The Good:

ICC and GenCon staff were plentiful, helpful and did a great job keeping traffic flowing outside of the halls (like having a traffic area roped off from the waiting area outside the Dealer Hall, for instance).  I was especially impressed with the state of the bathrooms this year.  It must be a challenge to keep them somewhat clean and stocked, but compared to past years, this year was surprisingly decent

Will Call on Wednesday at 3:30pm had no line outside of the cattle runs.  NO LINE.  I have never seen that before in the 7 years I've been attending.

I met more interesting people from far-flung corners of the globe than ever this.  All of them were super-nice and it really made my GenCon extra-nice.

The Bad:

The Fantasy Flight Legend of the Five Rings event.  The costumes and the pagentry were awesome, but the actual event was run horribly.  I was looking forward to this event the most of GenCon and I dropped before the first round because of how poorly it was run.  I don't think I'll partcipate in anymore FFG tournaments as a result, which is a shame because I really like their games.

It seems like word has spread about Pasttimes poor management and exhorbinant pricing for Magic the Gathering events, as they took up significantly less space in the card halls than in past years.  I didn't even bother playing any drafts for the second year in a row.

The Ugly:

Nothing managed to leap out at me this year as particularly ugly.  Didn't see any bad behavior.  If I'm forced to pick, I'll give this to Scotty's Brewhouse for not having the air turned up to a tolerable level on Thursday and Friday.  My group just stopped going because it was just too warm inside.

This was my 40th GenCon, and it was one of the best.

The Good:
I ran four games of "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen", and everyone had a blast. I dressed up the table with a nice tablecloth and a lace centerpiece to set the tone, and used old English pennies for tokens. I also handed out notebooks and Pilot Varsity fountain pens for the players to use. Even though it was only a $2 ticket, I really wanted to make it memorable.
I played in a fantastic BYOV game! They really outdid themselves this year with their LARP scenarios, and I'm already looking forward to next year.
I also played in a Brass & Steel game (another LARP) for the first time this year, and it was excellent.
The Horticultural Hall exhibit was wonderful!

The Bad:
I played in an RPG event that relied on having uninterrupted Internet access, and they did not have Internet access. They brought their own devices for the players to use, but the devices couldn't communicate with their server, and they had to spend the first hour of the game coming up with an offline workaround solution. On one hand I felt bad for them, but on the other, I wished they had thought it through ahead of time.

The Ugly:
Thursday morning in the exhibit hall, trying to make my way through the crowds of people who are jockeying for the limited-supply promotional items. If I were King of GenCon, I'd require all the dealers to have enough promo stuff to last the whole weekend. (Yes, I know it's probably impossible, but I can dream.)

Good:

• Even with the sellout, crowd control was excellent.
  
• Thursday felt a little more crowded though, but not terrible
  
• Spent Saturday in Iron GM from Noon-6:30 so may have dodged a bullet there…J
  
• Sunday almost felt light; Vendor Hall was navigable.
  
• The aisle ropes separating the doors from the milling crowds in the main hall worked PERFECTLY. Awesome idea!
  
  
  
  • I was able to walk to the Auction at 9:30 on Saturday without needing to push through the Vendor Hall crowd. Thumbs up!
    
  
  
• Food truck lines seemed much better; wait times (at least for my off-hours visit) were short. Variety was good.
  
  
  
  • Exception: Had a 45 minute wait at Mac Genie from order to getting food (11:15 to noon), they seemed to have run out right away and had a hard time getting restocked. Food was still good though.
    
  
  
• Iron GM as always rocked!
  
• Excellent last year for Kentucky Fried Gamers on Wednesday. Looking forward to Red Headed Stepchild next year!
  
• Shrimp Cocktail at Harry and Izzys: First time for that. WOW!
  
• Lost my license digging in my badge holder for singles at a vending machine; realized it five minutes later and got back in time to find someone there calling my name in advance of taking it to lost and found. Awesome; and heard a lot of stories like that.
  
• Westin staff awesome and accommodating as always.
  

• Some folks haven’t seem to gotten the message about there being a dedicated Cosplay photography section.
  
  
  
  • Had to dodge multiple photo-ops in the Vender hall; and in other hallways as well.
    
  • Sometimes they couldn’t even be bothered to move to the side.
    
  
  
• Vender Hall Announcements: Too loud. Distracting. I’m thrilled there is Pathfinder Games in Sagamore. Go shout there about the Vender Hall being open and see how that goes.
  
• Too many broken vending machines (or not taking bills/change) and then having to walk a quarter mile to find ANOTHER of order machine was terrible.
  
