GMing at GenCon 2025

In about 9 hours I leave for GenCon! 

This year, 2025, will be my 3rd trip and I will once again be GMing some games, and of course, playing in others! my schedule is very much RPG heavy this year, only one or two board games, I think.

I am running 3 GURPS games this year at GenCon. I wrote two of the adventures myself and the third one is written by the amazing JC Connors over at 1shotadventures.com Go check those out, they're great! Or better yet, go by and see JC running two GURPS games this year! Sadly I was not able to get tickets for either of his games, I do hope I get a chance to go by and see him!

This year, I also convinced my cousin and long-time gaming partner, Ben, to run a GURPS game as well. He's run it a couple of times here locally and is ready for the big leagues! Wish him luck. 

With hopes of spreading our love of GURPS to even more people this year, we have joined forces with a couple other GURPS GMs and are now a part of the Nick and Nose World Tour! These two guys are great, they are the ones responsible for the GURPS Game Aid for Foundry, and Nose has a whole series of YouTube videos about How to Play GURPS... check that out HERE!

My GenCon GM Schedule looks like this:

Those The Comet Brings (GURPS) Kicking off GenCon Thursday at 9am! Written by JC Connors over at 1shotadventures.com

Cold Shadows Over Valley Forge (GURPS) immediately following Thursday at 1pm

Bitter Song of the Black Mangroves (GURPS) Satruday at 6pm

and at the table right next to mine is Ben running his very first GenCon game

Nightcrawlers (GURPS) Saturday at 6pm

There are EIGHTEEN GURPS games being run at GenCon this year, woohoo! If you're going to GenCon I hope you play a GURPS game (with me or one of the other GMs!)

Our partners Nick and Nose are doing their World Tour again (with US as part of it!) and running quite a few games between them again.

The Wizard King's Challenge - Year 2 - Thursday at 2p and Saturday at 4p

Problems in Xanth - Friday at 10a and Sunday at 10a

Saethor's Bane - Friday at 2p and Sunday at 10a

Toys in the Attic - Friday at 8p

Plus quite a few other GURPS games, even some 3rd Edition games out there:

Honey Tree of Pelion (run by JC himself!) Thursday at 1p

Steampunk Cairo - Thursday at 1p

Steampunk London - Friday at 1p

A Galaxy Far Away 3e Star Wars!!! (I'm playing in this one!) - Saturday at 9a

Gotham '39 (another one run by JC - I'm SO SAD I couldn't get into this one!) - Saturday at 1p

Steampunk Sydney - Saturday 1p

The Alexander Incident (Star Trek - Im playing in this one too!) - Sunday 9a

Wish I could have gotten into some more GURPS games... Lucky Ben got into 7 as a player (one of mine) and of course the one he's GMing himself.

Can't wait to roll those 3d6s and have some FUN at GenCon!

GenCon 2024 Recap

 

(Disclaimer: I don't get jack from any links posted on this site. Just wanted to help people find some stuff I thought was cool!)

Other Note: I found this half finished draft on my blog, guess I never posted it up from last year... we'll just in time for GenCon 2025... I present my GenCon 2024 Wrap Up!

I have successfully leveled up after the completion of my 2nd GenCon! Again, what a fun time. I was part of another record-breaking crowd this year... total attendance was over 71,000! I am also now an official GenCon GM, having run 3 separate RPG events. Two for GURPS, and one for OSE. I also traveled with my cousin, Ben, exposing him to his very first GenCon.

So here is a rundown of my GenCon'24 stats:

• Slept 22.5 hours (tue-sat night) ~ more than last year, but I went a day earlier, so actually I slept LESS this year at the con
• Drove about 9 hours/ 500 miles
• Attended 15 con game events (was signed up for 17 but one cancelled and one we skipped due to exhaustion)
• GMed three 4-hour RPG sessions this year. Two for GURPS and one for Old School Essentials. Both scenarios were written by the wonderful JC Connors of One Shot Adventure
• Played over 43 hours of actual gaming at a table plus the 2 hours in the True Dungeon and another hour in a pickup game in the hallway.
• Played 1 game in the hallway with Ben (River Valley Glassworks)
• Participated in my 2nd LARP - an ancient Roman garden party where I was the goddess Ceres in disguise... and completely betrayed by everyone around me!
• Joined my first True Dungeon party as a Bard. We met up with Don from my home gaming group and 7 others to delve into the Tome of Terrors Redux.
• Bought only 2 games this year, Nut Hunt and River Valley Glassworks (by my favorite... Allplay!)
• Stood in lines less than half an hour (this year I avoided the Will-Call and Merch lines alltogether)
• Walked almost 70,000 steps Wednesday to Sunday! (Less steps despite being there Wednesday as well due to more RPGs which were longer sessions)

I felt like an old pro this year at GenCon, though it did take a minute to get re-acquainted with where everything was. Ben and I went to the convention center Wed afternoon after checking in to our (really shit-hole) hotel so I could show him around a bit. This was quite helpful to him as his first several game slots were without me the next morning. And sadly, I took far less pictures this year. I will try to do better next year snapping some pics.

