Sunday 23 July 2017

LongCon 2017

Sometimes you just can't do everything. Sometimes two conventions that you really want to attend both come up at the same time. So it was this year with StabCon and LongCon.

I've already written my report on my visit to Summer StabCon from Friday 7th-9th July. Whilst I was having fun in Stockport, over at the Garrison Hotel in Sheffield LongCon was happening. I really wanted to attend both events but I can't be in two places at once so I had to choose and StabCon won. But it was a close thing.

This was the third year of LongCon. It's a unique convention devoted to longer games. Most conventions have several "slots" per day. Typically something like 3 slots of 4 hours each. The games on offer have to fit into those slots. This can produce some fun games but it can mean you miss out on some of the deeper character and story development which are one of the USPs of tabletop RPGs. At LongCon, the great majority of the games run for the whole weekend. There are some "day" games which run just for Saturday or Sunday in case people turn up just for those days. The primary focus, however, is extended two day games, basically mini-campaigns.

Last year I was able to referee and complete the entire, classic, Advanced Dungeons and Dragons adventure "Against the Cult of the Reptile God" using The Black Hack, lightweight D&D rules.

Even though I didn't attend this year, I followed the reports coming out of LongCon with interest.

As is usual with "Garrison" conventions, there is nothing formal organised for Friday night. Personally I wish there was. However, I suspect it's a combination of the staggered arrival time of attendees - many of whom are travelling after a full day's work - and the fact that the Hotel always has other events taking place on Friday nights. I guess that the extra amount the hotel would charge for the use of the rooms wouldn't justify the amount of use they get. Anyway, it's nice to meet up in the bar and people can always organise an ad hoc game of something if they want. This year there was a game to playtest some rules, for example.

The main games start Saturday morning and run until Sunday afternoon. You stay with the same Referee and the same group of players for the whole weekend, taking breaks when it's appropriate for your group.

Apparently this year there were:

a massive impressive looking D&D game
a massive impressive Symbaroum game
a game of "Mage" game
a Call of Cthulhu game set in WW2
two urban fantasy games
and a couple of others. (I know at least one other D&D game was offered along with a SciFi game).

This is a significant increase on previous years, and seems to show that the convention is growing. Apart from the increase in numbers, there were also a number of younger players present.

However, this year, people don't seem to be reporting the events of their games on line. In previous years the game reports were EPIC. It was like reading novels. This time  around people seem to have enjoyed their games but the stories have just disappeared into the ether. That's a shame because I'm sure they were just as memorable this time around as they were previously.

The other odd side effect of the convention set up is that, because you take breaks when it suits your game rather than according to a preset schedule, you're also eating and socialising with the people you play with all weekend. You don't meet up with the players of other games to swap war stories - which I think would be fun.

However, LongCon remains a fascinating and unique event which I thoroughly recommend you get to if you possibly can.

Apologies for my delay in posting this proxy report and thanks to Neil Gow for his report on UK Roleplayers upon which most of it is based.

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