Some thoughts on my first big con: Origins 2014

Two weekends ago I attended my first big gaming convention: Origins Game Fair in Columbus Ohio.

My wife and I have been talking about attending a con for years now. Many years. We've always put it off for one reason or another. Our excuse used to be that we didn't have Passports so couldn't cross the border anymore (pre-911 you could get across with a birth certificate). 

This past year we got our passports and no longer had an excuse. My wife gave me the option of going to either Origins or GenCon. Now I know a bunch of you are probably moaning and yelling at your monitors right now telling me I made the wrong choice. I don't think that I did.

In preparation for the trip I asked the awesome Google Plus gaming community what they thought of each con and received a ton of feedback. The consensus was that Origins was much more laid back, relaxed, spaced out and better for just chilling with other gamers and gaming. That was exactly what I wanted. I've heard stories about how awesome GenCon is. How it's The Big Deal. I also heard how busy it was and how much it cost to attend. So we I decided on Origins and I'm glad I did.

July 5th - Brimstone Board Games Night - Featuring Fleet!

The Windsor Gaming resource returns to Brimstone Games on Saturday July 5th. This officially marks the official start of the bi-monthly Brimstone Board Games Nights.

The 1st and 3rd Saturday of every month will be Brimstone Board Games Night running from 5pm to 10pm.

Brimstone is working to become Windsor's premier board game shop. They've got a great selection of the hottest games and tons of gaming space to play them. Not only that but all board games are currently 30% off!

Win a Board Game! 

Every Board Game Night at 8pm we will draw 1 ticket and the winner will receive a free board game!

Players will earn 1 ticket for playing a game, limit of 1 ticket per night. Earn 1 ticket for purchasing a snack or drink, limit 1 ticket per night. Earn 1 ticket for bringing 1 or more board games for people to play. Earn 5 tickets for each board game purchased. First time players will receive 5 additional tickets.

You can find Brimstone at 3298 Walker Rd. Parking is available on the south side of the building and on the street around back. Note that Brimstone used to be located in McGregor. This is no longer the case, they moved into Windsor just over a year ago.

Featured Game: Fleet

The featured game of the night will be Fleet by Ben Pinchback and Matt Riddle put out by Eagle-Griffon Games.

This is one of the tightest engine building resource management games I've ever played. I got to demo it at Origins and bought a copy right after.

It's quick to learn, easy to teach but so very difficult to master. We will be running demos of this awesome game all night. In addition the nightly give away will feature a copy of Fleet (and just maybe the expansion: Arctic Waters as well). 

Games & Grub at the Green Bean - June 27th

Friday June 27th we've got a Games & Grub event being held at The Green Bean's Windsor Star News Cafe. This all ages event runs from 6pm until 11pm.

The Windsor Star News Cafe is located at 300 Ouellette Ave, 3rd floor. This is the cafe that is part of the new Windsor Star located where the old downtown palace theater was.

The Green Bean Cafe has great food and offers bottomless coffee along with lots of other yummy things. The location is also licensed and offers some awesome beer from Walkerville Brewery as well as local Wines. Street parking is free after 6pm if you can find a spot and there are two parking garages in a very short walking distance if you can't.

We play a wide variety of games at these events. You will find card, dice and board games. We've even seen some miniature gamers bring their armies out. There's no theme to the event. Our last gaming event saw games of Manhattan Project, Ticket to Ride, A Game of Thrones, Merchants & Marauders, Takenoko, Forbidden Desert and more.

We encourage you to bring some games out, whether an old favourite or something new you want to try out. If you don't have anything to bring, that's cool too. There's always lots of variety and people are always happy to teach you the games they have brought.

Boards & Bits @ Brimstone - June 14th featuring Russian Railroads

The Windsor Gaming resource returns to Brimstone Games on Saturday June 14th from 5:30PM to 11:30PM

Brimstone has a huge gaming area with tons of tables, chairs and great lighting. I'm told by the owner, Sean, that we could fit 60 of us in there.

This is an open, all ages, theme-less gaming event. Just a bunch of us getting together to play some games at a great venue. Along with having games for sale Brimstone also has a good selection of drinks and snack food. They are also really cool about people bringing food in and personally I'm a big fan of ordering Pizza from Armando's just down the street.

You can find Brimstone at 3298 Walker Rd. Parking is available on the south side of the building and on the street around back. Note that Brimstone used to be located in McGreggor. This is no longer the case, they moved into Windsor just over a year ago.

Featured Game: Russian Railroads

The featured game of the night will be Russian Railroads by Z-man games. It's one of the hottest games out there right now. Big J will be running demos of this great game all night and this is a great chance to try before you buy.

At these events you can usually find people playing Magic The Gathering and since Brimstone is a Games Workshop specialty store so we've often seen a table or two of Warhammer going down. They have also added Hordemachine to their repertoire. Add to this our usual mix of card board and dice games for one of the most varied events in the city. Bring your own favourite game or play one of ours.

I got a sneak peak at Unframed The Art of Improvisation for Game Masters

I have to assume that +Martin Ralya from +Engine Publishing liked my review of Never Unprepared: The Complete Game Master's Guide to Session Prep. Or maybe it was my more recent review of Odyssey: The Complete Game Master's Guide to Campaign Management. Heck, maybe he's just still happy I made him Geek of the Week back at RPGgeek.com a few years ago.

Whatever it was, I'm glad I did it. That's because, soon after announcing that Engine Publishing had a new book, Martin contacted me and offered me a chance to review a pre-release copy of it. This new book is Unframed The Art of Improvisation for Game Masters. (I don't know what it is with Engine and the really, really long titles, from now on, I'm just going to call it Unframed. Cool? Good).

I, of course, jumped at a chance to check out this soon to be released book. I really enjoyed Engine Publishing's previous Game Master 'self help books'. Both have actually changed the way I prep, plan and run my games. As expected, Unframed did not disappoint.