So, here's the complete list of Con games I played this year:

Thursday 

• 10a-2p GURPS: The Final Voyage of Drængr Thar. This was my very first GenCon GMing experience. I was nervous leading up to it, but once we started we had a LOT of fun. Only 3 of the 6 players signed up actually showed, sadface... but one of them was Jeff W (of Nick and Nose fame). The players all had a blast unraveling the creepy "viking-style" mystery.
• 2-6p OSE: The Final Voyage of Drængr Thar.  And right away, into my 2nd GenCon GM experience. Ran the same adventure but in a different system. This table was FULL. All 6 players showed up and they were ready to game. Had a whole host of characters being brought to life by this crew. Earned my first Con-Kill when the lead-from-behind Young Haldor decided to put his money where his mouth was and charged the wight king.. only to die the very next round! Very dramatic and cool!
• 6-11p GURPS: Leviathan Files: Mother's Milk. GMed by Nick Coffin, PI (Jeff W). A continuation of the 6 Guns and Sorcery game I played in last year. Full action weirdness happening out in the old west and the Cypher Bureau has sent us to figure it out. I played the blind Martial Artist and Ben drew the Gunslinger. Was pretty cool. Investigating disappearances then ending up inside an alien spacecraft!
• 11p-12a We were supposed to play in a social deduction game but after 13 hours of straight RPGing...Ben actually RPed like 15 hours that day... we went back to the hotel and crashed.

Friday

• 9-1p GURPS: Canyon of the Snow Cairns. My 3rd and final GMed game. I ran a group of 5 through this creepy Ice Age horror adventure. The group really got into following all the little clues that were places along the way. Somehow, they managed to keep their sanity (mostly) intact as they faced off against otherworldly foes, traveled through a portal to another realm, saved their missing chieftain, and then made it back home. They gave me a standing ovation at the end of this one. That felt pretty fucking good!
• 1-3p The Sting of Decay. A short 2 hour RPG scenario in the Seeds of Decay campaign setting for 5e. It was a fun little adventure, though some of the other players didn't seem too into it. We did get to meet Daryll T. Jones, the author of the setting, who was running games in the next room.
• 5-6p Deadlands: Dark Ages. A super short, one encounter showing off the soon to be released Deadlands: Dark Ages for Savage Worlds. Took too long to get going and we had to jet out early to get across the con to get to our LARP. I would like to look at this one more, the setting seems dark and cool!
• 6-11p CoC LARP: Nectar of the Gods by Elder Entertainment. A ancient Greek garden party hosted by ME, playing as the Goddess Ceres in disguise, trying to lure everyone to their deaths to keep the souls flowing to the Underworld to keep my in-law, Hades, happy. Wild and crazy time, this was. I think EVERYONE betrayed EVERYONE at least twice in this one! This was run by Randy, a fellow player from an online Pulp Cthulhu game I'm in. 
• 11p-12a Savage: A Game of Survival. Then we rushed back over to the ICC for this cool game. We were tired, but since we skipped the late game the night before, we thought we should follow through on this one. Our team won.

Saturday

• 8a-12p Harry Potter Year 5 - 5e. I loved the idea of this, but playing through this 5e game skinned for Harry Potter just left a bad taste in my mouth. To be fair, I believe it was set up to be played by kids, though there were no kids in our group. Ben and I sat and played this together. Next year I am not playing ANY 5e games!
• 12-2p Pathfinder Revloution by Steve Jackson Games. I really liked this game. A combination board game, resource management, and social deduction set on the backdrop of Korvosa in the Pathfinder RPG setting of Golarion. I would like to own this game myself, though not sure who all would actually play it with me. Played this one with Ben as well. 
• 2-3:30p Through the Desert. Finally got to learn how to play a board-game I had bought off a kickstarter. Played a couple of rounds of this classic game with Ben and a couple con randos who were really nice. Can't wait to play this one again!
• 4-8p Tomorrow's Messenger (Cypher System RPG) This was a wild and crazy powered RPG set in some high tech future world time-traveled to the past with cyborg dinosaurs. The game seemed fine, the setting was wild, but the GM was a total worthless waste of time. He didn't know what he was doing. He literally fell asleep multiple times during the game, sometimes in the middle of him telling us things. There were a couple pre-teens and their dad playing with us and they were having a GREAT time, otherwise Ben and I would have walked away during a break cause it was just so much horrible!
• 8-9:25 Break Time We took a break in the hallway and played River Valley Glassworks that I bought earlier in the Vendor Hall. It killed some time until it was our time to meet up with fellow local gamer Don to enter the.....
• 9:25-11:25 Tome of Terror: True Dungeon Well this was an experience to be sure. Don really likes them. I liked it too, but was a bit unsure of what all I was doing. I did enjoy it. Will I do it again? Maybe sometime, but it carries a pretty heavy price tag!

Sunday

• 10a-12p Car Wars 6e Got Ben to the table to play his first game of 6e Car Wars. He beat me (of course he did!) but it was fun! Fiery wrecks are the way to go!
• 12-1p Break Time One last walk-through of the Vendor Hall before our last game at GenCon 2024.
• 1-4p A Grimm Outlook on the Outpost: Vast Grimm Played this cool and stylish grim-dark scifi game of space pirates, brainworms, and lots and lots of chaos! Run by one of the dudes that made the game. Very cool. We escaped the space station, stole a sweet new ride, and made it out alive.. until next time, that is!

All around, another great year at GenCon. Was glad to have Ben there with me, he enjoyed it so much he plans to return next year and even GM a GURPS game or two as well! Cannot wait!

(Disclaimer: I don't get jack from any links posted on this site. Just wanted to help people find some stuff I thought was cool!)