SCARAB 2012: The Geekcentric Experience
SCARAB Gaming Convention is a relatively small con that is held just a few hours from my current hometown every January. This was my second time attending this con, because it was only the second SCARAB they’ve held. I don’t want to pretend this is a full review or “after action report” of the con, because I wasn’t able to attend all four days and when I was there, I only experienced a small fraction of what SCARAB had to offer. I was busy running and facilitating games most of the time.
If you want to read about some of my experiences at SCARAB 2011, I recommend this article, and this one too. If you want to read a review of SCARAB 2012, I recommend the ConSCIENCE review by Clint and Jodi Black of Beautiful Brains Books & Games and Pinnacle Entertainment Group (Jodi is the president of Beautiful Brains and Clint is the Savage Worlds brand manager for Pinnacle). For more on this con’s excellent Kids’ Track, check out this article by Liz Schultz, who actually runs the Kids’ Track at SCARAB (and does a phenomenal job of it).
When I registered the games I wanted to run at this year’s SCARAB, the process was incredibly smooth and painless because all I had to due was send them to the Con Director and he got them entered into the WARHORN. From there, people could visit the con’s WARHORN site and sign up for whatever games they wanted to play. The fact that they could do this well in advance of the con meant that I had a fair idea of how much interest there was in each of my games, which ones would make, and what materials I needed to bring. Registration for games was even simpler at the con due to a small bank of computers in the lobby dedicated to game registration. The con staff was extremely helpful in assisting people with registering for games and as a GM, I could and did check in (probably way too often… actually, I did it obsessively) on who was signed up for my games, so I could be better prepared for the number of players I would need pregens for or how many dice I would need for Fiasco. It was a HUGE improvement over the sign-up sheets and hunting for players of the previous year.
I was supposed to arrive on the first day of the con, but several monkey wrenches got thrown into my plans starting about a week before con time. I was scheduled to run a Hunter: The Vigil game (and am still jonesing to run an H:tV one-shot since I didn’t get to run it there) on Friday night, but it was not to be. I didn’t actually arrive at the con until mid-morning on Saturday. I arrived feeling like I had already missed so much.
I was scheduled to facilitate a full day of Bully Pulpit Games‘ excellent Fiasco rpg that day, and finish it off with a late-night playtest of their upcoming game, Durance. I had plenty of time before my first Fiasco game to greet and chat with friends from last year’s SCARAB, who feel more like old friends than people I see once or twice a year at cons. I also had plenty of time to track down Clint and Jodi Black and pick their brains (Beautiful Brains?) about running Savage Worlds for my upcoming weekly home game.
My afternoon Fiasco game was excellent. The group of four players was the ideal size for Fiasco, and none of the players had ever played it before, so I got to introduce some new players to a game I love. We used the “Small Southern Town” (quite appropriately) playset and had a fairly typical, at least in my experience, game of Fiasco: things exploded, people died, lives were ruined. It was beautiful.
My evening Fiasco game was a ton of fun, but slightly less typical, in my experience. I had an incredibly large group of people who wanted to play and since most of them were hanging out together at the con, they wanted to all be in the same game together. Also, they had all played the game before. One of them was (is) a good friend of Bully Pulpit’s Jason Morningstar (a.k.a. the guy who wrote the game we were about to play). Being a bit of an entertainer, I switched gears a bit and adjusted for a table of 7 players. I enlisted Tobes, who is an excellent GM, to assist me in facilitating by playing most of the non-player characters. This allowed the players to focus more on their own characters and keep scenes short and focused. I chose “Flyover Country” as the playset because I was very familiar with it, as were a few of the players. It was an aggressive, or at least assertive, group. Several of them had agendas right from the beginning that they pursued zealously over the course of the game. We (myself and another player got to choose the tilt elements) chose 3 elements for the tilt instead of the customary two. This gave everyone something to angle for in the second act, which we shortened to one scene each. It was a new and entertaining experience, with a memorable story and some incredible lines. Having been a high school teacher and with lots of experience GMing for large groups, it was fun and manageable, if a bit of an adventure for me, but it isn’t something I would recommend for the faint of heart. It was, in short, a Fiasco.
My late-night game was a playtest of Bully Pulpit Games’ upcoming Durance rpg. I had previously played this game with my home group, but Jason sent me the latest updates right before the con and I dove in with 3 players, who weren’t all that aggressive, but were very much into examining the systems of the game and taking it apart to see how everything worked under the hood. We played a few scenes pretty straight, then cut to the chase and resolved the action at a fast clip. It was late, everyone was tired from a wonderful day of gaming, and they got what they wanted from the game.
