Quote from: Willie the Duck;1040443Source finally has that on their calendar. :-)

Yep. I was a little concerned that they'd originally had a Pokemon tournament and a Magic tournament scheduled for the same day in the same space, the former in the morning and the latter in the evening; they had the former running in the morning, and things were very loud in the game area. The historical miniatures guys, the Centurions, tend to stay over in their alcove with their game on the sand table, and not bother us. At this point, I'm not entirely sure what's happening, and I'll try to find out.

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1040531At this point, I'm not entirely sure what's happening, and I'll try to find out.

Understood. I'm in the same boat. Local gamer and 'remember the guy who...' level mini-celebrity David Weinlick passed away recently, and the funeral might be that day. If not, I will definitely be in to say hi.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;1040571Understood. I'm in the same boat. Local gamer and 'remember the guy who...' level mini-celebrity David Weinlick passed away recently, and the funeral might be that day. If not, I will definitely be in to say hi.

Right, gotcha.

The event is not listed in the 'retailer locator' guide of the 'Free RPG Day' site, and it's listed as a store event on the store's site. So, I don't know if they bought any of the retailer packages or not. We'll see what happens on the day, I guess.

It has been a long hot day, but the air conditioners are in and running. The game table for the 5e game session on June 10th is starting to come together, and things move along very nicely. Next stop is the workshop, and getting the new lead onto The Workbench.

Happy Memorial Day!!! PALANQUINS & PERILS...Sounds like a great urban/sakbe road scenario book!!!
Nice posts over at the Workbench. What's the name of your Conan type to combat the Temple of Set? Your figures are shaping up nicely by the way.

H;0)

PS Just realized that those aren't the figures we are looking for.

Quote from: Hrugga;1040979Happy Memorial Day!!! PALANQUINS & PERILS...Sounds like a great urban/sakbe road scenario book!!!
Nice posts over at the Workbench. What's the name of your Conan type to combat the Temple of Set? Your figures are shaping up nicely by the way.

H;0)

PS Just realized that those aren't the figures we are looking for.

I'll just write something, shall I?

Conan; I have "no creative ability", according to the Egg of Coot. He's accompanied by Valeria and Subodai, all three figures from Dark Fable. I enjoyed painting up the three different "Prophets of Set", as I knew James Earl Jones from my time at the theater.

I think I will probably end up painting the 40 warriors as what they are, assuming I don't get banned from the FLGS by The League Of Decency for cultural appropriation. I also have a batch of Foundry and Copplestone 'Darkest Africa' village personalities which I will add to the mix, to establish an alliance of warrior tribes to aid the Nubian king in his on-going efforts to annoy the Egyptians.

I feel a campaign coming on. Where's my copy of "Source of the Nile"?

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1040995I'll just write something, shall I?

Conan; I have "no creative ability", according to the Egg of Coot. He's accompanied by Valeria and Subodai, all three figures from Dark Fable. I enjoyed painting up the three different "Prophets of Set", as I knew James Earl Jones from my time at the theater.

I think I will probably end up painting the 40 warriors as what they are, assuming I don't get banned from the FLGS by The League Of Decency for cultural appropriation. I also have a batch of Foundry and Copplestone 'Darkest Africa' village personalities which I will add to the mix, to establish an alliance of warrior tribes to aid the Nubian king in his on-going efforts to annoy the Egyptians.

I feel a campaign coming on. Where's my copy of "Source of the Nile"?

The Eyes of Pharaoh, Lord Meren!!!

H:0)

Quote from: Hrugga;1041018The Eyes of Pharaoh, Lord Meren!!!

H:0)

Oh, yes, very much so. The series has a number of hints about the external situation facing Egypt at that time in the late XVIII Dynasty, when Egypt's regional dominance under Amenhotep III had largely been abandoned by Amenhotep IV / Ankhenaton. In one of the later books in the series, Meren is trying to argue Pharaoh out of personally leading a campaign into Nubia. Given the startling abruptness of Tunankhamun's death, one does wonder if it was in an accident on the campaign. We just don't know, due to a lack of documentation.

I do like meta-gaming campaigns, in the classic Tony Bath mode; it would be very easy for me to run one set in this world, as we have pretty good information to base everything on. Like my Tekumel campaign, which continues to roll happily on in the computer, I could set this up as a classic 'battle generator' where people could drop in and out ast hey had time and interest.

