Scooby Doo Gencon Revisited

Gencon is nearly here.   I had planned to continue my blogs of gencon pasts, but….  I failed.  Still, I plan to post blogs during Gencon 2012, my 21th consecutive Gencon!

But before that, I got a special treat.  If you recall during my first blog post, I had mentioned a Scooby Doo based Call of Cthulhu event, which was one of my favorites.   A funny thing happened a few months later. The GM that ran that very event contacted me.  Gotta love the intertubes!    Here’s our email exchange.

From John Storch:

“Hey... I decided to do a Google search for "Call of Cthulhu Scooby Doo at GenCon". Your post was the first one that came up on the list. And guess what! I'm the guy who ran those CoC games. Surprised to find that someone actually remembered any of it. 1992 was probably my last year at GenCon but I still have the character sheets and the summary of the games from 1985 -1992. I was going to do "The Death of Scooby Doo" in 1994 but GenCon would no longer allow me to use the terms Scooby Doo or Cthulhu Busters. By that time, I had enough and dropped out. John”

From Me:

Wow, I didn't expect this email. :)  Thanks for contacting me.  I would love to see scans or something from that game.  It was my first gencon and it was my favorite event.  Too bad you have never made it again.  It's lame that they got so anal on the terms.  I wonder if it would be like that today or not.

Would you mind if I reposted this email on my blog? or better, if a scan of some of the character sheets.

From John:

Here's what I have ready to email you for right now.  It's the history of my Scooby Doo CoC games at GenCon.  Keep in mind, I ran each of the games multiple times each year, so just because Velma went missing in your game, doesn't mean she's out of the game.  I do have the character sheets somewhere at home.  I'll bring them in to work to scan them into PDF files tomorrow.

Which he did.  Looking over those scans was a total blast from the past.  Man that event was fun.   Below are links to the files.   Thanks John so much for contacting me and allowing me to post them here!

• The Legend of Scooby Doo and the CthulhuBusters 1994
• Fred Character Sheet
• Shaggy Character Sheet
• Daphne Character Sheet
• Velma Character Sheet
• Sketches

Gencon 2011 Day 3

I started day 3 of gencon exploring the upper and outer ring of the convention center. I found the miniature painting contest display and took a lot of pictures. Most are of poor quality since they are behind glass. I then visited the art exhibit which is in the center of the main hall.

After trying unsuccessfully to get in a Catan Histories: Settlers of America Trails to Rails, I lucked out and got into Mansions of Madness. It wasn't what I expected. It wasn't a bad game, but the problem with Mansion of Madness is the same one I have with the D&D board games: it just feels like an RPG on rails. I would just rather be playing the RPG.

Later that evening I played the new Shogun. The one that replaces dice rolling with the crazy tower you drop units into. It's a great improvement of the the original.

Capped the night off with quick games of Space Hulk card game and Bang!. The later is a convention favorite we play every year.

Day 4 is sort of a throw away day at gencon. I'll visit the hall and buy a few minor things a catch my flight.

Gencon 2011 Day 2

Spent most of my day touring the gaming hall, which contains most of the board, card, war, and miniature games. I saw a ton of outstanding terrain maps for miniature and war games.

The rest of the time I spent first playing a demo of Chaos of the Old World and then playing it for reals in the gaming hall. It's a great game and will definitely buy it at some point.

Later with my friends we played a the new space hulk card game. Pretty good at capturing the feel of the original space hulk, but I miss the miniatures. I capped the night off with some Arkham Horror. For once we saved the world and beat the game with just one turn before Cthulhu himself appeared.

Follow my Google+ stream for real-time.

Much easier for me to post my pics and info via Google+.  So if you want to follow my in real time, do it there.  I'll post a summary with photos later in the evening.

Gencon 2011 day 1

I had a issues posting to blogger. It was much easier posting to G+. After a 2 hour wait for my badge, I spend most of the day walking around the exhibition hall and some of the gaming hall.

I collected a few of the photos in a picasa web album.

Why preregister for gencon?

For the last decade, I've either been a GM or vendor.  So getting my badge has been rather painless.  As a standard attendee, I have to get it via will call.  My god this line is the length of the convention hall!  Why preregister? It would be faster to buy a new badge.  Gencon logistics are as incompetent was ever.

Off to GenCon 2011

I had hope to write more blogs about the Indy years before leaving for GenCon 2011, but the convention came quicker than my writing. I'm off to catch my flight. I may continue blogging about past GenCons after the convention or start up again as GenCon 2012 approaches.

I'll post the major events here, but you can also follow me on Google+ or Twitter.