Gothcon 2024 – Day 2
After a lovely day 1 at Gothcon I was looking forward to the second day where I would have a bit more time to explore the campus the convention was hosted at and poke my head into some rooms to see what the con was offering to the wider gaming community.
My day started with my last firm commitment of the con. I was joined by Andreas (Sweden Rolls), Hjalmar (Red Moon Roleplaying), Ras (hope I am spelling that right) a German gentleman who is involved with the sister convention of Gothcon, and Michael (a different one from yesterday) to chat about reviewing RPGs. I was leading the discussion but I wanted to be careful not to dominate.
I had a really good time talking to the panellists about various aspects of reviewing. We dived into what we expect from an RPG review, how each of us thought different aspects where important. The importance of play based reviewing was one of the bugbears I had to bring up. We talked about the idea of bias and what balance means to us in an RPG and if it is even really important. It was a really fun chat and it was great to get some outside perspective on something I am thinking about a lot.
I spent the rest of the day wandering the convention, playing games, and getting some interviews. I had mostly been in the South area of the convention where the shops and podcast room were situated. The convention is spread over at least 4 of the buildings that make up this school and there is a lot of walking! Each building is over 4/5 floors and the various rooms that the classes would be in are where you’ll find all sorts of games.
In the North building is where the main ‘assembly hall’ is that had the awards I had attended the night before. Over the course of the day it would hold an auction that lasted for 4 hours! The rest of the building has some more RPG games in it from Fria Lagan running some to introductory games for those looking to get a taste.
I headed to the first floor where I had spied a bunch of board game clubs setup on the Friday. I walked into a room looked around, and was immediately invited to play. I sat down with Craig, Greg, and JC to play Villages of Valeria. This was an engine builder that I had been wanting to play for a while and I really enjoyed it. Effectively the core of it is a role selection and follow game with you using cards to build resource gathering or point creation. It must have been good, because I won.
Grabbing some lunch I wandered to find the other bits of the convention. Over in some of the other buildings I saw an entire floor of people playing Diplomacy. Whispered plans were being cooked up outside in rooms, while inside matters of state between the leaders of nations were being openly discusses. I have never seen Diplomacy being played in real life and it looked very intense!
On another floor I came across folk moving in between rooms as a megagame got played out. Mysterious hexagonal maps held huge plastic tokens and various words written on the whiteboard showed which phase the game was in. Folk were dressed in elaborate costumes presumably denoting a faction they were part of. It looked like everyone was having a blast.
Across the road from this building I found folk playing elaborate versions of Heroquest, miniatures games, and just loads more folk sitting at tables in the corridors playing whatever game they fancied. There are loads of breakout games across the convention with folk finding space to play their favourites. It’s lovely to see such a diverse range of people playing a wide range of games.
Mid afternoon I headed back up to the podcast room for the Meet & Greet. I had a lovely time talking to Magnus Seter who is a legend in the Swedish RPG scene. I would later get a chance to talk to him for a bit longer and I hope to bring that interview to you post convention. Some prizes were given out for a quiz that had taken place over the course of the first two days. We got a chance to take a group photo which was a lovely moment.
I went and did a bit more wandering and picked up the chance to interview Emil and Hjalmar who had been on the panel with me on Friday. I want to try and get a little bit from everyone I’ve met here so I can bring their passion and projects to you. I spoke to Lucas from Blackfisk Publishing who are doing some really interesting work, their Flowers Withered on the Stem I highlighted yesterday.
My day wrapped up with a game of Celestia with the Gothenburg international board gamers and then meeting up with some of the podcast room for chats and dinner. We headed to the Flying Barrel Pub and I had a lovely time setting the world to writes with some of the friends I have made over the course of the con, having some beers, and eating tasty food.
I am really enjoying myself at Gothcon and its been lovely to chat more indepth with folk today about the nature of the Swedish gaming scene. I want to do a bit more of that today and will likely end up helping do some clear up for the convention today as things wrap up mid afternoon. Hoping to bag some more interviews today and who knows what else I might get up to!
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