The biggest problem with getting a 'live' campaign going has been the total inability of anyone locally to find time in their schedules to play on anything like a regular basis. Hence all the new hardware in the basement, and the joys of digging out all the cameras in the office this weekend. I'm had been moving in the direction of doing pretty much all my gaming with 'remote' players, and the incident a week ago has really pushed me in that direction. From my point of view, what's the point of doing all the logistics work in setting up games in public / open venues if I'm going to get hassled for it? Much better, in my opinion, to go with the model of the wonderful 'micro-convention' that we had some years ago, which was very easy to do and very enjoyable for everyone who came. The old model of games at conventions and the FLGS has not worked out for me (1), especially over the past few years, so why reinforce failure?

Footnote 1: Attempts to do 'outreach' at various of the local FLGS have not been successful; either I never get an answer to my calls or e-mails or I get told that I will need to fit into their programming format or marketing plan. Heck, even offering to come in and do painting demos hasn't gone anywhere, as the FLGS management gets bogged down in discussions about marketing, product placement, retailer involvement, and other business issues. Which I certainly don't have an issue with - miniatures do not pay the bills, by any means, and are mostly stocked because the wholesaler / distributor pushed them to the store management. I can't bring anything commercially marketable to the table, so I don't get a table.

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1041024The biggest problem with getting a 'live' campaign going has been the total inability of anyone locally to find time in their schedules to play on anything like a regular basis.

I hear this a lot about gaming.  Yet, bowling league teams meet regularly, Rotary and Lions' Club meet regularly, model railroaders have op sessions regularly, golf foursomes meet regularly, etc.

Only in this hobby have I seen such incessant complaining about "not being able to commit to a schedule."

I regularly operated on half a dozen model railroads when I lived in the Cities.  If start time was 7:30 you were there at 7:30.  If you blew it off without calling more than once or twice, you would be uninvited.  It rarely happened.

One chap even operated every week, and I made it almost every time; in ten years I doubt I missed more than 10 or 15 sessions total, and never without advance notification.

Quote from: chirine ba kal;1041024Oh, yes, very much so. The series has a number of hints about the external situation facing Egypt at that time in the late XVIII Dynasty, when Egypt's regional dominance under Amenhotep III had largely been abandoned by Amenhotep IV / Ankhenaton. In one of the later books in the series, Meren is trying to argue Pharaoh out of personally leading a campaign into Nubia. Given the startling abruptness of Tunankhamun's death, one does wonder if it was in an accident on the campaign. We just don't know, due to a lack of documentation.

I do like meta-gaming campaigns, in the classic Tony Bath mode; it would be very easy for me to run one set in this world, as we have pretty good information to base everything on. Like my Tekumel campaign, which continues to roll happily on in the computer, I could set this up as a classic 'battle generator' where people could drop in and out ast hey had time and interest.

The biggest problem with getting a 'live' campaign going has been the total inability of anyone locally to find time in their schedules to play on anything like a regular basis. Hence all the new hardware in the basement, and the joys of digging out all the cameras in the office this weekend. I'm had been moving in the direction of doing pretty much all my gaming with 'remote' players, and the incident a week ago has really pushed me in that direction. From my point of view, what's the point of doing all the logistics work in setting up games in public / open venues if I'm going to get hassled for it? Much better, in my opinion, to go with the model of the wonderful 'micro-convention' that we had some years ago, which was very easy to do and very enjoyable for everyone who came. The old model of games at conventions and the FLGS has not worked out for me (1), especially over the past few years, so why reinforce failure?

Footnote 1: Attempts to do 'outreach' at various of the local FLGS have not been successful; either I never get an answer to my calls or e-mails or I get told that I will need to fit into their programming format or marketing plan. Heck, even offering to come in and do painting demos hasn't gone anywhere, as the FLGS management gets bogged down in discussions about marketing, product placement, retailer involvement, and other business issues. Which I certainly don't have an issue with - miniatures do not pay the bills, by any means, and are mostly stocked because the wholesaler / distributor pushed them to the store management. I can't bring anything commercially marketable to the table, so I don't get a table.

I have only read the first book. I was impressed. Lyndia Robinson really paints a vivid picture of life in Ancient Egypt. She really did her research. From history, weapons and religion to furniture. A pleasure to read. Charioteers onward!!!!

