The Caffeinated Penguin

Posted By matt on July 24, 2004

It's been a good convention so far. ESR was supposed to show up today, but I haven't seen him yet.

I played in a modern infantry/armor game (US Army vs. Iraqi's). Of course, the GM played the Iraqis because they're not that much fun to play as they fairly easily get slaughtered. But, I won a $20 gift certificate (random die roll, no skill required) to the place that casts the figures so I picked up some of them and then today I picked up some Bradley APC's for the US troops. Of course, the funny thing about this is that it's really hard to get “bad guy” troop carriers for modern infantry, since most of them are riding around in the back of Toyota pickup trucks!

I also realized that I miss gaming, but not enough to want to do it every week. However (provided Liz is agreeable) I'll be running small games maybe once a month on a Saturday or Sunday at our new place. So, I picked up a few hills at the flea market, and a bag of trees. I was amazed – the trees were like $10 (cheap!). Then I showed them to a friend, Bob, and he said that I should go to a cake decorating place. Well, lo and behold bags of 144 for $20. Now, they still need bases, but you can stick them into cardboard and base them like that pretty easily. So, I might pick up some of those. They have Palm trees too, and those fit desert warfare better. I've learned a lot about terrain on the cheap. You know those large felt groundcloths that a lot of people put on tables for a base layer of terrain? Well, a roll of automotive carpet works just as well, and you can get them in the sizes I need (no larger than 4' x 6', ideally 2'x3') for like $10. Of course, you can use rolls of felt too, but those tend to be more expensive.

Let's see; what else?

I played in a western game yesterday. It was the townsfolk and lawmen vs. the outlaws and it ended up splitting down the main road with 2 groups of Mexicans vs. the happy drunks and the Earps on one side and and the guys in long dusters and the Irish gang vs. the sherriff and depities and the townsfolk on the other. I was one of the groups of mexicans. We basically slaughtered each other, and the group on the other side took up positions in buildings and ended up shooting at each other across the street and fighting to a stalemate when no one could kill each other because they were hiding in buildings.

Today I'm going to try to get into the game that my mom always talks about where it's basically a movie – everyone gets and actor and you make up the script as you go along. After that, there's another of those modern games, only unscheduled and I was invited to play.

I picked up a copy of Axis and Allies. I might run that some of that too. Dunno. I just want to play lots of different games, and there's no need for them to have any continuity. I'll probably write up scenarios to keep it interesting, and am going to try to keep it to “just show up and play” complexity. I'll make up the armies, and all everyone else does is learn the rules.

Strange bits:

For some reason, when I sit with my computer in the evening, it seems to attract a group of late teens/early 20's. Not that I mind most of them, but there are a couple just annoying skate rat / anti-establishment / I'll smoke inside because fuck them and their rules types which are rather annoying.

Gaming conventions are tremendous motivators for diet and exercise. I think I've got the diet down – I don't eat that badly, and I just need to start exercising more. The motivators are twofold – there is a lot of walking around, and there are a lot of obscenely fat people who come out of the woodwork at these things. Large, fat, sweaty, smelly men with soaked T-shirts clinging to their enormous girth. Sketchy.

The above fat men wearing various “Airborne” and “Navy Seal” T-shirts. Yeah, like you could be in any special forces..

One guy with a Hitler brush moustache and a variety of German shirts, largely centered around famous Wehrmacht tanks such as the Tiger.

I tried to go to bed early last night, but I get to my room and it's like 85 in there. I call the desk and a man comes and replaces the thermostat (it had broken), but it takes about an hour, so I end up getting to bed at midnight anyway.

I think that's about it. I think I'm going to go try to find some lunch.

Category: LJ Import
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