So, another Origins game convention is in the books. This year, I did three full days--Thursday, Friday, and Saturday--and I had overall a great time. As I have said before, I think Origins is more or less the perfect size, being definitely big, but not overwhelmingly big as Gencon can be (though, I was surprised to see that four-day badges for Gencon are still available, which suggests that it may not be quite so big this year).
Here are my highlights and thoughts:
1. How Not to Sponsor RPG Sessions at a Convention: Last year, I ranted a bit about game companies who sponsor game sessions and then have the GMs not show up, and how bad a look that is for the publisher. [As it turned out, Kobold Press (the folks who had the GM flake on me last year) turned over the running of sponsored games to a third party entity, Warduke Press, and while I didn't get a chance to play in one of those games, I talked to those folks and I am confident they were on the ball.] This year, I ran sponsored games for two different companies--Pelgrane Press and another publisher that shall remain nameless (so as not to, as the kids say, put them on blast). This is my fifth con (between Gencon and Origins) that I have run things for Pelgrane, and every single time it is a joy. Running games for the other publisher was, um, less of a joy.
From my point of view, if you agree to GM games on behalf of a publisher (especially a medium or smaller publisher), part of your job is to make the game, and thus the publisher, look good. I want to try to sell people on your games. But the publisher needs to put the GM in the position to make that happen. And the #1 way to make that happen is to provide high-quality, finished materials for the GM to run. Instead, I got a half-finished draft of an adventure. And when I say "unfinished," I mean it was unplayable strictly as written, because there were no stats for the antagonist in the last encounter. And when I say "no stats," I don't mean there were no stats printed in the adventure, thus requiring the GM to hunt down the relevant stats from various published books (though, that, too); I mean the stats for that antagonist are not printed anywhere. Either the GM has to come up with the stats on his or her own, or (as I did) you have to cut the last encounter.
And, to be clear, I got the adventure with a cover email saying "[the product line manager] wants you to run this at Origins," so this was what they wanted put out there. I suppose you might say "well, you got the adventure the 1st of May; this wouldn't have been as much of a problem if you looked at it earlier than the week before the con." And, true, but (1) I was busy; and (2) at the end of the day I am a volunteer. Don't make me do all of this free labor to get your materials in a position that I can use them. And if your adventure is not ready for prime-time, don't send it to me to run in public. Help me help you.
By contrast, Pelgrane has a set of publish-quality adventures, written by their top authors in a publish-ready format, strictly for use at conventions. I also ran an adventure for a game that is in playtest that was at a far higher level polish and completeness than what I got from the other publisher. This not only makes it much, much easier to run and a much, much more enjoyable experience, but it makes me want to run more things for Pelgrane so I can promote more of their games. I split my GM time two and two, and I wish I had just run four games for Pelgrane.
Be like Pelgrane, publishers. Do right by your GMs that volunteer to promote your stuff.
2. Gumshoe: Speaking of Pelgrane, I ran an adventure for Trail of Cthulhu and the playtest adventure for the forthcoming Swords of the Serpentine. Both went well, especially the Swords of Serpentine adventure. I'm going to do a series on the Gumshoe games, including Swords of the Serpentine, so more on this in a bit.
3. Starfinder: I played two Starfinder Society games, and had fun with both of them. Whatever you want to say about organized play in general and Paizo's version of organized play specifically, they really do a good job of showing off the strengths of the game. The setting of Starfinder is fun and light-hearted while still having stakes and tension--I've used this analogy before, but it has that Guardians of the Galaxy magic. So, for example, the first scenario I played involved being on a game show run by undead, and the second one involved a massive invasion of an enemy force, and both of them felt like they belonged in the same world without contradiction. And the Starfinder scenarios, while not usually breaking any sort of new ground from a design perspective, are consistently solid. Plus, I have found that they do a good job of making sure the GMs are prepared to provide a good experience at the table.
Saturday night was "the special"--a forty or so table extravaganza where the results of your table affect the things going on with the other table. There are a series of discrete encounters that the table gets to select from, and after a certain number of groups complete a particular encounter, it is closed for other tables and new encounters are unlocked. It's chaotic, combat-heavy, and a bit disjointed, but fun--I wouldn't necessarily want to do this every week, but as a once-a-year thing, it's something different and enjoyable. Also, shout-out to the Starfinder Society folks, including many from the local area--it looked like an enormous undertaking to put this on, and they did a great job.
4. Pathfinder 2nd Edition: I was hoping that the two hour demo game I played would be using the final, forthcoming 2nd Edition rules. It wasn't--it was basically the last version of the playtest. That was an odd choice, and if I had known that was the deal I probably wouldn't have done it, as I have already messed around with the playtest.
As far as the game itself, I worry that they are going to caught between worlds, and between audiences. It certainly seems like they have smoothed and streamlined the game as compared to 1st Edition, making it appealing for someone like me who finds 1st Edition too slow, too complicated, and with too many options to wade through. But, I'm not sure it was streamlined and smoothed out enough for me to really want to dive in and/or use it as a replacement for 5e or 13th Age. And, on the flip side, the complexity and options of 1st Edition that turn me off are the very things that have hooked a big chunk of the Pathfinder community, so the streamlining reduces the thing that draws them to the game. That seems to be the conclusion in the main from the folks in the local Pathfinder Society around here--they have been pretty clear that they intend to run both 1st and 2nd Edition stuff come August when 2nd Edition launches. So, whatever the merits of the game as a game, I think it may be a misstep as a consumer product and as a community building exercise.
5. Overlight: I try at conventions to find at least one game that I will never play otherwise, and this year it was Overlight from Renegade Game Studios, which I had not heard of until now but had a big presence and appears to be a large company. Overlight was interesting, and a little bit hard to describe--I think the best short description is "surreal, non-Tolkien fantasy." For example, I played a talking archaeopteryx--a bird-like flying dinosaur--that are expert scientists and logicians. The system is tied to colors, which in turn are linked to emotional traits like compassion and wisdom.
I could be reading too much into this, but I got the sense that this game was on some level trying to be a metaphor for being LGBT--the PCs are "skyborn," who are noticeably different from other people at birth and inspire either adulation or fear among others. So, basically, the X-Men, which is probably why I got the "this is really about being LGBT" vibe. Plus, the rainbow color thing. If so, great--the fact I am not sure if this is the designer intent show that the metaphor, if it is there, is applied deftly enough not to bludgeon the players in a way that will take away from game play.
I had fun with Overlight, and I would definitely play again if offered, but I wasn't completely captivated by it. I flipped through the core book in the dealer's area, and it is a beautiful book with a unique art style, but it was $60, and so I passed. But it is definitely something that folks should look into.
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