• Consignment store closed at 7pm Saturday? That always used to be open later; and there was a ton of stuff left. Disappointed.
  
  
  
  • As I stood there in the far right door watching the Charity Auction from around 7:30 til 9pm, I started to count the number of folks that walked in looking to hit the Consignment store. Stopped at 15.
    
  • I understood it closed earlier this year to allow a quicker breakdown for the volunteers, but with the level of stock left behind and the number of folks turned away I’d hope they reconsider next year.
    
  
  

• Nada. Awesome 50th, with a minor knock to the 50th Crystal Caste dice design: It looks out of place next to all my others. Grateful I got one.
  

The Good:
-Fantastic meals w/ friends at St. Elmo’s Steakhouse, Shula’s, Oceannaire, and Weber Grill along with the wide variety of Food Truck Selections for lunch.
- The Starfinder RPG ‘Grab n’Go’ Kiosk in front of the Sagamore Ballroom. Such a great idea!   Once I saw the crazy line at the Paizo booth on Thursday, I finished my other vendor ‘surgical strikes’ picking up what I needed, before I headed up there.  The book sold out 3 hours later.  The Kiosk still had a line but it was very manageable.
- The GenCon Museum at Lucas Oil Stadium – I hit the museum during my last couple of hours at GenCon on Sunday.  Glad I did!  It was well thought out and informative.  It definitely made me feel old when things and games I recall fondly were now encased in glass..LOL.
-Kingdom Death…’nuff said.
 
The Bad: 
-The Catalyst Game Lab room in the ICC.   I played a good amount of Shadowrun Missions there.  It was extremely noisy due to the crowd size and was extremely difficult to hear my respective judges.  Otherwise, the judges and volunteers did a wonderful job and was a great way to end this season’s campaign before next year’s restart.
 
The Ugly:
-Nothing comes to mind.  With the badge sell out, I was expecting an ocean of humanity in the convention hallways, dealer room, and local eateries.  It didn’t seem any worse as in past years which was a relief.
 

We had the same issue with 1 gm for 2 games. Works if the gm isn't an actual part of the game. Unfortunately we were playing "The Others" with CMON. We ended up leaving. Since we were the full group.

GOOD - love the experience overall. 

BAD - buying Gate10 4 day pass with shuttle, and getting put in a "Non-shuttle" lot. 

UGLY - Our schedule this year LOL

The Good:

• Oddly enough, an RPG that I merely observed in passing, not in playing. Sometimes magic happens when the GM is sharp and the players are on it. It's not often it rises to being good enough to be a spectator at someone else's RPG, but it's amazing when it does.
  
• 'Sploding Kitten's "vending 'machine'". ROFLMAO! 
  
• I will perpetually be positively amazed at some of the complex tabletop sim games, and the sheer beauty of them. Whether incredible artwork or minis, or just damn fine play, it's amazing to see. 
  
• For a sell out con, it felt surprisingly normal. I didn't feel like it was any more crowded than usual, and in fact when driving up was wondering where everybody was (until I got close to Georgia St). 
  
• Oddly enough, the weather was milder than in years past, at least while I was there. I was still pretty damn warm, but I wasn't steam-broiled alive like in some past years.
  
• Just walking by Island Noodles on Georgia Street and taking in the scents is an experience. 
  

• Nothing to do with Gen Con or Indianapolis whatsoever, but it stinks to have a family medical emergency pull you away and force you to miss Saturday and Sunday. :(
  
• This is only mildly a problem: In the hour-play video game room (yeah, I went), one of the multi-game standup machines kept on wigging out. It worked great while it was up, but it was unstable. As a counterweight to the 'bad', the room staff was really good about getting right on fixing consoles when they were told about problems. 
  

• My mug in the mirror after not getting good sleep. Presuming no more family emergencies, I **AM** getting a hotel room next year and experiencing the entire con top to bottom for all four days. 
  

 aldctjoc wrote:

• Oddly enough, the weather was milder than in years past, at least while I was there. I was still pretty damn warm, but I wasn't steam-broiled alive like in some past years.

Where were you at??
 

It wasn't like it was a pleasant spring morning, don't get me wrong. But I've experienced some brutal midwest heat in August before, and those two days were mild in comparison. 

And as noted above: I had to leave Indianapolis Friday evening, so I was out of town Sat. & Sun. I can't speak for those days; even where I was at, I was stuck indoors. 

The Good:

• DCC and MCC RPGs. Signed up for MCC and had a blast.  Showed up with generics for DCC on Saturday.  Had more fun.  Great group of gamers and great GM (Jeff).  Laughed thru both games.
  
