GenCon 06 wrap (Part II: Thursday)

Okay, so I said more on the shepard's pie would come later. It was Thursday morning in fact when I finished it. Sure, it was safe-and-sound in its little styrofoam package overnight - but I had not put it on ice and nor put it in a refrigerator (something our Motel 6 hotel room lacked). Did I die from it? Obviously not. Was it safe to eat? See previous question & answer. Was Adam & David grossed out? Yeah, I think I might have ruined their breakfast appetites.

So we got up and drove downtown. I needed more packs of Ultra-Pro sleeves and a box of Hunters to try and get the two cards I needed for my Day 2 Rings deck: a Mountain-Troll and the new Gloin. So the first place we stopped was the convention hall for an hour. I got both the cards I needed in my box (yes!) and got the rare Aragorn, too. You bet I was stoked. Meanwhile Adam purchased a Second Edition booster box.

What sucked was Ultra-pro didn't bring any product for the convention attendees to purchase. Uh, hello? This isn't an industry trade show. GAMA in Las Vegas covers that. Let your consumers buy your product! Sure, it's nice to give out free samples, let people spin your wheel to win prizes and tell them other booths in the hall where to buy Ultra-Pro products... but if you actually attend the convention and set up a booth... sell your goods! You did it in the past, why not now? (End of rant)

David wondered off to see the computer games being shown off in the convention hall (he's an avid online gamer). More on that later. Adam and I headed to the gaming hall where we learned Decipher again had not supplied Paul (Rings tournament guru) or Charlie (Trek dAgent) product for their sealed deck tournaments. Ugh! You'd think after it happened at Origins they would have learned their lesson. After some nudging we got them to agree that players who wanted to play in a sealed event could go buy their product in the convention hall.

Since there was just three players who wanted to play in the Trek Day 1 Sealed tournament and only Adam and I had paid the $22 entry fee, Charlie fairly decided to pre-qualify us for Day 2 and give us our prize support for entering the tournament. That freed us up to play in the Race to the Alpha Quadrant 2E tournament.

Since neither Adam nor I thought we were going to play in the event, we didn't bring constructed decks with us from the hotel room. So I gave Adam $5 and he back to the convention hall and bought some combo boxes. We made two decks out of mostly commons and uncommons and just a few rares. Suffice to say we went a combined 1-5. The one win... me against Adam - thanks in part to a well-timed Vastly Outnumbered dilemma. It caused him to lose five points and forced him solve a fourth mission if he want the victory. Of course, my quickly constructed deck included three 30 point missions. That meant I HAD to solve all four of my missions. Ugh, but I was able to do it! We have fun and got good prize support. Thanks Charlie!

David ventured around to the gaming hall eventually after almost becoming a company volunterr. He stuck around this one booth for awhile. After viewing and playing the demo, one of the company volunteers had to go to lunch and asked David to step in and show how the game operated to an interested convention-goer. Hey, isn't that how you become a beta-tester?

After our tournament wss over David, Adam, Paul and I went to dinner at RAM. The chicken salad I had was good... but the best was the bread pudding dessert. Adam ordered it for us. Yummy! I had never had this English dessert before but RAM does it right. Well, maybe a certain Indiana Trek 1E player who's originally from England could review it sometime. RAM's on-site brewed beers aren't half bad either.

We eventually made it back to the hotel where I aided Adam in shrinking his Day 2 Trek deck down to about 60 cards. Then it was time to hit the sack and get ready for Friday... only, maybe I should have set my cell phone alarm... oops!

GenCon 06 wrap (Part I: Wednesday)

So I took Wednesday off from work to get my stuff packed on Tuesday night. If you didn't know already, I work overnights so that makes sense. I was able to organize my trade binders, built four decks I would choose from for Lord of the Rings Day 2), playtested those decks with a friend at his house, and got my Trek cards ready.

Wednesday came and I got up early to get clothes packed, computer packed (in case the hotel had high-speed internet access which it didn't), and my cards I would be bringing put into boxes.

I was running late to the airport - nothing unusual there. There was a commuter plane that made an emergency landing at TIA (Tampa International Airport) about 40 minutes before I arrived. CNN had showed it live. I hoped that might delay my flight by five to ten minutes. It didn't, but I breezed through security and got to the gate while they were boarding. The only problem I had was the security attendant before the monorail ride to the individual terminal didn't want me to go ahead with three bags - despite the fact I carried three bags to the AirTran gate before and checked one of them there. Was this his first week on the job?

An uneventful flight to Atlanta later I was standing at a gate waiting standby for the next flight out to Indianapolis. I had used a frequent flyer coupon for my flight to GenCon... but that required a six hour layover in Atlanta unless a spot opened up on the next plane. I was crossing my fingers because if I didn't make it I would have Adam and David (the guys from Orlando I was rooming with) waiting in Indy for me for over three hours.

I passed the time playing Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories on my PSP. I usually only play the game while travelling. I was able to pass three missions this time. I got lucky and was able to get on the earlier flight thanks to five people not showing up.

So I made it to Indianapolis. Met up with Adam (who I know from the Orlando Trek scene) and David (one of Adam's friends who I didn't know). We got the rental car and headed to the hotel. Got our luggage inside athe room nd went downtown to register for the convention.

As the norm, the wait time to get event tickets was nearly an hour long. We decided to regiater for our Thursday events the next day. So we just paid our $70 and got our bags. Adam saw a Pirates expansion pack was included... so he quickly grabbed my pack (I don't play that game). The other pack included in each bag was for the upcoming EVE: The Second Genesis game. David plays EVE online so he was interested so see those cards. In the three packs we got two really cool foils.

From there we headed to dinner at Claddagh's Irish Pub. Adam and I both ordered the Sheppard's Pie. It was delicious. I also got a pint of Guinness. You know it's good for you right? The waitress did make one mistake. We order potato skins as an appetizer but she thought Adam said Oysters... oops. I couldn't finish my entire plate so I had the leftovers put in a to-go box (more on that later).

We headed back to the hotel... where I looked over some of my cards. David and Adam were reading through the event guide. Then we turned on the TV and watched South Park and Futurama. Right before I turned the television off, I changed the channel over to CNN - and wow, the shit had hit the fan in Britain. Yup, that's when we learned our flights home might be a bit more interesting after the arrest of terrorist suspects. After that it was lights out...

illing

So I get home from GenCon early Monday morning... and learn I brought back a consolation prize with me - a flu bug. I had been planning on writing about my weekend in Indy earlier this week (and I still plan to), but this flu has got me sleeping probably 10-12 hours a day. I am feeling better than I did two days ago - less drainage, but more coughing.

I'll try to write about my GenCon experiences this weekend... so keep an eye out for that.