"Worst gaming convention experience???" Topic

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What has been your most forgettable day at a gaming con?

Getting assaulted in Lancaster at Historicon a few years back. I needed a root canal eventually to fix the damage done.

I have also had that same situation happen to me at MEPACON. It is not a historical con at all as I found out several years back when no one wanted to play in my historical games but were quite happy playing some game that involved Play dough (no joke) at the next table.

I had not used the MEPACON name, but of course this was the convention I was referring to. I will never go back, or if I do, I will take a carload of buddies with me to make sure that there's at least a few gamers there to play the Gettysburg game.

Just thinking of those "delectable" hotdogs from that nightmarish trip has my stomach churning again.

At least today I will be in Gettysburg signing books at the annual History Meets the Arts festival and then taking my first detailed look around the new Vistors Center. Hopefully it will be a better day than the MEPACON day…

Strangely enough I will be at Gettysburg today too. I'm leaving in 40 minutes with a bunch of friends (and a couple of their kids.) Maybe I'll see you there.

And I would add that MEPACON is not a bad con at all. It is well run, with friendly staff. It is just not a historical con at all. It isn't much of a wargaming con in my experience either although that may have changed.

They had a lot of people there enjoying themselves just not doing historical gaming.

If I was in gettysburg, I'd have lunch at O'Rourkes. :)

Agreed, MEPACON looked to be a fun con if I was into fantasy gaming. Everyone was having a good time (except me by that point). It is well managed and run, and someday perhaps we historical gamers should collaborate and make a stronger presence. I'm sure the organizers would not mind the added attendance and admission monies. Perhaps it's a great possibility for a Warhammer ACW game or two?

And Lord Billington Wadworth, your excellency, I heartily agree that O'Rourke's is a fine place to eat. I also enjoy the Dobbin House, the Gingerbread Man, and the Lincoln Diner. All sure beat gas station hot dogs!!

I ran a FIW skirmish game using GASLIGHT as the rule set. I had a prime spot at the local Winter War convention, a prime time, Saturday morning, and I like to think a nice visual setup. About a half hour before the game was to begin I started the setup. The green vinyl (naugahyde) table cloth lets me pour Woodland Scenics small ballast roads. Cork board hills make for rocky outcrops. Woodland Scenics trees in fall colors. Rail Fencing for the roads. Those "grass" door mats cut up in 2x3 squares make a nice "wheat" field. Woodland Scenics chunky ground cover spread around the naugahyde cloth give a rough feel to the open areas. Resin buildings grace the landscape, just right for the Indian attack. A small fort at the end of the table for the valiant Redcoats to sally forth from. Now for the figures. O.K. which box did I pack the figures in? Not this one. Nope, not that one. Nor this one. I'm out of boxes. WHERE THE HELL ARE THE FIGURES? Not a one to be found. Then a profound revelation. I didn't pack the figures. They are setting at home. And the game starts in ten minutes. Frantically I leap in the car and start for home. I only live about 15 miles away. Half hour there and back if I'm lucky. I'm not. More stoplights than I can recall and all of them red. And one woman in an SUV sits thru a green light while talking on her cell phone. Then runs the red light. I finally get home. No figures. I search and search. Finally I give up. Back at the con, about 45 minutes after the game was to start, I have to tell the players that the figures have gone walkabout. At that point the fellow running the game next to me taps me on the shoulder. "Is this your box? I got it mixed in with my stuff when I was setting up." Yup. My box. My figures. We play and have a good time, but I don't ever want to go through that again. I aim now for "one box games" that pack into a single large tub. If that it missing I'll know it right away.

I think I've forgotten those pretty efficiently.

Only have memories of tournaments with losing every battle, having a demo table in a dark spot of the hall, having individual stands of troops completely crushed by the hands of enthusiastic Englishmen and going home early because of feeling ill.

