
instantly became dead silent, and 300 eyes were focused unflinchingly on
the young fellow at the end of the room. A second or two later people
recovered their composure and gave him scattered applause and cheers, he
gave the rest of the room a deep bow, and all went back to playing their
games.
Mark, you wanted me to post the gory details of the BattleTech campaign.
Everyone YAWN now before you read further. :-) The ref (a young fellow
with dark hair, wry grin, and the name "SHAD" written on his forehead in
green soluble marker) threw down about 10 'mech sheets in front of us.
I picked a moderate 'mech called a "Dragon", which weighs in at about 60
tons and is armed with Long Range Missles, an Autocannon/5 and an arm-
and back-mounted Medium Laser. While my compatriots all party down the
middle of the hex map with heavier 'mechs, I decide to rapidly skirt
down the right side; that way, my right side is safe from attack.
Suddenly, I discover another mech left and above me on the hillside! He
wounds me and I return fire, wounding him. He jumps down off the hill
next to me and fires some more (A light 'mech - a Wasp, I see!). And
then a Locust comes by (another light 'mech). I shoot the Wasp --
ineffective. The Wasp misses and the Locust hits. I kick the Wasp, and
the locust takes off to fry other fish. The Wasp keels over. I start
to repeatedly kick the Wasp while he fires back at me. Eventually the
Wasp becomes an inert, twisted pile of metal, and I resume sidling down
the side of the map to fire LRM's at a new opponent.
Meanwhile, across the map, Richard is facing repeated "death from above"
from a Commando - a kamikaze jump-on-opponent type of attack. Between
damage taken by consistently missing Richard, and fire vectored in from
all the other player mechs, he finally finishes himself off in his final
leap, and crashes into a riddled heap at Richard's side. On the other
side of the table, no matter how hard he tries, Mark can't hit anyone,
despite trying to come over and rescue my 'mech, and he is being ignored
by the enemy. Worse than that, his dice fail to cooperate.
At the end, they awarded me the "Best Player" trophy, which I humbly
accepted. I feel I earned it through a combination of luck, asking lots
of questions of a Battletech expert that was co-GMing, and a small
amount of previous tactical wargaming experience.
Richard hasn't shared anything he learned in the "How to get Published"
seminar. Come on, Richard, let's share some of this with the group.
You should've seen how hard Mark role-played in the "Total Recall"
campaign, faced with his character's wife, he is forced to basically
struggle within himself and with her over the topic that she is a
dangerous liar. I *know* I couldn't have maintained character at that
point. Maybe the fact that the character wife, Lori, has the same name
as Mark's real wife, helped him keep character focus.
The other real gem of the Total Recall game was the young fellow playing
the rich-bitch character of Leona Trump. Dependent upon her hubby,
Larry, but amazingly resourceful with the pistols made from the company
she owns, she was played wonderfully and was very believable (and
annoying at times). Ron's quick-thinking improvisation of a prop was
another good story. Leona calls up Larry on the video, and guess who
appears on the screen but the image of Arnold Shwarzenegger. Ron holds
the picture in front of his face, looking at Leona's player, and says
(in a deep, legato Arnold accent), "Leona honey, what's wrong?!". The
table erupts in raucous laughter. Ron was able to milk laughs out of
that prop and accent all afternoon.
The Flaming Eye adventure was a lot like Eastern Pennsylvania to me.
That is, I think that Eastern Pennsylvania must look very pretty when
you aren't looking at it through smog from an expressway. I was sitting
at Gary's table, while Richard and Mark were at Joe's table -- I had
thought it might be fun to get a little different slant on it than Mark,
since Mark and I had shared the previous three sessions. Guess I
should've stayed with the more experienced gamers. I picked a Scout
that was a highly experienced engineer, who chose to run light and not
be the party leader. Unfortunately, I resorted to poking ideas at the
leader on several occasions, and acted as treasurer despite the fact
that duty ought to fall on the captain. My attempts at characterization
were encouraged by Gary, but the other players did not seem interested
in characterization, and seemed more interested in exercising their
skill DM's, having their very own starship, and provoking Vilani police
with automatic weapons rather than having more subtle fun. I got the
impression that Gary was moving quickly through the adventure to get it
over with, more because of the other players, as well as the distracting
noises and short playtime.
When I really came to understand characterization and ROLE playing in
games, some years back, it was like a light went on in my head and I
could see wonderful possibilities. I guess the other players at my
table are lucky that they had not had that freeing experience. :-) I
hope that some day I can play with Gary when he is free to concentrate
on his refereeing or play - he is quite talented, clever, and very good
at making characters come alive - when there are fewer distractions,
more time, and the more appreciative players.
It was really wonderful to be "on the inside" of the convention -
especially wonderful in our case because we didn't do any of the work on
it. :-) The opportunities to meet and talk to Ron, Gary, Joe, Patricia,
Joe Jr., Ken, Dave, and all the others I haven't mentioned was terrific.
They were all excellent hosts. I think Joe and Gary appreciated us for
having serious Traveller GM's to bounce ideas off of, and we enjoyed
bouncing our own ideas off them. I appreciated their candor and
friendliness.
I'd like to thank Mark again for providing transportation, and Richard
for the breakfast he treated us to. I also enjoyed the chance I had to
get to know Richard and Mark better (what else is there to do but talk
when on the road 16 hours round trip:-) )? I had such a great time that
if anyone is stupid enough to invite me, I'll do it again next year.
James
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Traveller Mailing List Administrator James T Perkins @ Tektronix, Inc
[email removed] Beaverton, Oregon, USA
[email removed] "Load Auto/Evade, Beowulf!"