Hello there, readers. Long time, no see. Nobody probably noticed, but the blog has been on kind of a hiatus for the last six months or so. There are a number of reasons for this. A big part of it has been time. My schedule has been tighter and I've had things other than gaming taking up my time.
Another part of it is that I work in a game store. This isn't a new thing. It's been over a year since I started there and I still used to update. But as time goes on and I get more comfortable with the game community, I find I have more social outlets for my gaming. When I started the blog, you will find I was almost exclusively a solo gamer. Now I have a whole community of people to discuss and interact with, so the blog is less necessary than it used to be. This is a positive thing but it means the blog has gone unused.
On a slightly less positive note, this year has been a little hard on me physically and mentally. It is amazing how much chronic pain, depression and anxiety can sap your will to do the things you love. Playing a game seems like a chore and the paintbrush moves a little slower. These are things I'm dealing with and have always dealt with. I'm hoping in the new year that I can get a better handle on things.
So what does that all mean? Well it means I'm not going to try and force myself into a scheduled posting regime. No longer will I try to get a monthly post up, fail, feel bad, then forget to do it again. I'm going to just post when I feel like I have something to say. That might be a painting project I'm particularly proud of. It might be a game review or description. I might just pop in to say hi. I'm not sure exactly how it will go. It might end up I never post anything again. I hope that's not the case, because I've loved writing everything I have so far.
Ok, tired of listening to me ramble? Want to see the one thing I've gotten painted in the last six months? OK!
Back in August, Privateer Press put up a number of con exclusive models . Not only did I get to snag the Brute Thrall Femme Fatale I've been wanting for a while, but I also picked up the Bloody Buccaneer Brew version of Skarre.
Most of the BBB style models are pin-up types and for most of the Warmachine range that ends up looking rather ridiculous. For Skarre though, that sort of medium works. She's already a dangerous lady in skimpy clothing. In fact, they didn't even have to change her outfit much. And it's perfectly sculpted. The whole model just encapsulates the pirate queen in her natural element outside of battle, casually drinking a good brew (or maybe the blood of her enemies). She looks mischievous, yet relaxed. It just fits her whole character so well.
So without further rambling:
There are a couple of things I'm pretty proud of. First, I sculpted the floor with greenstuff so she would be standing on a tavern floor. Second, the cup of blood with the dribble down the side, just a little bit of red wash at the right angle. Finally, I did some jeweling on the dagger handle. It's a little hard to see because it's so small but I think it adds just a little extra touch to the whole.
I stuck pretty close to the original color scheme, since my Cryx are purple anyway and I like purple. This miniature didn't literally take me four and a half months to finish. I just took a long time between paint sessions on her. She languished untouched for all of October. But I finally got it done and I'm very happy with the result. She's now on display in the case at work for all to see.
That's all for now. With any luck, you will hear from me again soon. I have a couple of projects I'm excited about so I'm sure you will.
I have been a big fan of The Oatmeal for a while now. His style of humor just seems to mesh with my own in delightful ways. His sense of weird and truth (and weird truthyness) are everything I look for in comedy. And it doesn't hurt that his art is hilariously adorable. He is accurate about dogs, as well as cats and even grammar in a way mere mortals can only dream of being.
I guess you could say I like his work alot.
So when I heard that The Oatmeal was making a GAME on Kickstarter, I was intrigued. When I heard it involved kittens exploding, I pledged immediately. A lot of other people did too. In fact, people threw about 8 MILLION DOLLARS at him for the chance to meet their end via combustible feline.
The Oatmeal and his companions, Elan Lee and Shane Small, also did something that very few Kickstarter projects have achieved (especially one of this size): They delivered on time. They promised to ship in July, they shipped at the end of July and it just so happens that a few days ago I received my pledge. And now I'm here to share that with you.
A small blue box arrived with an adorable kitten and some big white letters on it.
I was mildly confused because it said it was shipped by Blackbox.
This box is blue. Not black. I expect better, dear sirs. I expect better. Luckily it got better. In fact, I received the best packing slip I have gotten in any package ever, and I doubt ever will again.
In fact all of the inserted paper materials have a delightful sense of whimsy about them.
Inside this blue (not black) box were two more boxes: My regular edition of Exploding Kittens and the NSFW edition.
A lot of fuss was made about the fact that a special addition was going to be made to the box, something that would surprise and delight us. At least in my case, they were correct. I could tell you what it is, but I think showing you would be better.
I spent a fair amount of time just opening the lid and giggling. I won't tell you exactly how much time, but I assure you it was inordinate and mildly disturbing.
Inside, of course, is the regular Exploding Kittens deck, a slot for a second deck and a little folded page of rules.
Lifting up the deck shows off the bottom, which has some lovely art of a litter box.
Lets not forget that I also got the NSFW Deck as well. The box is nice, but the deck will be going into that extra slot in the regular box for sure. It doesn't even have any cool art inside, just a plastic insert.
As for the game itself, well, it is not deep. Each player gets some cards, which do stuff and every turn each player can play those cards, then draw a card from the deck. If it is an Exploding Kitten and you don't have a Defuse card, you blow up and are out of the game. Last player standing wins. There are a couple extra rules, but that's the core of the game.