A second bad gaming experience. I went to Little Wars when it was held at a motel convention center. You got a number of tickets equal to the number of sessions and could use a ticket for any game. A friend and I wandered past a nice FIW layout with a fort and woodlands and some well painted figs. Looked good to us so we handed the game master our tickets. That inspired a couple of other folks to join up and in short order the game was full up. The gamemaster didn't look very happy. He handed us an index card with "all" the rules on it, explained them, told us what the objective was, then started the game and sat back to watch. A turn or so into the game several fellows walked up and asked him what happened. They thought they were going to play the game with their buddy, the gamemaster. After some discussion, all of them, including the grumpy gamemaster, left. We were on our own. No rules interpretation available. No one of whom we could ask questions. The game sputtered to a halt and eventually we all wandered away. Coming back past the table about an hour later, guess what we find. Yup. The GM and his buddies happily playing the game.

I played in a game at Little Wars where the GM took every question about the rules (even "what do I need to roll") as some kind of personal attack or challenge and routinely snapped at players (myself and one other were the only ones out of 8 who had ever played the game and he was using a modified version of it). As the game went on the US side became less interested; if they asked a question about how something would work (to formulate some kind of defense) they got attitude. Lots of eye rolling all around. Eventually we got to the end, got criticised by the GM on our bad playing, and went our own ways. Later, as I wandered around the Con that weekend, I'd pass a player from that game and we'd share that acknowledging nod that said "hey you were in that game and survived" or we'd have a chuckle about it. I still see the GM running events there so I know which ones to not sign up for. Didn't ruin the con though but it was the first time I've experienced that.

Past cold wars was the first con I had been to since my son was born in November. I was still suffering from lack o sleep and I only wen for the day. We ended up playing in one game only, a game of Lapanto wars. It was a lot of fun but traveling 2 hours each way and being tired, I was not really feeling the joy.

Despite all of that, it sounds like you had a worse time than I. :(

I remember a con where we had set up a beautiful game recreating the town of Clervaux during the Battle of the Bulge. My friends and I pooled our terrain, minis etc.. We had a lot of people walk by and admire the setup. We must have had 50 people taking photos of the table. We only had two players. Oh yeah, it was a con that was a mix of everything.

I remember Gencon SoCal where we had set up a Viet Nam game with huts, helicopters, recoilless rifles and lots of jungle.
Great terrain, but no one came to play whatsoever. People would rather play at another table next to us that the felt mat, one tree, one ruin and they were happy with it. There may have been unpainted minis to go with it as well.
GenCon SoCal was primarily fantasy/collectible miniatures collectible card games.

People like simplicity. They think that if a game looks complicated, it will take too long and therefore it won't be worth playing. Lots of eye-candy will make games look complicated. A felt mat and one tree looks more accessible.

My son and I played in a convention game run by a guy notorious for what followed.
We played in a Western game while he was also running a naval game at the same time on a neighboring table.
He briefly outlined the rules, and I suppose he did the same to the naval game. He ate his dinner through the first turn or two, and then left. Disappeared.

In the meantime, we found that his rules were not as crystal clear as he thought. Anarchists took over the game in the form of the players playing the Banditos, whose interpretation of such things as movement rates was rather imaginative. I shot one figure in the doorway which represented the Bandito chief. "Oh, wait a minute. That's the wrong figure." So, he put a peon there in its place.
And so on.
Great experience with an 8 year old by your side.

I have since confirmed with other players that that is how he "runs" all of his gmes.

Geez. My own bad experiences have now been put into perspective.

(1) A very strange man with no social skills whatsoever abruptly decides to upgrade me from "complete stranger" to "trusted friend" and follows me around talking at me about games I've never heard of, then asks me to help him set up a table, and then cops an attitude with me when I don't want to.

(2) A drunk person suddenly and explosively vomits across the highly detailed surface of Macragge, drowning a battalion of beautifully painted Tyranids, and opening up a new flank for the Space Marines. It was not my table, my scenery, or my figures, but it was a hell of a sight, let me tell you.

