SortaCon - The Games

I knew I'd be posting about this past weekend, but hadn't realized quite how much I'd have to say, so I'll probably have to break it down into pieces.

The comedic Sorcerer game went very well, so I expect to run it at DexCon. It needs a few tweaks, as I've realized that a couple of the demons I'd designed weren't quite right, but no major changes. The full title is "Clerks 1 1/2: Sex, Demons, and Videotape". Everyone played their characters pretty well (including the many Kevin Smith movie-appropriate f-bombs and sexually oriented jokes), but if I'd been giving out a prize, I think my winner would've been the guy playing Silent Bob. The player is usually pretty verbal, and did a fine job of managing to speak as little as possible, often to hilarious effect. One of my favorite moments of the scenario was when Jay called him (from jail) and he reacted entirely in character without saying a word, while Jay, of course, heard absolutely nothing from his end of the phone.

The Fluid session didn't work as well as I hoped, though we still got some big laughs out of it. The players had to choose a genre on the spur of the moment and chose to play... cavemen. Specifically, they were most of the men from a tribe of cavemen, and decided to steal the women from another nearby tribe, including a tall blonde with Asian features (a carryover joke from the Clerks session). In the end, they succeeded, but not without taking a few lumps, including being captured briefly by the other tribe. My favorite moment was when one of the cavemen dressed up as a cavewoman (putting casaba melons to use to cover his lack of certain necessary elements) and danced to distract members of the opposing tribe. As a Fluid session, though, it just didn't work that well. I could have improvised almost exactly the same thing with any system and the right mind set on the part of the players. I'm still not sure what, if anything, I'm going to do with Fluid.

My final session was effectively the playtest for my newest GURPS Cabal scenario, "Lives in the Balance". It's interesting to note that while the players involved are regulars at some of my convention sessions, not one of them had played any of my previous Cabal scenarios, primarily because they're not big GURPS fans. Still, they quickly grasped the characters (I think I had my best Jenny Keelin yet) and this was clearly the best session of the weekend all around. I suspect I'll see some of these players in future Cabal con sessions if I keep the series going. Again, I think it needs a few tweaks, but nothing major.

From a general gaming perspective, this was a great weekend, and a reminder of why this hobby can be so much fun.