Vacation Gaming, part II

A followup to the previous post:

I returned to the store (Tower Games in Minneapolis) later, during business hours, and was pleasantly surprised. Although the tabletop RPG selection was a bit limited, it did include plenty of Pathfinder and Mongoose Traveller materials, so my gamer aesthetic sense was satisfied. I had a brief, but pleasant, conversation with the owner, who was preparing to sell some of his old stuff on ebay; it included the Mentzer Basic D&D and other mid-80s-era TSR products.

I ended up buying no RPG merchandise except for a single d6, but instead bought the Lovecraftian boardgame Elder Sign. Put out by Fantasy Flight, it's a different (and much quicker) take on Arkham Horrror, re-using a lot of the artwork but using a task resolution system that reminds me of nothing so much as the 4th edition D&D Skill Challenge system. The number of dice rolled represent the number of failures you have left, and the type of result rolled on the specialized dice represent the kind of successes. It works for a boardgame, and very well.

The proprietor mentioned their open game nights, and said that Wednesday was D&D/Pathfinder night. So on Wednesday, I returned to check out the miniatures and bulk out my d6 collection--I'm a little retentive about the kinds of dice I lug around--and while I was shopping, I eavesdropped on the games.

One of the DMs seemed to have pitch-perfect narration: succinct but clear description and a fast-paced narrative style. I almost felt pangs of jealousy until I saw that he was reading directly from some pre-printed text, when all the sadness went away. I'm not a fan of pre-packaged narration, because it presupposes when and how players will meet NPCs or encounter other game elements--at best. At worst, it's a sign of out-and-out railroading. The guy did seem to have a good flair for the dramatic when the interaction went off-page, but nothing that a mere mortal like me couldn't pull off.

It turns out I spent the most time looking at Crusader Miniatures.They produce a line of historical figures for old-school wargames: Saxons, Vikings, Medieval Spaniards, Irish warriors, and the like. While not as detailed as the fantasy miniatures for D&D and Pathfinder, they appealed to me more because of their relative historical accuracy (as far as I could tell) and their price. A typical set of 8 figures was priced at $18.00, or $2.25 a figure. I'm told the Old Guard thinks that's outrageously high, but for RPG figures, where the typical price starts at $5.99 for a single piece, it's a steal.

I'm probably going to go there one more time during my trip and purchase some of those minis. I try not to buy on impulse, Elder Sign not withstanding, and I want to have a good look at what kind of historically-accurate warriors I want to collect (even if they're going to be used in a historically-impossible fantasy setting).

cheers,
Adam

Vacation Gaming, part I

Vacationing away from Southern Arizona, I find myself in Minneapolis during what I am told is an "unseasonably warm" week in January, which means that water is frozen into ice, but Nitrogen has not liquefied yet. I still need to bundle up, but apparently not as much as if I were at an Arctic station.

I drove by a gaming store here last night, and decided that, since it's within walking distance, I'd pay it a visit this morning and see what the local gaming vibe was like. Turns out they're not open until 2 p.m. That may itself be a sign that the gaming economy here doesn't support a full-time store. Of course, I've always wondered how furniture stores stayed open when everyone else was at work or in school, so my understanding of retail economics is sketchy at best.

I did take a peek in the window to see what I could; the first thing I saw was a White Dwarf display rack. The next thing I saw was a pegboard full of Warhammer minis. In fact, it seemed like most of the floor space was turned over to miniature-based sci-fi wargaming. In the back, barely lit by the reflected sunlight in the window, was a Dungeons and Dragons display rack. I wondered if there weren't some other games behind that, but I saw no identifiable logos. No White Wolf, no Pathfinder.

But speaking of gaming economy, I do know that a smart retailer apportions floorspace according to the most profitable merchandise, and it isn't really a surprise that miniatures are more profitable than rulebooks. After all, you can get by with only one set per 1-5 people, and with pdfs--not exactly a retail-friendly product--you can get by even without those. But you need bunches of minis to play W40K or other wargames, and there isn't yet a good digital substitute for them.

Still, I plan to visit them again soon, during business hours, and see what tabletop RPG goodness they might have. I'm hoping that, at the very least, it isn't the generic D&D plus White Wolf...I'm hoping that it has a touch of local flavor. After all, we're not that far from Wisconsin and Illinois, where the hobby was born.

cheers,
Adam