"A drunk person suddenly and explosively vomits across the highly detailed surface of Macragge,……it was a hell of a sight, let me tell you."

YES! I'd do it sober! After helping of split pea soup and chicken and rice with a side of carrots. Techicolor!

So far mine is setting up for a game on Saturday morning this past Cold Wars and not a single player showed. The game next to me, which I hate to admit was ran by one of the best convention GM's I've known, is packed to the gills. Such is the GM's fate.

Joey

No, scratch that, not having players is just annoying. Let me tell the real worst one.

I was running a zombie cowboy game us the .45 Adventure rules. My game was is stashed in a far off room of the Eisenhower that required a sherpa and an armed escort to find. The room is filled with several gamers who have either set up in the room or were playing a previously schedule game, I couldn't tell. Included in these gamers is a group of about 4-5 kids who are between 6-10 years old. Well a buddy of mine had already set up his giant robot game and they instantly swooped in on him and started fiddling with his stuff. Dad and his buddies kept an eye on them, but didn't really keep them in hand. Now I know what's going to happen when I drop the first zombie. Cries of ooh's and aah's ring out and the little dears swarm my table. They want to play my game of course, but I tell them I have to wait if any pre-registered players show up. I get two of course and my buddy's game is full, so the kids take the other spots in my game. Great I think, but hey at least dad's nearby by. Guess what. Dad and his buddies kiss the little dear's goodbye, confirm that their walkie-talkies work (I kid you not), and leave. So there I am with two nice players and a baker's half-dozen of over-sugared elementary kids. Thank the stars a group of teenagers wandered in a few minutes later who were interested in playing. I don't think I've every been thankful to see teenagers before. Well I quickly parceled out the teens into teams with the kids and we started playing. Of course, the little kids got bored half way through and wandered around. Still most of the players had fun. What was cool was that one of the teenagers had a great time and he stopped me at Cold Wars and mentioned how much fun he had. That felt pretty good. I just can't believe how irresponsible some parents are. I and other game masters are not babysitters. After that I put a blurb in my game write-ups that kids are welcome with a playing adult. Some day I shall recount the tale of "chair flying kid'.

Joey

Five of us drove to Nashcon in the late 90's. It was my first con. One game was a WWII skirmish game set on the Eastern Front. We all signed up to play and sat down to play. The GM announced that they were his home rules and that he had not had a chance to play test the scenario or the rules. It was down hill from there. My squad slowly worked its way into the city and then they were dead. Everyone's squad died on first contact with the other side. After 30 minutes everyone had another squad and and a few minutes later it was dead too. I was introduced to bad home rules and an unplaytested scenario.

We all went back to our rooms grumbling about the stupid rules.

A friend of mine had a worse experience. At Historicon he signed up for a game and then had to listen to the GM give a lecture on the battle for over an hour before any player did anything on the table. He waisted a whole game session on listening to the GM talk about the battle.

Terry

Three stand out in my mind:

1: Nancon 86..where the Twilight 2000 tournament is a total complete farce. The guy running it uses a computer to "roll the dice". It's supposed to be a 2 hour tournament game. It takes 2 hours for everyone to roll up their characters, before it even starts! The only girl in the group, (who happens to be dressed like tinkerbell and sitting on the floor rubbing the gm's leg), actually wins the tournament.

2: Bayou Wars 2004. I played in a pirate game where I played the townsfolks, and the objective was to stop the pirates from coming out of the jungle into town and taking the ship.
Okay Me: "Do any of my people have weapons?"
GM: "Just the two guys at the tavern, they have clubs."
Hmmm..Me: "Okay, can I scuttle the ship?
GM: "no"
Me: "Can I said off in the ship?"
GM: "No."
Me: "Can I toss the gangplank in the water?"
GM: "No"
Me: "Hmmm..that's a cannon on top of the tower right? Can I use it?"
GM: "No. It's a signal cannon."
ME: "Can my people attack?"
GM: "No."
Me: "So what am I supposed to do again?"
GM: "Defend the town."
Me: "How?"
GM: "You figure it out."