After the day’s action, I spent a pleasant night at the con hotel and awoke reasonably well rested for the next day’s comparatively light action.
On Sunday, I was only scheduled to run one game. But there was one complication in that rather simple scenario.
I was originally supposed to bring a friend with me to SCARAB this year. I found out he couldn’t make it about a week or so before the actual con. I had added a game to the schedule to give him a chance to run something, since he loves to GM and doesn’t normally get the opportunity. The game he was going to run was Eden Studios‘ excellent zombie survival rpg All Flesh Must Be Eaten. Except now, he wouldn’t be there to run it.
The complication?
I had never GMed (or ZMed, since the GM is called the Zombie Master) a game of All Flesh Must Be Eaten in my 30 years of GMing.
Wait.
I’m not being totally honest here. In the interests of full disclosure, I have to admit something.
I had never even played All Flesh Must Be Eaten. Not once. I was a complete virgin to the game. I spent the entire week leading up to this game, feeling like the players were going to kill me and eat MY flesh. I was a complete charlatan. I was terrified that my lack of experience with this game would lead to horrible things. I mean, I own a copy of the game and my friend gave me a pretty good introduction to the rules and systems, but that was about it. I was fresh meat.
For this game, I chose a scenario written by James Wilber, “Parishioner’s Eyes.” This scenario was written for use at gaming conventions to introduce new players to the game. While it is a fairly straightforward AFMBE scenario, it does have some elements that are risky at a con. The first scene is a prequel, with the characters four years younger, and one of them not with the group at the beginning of the scene. This character would have to be rescued by the others. I was fortunate that all of my players were familiar with the game (or is that unfortunate?) and that I had a player who was willing to play this role.
SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for James Wilber’s “Parishioner’s Eyes” AFMBE scenario. Read at your own risk.
Before the session started, I studied and tried my hardest to memorize the conflict resolution mechanics of the game. I was comfortable with the scenario. It was the rules I was worried about.
When everything started, I relied on good ol’ campfire storytelling to get the players in the right mood. I also got a healthy dose of luck.
In the second scene, the characters are searching through a farm for supplies when one of them discovers a nearly full gas tank once used for filling up tractors and farm vehicles. In a world overrun by zombies, gasoline is a prized commodity. Just as I was hoping, that character failed to notice the zombie rounding the corner of the barn. The character behind him with a loaded shotgun did not fail to notice and when he fired the shotgun, he did not fail to miss the gas tank. He did miss the zombie, and only succeeded in lighting him on fire, which made an interesting resolution to the scene as they dispatched the hunk o’ burning zombie. This set up the final scene nicely.
The third scene involves the players finding a large group of survivors led by a former revival-style preacher wearing a thick, but ratty fur coat and lots of heavy gold chains. This was a role I could play. I spend a lot of time standing behind my chair swaying back and forth with my arms raised to the heavens. I really amped up the crazy for the next few scenes as the group became acquainted with this character and his post-apocalyptic cult. The players were well and truly weirded out by the time the cult started their crazy ritual and the girl who had developed a crush on one of the characters asked to leave with them.
This request was, of course, denied by the cult leader, who let the characters go on their way. Unfortunately, young love is always trouble. The young girl snuck out of the cult’s compound and followed the characters until she caught up with them when they were sleeping for the night. After a debate, they decided to let her come back to their nearby base of operations with them.
Cue the final scene.
The cult leader arrives at the base of operations with a small army of his cult followers and a semi truck containing who knows what, threatening to “Unleash the cleansing wrath of God” upon the characters unless they give back the girl.
Then, the player who hit the gas tank with the shotgun during the second scene got an idea. He worked his way close enough to the semi and quietly aimed for the gas tank while the cult leader spewed crazy talk and everyone else was involved in a tense standoff.
Cue pyrotechnics, large explosions and roasting flesh.
Roll End Credits.
The players had a blast (both literally and figuratively), and so did I. All of them thanked me for the best game of AFMBE they’d every played in. What?!? I really dodged a bullet on this one. I fooled them all. I actually, I had warned them up front that I was “relatively inexperienced” with running this game. If only they had known what that meant.
After that game was over, I thanked Del Collins, the excellent and friendly con director, and made the 3 hour drive back home. I would not be able to attend the final day of the con (damn you, real life and day job!), but I had a great time for the two days I was able to attend. All of my games had enough players to make (thanks in large part to the revamped scheduling system). I’m already looking forward to next year’s SCARAB (if they’ll have me back)!
