I realize I forgot to mention that on Thursday, Elizabeth and I tried out Pirates of the Spanish Main by WizKids. You get these little plastic cards where you can punch out pieces and assemble them into pirate ships. Then, by taking turns moving them and firing with cannons, you fight the other players ships and try to sink them before they sink you. The basics are very simple and the game is very compact, so we bought a few packs of ships.
After some more time poking around the exhibit hall, we went to play the National Security Decision Making Game. Not the most exciting title, but it's a game of role-playing political leaders, military leaders, and so on in a real-world setting with a near infinite number of scenarios to play. Elizabeth found the briefing very confusing, so she instead went to watch some anime and go back to the exhibit hall. I stayed to play and ended up in a dual role of Air Force Chief of Staff and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. There were about 50 people in the game, half playing US roles, half playing Iranian roles. In the game, the Iranians were developing nukes, an Ebola outbreak was spreading through Africa and bounced to continental Europe, and internal intrigue was going on in both countries. The winners are determined by judgement call of the group of facilitators, and I nabbed a very respectable fourth place by being the instrumental player in containing the Ebola outbreak and building some Air Force-controlled bioweapons despite international treaties and without the Secretary of Defense or President knowing that it happened.
We also tracked down my good friend Bobby, who has left his "regular" job to become a full-time miniatures sculptor. I hadn't talked to him in some time, but we picked up right where we left off, which to me is the best indication of true friendship. No matter how long it's been, it's like no time has passed when you get together again. I caught him at his sculpting demonstration table, put my camera in front of my face, and called out, "Mr. Jackson, a picture please?" He looked up, I got the photo below, and he only figured out it was me when I lowered the camera. Warm welcome number two!
Bobby Jackson, Cool Sculptor Guy
Later, Elizabeth and I got into a game of Seafarers of Catan on a "giant" board. It wasn't as large as I expected, but it was still fun to play on a cool board. It was an incredibly close game, as I was prepared to win on my next turn when another player, Carol, picked up her last victory point and won ahead of me. Here's a look at the special board:
Giant Seafarers of Catan Board
We then went to a seminar, where I was the "expert." One of my StormReavers, Steve, helped me set up two seminar sessions where I would discuss the WarEngine rules with experienced players as we try to figure out what a new edition of the game might include. The seminar included only three attendees for this session, Steve, Ray, and David, but that was okay, as we worked through a better movement system, a better way to define weapon characteristics, and a few other smaller fixes. There's another session tonight and Bobby at least will likely join us for that one.
After the seminar, it was back to the Hong Kong Action Movie room, where Elizabeth again fell asleep, but I watched the last hour of a funny movie. I have no idea what it was, though, as I never saw the title.
Now, Elizabeth is ready to go and we're headed for the convention center again, prepared to fight for parking with fans coming to the Colts game in the RCA Dome right next to the convention. More True Dungeon today, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment