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Man that hotel poo poo is nailbiting now, even more so than the mad rush it normally is. Luckily I talked my girlfriend into getting a badge early and she managed to get assigned a time slot immediately on the opening of the reservation system. Gotta make a habit now to have anyone going with me to register early if this is the system they're going to stick with, more chances to get in early.
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Jan 26, 2015 13:51
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I think for future years I am seriously considering just booking out the block a year ahead of time, probably at a hotel on the shuttle route since I can't afford the rack rates at the downtown hotels, just to make the whole hotel experience less nerve wracking. I am glad the convention is growing so much but this stuff does really suck for attendees. Soon we will have people sleeping in vans and hallways like Milwaukee all over again. The official gen con forums is making me kind of hate humanity. People quoting atlas shrugged and claiming the system shouldn't be fair but skewed so those able to either game the system or who have the most money deserve the best shots at rooms. Ugh, gamers sometimes.
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Jan 26, 2015 15:19
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nesbit37 posted:I think for future years I am seriously considering just booking out the block a year ahead of time, probably at a hotel on the shuttle route since I can't afford the rack rates at the downtown hotels, just to make the whole hotel experience less nerve wracking. I am glad the convention is growing so much but this stuff does really suck for attendees. Soon we will have people sleeping in vans and hallways like Milwaukee all over again. One memory that stands out from my first year at gencon in 2011 was seeing convention center staff waking people up when they slept in the hallways. After coming from Origins in Columbus where sleeping in the convention center was acceptable that was a nice change.
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Jan 26, 2015 15:34
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Welp, me and my bros are attending for the second time this year after having the most fun I've had as an adult last year. First lesson learned: You will not get a hotel room connected to the venue if you're not sitting at your computer at exactly noon. Also, the Filipino lady how handles the hotel bookings is extremely nice.
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Jan 26, 2015 16:08
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nesbit37 posted:I think for future years I am seriously considering just booking out the block a year ahead of time, probably at a hotel on the shuttle route since I can't afford the rack rates at the downtown hotels, just to make the whole hotel experience less nerve wracking. I am glad the convention is growing so much but this stuff does really suck for attendees. Soon we will have people sleeping in vans and hallways like Milwaukee all over again. You could always book one separately and then see if you can get one in the hotel block via gen con. Then you're free to cancel the more expensive one if you do. I'm considering that as a backup plan in the future myself. If you get a downtown hotel it should be pretty easy to find some people that want to double up to cut the cost down too. Sloober fucked around with this message at 17:10 on Jan 26, 2015 |
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Jan 26, 2015 17:01
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My group got our two rooms at the Hyatt we were looking for, but we had 5 or 6 people all logged in at noon, and 2 of us managed to have <30 minute wait times. Not sure when downtown sold out, my wait was 2:40 and by then, pretty much anything inside the Indianapolis beltway was gone (at least for 5 nights, maybe shorter periods were available).
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Jan 26, 2015 17:15
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From the forums and my own experience it seems downtown was essentially gone at the 1 hour 30 minute mark. I know there were several downtown options when I got on at 1 hour 7 min. My parents got on at 1 hour 11 minutes, and then they had a couple issues because they didn't put their desired booking dates in, so once that was sorted it was about 1 hour 20 minutes and they only could see 1 hotel within walking distance for Wednesday through Saturday nights. There were people reporting that they were getting downtown rooms after the 3 hour mark but they seem pretty sparse.
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Jan 26, 2015 17:37
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nesbit37 posted:From the forums and my own experience it seems downtown was essentially gone at the 1 hour 30 minute mark. I know there were several downtown options when I got on at 1 hour 7 min. My parents got on at 1 hour 11 minutes, and then they had a couple issues because they didn't put their desired booking dates in, so once that was sorted it was about 1 hour 20 minutes and they only could see 1 hotel within walking distance for Wednesday through Saturday nights. There were people reporting that they were getting downtown rooms after the 3 hour mark but they seem pretty sparse. I checked my login time which was around 3 hours after opening and it still showed some stuff within a half mile open. Hell the hotel I wanted was still open - about a half mile down on ohio street. Luckily I didn't need the room then, I probably would have gotten it if I knew enough people going that would still be looking though.
