wavester wrote:
Oh ya. Finding DM's this year was rough. Between those not willing to get vaccinated (I have no use for them - they were a minority) and those that just have Covid Fatigue (they are vaccinated but just tired and have decided to just stay home until they don't have to do all the 'things' anymore) it was rough at times.D&D Numbers
2019 - 5,250 tickets - sat 5,997 players (because we rock like Winger)
2020 - Dave had a really boring August - it was weird
2021 - 1,765 tickets - sat 1,851 players (even Covid cannot stop the power of Kip Winger)
2022 - 2,448 tickets - sat 2,376 players (no-shows killed us - baby Winger is crying) - this also does not count any Demo or ad-hoc learn to play games
So we did take a big step forward this year from last, which compared to the problems many were having I will take as a major win, but we are still about half-powered compared to 2019 which we use in all our show benchmarks as the 'last normal year'. Hopefully we'll take another huge step forward next year on our road to return to 'the new normal'.
Thanks for the info. It's very interesting. I'm guessing that fewer events made it seem crazy crowded at time, even with the lesser attendance from 2019.
The crowd flow seemed to fluctuate much more than previous years. As I said above, I had times on Thurs or Fri where the dealer hall crowd seemed to match Saturdays of previous years. Then I had long stretches on Sat and Sun where I could stroll unimpeded down walkways. There was always a little of that, but it was extra noticeable this year.
The most important thing was that my family had a great time this year! We will be back again next year, maskful or maskless.