Origins, Day 1: Thursday

Today I was back on much more familiar ground. I knew where the Board Room was, so I headed there first, just in time to get in on a game of Battlestar Galactica. This game defies the rule that Licensed Games Must Suck. The goal for most of the players to to work together to get the fleet safely to Earth, but much of the game consists of trying to determine which of the players is secretly a Cylon trying to undermine their efforts. I was at a real disadvantage -- I had never played before, the explanation was cursory (sorry, Chuck Whatever-Your-Name-Was, but it's true), and the board was even upside down from my perspective. It was actually a relief when we realized that the dealer had dealt out too many Cylon cards and we had to abandon the game. Now that I know how the mechanics work, though, I would gladly try it again.

Then came the Great Trade Room Unveiling. I sought out Tom Vasel, who hosts the Dice Tower podcast, and who was manning a booth along with what seemed to be a dozen of the podcast's contributors. I had never seen any of these people's faces before, except for a still photo of Tom, and not one of them looked the way I expected. I later happened to be looking at the selection in a booth that sold games by Reiner Knizia, and Tom was there also, with fellow podcaster Joe Steadman:

 

Apparently the lady who worked at the booth sneezed as she took this photo. Must have been Tom's shirt. Anyway, it was surreal to have the actual voice of the actual Tom Vasel in my right ear as we looked through the games, instead of just coming through the speaker of my car as he talked about games.

Another chunk of my time was spent in pounding out demos of Mayfair games to earn resource ribbons in their annual Catan-themed ribbon quest. I did much the same thing with a few new games from Looney Labs.

Games played: Battlestar Galactica, Elk Fest, Station Master, Megastar, Catan Dice Game, Alhambra, Pirate Fluxx, Back to the Future: The Card Game
Games won: Catan Dice Game, Pirate Fluxx