Day 1 GenCon, A Success!

Well ladies and gentlemen, I have completed my first day at GenCon and am about to begin day 2.  Yesterday was absolutely wonderful.  It was an early trip to Indianapolis from Chicago; not a bad drive at all.  I feel as though I have completed my first gamer pilgrimage.  GenCon is my gamer Mecca and now I really feel like part of the group.  Though I did admit to Mark the closer we got the more anxious I was that I might not be gamer enough to fit in here   Good news… I was just fine! Woo!

We were able to skirt into parking, after nearly hitting Wil Wheaton.  Perhaps that’s an exaggeration, he walked in front of our car while going across the crosswalk   I told Mark it was his first geek celebrity sighting and we hadn’t even parked yet.  Score one for GenCon

The first thing we did was to hit the main entrance hall and pick up our media badges.  How fun to be handed this pass that could give us the key to a new and unique gaming experience!

We ran to catch Wil Wheaton’s “I’m Wil Wheaton and I’m a Gamer”.  It was a fantastic seminar where Wil discussed the importance of gaming and especially the role it could play between parents and children.  As a parent myself, albeit of a little one who isn’t gaming yet, I felt like it hit home.  Mark and I are very excited to teach Gabe how to play once he gets just a tad bit older.

Quickly from there we were able to meet-up in the lobby with Jeff from The Bonescroll,  Zach from RPG Blog 2, Michael Wolf (aka Stargazer) from Stargazer’s World and Nick better known as Necronomitron on the FTB forums.  After the introductions a game of Mouse Guard was started.  Zach had to leave for other events and Michael wandered in and out watching our game.  There was the stunted start and stop of everybody learning a new game but soon it was filled with plot ideas and advancements and event the dragging of a “bad” mouse back to the guard by his tail.  All in all a very good time.

A quick lunch and a little walking around the convention center looking for another open game table led us to the Hyatt Regency’s 3rd floor.  After lots of set-up, Mark, Jeff, Michael and I all sat down to play Warhammer Fantasy.  The game was wonderful, once we all figured out what we were doing, again!  I played the Dwarf Troll Slayer which couldn’t seem to miss hitting and destroying opponents.  Now for anyone who reads my writings regularly I don’t tend to be a fantastic roller but maybe GenCon is different?  Michael was wonderful at intimidating our snively merchant at the end of the game with such wonderful statements as “I think I may hear the beatmen returning and they will eat whoever they find.  They don’t care if you’re alive or dead”.  It was awesome.

We got to wonder the dealer hall but only for a few minutes as we stopped to see my Sister-In-Law who works for Fantasy Flight Games.  We are really looking forward to heading back in their today for some compulsory dice shopping and playing some really interesting looking demo-games!

This completes my first day.  On to day 2 and I can feel that it’s only going to be better than yesterday!