HYPERBOREA » Gary Con VI (2014)

capitalbill · 3/29/2014 9:27 am

Very fun game last night! Great day table, great adventure, great referee.

Kollesta the She-Bull of the Skarag Coast kept herself warm last night with the fresh pelt of the sabre-toothed tiger formerly known as "Charlie".

Blackadder23 · 3/29/2014 10:48 am

^
That sounds just like her!

Glad you guys had some fun with it. Just as an aside, my wife (who isn't a gamer but is a big fan of HPL/REH/CAS) started laughing sadistically about a third of the way through reading the manuscript for Beneath the Comet. When she finished her exact words were: "I don't see how anyone ever survives one of these things." So one casualty is not bad at all.

Last edited by Blackadder23 (3/29/2014 10:49 am)

Chainsaw · 3/29/2014 11:44 am

Trouble in Vikland

Santaj · 3/29/2014 1:43 pm

Keep the pictures coming, Chainsaw! I very much want to attend Gary Con someday. In fact, I've only really been to one convention in my life. That was North Texas RPG Con the year before last. I brought my son, who was almost 14 at the time. We both had a blast! I think I will be getting back to that Con next year, I hope.

So please post more pictures and share any info that you care to about the goings-on at Gary Con, AS&SH related or not. I have to live vicariously though you!

capitalbill · 3/29/2014 2:04 pm

Chainsaw noticed this awesome note on the Kimmerian Barbarian's character sheet in Francisca's game...

Blackadder23 · 3/29/2014 5:48 pm

That is awesome!

Chainsaw · 3/29/2014 5:49 pm

Here you go, Santaj - a few more:

tacojohn, grodog and OSRIC

ligedog running some AD&D ("It was a bloodbath, most of them died" "This never happens, but a guy lost his leg from critical hit," "The funny part is that they ended up with no treasure.") Afterward, I overheard a couple of the players talking privately - they said it was a great time!

Welleran's AD&D game (5/11 dead, but the survivors hit the jackpot!)

Ernie's D&D game

grodog's amazing Aliens set up

JasonZavoda · 3/29/2014 6:00 pm

Chainsaw wrote:
grodog's amazing Aliens set up

I'd love to get a chance to play in Grodog's Aliens game.

Chainsaw · 3/29/2014 10:50 pm

@Jason - hope you can, one day. It's fun!

Our fearless adventurers deciphering a confusing Bottle City map (game run by grodog).

joseph · 3/30/2014 9:14 am

grodog's Aliens set up is absolutely fantastic.... <I really want o build a colonial marine miniature now....>
Hope to make it out some time, maybe next year!

Chainsaw · 3/30/2014 2:11 pm

Kuntz's Lost City of the Elders game

Timeline of EGG and DA's D&D development, EGG from left to middle, DA from right to middle. Very tasteful.

Jousting table

Wall of board games, free to play

Scene of many crimes, including: the dueling "gift" of whiskey shots between Ghul's table and EOTB's table; chainsaw's gift of lemon drop shots to his own companions ("Oh, is that actually the cheapest tequila they had? Should have sipped it first!"); and the now infamous "You open the door with your naked hand?" eliciting, "No, I open it with my naked _____ mofo!" which did not work out as cool as Crockzillatron expected. Yeah, Friday was rough.

Chainsaw · 3/30/2014 2:29 pm

So, I didn't have a chance yet to post about francisca's Saturday morning Trouble in Vikland AS&SH game, but that was the third of my AS&SH games and a ton of fun. francisca took Vikings, Esquimaux, Norse trolls and pieces of The Frost-Giant's Daughter and whipped them into a really cool outdoor adventure in the snow covered mountains of Hyperborea. I'm a huge fan of artic-based adventures, so it was right up my alley immediately. Throw in francisca's penchant for extreme brutality and you know that everyone's not making it back! Hahaha. Although our group completed the mission, we did have two deaths, so we didn't escape unscathed. Plus, the final battle could have been much, much worse, but we got the drop on someone and that advantage pretty much enabled us to overcome him. Otherwise... bad, bad news.

Anyway, more broadly, I think the backstory (which I won't spoil here) could be the nucleus of a nice little sandbox (snowbox?) game for a home campaign if someone wanted to spend a little time expanding it.

Crisippo · 3/30/2014 2:54 pm

I love this thread, especially the pictures. Gives me a sense of what a con looks like in the US. So i can dream of getting to one someday.

