ICON 2009

I took a day off from work on Friday, and we went off to the ICON 2009 games convention. We hung around a bit, bought some rather pretty dice, coffee mugs and stuff from some of the stands there, and munched on curry and hotdogs. It was nice to chat to magependragon, who had flown up from Cape Town to be there, and to meet phaezen. We were hoping to find ourselves a game to play, but the convention rules (more about that below) were not conducive to casual games.

On Sunday we went again, because the afternoon games are apparently meant to be re-runs of modules from previous years. We met up with ticktock_za, and looked for games, but at 14:30 it seemed the morning sessions were still running, and time-wise, that was definitely going to be an issue.

Some comments about the convention, from the point of view of someone not involved, and someone who is a casual gamer (at least from the point of view of those who belong to the gaming societies):

• Bad hair abounded - far too many people (especially males) with long, lank, unwashed hair, and with scruffy facial hair. Also, it seemed that far too many people thought wearing goth outfits made them look cool.


• The stalls there didn't have much of interest (well, to me, at least). I suppose if you're interested in overpriced 6" figurines and comics, it must be paradise, but there were no novels, and a rather so-so (and very overpriced) selection of game books.


• There's no place there for the casual gamer who wants to drop in with his/her gaming group and play one of the modules for fun. From Friday morning till Sunday morning, all the modules are either competitive or semi-competitive, and according to the rules (which are not mentioned on the brochure), groups are split up so that the don't sit at the same gaming tables. This is because the scoring for the modules is apparently done by peer voting (I say apparently because the brochure does not state how scoring is done), and the assumption is that teams will vote each other higher scores. This means there's no way for a group of friends to play together, or for casual groups. Since that's the major reason I'd want to play in the convention, it's a bit of a downer. The Sunday afternoon session (if it even took place) was too disorganised.


• Organisation seemed somewhat iffy. I can see a bunch of people went to a heap of effort, especially with things like catering, but the gaming side of it wasn't too good. Registration tables weren't clearly labelled, were usually unmanned, and games seemed to be starting hours late (and I gather this is an issue every single year).


• The convention is not at all inviting to casual players or new players.

I can think of a few things I suspect would improve aspects of the convention:

• Provide free shampoo samples. (OK, seriously now...)


• Encourage the stall resellers to bring along science-fiction & fantasy novels, and to provide show discounts.


• How about a stall from one of the music/movie stores, like Phase 2 or Look & Listen, selling a selection of science-fiction & fantasy DVDs?


• Make the brochures clearer and more detailed. If it's a problem for printing, at least make a link to a web page with the details.


• Stick to the schedules. If a module is scheduled to start at 9AM, start at 9AM, and let latecomers be penalised.


• In the module descriptions, detail how scoring is done, and detail rules like how groups are split up. I also wouldn't mind the odd module that's scored the old way - by the group reaching objectives or defeating obstacles.


• Make some effort to cater for new/casual gamers. This could be things like "demo" tables where volunteer GMs run newbie players through simple adventures (the boardgames people had something like this), and allowing gaming groups to play the modules as groups, but unscored, so they don't get rated and ranked against competitive players.

Of course, all this is my opinion. I've only been playing role-playing games regularly for 26 years or so; more experienced people may have better ideas, and no doubt some of this has been considered by the organisers before