On Friday we were scheduled to play Arkham Horror by Fantasy Flight Games at 10:00 AM. We endured the snipe hunt, found the correct table - and settled down to wait. The point of playing this board game is to enjoy ourselves, and part of that enjoyment comes from not having to set the game up and put it away afterwards. For those who have never played Arkham Horror, the setup takes time. Then there's the fun of looking up obscure rule exceptions and keeping track of a myriad of play exceptions.
On the way to the table we got waylaid by a pert, young co-ed who, upon learning we were playing Arkham Horror, exclaimed! that, "Your game master is Kim! She's awesome!". Yeah, she really did talk that way.
The game is being hosted by Gamers of the Apocalypse (GOTA on Facebook), who are being compensated for their efforts. About 15 minutes after the game was due to start, a morbidly obese man in a motorized chair wheeled over to tell us that our game master was in the ladies' room throwing up, so the game was canceled. Clearly, Kim's awesomeness didn't extend to limiting her liquor intake to something she could manage on the morning after.
Mister Big Wheel (I never did get his name) signed off on the cancellation at our insistence. We went over to the manager's kiosk, where we were given a somewhat surly reception when we had the audacity to ask for our money back. Officialdom finally signed off on the refund, and we were directed to go to customer service. The lady at customer service was nice about the whole business, apologized and gave us a refund. So we now have a six hour time slot that is empty.
But this gets better.
The following day we showed up for another event for which we had registered and bought tickets. Again, it was Arkham Horror, only this time with all the expansion sets. The game board is going to take up more space than a large dining room table, and the complexity is significant. Once again, Gamers of the Apocalypse was in charge, and once again they failed. This time the game master showed up, but the game was missing. The game master signed off on the cancellation under the direction of Mister Big Wheel, again we went to the manager's kiosk where the reception was a good deal less salty than our previous experience, then over to customer service where the same nice lady refunded out money and issued the standard apology. Now we've got another six hour time slot empty.
This is not our first experience with GOTA. Last year they hosted Arkham Horror, and the game master was an hour late. When she finally showed up, she was so hung over that she was shaking so badly she had trouble holding a cup of coffee. I don't know what she was taking besides liquor, and I don't think I want to know.
I think that in the future we'll just skip the events hosted by Gamers of the Apocalypse. I also think the Origins management team should do a better job of vetting the staff.
Random scribblings and thoughts about writing, publishing and the entire letters to dollars process. Includes copious notes about politics and everyday life.
Thursday, June 11, 2015
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Origins Gaming Convention, Part 2
On Thursday, June 4th, the three of us played our first registered event: Elder Sign. I mention this as a point of interest for two reasons:
Here is a shot of the winning board, which looks fairly chaotic. The game is complex, and the players must cooperate if they are going to win.
After the game, we walked around the dealer show a while. The crowd on Thursday was a little sparse by comparison with the weekend, but there was traffic.
I have no idea what the vendors pay for a booth, but I gather that Origins sold out of booth space.
- We won, which is rare with Elder Sign.
- The other events we registered for were canceled.
Here is a shot of the winning board, which looks fairly chaotic. The game is complex, and the players must cooperate if they are going to win.
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| Elder Sign - The Win! |
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| Dealer Show |
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Origins Gaming Convention, Part 1
I'm a gamer. I make no bones about it. I enjoy fantasy role play (FRP) games, as well as board games. About the only thing I don't enjoy (game-wise) are head games, especially with members of the opposite sex.
So last week I, along with my two brothers from other mothers, attended the Origins Gaming Convention in Columbus, Ohio. We've all attended Origins before, and so understand the dysfunctional system that the organizer mistakenly calls registration, but this year the glaring errors in the process were worse than ever.
The Origins Game Fair is organized by the Game Manufacturers Association, or GAMA, a non-profit organization based in Columbus, Ohio. Origins is held in the Greater Columbus Convention Center Hyatt Regency (GCCC/Hyatt). About 15,000 people attend the convention over five days, June 3rd through June 7th. Given the number of people, online preregistration is strongly encouraged.
