| Origins 2003 |
| One of the nice things about Origins is that my employers buy my badge. I still wind up running games, mind, but if I just want to run game for general consumption (like this year), that's OK. Does mean I have to work the booth a while, but that's OK too. I actually did some role-playing this con, unlike at MarCon, when there weren't really any games that jumped up and grabbed me. Took some fun pictures, and since that's what you're all here for, let's take a look. |
 |
| That's Kylee getting into the Matt-mobile. Note my barn in the background. Heather didn't come down with us because she was still working, but she caught up with us the next day. Kylee looks pretty chipper here, I think. The drive down was uneventful. She slept. I drove. That's all. We got to the con and checked in with the folks at the White Wolf booth (at right). Justin, Geoff, Mike, Dean, Chad...probably some other people, too. Not much reason for me to stay there (especially after Justin started doing the ass-chicken dance, at left), so we took off to get dinner and then work. Yep, you heard me. We're a couple of real nerds. At left are pictures of the unwashed masses of Origins (far left) and Kylee working like a nerd (immediate left). |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| The next day, I had a Dark Ages: Vampire game to run. But before that happened, I saw many strange and beautiful things at the con. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| A knight. |
| Justin demonstrating our Ether Goggles. Note the GenCon announcement poster to the left of his ether-shaping majesty. |
| The stormtroopers. Again. |
| A little remote control car. For zooming. |
| So then it was time to run my Dark Ages: Vampire game. I ran Snow and Madness, same one I ran at MarCon, same one I'm running at GenCon. I like it, so sue me. Never ends the same way twice; this time they killed the freaking Baroness. As always, a group picture. |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| So a little later on, Kylee and I played in this game of Victorian Age: Vampire. See, the thing was, we signed up for several games, and the guy who was supposed to run them didn't show. I am now about to demonstrate that I'm a more tolerant and understanding person than 9/10 of the Internet and not assume he's some jackmunch who got stoned and flaked, but instead assume that something came up that he couldn't avoid. But the game went on, sorta. Mike stepped in to run the game, statted a bunch of Ventrue (I got to play an alienist! Rule!) and we went on. One guy got up and left because the characters didn't have enough Disciplines for him. (See? No comments about worthless twinks. Still being tolerant.) The game was good, but we had a weird mix of players. Kylee and I are, according to Mike, "hard core role-players." I guess that's true. The other two folks who were playing just didn't seem to grasp Vampire or the genre very well. I wound up deciding that their characters were insane and staking them both in my asylum for further experimentation. A picture of the group at right. |
 |
| And, for the final picture of the day, Heather in my hat. |
 |
| The con goes on. It now being Saturday, we were all kinda bushed, but none moreso than Kylee (at left). I hung out the booth some more (and was again pursued by those bloody stormtroopers, right) and geared up to run Dark Ages: Werewolf by special request from my amigo Colin. While waiting, a gay pride parade passed by on Nationwide Blvd. Who knew it was gay pride week? (A lot of folks, evidently, but I didn't.) Still, we had a great view of it. I still only got one good picture, though. |
 |
 |
 |
| So Kylee made her character for the Werewolf game, we both worked for a while (nerds!) and then headed down to the gaming room. I waited for Colin and George for a while...they were late...so some other folks that I knew from last year asked to play and I said, "What the heck?" And then, of course, the boys showed up and I had 7 players instead of 3. Story of my life. The game was good, I think. They faced down Kylee's character's Dark Secret. One of the players snorted a Pixi Stick. I built a forest and graveyard out of pop cans and candy wrappers. Someone took a picture of me with a foam demon head in my glasses (all pictures at right). And then the whole lot of us (by which I mean me, Kylee, George, Jo, Colin, and Heather) went to dinner to celebrate Heather's birthday. Picture below. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| So that was Origins this year. Lots of fun, and followed the next week by the 4th of July party at my place, which I do have pictures from. I'll post them someday. Next stop, GenCon! |
| Click here for quotes. |
| Click here for quotes. |