So I spend most of the game herding animals throught the town to keep them from being taken by the pirates. My cell phone rings, and I excuse myself from the table to take the call. When I get back, I find out that the GM has "moved" my stuff all over. (According to him, since I wasn't there, the firing caused the animals to scatter), and then when the boy playing the British Marines accidentally dropped a die on the table and knocked over two figures, the GM said "Well a meteor just hit the ground and killed two people!" and took out his knocked over troops (which happened to be his commander and another marine).
I said "Hey..he just dropped the dice."
The GM then said loudly to me: "YOU DON"T ARGUE WITH GOD!"
Whereupon I said "1: You aren't God. 2: This is a game. 3: You are making an ass of yourself, 4: Get a grip.

And I walked off.

3: Imagine going to a con (which shall remain nameless), and setting up a really attractive fun game, and then finding out that other GM's (local ones that also run games), complain to the convention staff that "When Murph runs his game, he has a lot of people and they have more fun, and no one wants to play ours. It's not fair!", and being told by the convention staff that "You aren't allowed to run the game you listed because the other GM's are jealous."

Yeah it's happened to me. Had a couple of them get upset because I was running a game and it looked better than their WWII setup, and we were having more fun, than they were. To tell the truth they were the standard "grumpy gamers" anyway, and each move on their game was followed with a history lesson.

Needless to say I didn't go back.

Playing a Napoleonic game st a convention. It was a set of home brew rules. The Author, running the game, made a big point about wanting a playable game. He would always go with playability over realism. I was advancing with my troops and I was attacked, one of my units routed. All of my units routed and I could not rally any of them. I asked the author that this seemed to be a bit hard to rally my troops. He went on to say that when one unit routed all most always the units around the routed unit stayed in place. That is what happened historically. Gosh I spent three hours trying to rally my troops and I guess playability went out the window.

I can't remember a bad experience, I'm happy to say.

I once attended a convetion held in a barn. A real, honest to goodness barn.

There were two lightbulbs in the room. The dim illumination these provided was augmented by sunlight streaming in through the cracks between the boards in the walls.

However, it was late fall and a bit cold outside. It was a bit cold inside as well. I played a SYW game – in the dark -with rules that made no sense and could not be explained. Finally the game ended.

I wandered downstairs – into the barn's 'basement' – where I find a well lighted, heated space total filled with CCG gamers.

Worst convetion ever.

I don't recall its actual name, but it will forever be known to the survivors as "BarnCon".

My only bad historical gaming event was my first – at a local store when I lived in LA. They were running a "minicon" to drum up business. I had never bought nor played with historical minis, but was an avid player of board games, so I went to see what it would be like to play advanced squad leader with minis.
I show up, say hi, and ask to join the game. I get a company of russian assualt engineers who's job is to clear a hill. The hill is being held by a guy who is the buddy of the GM, and amazingly has 4 heavy machine guns on it. There is no defensive terrain that can possibly stop this – any hex they can see, they can destroy, and they can see them all. I have no long range weapons – in fact, from my deployment area, I'm not even in range to fire on this position with small arms. It's three turns of movement (two over open ground) to get to the peak of the hill. I advance through the woods toward my objective, and my troops start dying in platoon sized chunks. With the castualties I'm taking under cover, I realize that none of my troops will survive the approach to the hill, so I try to at least back up and hunker down to wait for armor support – but there's no place to hide, so it's just me getting shot and taking it with a straight face. I think I "enjoyed" all of a half an hour of real time before my force was destroyed and I went home.

So, as I walked into the store that day, I was a semi-regular customer looking for some fun, possibly making some friends, and maybe, just maybe, I would have joined a local gaming group (if one existed – I still don't know if one did). I left hoping not to see any of those people again, and I didn't try historical minis again for another 6 years.