The problems we encountered at Origins started with the online registration system, which might have been designed by an SJW suffering the effects of mescaline and PMS. The design is just this side of completely dysfunctional, but the worst part about the design is that one person isn't able to register several people for an event at the same time. So if you have a group going to Origins and you all want to attend one particular event, good luck. You must all register separately and hope that available slots don't fill up by the time the last person in your group registers. Making things worse is the downloadable event grid, which is in an *.xlsx format. If you don't have an up-to-date version of Micro$oft Excel, forget about trying to open it. Mind you, GAMA could have published this as a PDF file, which everyone can read, but I guess they didn't like that idea.
When you have trouble with the online system, you can try emailing GAMA. They won't answer any emails, but you can try. Mike sent GAMA four email messages and was ignored all four times. While one email message might get lost in the shuffle, two is improbable and four is just plain rude.
The three of us managed to register more by luck than anything else, and received an email message confirming our registration and providing us with a barcode that we will presumably scan when we get to the con.
The registration line at the convention is long. It's always long, and this year is no exception.
I'll give GAMA credit where it's due. Although the line was long, it moved right along and about 15 minutes later we had tickets to the three events we'd registered for, along with our badges and passes for the board room, an exclusive gaming area.
The printed version of the events list is not organized correctly. GAMA separates the list by genre, then by date and time. So, if you're trying to find out what might be available on Saturday morning, you end up flipping back and forth between sections of the program and getting more frustrated by the minute. Again, this is a simple fix that GAMA refuses to provide.
As I looked through the program, I noticed that several authors I admire were going to be present at Origins, but that none of them were holding a seminar. In particular Timothy Zahn was here, but he wouldn't be speaking anywhere. All the seminars were being held by someone whose name I didn't recognize. Then I discovered that Michael A. Stackpole was here, but not listed as a speaker. I found that very odd, as Stackpole is a high-energy sort that will hold a seminar for anyone.
I made a few inquiries and found out that the man in charge of printing the program had quit in 2014, just before the convention opened. His replacement was responsible for the myriad errors in the program. This is something that GAMA had one year to fix, and they couldn't even get this one right.
Then Mike pointed out the problem with the tickets.
This is a ticket for an event at Origins. Note that the ticket displays the name and number of the event, the date and time the event is held - but where, exactly, are we supposed to go? The locating is listed as the GCCC/Hyatt, but the room number and the table number are conspicuously absent, as is the name of the game master (who supplies the game, does the set up and teaches the rules as necessary). We went from the customer service booth to a large gaming room where we spoke with another official, who cheerfully admitted that GAMA screwed the pooch on this one and directed us to the correct table.
I mean, tickets, right? You'd think that someone would have proofed the tickets before printing and spotted this little error.
Tomorrow I'll be writing about the gaming experience we had at Origins.
So last week I, along with my two brothers from other mothers, attended the Origins Gaming Convention in Columbus, Ohio. We've all attended Origins before, and so understand the dysfunctional system that the organizer mistakenly calls registration, but this year the glaring errors in the process were worse than ever.
The Origins Game Fair is organized by the Game Manufacturers Association, or GAMA, a non-profit organization based in Columbus, Ohio. Origins is held in the Greater Columbus Convention Center Hyatt Regency (GCCC/Hyatt). About 15,000 people attend the convention over five days, June 3rd through June 7th. Given the number of people, online preregistration is strongly encouraged.
The problems we encountered at Origins started with the online registration system, which might have been designed by an SJW suffering the effects of mescaline and PMS. The design is just this side of completely dysfunctional, but the worst part about the design is that one person isn't able to register several people for an event at the same time. So if you have a group going to Origins and you all want to attend one particular event, good luck. You must all register separately and hope that available slots don't fill up by the time the last person in your group registers. Making things worse is the downloadable event grid, which is in an *.xlsx format. If you don't have an up-to-date version of Micro$oft Excel, forget about trying to open it. Mind you, GAMA could have published this as a PDF file, which everyone can read, but I guess they didn't like that idea.
When you have trouble with the online system, you can try emailing GAMA. They won't answer any emails, but you can try. Mike sent GAMA four email messages and was ignored all four times. While one email message might get lost in the shuffle, two is improbable and four is just plain rude.