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Jan 26, 2015 17:52
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Yeah, it's interesting to see the range of experiences. For mine, I clicked the website right at 12:00 and the place in line wouldn't load until I reloaded a few minutes later. I got 1 hour 45 minutes, which was better than my two friends who also clicked right at noon. We were trying to get two, maybe three downtown rooms between all of us between our two groups. At the 1 hour, 45 minute timespot, all the connected hotels were long gone and the remaining downtown ones were going fast. Specifically, I was able to get one room 4 blocks from the Con Center, but in the time it took me to go back to the website and look for a second at the same hotel, everything less than 2 miles away had booked up. My friends who had tickets an hour later only saw the 7+ mile hotels, so I don't think they had a certain number of downtown rooms reserved for each time; seems like it was first-come first served on that. Edit: Though this was apparently different from Sloober's experience, so who knows? Last year we apparently got lucky, because we found a hotel outside the block and reserved it with no issues way back in October. This year's experience was way more nerve-racking and had worse results than that, in addition to chewing up a good chunk of the day on Sunday. Sionak fucked around with this message at 17:56 on Jan 26, 2015 |
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Jan 26, 2015 17:54
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My niece had a 1:30 wait to start and got in at the Marriott Downtown (best hotel), so who knows. Could've just got lucky. I heard rumors of the "buy badge, jump line" thing, and was hoping it wasn't true. Stupid system. Hope the waitlist is good, as long as they just do the same thing they did last year, namely "this room has opened up. first person on the list, do you want it? no? #2?"
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Jan 26, 2015 18:26
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When do they start the waitlist? The woman I talked to mentioned I'd just need to keep checking back every day.
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Jan 26, 2015 18:33
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They aren't doing a wait list this year at all. People are not happy about it. edit: their official answer is reserve a room, go back to the portal regularly by hitting "modify my reservation" to see if something you would rather have has opened up, and then either change your reservation or don't.
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Jan 26, 2015 18:46
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No wait list is a kick in the junk with their lottery system. I feel bad for folks that didn't manage to get one. Edit: I'm probably not going to know the answer to this until June or July but I might have a spare room at the Sheraton Indianapolis City Center, my group booked two because we have several people that couldn't commit immediately, and/or tried to rely on a different person they barely know that's never been to gen con before to do the booking. I even warned them it was lottery as soon as I heard that's what it was. Sloober fucked around with this message at 19:11 on Jan 26, 2015 |
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Jan 26, 2015 19:06
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I wanted a double bed room but I'm too deathly afraid of modifying my reservation if one opens up and having an issue.
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Jan 26, 2015 19:55
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I'm coming for your room man, know that I'm vigilant and will swoop in on any mistakes.
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Jan 26, 2015 20:26
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Jan 26, 2015 21:01
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nesbit37 posted:I think for future years I am seriously considering just booking out the block a year ahead of time, probably at a hotel on the shuttle route since I can't afford the rack rates at the downtown hotels, just to make the whole hotel experience less nerve wracking. I am glad the convention is growing so much but this stuff does really suck for attendees. Soon we will have people sleeping in vans and hallways like Milwaukee all over again. nesbit37 posted:The official gen con forums is making me kind of hate humanity. People quoting atlas shrugged and claiming the system shouldn't be fair but skewed so those able to either game the system or who have the most money deserve the best shots at rooms. Ugh, gamers sometimes. The V.I.G. arguments every year are beautiful. "IT IS 100% UNACCEPTABLE AND MUST BE CHANGED AND THERE MUST BE NO SUCH THING AS THE ABILITY TO KEEP THE BADGE YEAR-TO-YEAR" "Would you pay for a V.I.G. badge if you could only get it once?" "NO BUT THIS IS THE ONLY FAIR WAY" I also love that no matter what is suggested as a solution to any problem, someone will appear in the thread and literally post that this solution is so bad that (s)he will never come back to the convention again if it is implemented. But then, the attendance figures to me suggest they could do pretty much anything short of tripling the prices of hotels and badges and still get the masses to appear. Until 2020 when Gen-Con relocates to Lowtax's spare bedroom. Len posted:One memory that stands out from my first year at gencon in 2011 was seeing convention center staff waking people up when they slept in the hallways. After coming from Origins in Columbus where sleeping in the convention center was acceptable that was a nice change. Texibus posted:Welp, me and my bros are attending for the second time this year after having the most fun I've had as an adult last year. Texibus posted:I'm coming for your room man, know that I'm vigilant and will swoop in on any mistakes. Though Kaddish if you asked someone with a lovely reservation nicely maybe they would be willing to check if clicking "modify" somehow instantly says OK YOU WANT TO ABANDON YOUR ROOM?! GOTCHA! Somehow I doubt it though.