Trouble in Vikland seems very intriguing. Does anyone know if it could be available at some point? Privately, commercially or otherwise

Chainsaw · 3/30/2014 3:15 pm

Crisippo wrote:
I love this thread, especially the pictures. Gives me a sense of what a con looks like in the US. So i can dream of getting to one someday.

Good! I hope you can make it one day, Crisippo. Maybe you could fly into New York or Washington, spend a few days seeing the sights, then fly to Chicago, see some sights there, then drive up to Gary Con, then fly back home from Chicago. Seeing NY/Washington and then Chicago might be a way to justify flying all the way over for a gaming convention.

Crisippo wrote:
Trouble in Vikland seems very intriguing. Does anyone know if it could be available at some point? Privately, commercially or otherwise

Good question. I doubt francisca plans to publish it, but he might be willing to share his notes with you or something. I'll reach out and see if he can drop by to make a comment.

Last edited by Chainsaw (3/30/2014 3:15 pm)

Crisippo · 3/30/2014 4:41 pm

Chainsaw wrote:
Seeing NY/Washington and then Chicago might be a way to justify flying all the way over for a gaming convention.

Yes, i've had something like this in mind for a few years actually. As soon as life smooths out a bit i will be lookin to realize the plan.

Chainsaw wrote:
I doubt francisca plans to publish it, but he might be willing to share his notes with you or something. I'll reach out and see if he can drop by to make a comment.

Thanks! That would be great!

Last edited by Crisippo (3/30/2014 4:53 pm)

Ghul · 3/31/2014 12:30 pm

I had a fantastic time. I'll post pictures soon. I loved running the mini-adventure, Lamia's Heart, as well as Beneath the Comet on Friday night, and Mystery at Port Greely on Saturday night. Every session went extremely well and was lots of fun. There was hilarity, death, and beer -- what more could one ask for?

francisca · 3/31/2014 5:29 pm

First off, I'm glad you enjoyed the game!

Chainsaw wrote:
Throw in francisca's penchant for extreme brutality and you know that everyone's not making it back!

Sounds like I'm doing it right.

Anyway, more broadly, I think the backstory (which I won't spoil here) could be the nucleus of a nice little sandbox (snowbox?) game for a home campaign if someone wanted to spend a little time expanding it.

What you got in that adventure, is in fact, a small segment of a sandbox/drop-in mini-campaign. It's not much more than notes, hand-drawn maps, and scraps of misc ideas all milling around in my head, but it's there.

I don't know that I'd ever publish it. I personally don't think it's any better than anyone else's homebrew, and I would feel weird asking people to pay money for it. If I develop it more, maybe I'll stick a free PDF on rpgnow or something.

Crisippo · 4/01/2014 5:51 am

Chainsaw wrote:
francisca took Vikings, Esquimaux, Norse trolls and pieces of The Frost-Giant's Daughter and whipped them into a really cool outdoor adventure in the snow covered mountains of Hyperborea.

That description made me drool to say the least. I grew up with stories of Norse trolls, i even played in their woods and their mountains. I think The Frost-Giant's Daugther is one of the best examples of my kind of sword-and-sorcery story (it's also nostalgic for me being the first REH story i ever read); and i do identify somewhat with Vikings .

Reading about your Gary Con game and being the Atlantic Ocean (and then some) away, actually made me a little sad to be an Old Worlder .

francisca wrote:
If I develop it more, maybe I'll stick a free PDF on rpgnow or something.

I hope you do develop it and stick on rpgnow, any notes you would care to share privatly would also be appreciated

francisca · 4/01/2014 9:54 am

capitalbill wrote:
Chainsaw noticed this awesome note on the Kimmerian Barbarian's character sheet in Francisca's game...

Chainsaw wrote:
francisca took Vikings, Esquimaux, Norse trolls and pieces of The Frost-Giant's Daughter and whipped them into a really cool outdoor adventure in the snow covered mountains of Hyperborea.

Don't forget the gas station ashtray prop!

Last edited by francisca (4/01/2014 12:03 pm)

joseph · 4/01/2014 11:30 am

Chainsaw wrote:
francisca took Vikings, Esquimaux, Norse trolls and pieces of The Frost-Giant's Daughter and whipped them into a really cool outdoor adventure in the snow covered mountains of Hyperborea.

Trouble in Vikland sounds fantastic! I love running Viking adventures amd have done them in fantasy and historical settings. I even ran a game in my homebrew largely based on Volsungasaga, though it was more early Germanic in flavor. Yes, I would second a published version!