Simple America

Dragged out of bed around 8:30. Preston had already departed. He was quiet as a mouse or I slept like the dead. I felt dead when the alarm went off. I called Trey and got my breakfast and then made sandwiches for lunch. Then we were off, me focusing on every sign. I did not want to go towards Cleveland again.

Went up to the Hyatt room and gave Ed his clothes. He had not planned on staying in the Hyatt so he did not have a change of clothes there. Once he dressed we cleared the room and checked out. Then it was off to find our tables for our noon games. Weekend Warriors d20 was on my schedule, while Ed had ETU Savage Worlds on his. His voice was killing him, and Neal took over for him in a pinch. Really have to tip my hat to Neal. He is a stellar GM and he ran ETU twice (he ran it the first time the night before), having never read the adventure before. And he did a good job as I detected from player buzz.

My game of Weekend Warriors filled with six players. Which is just perfect. I added an NPC to keep them on story and I really had a good time running this group. We played to its conclusion and what an end fight. Everyone went away smiling. As it was the last game of the con or them, as soon as they finished they headed toward airports or along freeways back to their homes. Really had a good time playing with them.

While I ran Weekend Warriors, my camera took a little trip courtesy of Ed.

Players getting ready for some ETU fun at Neal’s table. You can look and see the necesseties of playing an RPG (roleplaying game) here on the table. Character sheets, dice, miniatures, and of course snacks and drinks.

Here the players are singing the ETU school fight song. Go Ravens!!!

Meanwhile at my table, the battlemat is depicting a parking lot, where zombies are chasing after the players. I’m just getting started too. They felt a little cocky when they saw the first dozen zombies. But I kept putting more zombies on the table and they decided running is not such a bad idea.

Neal Hyde, GM Extraordonaire. He’s like me too in that when he gets into the game he has to stand up and GM. Too excited to sit. lol

And as you can see he kept his players smiling.

After the game one of the players had the Clint Black bennie. She turned it in for an autographed copy of Clint Black’s Necessary Evil. Congratulations! And thanks Clint.

The mysterious Teller autographing someone’s book!

Joe and Jackie Unger (I hope I spelled her name right. She’s a sweet lady.) working the Pinnacle booth. Keeping it Savage!

Sean Preston and his buddy, Stacey Young were playing a lot of Sean’s Steampunk game at Origins. The folks that got to play had some really good times.

And the camera returned as the Weekend Warrriors game had moved to a lower level of the Top Secret Nuclear Chemical Weapons Laboratory. I used Flatlands to depict this basement level and it looks a lot better on the table than this photo portrays.

After the game closed up we went to Sean Preston’s suite and dropped our belongings. Then we headed across the street to an Italian place where I got my order right. Yep thats right. This time I did get lasagna and it was so good. Of course I forgot to take a picture. Doh!

But I had great company. I sat at a table with Ed, Clint and Jodi Black, the mysterious Teller, and Shane Lacy Hensley. Great gaming talk the entire dinner. Have a lot of motivation to get things done. Really exciting. I did have one embarrassing moment though. I did not realize who Teller was. I thought he worked for Studio 2. When I learned that he was Teller I really loosened up with him. Teller wrote Tour of Duty, a Viet Nam Weird War adventure that I absolutely love playing. We had a good time chatting about that and other mutual interests.

Then all of us went to Sean Preston’s room to play Runepunk. This was going to be awesome, as the creator, Sean Preston ran the game for us.

Clint and Jodi Black played in the game too. Awesome gamers and no one knows Savage Worlds rules better than Clint.

Sean Preston getting ready to play us across the mean streets of his Runepunk world. Shane and Teller were playing too. Talk about being excited. This was Ed’s and my dream to have the chance to play at a table with Shane.

As you can see Ed and I could not stop smiling. Even if my character is killed, he would die happy.

Mike Preston, Trey’s dance partner, and Trey read while we playing. Then they ran off a bit to watch Call of Cthulu a classic from the silent era of film.

And then it was over. Time to pack up and go back to our hotel near the airport. We arrived after two and packed our bags for morning flights. Neal slept in my room that night. We chatted about Chinese food until the wee hours and slumber over took us.

 

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 22nd, 2007 at 12:56 pm and is filed under Gaming, Travel, Friends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.