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Jan 26, 2015 21:58
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message my friend "hey I didn't get VIG and also didn't get a hotel room, what are we doing for hotels?" "Oh yeah I took care of hotels in september you just have to get your badge, our hotel is across the street from the RAM" I have the best friends.
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Jan 26, 2015 22:01
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I didn't even try for VIG this year (tried unsuccessfully last year). Are they just impossible to get because people who already have them, keep them? Did they increase the number of available VIG this year? I'd gladly split the cost of VIG + a companion with my GenCon buddy if it guaranteed a room and was attainable.
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Jan 26, 2015 22:43
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Lawen posted:Are they just impossible to get because people who already have them, keep them? Did they increase the number of available VIG this year? And yeah V.I.G. is primarily awesome for the hotel privileges, as far as I am concerned. And as evidenced by Sigma-X's experience. Particularly since it started becoming ridiculously hard to get a good room in the last few years.
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Jan 26, 2015 23:04
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Lawen posted:I didn't even try for VIG this year (tried unsuccessfully last year). Are they just impossible to get because people who already have them, keep them? Did they increase the number of available VIG this year? The previous year's VIGs always get a chance to re-VIG. Whichever VIG badges that don't get renewed (which is a pool that gets smaller and smaller every year) were in previous years just added to the available reg pool during public reg. This year however you had to email in your desire for a VIG and they rolled some dice to randomly determine who got to claim the un-renewed VIG badges. It feels like this year they were trying to seem more fair since they can't wave their hands and make another half dozen downtown hotels appear. I hate to suggest it, but it might be time to revisit the Gen Con west idea, especially now that they aren't shackled to the Star Wars convention.
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Jan 26, 2015 23:36
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Oh, so anyone who wants to take their chances at being a Very Important Gamer still has time to buy a badge and send the e-mail to the address mentioned in that linked post. You have until EASTERN TIME AT MIDNIGHT TONIGHT! GOOD LUCK, VERY IMPORTANT GOONS Edit: Oh right and 8one6 posted:It feels like this year they were trying to seem more fair since they can't wave their hands and make another half dozen downtown hotels appear. I hate to suggest it, but it might be time to revisit the Gen Con west idea, especially now that they aren't shackled to the Star Wars convention.
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Jan 26, 2015 23:43
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Quarex posted:Oh, so anyone who wants to take their chances at being a Very Important Gamer still has time to buy a badge and send the e-mail to the address mentioned in that linked post. You have until EASTERN TIME AT MIDNIGHT TONIGHT! GOOD LUCK, VERY IMPORTANT GOONS Speaking of cons in Vegas (I'm going to run my own Gen Con! With Blackjack! And hookers!) does anybody know what happened to NeonCon?
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Jan 27, 2015 00:17
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Well, the problem with having a second show is that Gencon's appeal is that it's the industry show, attended by everyone who's anyone. I'm not certain that the exhibitors want, need, or could even handle another Gencon.
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Jan 27, 2015 00:17
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My group ended up getting a room at the Embassy Suites Indianapolis - North because by the time we got to reserve rooms all the downtown ones were gone. One of our usual group members gets the VIG companion badge but he's sitting this one out due to his wife having a baby a month or two before the con. Embassy Suites are 12 miles away, which sucks, but they have big rooms and we should have plenty of space to game between the 3-4 of us.