The three of us managed to register more by luck than anything else, and received an email message confirming our registration and providing us with a barcode that we will presumably scan when we get to the con.
The registration line at the convention is long. It's always long, and this year is no exception.
 |
| Registration at Origins |
 |
| The Long Line for Registration |
The printed version of the events list is not organized correctly. GAMA separates the list by genre, then by date and time. So, if you're trying to find out what might be available on Saturday morning, you end up flipping back and forth between sections of the program and getting more frustrated by the minute. Again, this is a simple fix that GAMA refuses to provide.
As I looked through the program, I noticed that several authors I admire were going to be present at Origins, but that none of them were holding a seminar. In particular Timothy Zahn was here, but he wouldn't be speaking anywhere. All the seminars were being held by someone whose name I didn't recognize. Then I discovered that Michael A. Stackpole was here, but not listed as a speaker. I found that very odd, as Stackpole is a high-energy sort that will hold a seminar for anyone.
I made a few inquiries and found out that the man in charge of printing the program had quit in 2014, just before the convention opened. His replacement was responsible for the myriad errors in the program. This is something that GAMA had one year to fix, and they couldn't even get this one right.
Then Mike pointed out the problem with the tickets.
 |
| Event Ticket 2015 |
I mean, tickets, right? You'd think that someone would have proofed the tickets before printing and spotted this little error.
Tomorrow I'll be writing about the gaming experience we had at Origins.
Friday, May 1, 2015
Business Cards
I asked Tina Bongorno, the beautiful and talented lady who created the cover art for both my books, to design a business card for me. Here's the best of four final results.
What impressed me the most is that the staff at the print shop remembered the logo. Not me, of course - the logo.
"Oh yeah, you're the one with the feather and the ink well. Nice card."
Well, there you have it. At least an impression was made, which is worlds better than complete obscurity. My thanks to Tina for the excellent job she did on the card.
"Oh yeah, you're the one with the feather and the ink well. Nice card."
Well, there you have it. At least an impression was made, which is worlds better than complete obscurity. My thanks to Tina for the excellent job she did on the card.
Sunday, March 8, 2015
On Publishing and Associated Headaches
Writing a book is only part of the fun. Next comes editing (where you get to fix all the mistakes you made, including typos) then the real work begins. Over at the Mad Genius Club, Cedar Sanderson has put together a list of links to articles that will help make this process a lot easier. You can read all about it at From Writing, to Publication, and Beyond by Cedar Sanderson published on March 7, 2015.
Monday, February 23, 2015
Worthy Read
I enjoy reading the Mad Genius Club, and I found a particularly worthwhile post the other day. Check out Velocity and Trajectory: A guest post by Dorothy Grant. Dorothy writes about the new Amazon algorithm for determining a book's popularity, then provides a nice list of promotion sites.
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Health Update
The latest health news is in. I have type 2 diabetes which was brought on by obesity. I test positive for Human Papilloma Virus (HPV). Worse, I have squamous cell cancer which is in stage 4.
The good news is that the diabetes will leave when I lose the excess weight. The cancer is treatable by either surgery or a combination of radiation therapy and chemo therapy. Given that the surgery is 12 hours long and leaves permanent damage to my head and neck, I'm opting for radiation and chemo.
The national success rate for this is around 85%; My oncologist, Dr. Steven Rubin, has a success rate in the high 90s. I'll be having 7 weeks of radiation therapy, 5 sessions per week and 7 weeks of chemo therapy, 1 session per week. This translates into four months of misery.
Getting old isn't for sissies.
The good news is that the diabetes will leave when I lose the excess weight. The cancer is treatable by either surgery or a combination of radiation therapy and chemo therapy. Given that the surgery is 12 hours long and leaves permanent damage to my head and neck, I'm opting for radiation and chemo.
The national success rate for this is around 85%; My oncologist, Dr. Steven Rubin, has a success rate in the high 90s. I'll be having 7 weeks of radiation therapy, 5 sessions per week and 7 weeks of chemo therapy, 1 session per week. This translates into four months of misery.
Getting old isn't for sissies.
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