FallCon 22

WellFallCon 22 has come and gone, and to quote Tony the Tiger, it was grrrrreat!
Attendance was really good, I think there were more people there on Friday night then I have ever seen before. The place was cram packed! It was a little different then previous years, the auction filled up two hours after the auction opened...I started my FallCon adventure with a game called Glory to Rome, it won the People's Choice award and I was asked to moderate it. I really like the game, I just hate explaining it. There are so many things you have to explain for the game, and each one rests upon another one. I did manage to get through the explanation and then the game started. We played two games of it, and a winner emerged, a player that had never played it before. This was surprising because usually the winner has experience in the game. Glory to Rome went until 11 or so and I helped out around the booth and the game library until midnight, then I went home.

I arrived at 7:30 Saturday morning to help set up and ensure all the games were ready for the morning events. I had no games scheduled that day but just tried to helped things go smoothly.
I took over running the games library for awhile as well and played a game of Roll Through the Ages 2 player and lost badly. I like the game, so much so that I will probably purchase it. It is a unique filler and ends before the mechanism is wearing. The game is based on rolling dice to build your civilization. The downside for me is that it might as well be solitaire as there is no player intereaction except for the race to build wonders, you get more points for building a wonder first then your opponent.

I stayed at the games library for awhile and played some games with my friend Leah from Medicine Hat. She schooled me in Lost Cities and then she read the rules to Finca while I helped people check games out of the library. We played a game two player as we both learned the rules, she proved to be an excellent teacher by allowing me to beat her in the game. It is another interesting game that I will probably pick it. There is some depth to the game, and it plays in about 45 minutes.

My afternoon was spent helping pirates play Railroad Tycoon (Saturday was International Talk like a Pirate day) and then prepping for the auction.

The auction deserves special mention because of the games that were available this year. We had several people drop off large amounts (127 in one case) and the games were for the most part high quality. I would guess over a hundred were still in shrink and bidding for the games was fierce. One difference between this year and last was that there were far less miniatures (maybe 12-15 items) and magazines (2) then in previous years. This was due to the speed that the convention filled up. I saw several gamers haul their games back out to the vehicles because of the speed the auction filled. I purchased three games this year; Turbo Taxi, Fresh Fish and Android, and I missed out on Die Macher by a dollar!

I left at about 11:00 Saturday night, being too tired to stay longer and I wanted to finish my prep for my tournament the next day, BattleLore. I also used the Hundred Years War expansion for Battlelore as well. This expansion is great for tournaments because it removes the council and presets the Lore deck, which is great when you are teaching the game at the same time. There were an uneven number of players so I played as well. I won my first game 9-5 and had a shot at winning the tournament (which I don't like doing) but fate stepped in and gave me no centre cards in the second round, causing me to lose the game 10-4 (yes I was squished like a grape). The tournament was fun though and I really enjoyed playing it.

Afterwards we cleaned up and went for beer...
I had a really good time and everyone that was staying at my place for FallCon (there were 6 people) all agreed that it was great.
We have started planning for FallCon 23 already. So come on over for a weekend of gaming!
All the pictures were taken by The Bit, a real photographer.... for FallCon.