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Jan 27, 2015 00:22
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Did your friend give up his Elite Status(tm) because he could not go? If not, it might still not be too late for him to book a better room for you, given that as I understand it the V.I.G. block is separate from the general block. If he DID give it up...well, glory to all gamedom for its availability, but if I were you I would have taken up a collection to get him to renew anyway  Edit: Why do I keep forgetting to do full responses Haystack posted:Well, the problem with having a second show is that Gencon's appeal is that it's the industry show, attended by everyone who's anyone. I'm not certain that the exhibitors want, need, or could even handle another Gencon. 8one6 posted:Speaking of cons in Vegas (I'm going to run my own Gen Con! With Blackjack! And hookers!) does anybody know what happened to NeonCon? Not to mention that it is explicitly billed as a family convention, and good luck keeping that reputation alive in Las Vegas. Dr. Quarex fucked around with this message at 05:05 on Jan 27, 2015 |
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Jan 27, 2015 05:02
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Quarex posted:Did your friend give up his Elite Status(tm) because he could not go? If not, it might still not be too late for him to book a better room for you, given that as I understand it the V.I.G. block is separate from the general block. Yes, he didn't buy one because if he buys a badge he's going to do everything he can to go even if it's just for this purpose. We'll just rent a car or take the shuttle.
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Jan 27, 2015 05:10
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The best posts are the ones on the Gen Con community forum where people lay out how this was unfair but then give the solution being a way in which they would have prefferred access. "I've been going for 15 years. I'm not SAYING they should JUST reward ME, but here is my plan where that happens:" The lottery is the best way it just had some bumps in the road and I had about a 3 hr wait myself. With Uber and/or shuttles not being downtown isn't that bad. Hell, you could probably hire some weird people off Craiglist to drive you around for the day on your whim for the $200+ dollar difference per night it has at downtown hotels.
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Jan 27, 2015 05:16
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Yes, he didn't buy one because if he buys a badge he's going to do everything he can to go even if it's just for this purpose. We'll just rent a car or take the shuttle. I sort of understand. But I still think you should try to convince him to hold his place in the V.I.G. line for all eternity, as I imagine the odds of getting back in are not exactly very good (not that they are any different than anyone else's odds now, I realize).Still, I do not mean to suggest you are going to have a bad time. As I mentioned before I was a half hour away in 2003 and we still had a great time, and we were actually more like an hour away in 1997, and though that was kind of lame, Milwaukee itself had a lot more to do with it than the distance. The drive from suburban Indianapolis into the city is basically cake compared to the Hell Commute into downtown Milwaukee. Syntaxed posted:The best posts are the ones on the Gen Con community forum where people lay out how this was unfair but then give the solution being a way in which they would have prefferred access. "I've been going for 15 years. I'm not SAYING they should JUST reward ME, but here is my plan where that happens:" Syntaxed posted:Hell, you could probably hire some weird people off Craiglist to drive you around for the day on your whim
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Jan 27, 2015 05:32
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Quarex posted:
He's a VIG companion and the VIG is still going, I think the VIG is going to die at Gencon, so shouldn't he be able to just get another companion badge? I'm not too worried about it. It's a short commute but one year we stayed at the La Quinta Inn and walked it every day so it could be worse. I only plan on running three games and I have all my books in pdf form so it's not like I'll be carrying a bookshelf on my back either. quote:Oh yeah, those are the best. That same guy might have been complaining on the Facebook page; "I've been going for 15 years and THIS is how you repay me?!?!" It is, 100% obviously, a system set up to punish A Guy Who Has Gone For 15 Years. Gencon seems to be a con all about entitlement. I must get that thing that at retail price that is going to be in stores in two weeks, I must get the penthouse suite at the JW, and I must be able to touch those costumed titties.
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Jan 27, 2015 05:44
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RocknRollaAyatollah posted:He's a VIG companion and the VIG is still going, I think he's going to die at Gencon, so shouldn't he be able to just get another companion badge? RocknRollaAyatollah posted:Gencon seems to be a con all about entitlement. I must get that thing that at retail price that is going to be in stores in two weeks, I must get the penthouse suite at the JW, and I must be able to touch those costumed titties. I am sure the Cosplay Deviants have some magnificent stories about the last one. Well, I know they do, as I heard some of them last year, but I am sure I have not heard a tiny fraction of the creepy male entitlement stories. I DO, however, hear that Gen-Con is their overall favorite because it has the fewest harassment issues, I believe by a significant amount even. Go us! The guy posting everywhere on Facebook that everyone should boycott Gen-Con now that there is a hotel lottery is magnificent though.
