Between the heat wave (somewhat abated) and GenCon prep, I have not been getting much done except tweaking and formatting on chapters 1-5 of EABA v2. Once I'm back I hope to get chapter 6 (powers) up in a form that will no doubt generate heaps of discussion. I may break it down into several sub-chapters just to keep various bits of discussion together.

Anyways, I'll be wearing my traditional GenCon accoutrements, so if you spot me and want to get together for an impromptu game of something, I'm up for it. No booth for me, just attending for the gaming.

I hope you have fun. Take some pix, get someone to snap a few of you, post them here.

Maybe even a pic of your badge if you want.

Greg, while you're at gencon could you look for something called "In flames"? It's anew SF game setting I'm curious about. The preview sounds intriguing.

The paper version s supposed to debut at gencon.

So, assuming you survived how was gencon?

Well, I'm back in one piece. No tickets, no Bambi strikes, no money left, tired as hell.

Brain is full of ideas, so much stuff to catch up on. Probably going to spend most of the day typing just to get stuff down on paper while it is fresh. More on that some other time.

GenCon itself was well attended. The weather was muggy and often overcast, with hints of rain here and there. As far as games go, I bought some old stuff and some new stuff, but tended to stay away from major system releases. Bought a pack of "everything ever published for Underground" for $50 from Mayfair, including a set of dice and a couple T-shirts. Snagged a few board games, a few indy rpg's and some gifts for folks (none for you!).

Unusual games that I liked:
Resistance - A spy-vs-rebel game with a minimum requirement of 5 players. Fairly simple, a combination of deduction and social interaction. Everyone is supposedly rebels trying to complete missions, but two players are actually government spies trying to sabotage the missions. The side with the best 3 out of 5 missions wins. I bought it after a single demo.

Ascension - A Dominion-like game with the slightly different mechanic of a rotating selection of cards to purchase and a much greater number of cards that affect other players. Since I already know Dominion well, the learning curve was easy. Played it in the open gaming area.

Tanto Cuore - Pretty much Dominion with maids. You are trying to accumulate the most points by being the best possible maid service. Cute anime art and different words for game actions, but it has the equivalent of draw, action, gold and buy benefits for each card. The difference in mechanics is that there is one stack of "uniques" that you only see the top card of, so only one player can buy that maid. Also, there are actions that let you pull cards from your deck and set them aside, so you can get high-scoring but otherwise useless cards out of your draw pile. It clearly is aimed at a non-male audience, but it is still a competitive game with solid mechanics. My friend bought it. Speaking of non-male audiences, the national Settlers of Cataan tourney was won by a woman, and two of the top four were women. No word on whether or not they already have boyfriends, but I'm sure you can cyberstalk them and find out.

Tigris and Euphrates - A tile-based board game that would probably appeal to Settlers, Domain or Carcassone players. Don't know if it was new, but I had a 50% off coupon at the Mayfair booth and that knocked down the price from $50 to $25, so I bought it after the demo.

Other observations - Licensing rules. Anything with a fan base has a licensed game product somewhere. Firefly, Doctor Who, Middle Earth, Star Wars, Primeval, half a dozen anime series I've never heard of. The secondary markets are still strong. Magic, Heroclix, etc.

Playtested Rape, Pillage and Burn in the open gaming area. It went over well and I have a nibble from a manufacturer, so we'll see if that pans out.

Age distribution of attendees seems about the same. Overall sales looked good from what I saw, but if you are spending the money to go to GenCon, you have the money to spend on games. No point in spending hundreds of dollars to go there and not buy something.

Had a good time. Need to catch up on a lot of sleep, though.