The worst for me was I was running a The Sword and The Flame game using the lastest version. One of the players is a natural talker (meaning: talks to hear himself talk and to prove to others he is intelligent), but he has played other versions of the rules. The end result is he is constantly asking how "such & such" rule differs from earlier versions.

For the first half hour I am having difficulty concentrating on the game at hand by answering all of his questions with "I don't know, I've never played that version, this is the rules here on this table."

I became so exhausted with the constant yimmer-yammering, I flagged a buddy who was wandering and oogling the other tables, and asked if he could watch my flank by listening to this one player. My buddy looked over, saw who it was, and said "Oh, him! All of the favors I owe you are now wiped clean."

Bless his heart, he proceeded to answer and talk with that player for the rest of the game. I didn't know this player had a reputation as a Mr. Chit-Chat.

That was nice of your friend to do that, I'd rather be with a Lecter than a lecturer.

Last year at Little Wars I singed up for a post apocolyptic skirmish game. Each player had a small group of scavangers adn a vehicle. The figs were nice and varied and the terrain layout was excellent. What was terrible were the rules. They were a home brew set that they were trying out and intended to publish soon. The rules were uneccesarily complex and when anyone tried to ask questions, the gms would sigh and shake their heads like it was a huge hassle to explain their rules. What really irked me is that they would disapear to go have a smoke or chat with people who were more interesting than the ones playing their game. I did manage to win a gift certificate for playing though.

Then this year at Little WArs I was playing in a Pulp game and some guy and his two young sons come over and check out the game. We are pretty much in mid game with lots of stuff happening and the guy walks away and leaves his kids behind. I figure he just went to check something out and he'll be back soon. Meanwhile the kids are touching and moving figures that are in play and pestering the gm while he is in the middle of running some combat ang generally being a neusance. I start looking around for their dad and he is gone. Aparently he went off to enjoy his game and left his little monsters behind for us to babysit. About two hours later someone finnaly came and got the kids.

Finding myself trapped in the midst of a gaggle of hygenically challenged gamers at Salute. There was no where to go for 2 to 3 minutes. I still shake when I think about it.

Actually it wasn't all that bad but I was in a Cold Wars pulp game run by the infamous Mexican Jack Squint in which a bunch of rival gangsters, some Federal revenue agent types and the local constabulary were knocking heads over a booze shipment in the 1920's. One participants child spent what felt like the entire game raising a moderate fuss ignoring the game and attempting to trade a Stutz Bearcat Motor Car extraordinaire for a dilapidated truck and then sulking when he could not. Some kids are simply too young to enjoy some games and Cons are not meant for babysitting.

Walking by the Tuilleries game at Historicon(?) a few years back and seeing a gamer without his shirt on… :)

Played in some lame games, but that's my fault for not paying attention when I made my selections.

Thirty years ago I was laid low by a really nasty flu bug in the middle of a local con, my wife came to bring me home, and a friend drove my car home for me. I was sick for a week. That's about the worst.

Went to a big con two years ago…had signed up in advance, noted that I was running a demo of a new game. The con had advertised open tables as well so my wife and I packed our D&D stuff figuring to run a fun dungeon bash after my game.

The drive was about 7 hours one way…and we left our daughter over at my parents on the way up (her first overnight away from mom and dad) so were a bit trepidatious on that score. We get to town and find that the directions we were given were worthless (thank god for gas stations) and arrived 45 minutes after hitting town. We sign in and wander off with stuff to find my table.

The gaming area was scattered between two floors and three wings. To top it off, no mention of the demo game was in the con book (as was promised) and my table was in the farthest back corner of the back room on the lower floor. I had one guy stop to play. It was a fun game…we ran out of time before it was to a finale for either side.

So the wife and I run off to find the open game room to see if a table was open. The 'open game' area was a 15 x 15 room with four small tables…and the room was packed wall to wall people. The dealer area was one dealer in a corner…at which point we also hit the road after an overpriced lunch. That's about as bad as con experience as I've ever had.

