[GenCon 2005] Auxiliary Gaming Zone

[Ben Lehman]

Hi, everyone.

So, last year, we had the combined problems of:

1) Too many people at the booth.  We love it when our good friends come and hang out with us, but if it stops us from selling games, we stop loving it so much.

2) Not enough folks knew how to demo each other's games.  As far as I am concerned, playing in each other's demos doesn't rectify this problem at all.  Demoing a game (or, at least, demoing my game) requires a deeper knowledge than you get from 10 minutes of play.

3) Not enough gaming time.  Only playing one (or sometimes two) games a night is a problem, at least for me.

Andy posted his excellent solution to this in this thread.  In short, his idea is to find a space that we can constantly play 2-4 hour pick-up games in, throughout the con.  I want to make sure that his idea happens, which means we need auxillary space for playing games in.

My goals for this space are, in order of priority:

1) It be GenCon legal
2) It be easy to find and maintain throughout the con (so people could show up any time they want to play some games and find others willing to do so)
3) It be comfortable
4) It be easily accessible from the booth
5) It be used to promote the booth

Here are four ideas for space we could use.

1) Some free table in the dealer's room, which has the possibility of all 5.  If this is actually legal, it is pretty much ideal.  If someone with a relationship to GenCon LLC could ask about what we can and cannot do with those tables (not as a commercial entity, but as participants in the Con), that'd be butter.

2) Some space in a hallway outside the dealer's room.  This fails both 2 and 3, but it has the advantages of being most likely accessible and seeing a lot of folks.

3) Some space in the open play room.  This is okay, but I don't know how far it will be from the dealer's room, nor do I know how easy it will be to "stake out a territory" in the open play rooms.

4) Someone's hotel room / suite.  This has the problem of needing to leave one person there all the time to open doors, plus someone would have to volunteer their room.  Furthermore, it isn't accessible.  But it is very maintainable.  We could even stock it with some snacks and drinks at use it as a general R&R room for booth workers.

Any other ideas?  Anyone else want to make this happen?  Anyone want to talk to GenCon and see about the legality of these options?

yrs--
--Ben

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

If the hall has those open tables again, we'll use them.

If not, then some alternative must be found, just as you describe. I'll get in touch with Peter and see what he says.

Also, Ben, everything you're saying fits right into my Nefarious Plan for demo-development and other aspects of the booth.

Best,
Ron

[Ben Lehman]

Excellent.

Is there anything I can do to be of assistance in making this happen, or is it In Good Hands?

P.S.  Apropos of #4 on my list: Having a "Con Suite" set up with some healthy snacks {carrots and the like} and drinks for the Booth workers would be a great idea, either somewhere in the convention center (if legal) or in someone's room (if we could get someone to open the door / who didn't mind sharing their key and had a suite adjoining the convention center.)  This could be together with or apart from the Auxiliary Gaming Zone.

P.P.S.  I'm willing to do work on such a thing, but only if there is interest in using it, people are willing to provide a small amount of cash for it, and I'm not stuck with sole maintainance of it throughout the Con (Essentially: there is interest enough to get a couple of other volunteers.)

yrs--
--Ben

[Matt Gwinn]

The Indy gaming explosion games are all in the same room (207).  Chances are (based on past GenCOns) that there will be at least one free table in there at any given time.  Seeing that at least half of the games being run in that room (except on Friday) will be Forge games anyway, I don't think any of the GMs will complain.

,Matt

[TonyLB]

P.S.  Apropos of #4 on my list: Having a "Con Suite" set up with some healthy snacks {carrots and the like} and drinks for the Booth workers would be a great idea

Isn't there going to be a hotel room that is serving as back-room for stock?

I worry (a very little) about the dangers of mixing snacks and stock, but there's a pretty big benefit to putting the food somewhere that we need people to be going a lot anyway.  It turns "We're running low on Dogs... someone needs to run to the room!" into "I'm hungry.  What can I bring back from the room on my way?"