H:0)

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1041025I hear this a lot about gaming.  Yet, bowling league teams meet regularly, Rotary and Lions' Club meet regularly, model railroaders have op sessions regularly, golf foursomes meet regularly, etc.

Only in this hobby have I seen such incessant complaining about "not being able to commit to a schedule."

I regularly operated on half a dozen model railroads when I lived in the Cities.  If start time was 7:30 you were there at 7:30.  If you blew it off without calling more than once or twice, you would be uninvited.  It rarely happened.

One chap even operated every week, and I made it almost every time; in ten years I doubt I missed more than 10 or 15 sessions total, and never without advance notification.

Agreed. These days, if people remember to show up at all, it's normally an hour to two hours late. The amount of time and energy that goes into organizing a game session these days is actually more then I used to put in to organizing a convention with the net result that I have less and less time gaming. Quality standards have also slipped, from my perspective, but that's another subject. If one is not running a popular game at the FLGS, one is simply not going to get players I have found. So, for me, time to go in a different direction.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1041025I hear this a lot about gaming.  Yet, bowling league teams meet regularly, Rotary and Lions' Club meet regularly, model railroaders have op sessions regularly, golf foursomes meet regularly, etc.

Only in this hobby have I seen such incessant complaining about "not being able to commit to a schedule."

I regularly operated on half a dozen model railroads when I lived in the Cities.  If start time was 7:30 you were there at 7:30.  If you blew it off without calling more than once or twice, you would be uninvited.  It rarely happened.

One chap even operated every week, and I made it almost every time; in ten years I doubt I missed more than 10 or 15 sessions total, and never without advance notification.

Glorious General,

I don't get it either. One day a week for a few hours doesn't seem like too much to ask, does it? The historical gamers are far more reliable IMO, like the railroaders, which is why I have gradually drifted away from the RPG community. It also helps that  a lot of the "extremism" and insanity overtaking RPG's has not really made any purchase in what may best be seen as a far more mature, "conservative" and older demographic. Oh well, back to Zorndorf for me and old Fritz.

Shemek.

Quote from: Hrugga;1041036I have only read the first book. I was impressed. Lyndia Robinson really paints a vivid picture of life in Ancient Egypt. She really did her research. From history, weapons and religion to furniture. A pleasure to read. Charioteers onward!!!!

H:0)

They just get better and better from there, too. Very good plots, over and above the mystery, and very evocative of the time and place. I suspect I'm going to have to do some personality figures, too...

One notion I've had in mind regarding distribution and retail is that company reps could distribute to retailers.  I got told this was like the Amway of gaming but I still think the concept is sound.  Getting distributors to take products is even harder than getting retailers to try.  So what if you did what the big grocery companies do and lease shelf space to manufacturers like Campells and Coke a Cola?  One thing running a gaming store has done for me is destroy any respect I had for the distribution system.  What if a company's rep got a cut of the sales like the distributors do.  Real cash money for running games?  Oh well, one thing I've learned is that people rarely want to change the way they're used to doing things or try something new.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1041025I hear this a lot about gaming.  Yet, bowling league teams meet regularly, Rotary and Lions' Club meet regularly, model railroaders have op sessions regularly, golf foursomes meet regularly, etc.

Only in this hobby have I seen such incessant complaining about "not being able to commit to a schedule."

I regularly operated on half a dozen model railroads when I lived in the Cities.  If start time was 7:30 you were there at 7:30.  If you blew it off without calling more than once or twice, you would be uninvited.  It rarely happened.

One chap even operated every week, and I made it almost every time; in ten years I doubt I missed more than 10 or 15 sessions total, and never without advance notification.

I wonder how attendance at things like that is today? It seems like there's a lot more demands on our time (even not considering I have a family now).

One factor I suspect is the ease of setting up a gaming group. I've had players in the past who I know considered my game their 2nd or 3rd choice game (i.e. they would show up at my game if their other games weren't running). On the other hand, I had some very dedicated players who really did show up almost every week and would usually let me know the week before if there was a conflict (people do go on vacations and business trips or have special events, and that's all fine, just let me know about them, and don't do it too often).

I have had to deal with players who had crazy work schedules. I don't know what to say to those folks. I guess find a game that really works for drop in play...

On the other hand, we had one drop in player who was so enjoyable to have when he was able to make it, we just rolled with it.

Frank