I will end this little unboxing with a selection of my favorite cards, first from the normal deck:
And then from the NSFW deck:
By the way, Smoke Crack With A Baby Owl is my favorite card. Of all time. In any game.
Life has been a little hectic over the last month. Moving a whole house, including about 3 times as many games as I thought I had, has kept me busy the last few weeks. But I'm glad I'm finally getting to sit down and type up the last day of Comic-Con. It has been almost exactly a month now, so hopefully I can remember everything. I'm also going to use this as a space to house the best cosplays we managed to get pics of. There were hundreds of great costumes but we sucked at getting pics.
Anyway, on to....
Day Three
Day Two was a fairly crazy affair, so we were looking forward to a much easier Day Three. We only had three goals that day: An autograph from Jewel Staite, John Barrowman's personal panel and the walk-on costume contest, which Brigid had signed up for.
Easy, however, was not on the agenda.
The con was starting a little later in the day, so we were able to sleep in a little bit. We made our way over and immediately made our way to the autograph area. We were significantly early, so we were third in line! We felt very proud of ourselves for making it early so we would have plenty of cushion time before Barrwman's panel, considering the Torchwood fiasco the day before.
This turned out to be a futile endeavor. Jewel ended up being about an hour late, which made us panic immensely. Not only did we question our time frame, but after her being so elusive the day before, we were worried she might skip out altogether. Eventually, though she did appear and I got my pic signed.
I had her write "Stay Shiny!" on it, which probably made her want to kill me with a hatchet. Scrawling the same word over and over in some variation on thousands of pictures of her own face probably was starting to wear a little thin. Whatever. Screw her sanity, I got my commemorative item.
I don't want to sound ungrateful, but Jewel Staite was probably my least favorite celebrity interaction. It was wonderful to get to meet her, but it just didn't come off as warm or friendly as the others we'd had. That's not to say she was rude. She was perfectly pleasant and I was still thrilled to be near her and shake her hand. But the same energy just wasn't there. I like to think that maybe she was just exhausted or feeling ill (hence being late) and that the fun, quirky, happy woman we had seen in the panel earlier was still in there, just taking a small nap.
We made a mad dash for the panel area, getting there a scant 2 hours early. People were already lined up for Barrowman and had been for at least an hour. In order to mitigate the possibility of a situation like the day before, no one was allowed up the escalators/stairs unless they were going to another panel or entering the costume contests. Anyone done with their business had to go back downstairs immediately. A pre-line of 125 people had been allowed and there would be an announcement when the second pre-line would be formed.
Of course the same problem persisted: the area at the end of the stairs was big and soon began filling up with nerds waiting to be in the second pre-line. And yes, we were in that group of nerds. So we were part of/witness to the shenanigans that followed.
As soon as the first line began to move and the second line announced, the wave of geeks surged forward. The mighty Linemaster, blocking the end of the stairs, raised his arms and shouted, "Anyone within 10 feet of me is not getting in!"
Dorks scattered like cockroaches away from him, to sit perched at the perimeter of his ultimatum like hyenas around a lion's kill. Every attempt to form a second line ended in a similar result, even with threats to cancel the panel. Once again there were a good thousand people who didn't realize that they weren't getting in, as if some miracle was going to add seats to this wondrous, extra dimensional amphitheater. Somehow they managed another 125 people up the stairs without an act of savagery. Only 100 people remained but the natives were getting restless
The final solution is that everyone was forced out of the lower area and past the 5 sets of double doors, people streaming out into the general convention area. It was then announced that they would take 20 people from each door. We rejoiced because we were easily within the first 15 of our door. In case you doubt the mass of people that was there, I did manage to get a few quick snaps of the crowd this time.
Yes, those are all people waiting to see John Barrowman. Soon our door (slightly right of the center doors) opened and the lady said she would start by taking four people, two couples. Our hands shot up and we and a pair of boys were let through and instructed to see the lady in the very tactical looking vest by the stairs. As we made our way over, the center doors burst open and a column of nerds surged through, heading for the stairs. We hustled over and were given our numbers as the staff yelled at each other about ignoring the plan. Apparently the even promoter told them to open the center doors. They were very lucky no one got trampled. We took our ink (I was number 200; I don't pretend to understand their numbering system) and headed upstairs, the worst over.
Once again, the John Barrowman panel was amazing. Easily the best time by far. The only picture that can sum it up is this one:
However if you require a more in-depth account, Brigid has several videos on her YouTube account. If you have to watch just one though, it has to be this one.
After the panel Brigid attempted to get to her costume contest, but three days of stress and exhaustion finally caught up with us. We cut our losses and made our way back to the hotel to gather our things.
We did, however, happen to have one last celebrity interaction before we left. It turns out that Jason Momoa was staying in our hotel and he walked through the lobby while we were waiting for our cab!
We feared decapitation, so we didn't say hi.