Ye gods mine aren't as bad as some I've read here. My worst was like many of yours I show up at a con to run a couple of historical events and nobody shows any interest for the subject. This may have been due to the fact that it was a Magi: The Gathering tournament event as well as some other CCG and CMG events going on. I walked in knowing this and guessing that pickings might be slim so I was mentally ready for a letdown. I had also planned on a buddy of mine coming along with me on this one but he got called to work on that weekend so I was flying solo.

Still mine was a better experience than a dealer friend of mine. He went to a small convention in Texas at some college or university and said there were more dealers than attendees there! He said that one of the dealers when handed a questionnaire about the con walked it over to the convention desk, lit the thing and dropped it into their file box!

Well I guess my worst would of have to been this years blackout at Cold wars, I was in a terrain class at the time and we could only get discriptions of what our teacher would use.Don't get me wrong Coldwars is a fantastic Con' and I had a great weekend, just not on that day…

The most frequent disasters I encounter (more times than I can count) are the GMs who can't turn anyone away and continue subdividing commands. The game designed for 4-6 players now has 12. Enjoy!

Still, for absolutely crap-tacular experiences, I will submit:

a) The guy who was able to get into an event that conflicted with his own. First, he tried to talk us out of playing his game. Then he insisted that it would only be an hour (rather than four) so he would be able to make the other event. Frustrated, I told the guy if he would get us all started, we could run the game ourselves. When we were done, my friend and I would stay and watch the stuff until he returned. As surety, he could hold my driver's license and a credit card to replace anything that went missing. He accepted, and things were going nicely until about thirty minutes after he left when his friend showed up to shut down the game (90 minutes into a four hour event). Apparently the guy had changed his mind. Things got really tense but we reluctantly acquiesced. While his friend began putting things away, I sought him out to reclaim my license and CC. He told me I would have to wait until he was done playing so he could "thoroughly inspect" his gaming stuff. Before I could point out that he had broken our deal, the GM (whose event I interrupted but who was being very patient) said to the guy "Give him back his license and card or you're done playing right now," which worked a charm.

b) The guy in the matching LAH hat and t-shirt who decided to liven up an Ostfront game with frequent outbursts of Nazi propaganda and racial theory. As the GM declined to do anything (despite requests), three of us walked out of the game. Most troubling (besides the GM and LAH-mann) were four who not only remained, but relished the sudden increase in their commands.

My worse experience was many years ago at a Gencon convention when it was still held in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. I and several friends were playing a War of 1812 miniatures game GM'd by a Canadian attending his first wargaming convention in the U.S. Beautifully painted 30mm metal figures. Anyway, the GM had stepped away from the table for a moment. We were discussing the rules among ourselves when a stranger came up to the table and began to take some of the figures off the table and put them in a cardboard box. One of my friends asked him what he was doing. He said he was the GM's brother and needed to borrow some of the figures for a 1812 game he was conducting in another part of the complex. We shrugged it off and returned to our conversation.

The GM returned to the table a few minutes later. He stared at the table for a few moments and said to himself "I though I had put the X and Y regiments out already" and reached under the table to get some more figures. My friend overheard his comment and said, "You did. But your brother came and borrowed them for his game".

Silence.

"I don't have a brother".

I've never felt more stupid or gullible. We searched the complex but never found the thief. This Canadian gentleman accepted the incident with great composure and without complaint or reproach completed putting on the game which we enjoyed very much. To make some amends we took him out to dinner that evening. Nevertheless, I doubt if he ever put on another game in the U.S.

I can't top those stories, but I went to historicon one year without my buddies . I lost every game that con, 10 games in all.
Bad dice, bad strategy, poor choices of games, I'm not sure. Of course, I did play 6-7 new games, so I didn't know the rules and it definitely affected my games. Or I suck.
I used to go to Dexcon in NJ to play 40K and other sci-fi games. A guy was playing space marines (Ultramarines) and started losing badly, he upset the tables and all the minis, terrain, and all hit the floor. Big tantrum, from a big guy. At the same con, we were captured by Trekkies dressed as Klingons, we politely told the Klingons we weren't playing. They didn't want to let us go. Weird guys. In the end, a the next year, Dexcon became a live action, role-playing con, we tried to play a couple of minis games under red lights, with metal bands playing loudly in the background and Klingons everywhere. I got a head-ache, and went home.Oi-vay!