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Jan 27, 2015 05:49
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The thing about companion badges is they're not guaranteed. While each VIG can upgrade up to three people to companion status there were only 350 available this year, and to my knowledge they are close to sold out already.
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Jan 27, 2015 06:20
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Carteret posted:My hotel booking experience was painless. $92 a night, and since I'm driving 11 hours to Indy instead of flying like a money haver, I have my own transportation! want to play Netrunner with this guy
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Jan 27, 2015 15:18
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What's another 15 miles?
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Quarex posted:I DO, however, hear that Gen-Con is their overall favorite because it has the fewest harassment issues, I believe by a significant amount even. Go us! If anyone has a link to that I would love to see it. Excited to bring my girlfriend to her first gencon this year and that's one thing she is concerned about. Also trying to talk another couple into coming and sharing the room we got with us and it would be good for them as well.
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Jan 27, 2015 16:46
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The hosts of my regular group are previously from Atlanta, and they said that DragonCon has all sorts of creepy dudes following costumed girls around staring at their butts, but you kind of have to look pretty hard to see stuff like that at Gen Con. (One of them is a photographer, though, and when shooting some cosplay shots, he does occasionally get a guy in the background clearly paying attention to different things from everyone else around.) As much as Gen Con brings out the weirdos, they're the nice midwestern sort of weirdos that are generally courteous.
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Jan 27, 2015 17:45
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I've always wanted to go to Gen Con. My brother and I already go to a few comic conventions here in Chicago, so I think I can get him interested in going to this. We already make an annual trip down to Indianapolis for the Indy 500, and we camp out next to the Lucas Oil Speedway on the night before. That's always been a good accommodation that's inexpensive as well.
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Jan 27, 2015 18:11
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Anyone else submitted their adventures yet? I'm going to hopefully be running Trail of Cthulhu, Night's Black Agents, and Edge of the Empire.Curse of the Black Crane posted:Shanghai, the "Paris at the East" to some and the "Whore of the Orient" to others. The city has sat at an uneasy state of peace since the violence that erupted between the Chinese and Japanese in 1932. Agents of foreign governments move secretly among the populace and Chinese communists wait for the time to strike while the Nationalists maintain a tenuous hold on the reins of power. The upcoming auction of a strange Han Dynasty bronze, "The Black Crane" has been the talk of not only the archaeologist community but also some members of high society. Why has this strange artifact attracted so much attention and what secrets does it hold? Trail of Cthulhu game set in 1935 Shanghai. Rasetsu posted:In 1897, the British ship Persephone ran aground along the coast of Nagasaki under mysterious circumstances. Strange occurrences would follow that event that remain a mystery to all but a select few. Night's Black Agents game set in Meiji Japan. Duck and Weave posted:The Duros shipping magnate Keravan Voss is throwing the event of the year and it's the perfect time to rob his private vault. A client has requested the procurement of a strong box holding artifacts that are of great value to them and they will pay handsomely for this box. Unfortunately there has been a rise in Imperial activity on the planet in the lead up to the gala and there are reports of increased Rebel activity in the surrounding region of space. It should all still be a simple heist, right? Standard Edge of the Empire game where the players play neutral characters.
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Jan 28, 2015 05:14
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saint gerald posted:want to play Netrunner with this guy  See you at Nationals?
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Jan 28, 2015 05:38
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Carteret posted:
I will be there, doubtless keeping the seats at the middle table warm, as I was the last two years. I'll probably bring another couple of decks for fun play too.
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Jan 28, 2015 15:40
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Anyone have any experience with the shuttles? Reading the forums and such give it a negative impression, but that's forum posts and people who are happy with the shuttle system probably aren't rushing to post about how it went.
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Jan 28, 2015 18:52
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