• Morning coffee.  Thanks Mayfair for providing free coffee on Georgia street.  Early morning relaxing and chatting with people I'd just met.  Before heading out to my....
  
• Early morning RPGs.  Along with DCC and MCC, played Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperboria.  Again an enjoyable group that played well and still kept it light.
  
• Talking to Tim Kask and Frank Mentzer as they took a break outside the ICC.  Wasn't able to get into any Gencon 50 seminars but had a conversation with two classics.
  
• Conversations in general.  Where else can you talk to a total stranger about the Expedition to Barrier peaks, or Pathfinder vs. Starfinder or any number of  "geeky" stuff?
  

I forgot about the Will Call line! I got in line at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday and ended up fairly far back, and got my badge by 12:02 p.m. because they started processing things early! I was impressed.

What a great con. Honestly I think it was my best experience in 9 years of attending. I absolutely cannot wait to go again next year.

The Good:

• Mike Mearls/Jeremy Crawford/Matt Mercer panel. Their passion for the game shows. I almost blew this off, and it would have been a huge mistake. Just a joy to listen to them talk about D&D for an hour or so.
  

• The guy who played 'Brick Samsonite' in our Shadowrun game. Apologies for the two kids  with me who just weren't woken up enough for roleplaying that early, but I can tell you we really did enjoy it. Brick's past history with the TSA will stick with me for a while.
  

• TOVA. Whoever the two gentlemen were running this auction, please bring them back next year. At one point, my 14 year old daughter was in tears from some borderline inappropriate but truly hilarious lines. 
  

• Baldman Games D&D. Was honestly kinda worried after hearing some of the reviews, but it was great. Only did two events, and I'm not 100% sold on the Tomb of Annihilation storyline, but both groups and DMs were quite fun.
  

• Lucas Oil Horticultural Hall exhibits. It could have been my exhaustion by then, but seeing so much stuff from my childhood got me right in the feels. I hope this continues in some format.
  

• Meepo. Hearing my daughter yell out in genuine concern, "NO MEEPO, STAY BACK!" delighted me to no end. She'll remember Meepo for the rest of her life, I'm certain.
  

The Bad:

• Dealer Hall rudeness. Not to feed into the whole stroller/rolling suitcase thing again, but man, my ankles can only take so much beating. Worse though was the just general rudeness exhibited by a small portion - blocking walkways, shoving, being hit with backpacks w/o so much as a quick "Sorry!". Not sure what more could be done about it, but it has gotten worse IMO over the 9 years I've been.
  

The Ugly:

• Embassy Suites construction. Both the rooms and the garage. Seriously, this has to be done next year, right? How long can this possibly go on - the garage has been like this for what, 3 years in a row now?
  

See you next year!
 

It's not as simple as moving the ashtray -- they are embedded in the concrete.

Overall, we were happy.

Good: 

• RPG Games I ran. Blessed with a great group of players, and things went wonderfully. Everyone was in character, we laughed, there were touching moments and cinematic moves and betrayal and fun character interactions. Part of the awesomeness is seeing how each group handles the situation differently and how the game progresses, and none of the groups disappointed. 
  
• RPG Games we were in. Jamie Stefko did a wonderful job running the GURPS games we were in; my wife and I were in rival houses and it was a blast to play. I'm super stoked for Tales From the Loop RPG after being in the session run by Bill Carter (been attending Games On Demand for four years now, and have never been disappointed). The Sixcess games are gonzo and tons of fun. Usually, there's one game that we thought, "yeah, that was a waste of time," and we didn't have that experience this time. 
  
• Crowds. The Will Call line was much quicker than I remember it, and the crowds and food lines didn't seem as bad as previous years. 
  
• Pandemic Season 2. Fun demo, and I'm looking forward for it coming out. 
  

• Marriott was under construction. JW was nice, but I felt that extra walking distance from our parking spot, and the tables seemed smaller. Had games scheduled for 8 plus GM plus wife, so the areas were cramped. 
  
• Lack of time and crazy schedule. There never seems to be enough time. It was maybe because I was running three games, but I missed out on a lot of the exhibition, and we were going through the Horticulture Hall as they were tearing it down. A 4:00 ending on Sunday seems way too early. 
  

• Gencon Die. Who puts branding on both the 1 and the 6? Really?
  
• Taking turns on the escalator in the sky walk. I don't mind taking stairs. Having a line for the stairs seems...excessive.
  
• Monday morning. Travelling the day after for the eclipse was painful.