I've gotten lucky compared to some of these. My most "annoying" story is from a Little Wars in the 90s. I played in a WWII naval game. I forget the rules, which didn't impress me, but I figured them out and was quite successful defeating a superior American force on one sector of the engagement with the Japanese. My opponent grumbled and mumbled about my lucky dice rolls in plain sight.

In a later game I found this fellow on my side in a sailing ships game. We had a tough scenario with the French against the British. We had inferior captains and crews but had pretty well wrapped it up when suddenly in his move with an automotive "varoom" sound I was rammed by my former opponent, now fellow captain. So with the resulting fouling the British took advantage and won the scenario. Bad luck, bad plot I thought to myself as the game ended. Shortly afterwards the chap walked into me (literally) and said, "oops, I rammed you." And walked off with an evil grin. So I guess that in some twisted way he got his revenge by sabotaging the game result.

And since that's the worst experience I've had, besides the six hour Warfare in the Age of Reason game that went four turns, I've been dang lucky. Rarely more than bored.

Michael

Played in an ACW game that went for at least 4 hours. I walked away as my unit had never came on board, Played in a beautiful colonial game with Brits and their enemies lined up the length of a 12 ft board. Played for 6 hours and I think 2 units shot at each other. To be fair the gm's were play testing their rules and may have stated this in the program. My God , the chart checking that went on! I once played the second edition of Terrible Swift Sword for 4 days at a small con. We got through one day of the battle as my opponent, playing the Rebs, took 1 to 2 hours to move his units. And the game starts out with very few units, He split fired all his regiments to gain maximum fire columns. I.E. 400 men from this 500 man regiment will fire at this regiment while the other 100 will fire with the 300 from the next regiment. Multiply this times 40 or more regiments and it becomes very time consuming. And he was very anal when he moved his units to make sure he had the maximum move. He killed me. I should have told him the first day that these were 20 minute turns and that is how long you have to move. He wasn't a general, he was an accountent. I would wander off when it was his turn and play video games.I was so bummed I sold the game at the con for $10. USD I still have my first edition, which I love.

Interesting thread. Over the years I've developed a few rules-of-thumb to increase my chances of selecting enjoyable games to play at wargaming conventions. This seems a good place to jot them down and see what others think:

· Avoid the game if the rules are described as under development, being play tested, or homegrown. I've had more bad experiences than good when such is the case.

· Avoid the game if one side or the other is dominated by a gaming group, sponsor group, or the GM's friends already familiar with the game. You usually find yourself out-classed and doomed to defeat. Even if you are unfamiliar with the rules, you have a right to at least a decent chance to win.

· Avoid the game if the GM is also a player; especially if he or she is playing on the other side.

· Avoid the game if the historical scenario does not lend itself to wargaming. Gettysburg and Antietam are notorious in this regard. Units dribble on to the battlefield and you can sit for hours doing nothing. A skilled and experienced GM can remedy this by giving everyone something worthwhile to do throughout the game. But if you see that the GM has made no effort in this regard, find another game.

· Respect your jerk-o-meter. As human beings we all have an internal list of indicators identifying unpleasant people. Most historical games start off with some sort of introduction. If during these opening remarks you find the GM is arrogant, insulting, belligerent, ill prepared, in-different, long-winded, or just plain ignorant you can expect the game to be tainted and you are probably facing a less than enjoyable experience. A similar situation applies if the GM is OK but among the other players are similarly disturbed individuals whom the GM seems powerless to control.