Soon, though we were on a bus and on our way home, happy and exhausted. The whole thing was an amazing experience. In fact, Brigid had so much fun that she has signed up up for Vermont Comic Con in October. I'm not sure it'll be as fun, but it might be less stressful.
That's all for the con adventures. Now I will just leave you with pictures of amazing cosplays!
Cosplay Critters
We managed a ton of pics of Doctor Who related pics with some lovely people:
Brigid also made Con-friends with an Ianto and Jack couple (also seen above):
We also got a nice variety of other characters from various sources:
Steampunk Tony Stark
A very Bale-esque Batman
An incredibly impressive Predator
Piracy is alive in Boston
Who ya gonna call?
A Rosie The Riveter themed Wonder Woman
One bad-ass Mr. Freeze
A very horny Loki-lady and the whitest of Power Rangers
The best at what he does and what he does is cosplay.
They certainly put a smile on our face.
The god of thunder demands to check out!
This Planet Express crew has a shiny metal ass you can bite.
I have no idea what this is supposed to be.
This is just plain insanely awesome. The Imperium is definitely safe with these guys around.
And that's it for cosplays! I hope you enjoyed the report even if it was insanely long. And if you missed out on the other parts, you can find them here and here!
After crashing hard following Day One, we woke early the next morning to continue the Comic Con madness. Hereafter follows the account of...
Day Two
This being only our first con, Brigid did an extremely brave thing and decided to cosplay. She worked up a full costume for Doctor Who/Torchwood's Captain Jack Harkness, complete with awesomely badass (and extremely expensive) coat.
The day before had been about taking in the sights and checking the lay of the land. Today was to be all business. With a jam packed schedule of autographs, photo ops and panels, this was going to be the true test of our con mettle.
The first thing we did upon entering was head straight to the signing area. We waited in line about an hour for John Barrowman, who was a tiny bit late since he had come straight from shooting and I'm sure was exhausted. However, John was extremely friendly and accommodating to his fans and had great energy at the table. Not only did he sign a picture for us, but he also signed Brigid's Captain Jack coat while she was wearing it!
Then we stopped at Sean Astin's table and he was very friendly. I got him to sign my mini Lord of the Rings SBG book, right over Samwise's profile.
We also spotted James Marsters at a distance:
And Jason Momoa, who did a walkthrough of the signing area. Dude is fucking huge. I took a video and the thing looks like a damn sasquatch film:
After getting our signatures, we went to the Star Wars comics panel. We let shortly after it began. We didn't recognize the artists, the room was small, it was hard to hear and generally bored us to death. So we snuck out and went back to get Eve Myles signature.
Eve was awesome. She was super friendly, and even though we had to pay $20 for table pictures, she let us do multiple for that amount and was fun and silly. The whole thing was a riot.
We tried to hunt down Jewel Staite, but she seemed to have disappeared. She didn't seem to be around much on Saturday at all. Oh well, we would catch her on Sunday
Giving up on Jewel, we hurried over to the amphitheater because the Torchwood Reunion panel was going to start in an hour and a half. Now, this might seem excessive to try and line up that early, but people had already been lining up for an hour before this. Try as they might to keep the area clear and send people away, a mass of about 1000 people eventually congregated at the bottom of the stairs to the auditorium. Brigid and I managed to sneak in the side near the front, but that was about the time shit hit the fan.
You see, at the bottom of these stairs was a foyer surround by a semicircle of glass with 5 doors situated at even points in this semicircle. The foyer held about 500 of these rabid fans, who were packed like sardines. I wanted to take a picture of the crowd, but I literally couldn't get my phone out of my pocket. Now, only two of the 5 door were open and the other 500+ people waiting were streaming out these doors into the convention center. The nutty part of all this?
The amphitheater only holds 350 people.
This mass of writhing nerds was composed of people who had been waiting 2 hours (while breaking the rules about where to wait as much as possible), people who had been waiting an hour or less (while following the rules) and a small war was beginning to break out as to who could get in first. Some of the 2 hour people had been pushed further back and were pleading to be let in first. The hour people were trying their best to keep them back and wanted only the front of the crowd let in. There was yelling, pushing, and some people who tried to climb the sides of the escalators and run past the crowd control people.
At this point they threatened to cancel the panel and a deafening silence fell over the crowd. The organizers asked everyone to move back, so the crowd started to move. But then, the rear of the crowd past the doors (who couldn't hear the announcement) began to push forward to keep their spot. This meant the people at the back near closed doors had nowhere to go, so were being squished and also pushed forward. People not at the edges of the crowd (Brigid and I included) began to be ground together and generally mushed. It was a miracle nobody actually got hurt.
Finally the organizers made everyone stop and began taking people 10 at a time from the front of the crowd to get in, under threat of cancellation if we made a fuss. Luckily Brigid and I got in and the panel was fantastic. Nothing I post here will be able to do it justice, so I am just going to direct you to Brigid's YouTube Channel, where several videos reside.
We went home and crashed shortly thereafter with a dinner of various snacks acquired from the nearby
7-11. Not the best of plans, but we could barely move and that was the easiest, closest thing.
That's Day Two! If you haven't checked out Day One, go here and stay tuned for Day Three!
