The Year I Learn to Love Organized Play
I launched Bored & Sorcery 6 months ago. I was riding a wave of inspiration to write about my hobbies and give myself a platform to speak about all the games I love. It was a time where I was spending many more hours thinking about gaming than actually getting any time to play games. I set out to post at least once a week (what I thought to be a moderate goal). I kept up for a while and then Gen Con 2012 hit.
This year's Gen Con brought out a few games that have since taken up a lot of gaming time. Things took a shift and I started to spend lots of my free time gaming and was taking a break from the constant reading, analyzing and planning for games to play in the future.
The first game was Android: Netrunner. The first of Fantasy Flight's LCGs that I really bought into. I love the concept. I love the mechanics. I love to play it. I was lucky enough to get the majority of my gaming group to take the plunge and we were soon playing as often as we could. Much to my pleasure, this is still the trend.
With Netrunner came another first for me. Branching out and finding a local scene for the game. I tried a few times in the past to get involved in a game and never really found any success. I was eager to play as much Netrunner as possible and was lucky enough to stumble on a post in the FFG Forums about a casual league starting up at Cat & Mouse Game Store here in Chicago. I quickly recruited some of my fellow players from my circle of friends and we decided to join up. What resulted was some of the most fun I've had in quite some time.
The store is amazing and the staff are great. The steady group of players are top notch and a blast to play against. I just love going there and geeking out for a Sunday afternoon. I found that this greatly improved my game as well. I get to play against different people with different play styles and it has helped me see some things that I may have missed otherwise. I am also loving watching the group grow and get better at the game in general. People trying out new factions or strategies after discussing them during a league match. I see some real growth as a group from the frequency of play. Players not falling for the same old tricks. New players learning the game and keeping everyone's enthusiasm up. It was my first real experience playing a game in it's Prime and experiencing everything that can go with a local "meta" scene.
As the first cycle of Data packs for Netrunner is starting to release, the excitement is still very high. We are currently getting ready to hold a tournament to wrap up Season 1 of the League and then start Season 2 as the New Year gets underway.
My experience with Netrunner lead me to seek out other games too. Instead of just looking for games that interested me and trying to sell them to my friends, I sought out games that that did that AND already had a game night or group somewhere for me to jump into. I found a great group playing the X-Wing miniatures game at Games Plus on Monday nights. I immediate felt welcome and have made some friends there while making "pew pew" noises and constant Lando jokes. It has proved to be a great pick up and play game. The pre-painted miniatures and the quick and intuitive gameplay make it truly enjoyable. More so than I thought at first glance. I bought into the game pretty deep and am eagerly awaiting the release of the second wave of ships.
It may sound cheesy or even strange but both of these experiences has really made me love gaming all over again.
So where do we go from here?
2013 is shaping up to be a fun year. I've found 4 or 5 solid games that I plan on playing a ton of. I have had some issues in the past with always searching for the next game to play. I'm sure that will continue to some extent but my wallet will appreciate the effort of focus for once. For the upcoming year I am going to focus on playing these games and seeing what happens.
I'm guessing you want to know what games made it on my list. No? Well here it is anyway.
The top 4 I am pretty sure on. The Star Wars LCG looks really interesting to me. I was lucky enough to get one as a gift this holiday season and am eager to try it out. It borrows enough from a lot of games that I like and turns it into something really fun. If nothing else, it should be a game that sees a good group of players (it's Star Wars remember) and the games look like they will go by quickly.
I already have plans to attend Adepticon 2013 and Gen Con 2013. I might even make a trip to Fantasy Flight Game's Worlds Weekend in November as well.
What does this mean for the Blog?
This is an interesting question. With all this gaming I should have more than enough to talk about right? I mean with all the gaming books I still read there should be plenty of reviews going up and if the above is any indication plenty of after action reports and event coverage.
I really fell short of my goal for the first 6 months here. I still have 6 months to go to make the first year come out right. I want to expand my audience and take on some new perspectives too. I'd like Bored & Sorcery to gain a voice in the scene in 2013. I know I can't do this alone. I am going to look for some like-minded individuals to contribute on a fairly regular basis. I will continue to look for a few authors that will have fun writing about everything and anything about gaming.
I have to do my part as well. I'm going to go back to my original goal and try to post at least an article a week. I feel like I am in a position to do that much easier than before.
So here is a sincere Thank You to all of you that take the time to read my ramblings. A Thank You to all of those that have helped contribute content to this site and a Thank You to all of those that I play all of these crazy games with on a regular basis. I'll see you all in 2013.
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