· Avoid the game if unsupervised children are playing. Note that I'm not saying you can't enjoy playing against a thoughtful 10 or 12 year-old even if the experience can be humbling…

"Gee mister, I'm sorry my troops pushed your troops off Culp's Hill".
"Don't worry about it, son. Preserving the Union is an over-rated concept anyway."

But an immature, easily frustrated or distracted youngster is another story.

All of mine have been at Historicon.

1) Got a chicken sandwich at the pool side bar at 4pm. By 11:30am had bad food poisoning. Missed half of the next day due to being hospitalized.

2) while packing up my game realized someone helped themselves to a DIVISION of painted 15mm ACW troops…

3) Got roped into the worst "game" I've ever played because the terrain was fabulous and the GM was such a nice guy I felt like a schmuck leaving because the game sucked so bad. Eventually made it out. Also had knowing nods from others I passed at the con who had been in the same game.

have a funny story from historicon one year
my buddy and I went to a fixed game ( GMs on one side players on the other) they were convinced that with their superior(sic) tactics they were going to kick our butts.
well, we trounced them good (I mean really good)they were all ed off said we cheated, my buddy and I looked at them and said at the same time "how could we cheat they are YOUR rules we just used them. They looked at us dumbfounded and said "we thought we would be playing a bunch of ruabs(sic) we laughed and said "see ya" and went on our way.
nowevery time we see them we just give a little giggle.

[Got a chicken sandwich at the pool side bar at 4pm.]

Considering this was at the Host in July, I can tell you your sentence indicates three critical mistakes on your part. I am delighted that you survived the experience.

I empathize with you on number three. I have a hard time bailing out of a game unless things are getting really ugly.

Well I have had a lot of the "sitting alone" with your game set up over the past 16 years. But it has been getting better. I do ask for feed back after a game and try to improve the next one I run.

The worst thing to happen to me was running a ECW game using the first edition of 1644 (??) It's been 14 years now since then, so I am not sure of the title. The figures were all Foundry and the table and terrain looked great. The players enjoyed themselves and the end turn was down to the wire. One die roll would determine the outcome of the game. (Not bad I thought for 8 players to be so into a convention game – and it was my first full turn out so I was feeling good)

Anyway, the player rolls his die and fails, thus loosing the battle. My smile quickly faded as he picked up the Cavalry stands and threw the figures across the table, stating what a stupid set up and rules system the game was, and walked away.

My friend and I just sat there stunned. Another player picked up the figures off the floor for us. I have never had anyone intentionally damage my stuff before. I expect things to get damaged, as things do happen when you cart your stuff to conventions. But this guy was really childish and angry that he lost the game.

We would see him from time to time over the years and I was always full if he came around wanting to play. I'm a pretty easy going guy so I let a lot slide, but not this.

Poor sportsmanship in games is always a turn off for me, whether I am running the game or playing in it.

Anyway, that's my "worst gaming experience" story.

Matthew

he would have had to take an ass whoopin from me for that

I was a teenager attending my first con and I signed up for an ACW game. I was given the Union cav. We were allowed to set up in a certain area of the table and I was told to put my troops in line on the right flank and my troops were basically set up for me by one of the other players on my side. My back was about 10 inches from the back edge of the table and the rest of the army angled away from the back edge. Then it was turn 1 and the Rebels got to move first. To our surprise the rebel cav were allowed to enter from anywhere they wanted. The rebel player points to the edge right behind my back and asks if he can enter there. "Yep." The rebel asks if he can enter with a charge on my rear. "Yep." I'm hit from behind and mostly destroyed. The force I'm left with is too small to be effective. I said a few nasty things to both the other player and the GM, and received in return a lecture on sportsmanship. In hindsight I'm embarrassed about the way I reacted, but the experience taught me a valuable lesson about treating players fairly. One that I still carry with me as both a player and a GM.

Hm. Entering my first con hall, and getting hit with the smell of BO.

Sorry, but its true… some wargamers need more deodorant. Or showers, whatever.

:)