Alright, I'm back from GenCon, so I decided to put down some of my thoughts on the events I played in.
Paranoia: The Happiest Sector in Alpha Complex
This was the adventure I ran at GenCon. I greatly enjoy running Paranoia for all the chaos that it brings about. The adventure focused on players trying to stop a terrorist plot in an entertainment sector of Alpha Complex.
The enemies, it turned, out, were employees of a different entertainment sector that were tired of Friend Computer World getting regularly named "Happiest Sector in Alpha Complex," and so had set out to drive away its customers before destroying the sector altogether.
During the course of the adventure, my players destroyed two of the rides in Friend Computer World, with very little provoking from the adversaries. The sector got shut down because of the rides being blown up, and the enemies used this as an opportunity to set up their weapons. Of course, this was when the players managed to catch them and stop them, after having caused far more destruction and killed far more people themselves.
The enemies, it turned, out, were employees of a different entertainment sector that were tired of Friend Computer World getting regularly named "Happiest Sector in Alpha Complex," and so had set out to drive away its customers before destroying the sector altogether.
During the course of the adventure, my players destroyed two of the rides in Friend Computer World, with very little provoking from the adversaries. The sector got shut down because of the rides being blown up, and the enemies used this as an opportunity to set up their weapons. Of course, this was when the players managed to catch them and stop them, after having caused far more destruction and killed far more people themselves.
Monster of the Week: Weekend at Winsome
I've been looking into a lot of Powered by the Apocalypse games lately (more on that in an upcoming post), so I was happy to get to try out two different PBTA games at GenCon.
Weekend at Winsome had us investigating attacks in a small town that seemed like they might have been caused by a large wolf. It wasn't a wolf. It wasn't a werewolf either.
Our team had a unique collection of characters, and I felt like our character types really did have an impact in how the adventure played out. The adventure was slow at a couple points, but all-in-all pretty good.
Masks: Caped Extravaganza
Masks was our other PBTA game of the convention. Here we got to play as teenage superheroes that were starting to gain recognition in the city.
I liked the variety of character types. The mechanics and moves seemed like they were fun and could keep things moving well.
The GM was very nice, and she tried to give us each an opportunity to explore our characters and experience different events based on what our characters wanted to do.
However, the adventure itself was a little bit...lacking. There was really only one encounter of the whole thing that was at all conflict-based, and that was a bit repetitive. I'm not sure what things looked like behind the GM screen as to if there was something we had to do to beat the boss or if we had to rip up his equipment a certain number of times, or if she just ended it after we each had taken a couple turns.
I think that because the adventure was so limited, there were times when the GM floundered a little bit because she was trying to draw things out. I think this took away from the game a little, and came off as a bit indecisive/uncertain.
Don't get me wrong, I greatly enjoyed playing this game, but I would say that based on the adventure itself and its execution, this was probably my least favorite of the games I played in at GenCon
Over The Edge: Under Broken Wings
Masks and Monster of the Week both provided a large number of character options with a lot of customization within each of those choices. Neither of these was as open-ended as the character options of Over The Edge, where the only limitation really is just one's imagination. This allowed for an incredibly unique team that included a pathological liar conman (my character), a short bodyguard, a monster hunter, and a rock bassoonist.
I think that this was the funnest adventure that I played at GenCon. The adventure was a little more gruesome/horror-ish than I tend to enjoy, but there were a lot of wacky bits that made the whole thing a lot more fun. The GM was very adaptable and did a good job responding to the crazy things that we, as players threw at him.
The setting of Over the Edge seems interesting and like something I'd be interested in exploring in more detail in the future.
The system itself didn't seem all that special, and I don't think there's anything it did that wouldn't have been handled as well or better by something like The Puddle. (Not that it did these things poorly, just that the system didn't really stick out to me as something remarkable.)
Call to Adventure: Board Game Demo
I almost managed to get out of GenCon without buying a board game this year. There were several that had caught my eye, but I never have as much time to play board games as I'd like, so I didn't want to spend a lot of money on something to just have it sit on my shelf.
Sunday, the last day of the convention, we'd gone back and looked at the exhibit hall and seen everything we wanted to see. We were going to grab a quick lunch at the food trucks and then head home.
We just happened to choose a table with this guy who had bought the game Call to Adventure, and who seemed incredibly excited about it. His explaination of the game spread his excitement to us, so me and one other from my group went to check out the game in the exhibit hall. We sat down and enjoyed a quick demo.
A lot of games that I enjoy (Betrayal at the House on the Hill, Untold, Secrets of the Lost Tomb, etc) are really almost more a mechanical justification to indulge in stories. Call to Adventure seems like almost the reverse of this.
With Untold especially and Betrayal to a lesser extent, the mechanics of the game don't really matter as much to me as whatever the story/events of the game are that time through. The mechanics are there as an excuse to tell whatever the story is.
Call to Adventure uses a lot of storytelling-type elements, but they are being used instead to justify the mechanics of a board/card game. In Call to Adventure, players are given a character type and background as well as a secret destiny/goal for their character to get bonus points at the end of the game. Gameplay extends over three phases, or acts, ranging from a character's humble origins through their growth as a hero or antihero to their climactic finale. In each phase, players gain cards representing different events in the hero's journey but mechanically granting additional resources to gain more cards. When one player manages to get their hero to the end of Act 3, gameplay ends and players all tally up their points (from cards, experience, and other things). Whoever has the most points wins.
It's a pretty fun game, and it's notably playable with 1-4 players and only runs 30 min to an hour, which makes it easier to play than some other games I have which require more time or players.
