In this episode...

Linnea joins Kellye to share her experience at her first BGG con in Dallas, Texas. They compare different sizes of conventions and discuss which ones to attend.

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Episode 192 of Board Games with Variant Hacks is all about BGG

CON and other conventions too. I'm Kelly, and in this episode

I'm joined by friend of the pod Linnea to share her experiences

at her first BGG Con last fall. And then we chat about

conventions in general. Big, small, near, far, cost, a

little bit of everything. Without further ado, I'll turn

it over to myself and Linnea talking about BGG, Con and more.

Earlier this year I told you I'd been doing some travel math and

that BG Con in Texas was much cheaper than PAX you in

Pennsylvania. They happened sort of at the

same time now because PAX, you moved up a couple weeks before

Thanksgiving. Now, I didn't end up going for a

number of reasons, but you did, and that's what we're.

Here. To talk about how did it go.

It was really good. It was really good.

Yeah. Thanks for that Intel.

Because I I made a whole, a whole switch.

What helped too is I also had some other friends that were

going to BGG Con that kind of pushed me in that direction as

well. So it wasn't, it wasn't purely

financial in nature. It was also just OK.

Well, actually I know kind of more of my closer friends going

to BGG Con then then to back. So it was kind of a solid

choice. Right.

It sounds like it just all worked out.

Now. I know it was in Texas.

I don't remember. What city?

Dallas. OK, very nice.

How was Dallas? Fine city.

The whole area outside of the convention hotel was all under

construction, so it felt like Indy, you know?

Yeah, Yeah. Because, you know, they can do

road construction in Dallas in November, so.

Yeah, you know what? They find a way to do road

construction here literally every season so.

True. Yeah, that's true.

There wasn't as many easy food options as there is with Gen.

Con or with packs. I will, I will say that because

there's there's some places that you can DoorDash, but there's

like a small little pizza place inside of the hotel, but much

more, much more limited. And there was a number of times

that we went with people out to a specific restaurant.

We actually had to Uber there and then Uber back.

So it was it was a little bit more involved.

I did my usual groceries stop on the first day, picked up some

stuff for sandwiches and left that in the room.

Luckily our room had a had a mini fridge so.

Oh, OK, OK. And I could see as well, this is

a smaller convention, so maybe you don't have that same draw to

bring in vendors, you know what I mean?

Yeah, as you would definitely. Yeah, for Gen.

Con, they're able to bring in a whole street full of food trucks

because there aren't necessarily enough close food options that

would actually work. And then they now they shut down

a parking lot kind of behind on the backside of the Convention

Center as well. But when you're going to these

smaller conventions, I think that BGG Con is a few thousand,

a couple 1000 people. Yeah, it was much smaller.

I think maybe like 2 between 2:00 and 5:00, I don't remember

exactly. Maybe not 2, maybe maybe more

than that, but certainly a lot smaller.

And they actually have like a pretty limited set of tickets

that they sell and they could surely sell more and there's

space to do that, but it would feel much more crowded.

So I'm I'm really glad that they don't.

OK. The convention space itself,

you're in a hotel. Are these like 1 ballroom?

Multiple ballrooms? Yeah, it's got multiple

ballrooms. It's a very nice hotel, so

there's like 2 large ballrooms that have an open gaming area

and then another area which is attached to the exhibitor hall,

which also has a pretty big gaming area attached to it.

OK, honestly you could always find a table.

I've never had issues finding a table.

One of the ballrooms I never even stepped foot in because we

always had like we kind of always went to the same spot and

we're always able to to generally find a table.

That's nice. The the room felt pretty full,

like there was a lot of activity and you had to kind of look

around for a table, but you could always find one.

I didn't know they had exhibitors.

Yeah, it's not the main focus for sure.

For sure. There was, I don't know, maybe

less than 30 vendors there. I mean the biggest thing was

there was a pretty nice BG vendor so you can get all your

bits and all your BG swag and all that.

That's pretty nice. It sounds like it is.

I went to Dice Tower W once in Vegas.

It sounds kind of similar to that.

I think they, I mean, 30 vendors might be a stretch for what Dice

Tower had. And of course they were then

selling all of their many kind of little add on cards that

they've done across different campaigns and stuff.

But yeah, I I get that it wouldn't be the focus, but BGG

has a pretty good store. So if you know you're going and

if you are going to go yearly or what have you to kind of wait to

do a yearly sweep of stuff because yeah, shipping, shipping

will get you and hopefully they had some things on sale maybe.

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, it

was there was a miniature market booth, so there's some miniature

market stuff you grabbed there. But for the most part, I don't

think the BG things were particularly discounted, but

they were all there for you. So it was, you know, because I,

I don't feel like the BGG things get discounted too heavily.

I think there was some discount on some promos, but it was it

was pretty standard. Yeah, I remember for for Gen.

Con one year, it may have been last year, they had a sale going

on some of their bits on the site at the same time that Gen.

Con was happening. I was like, oh, I'm just going

to go to Gen. Con.

I'm going to get those bits at that discounted price that I'm

not going to pay shipping or anything or feel like I need to

get up to some minimum. And I went to look at them

because they sell out of a different booth at Gen.

Con. I went to look at them and they

were full price and I was like, OK, yeah, never mind.

Yeah, I I used to be into getting promos for the games

that I liked, but honestly, a free promo Gen.

Con is great, but beyond that I just do not.

I just don't anymore. Yeah, it's not.

It's rarely enhancing the game experience for me.

So it's fun. And if it's if it's a tie in

with something that I like, I guess the geek up bits even that

I feel like I'm trying to pull back on because there are they

are fantastic. But when I'm realistic about

like how many times is this game getting played?

I don't know what the threshold should be, but I think it's

higher than what it currently is to justify.

Sometimes those bits are like kind of as much as the game,

especially if you were able to get the game on a deal.

Maybe. Yeah, they might be more than

the game. I think I bought my geek up bits

for quacks for more than the game, but my kind of

justification with those is is bits that get used a lot, like

in a bag building game I find much more helpful than just nice

pretty bits, you know? Right, because you may.

If those pieces wear out, it may actually lead you to buy a new

copy of the game. Yeah, Which then exactly.

The price is less important. Anyways, we've gone.

We've digressed into miscellaneous board game talk

back into the convention. So what?

I know that when I'm at Gen. Con, BGG does the hot games

room, so they do not bring their own library, but they go around

Gen. Con before anyone else I think

on the like the trade day or whatever and they buy a bunch of

games or acquire. I don't know how they work.

They acquire a lot of games of all the new hot things and

you're able to play them there. And my understanding is they end

up in that same library. So what does the full BGG

convention library look like? What?

How big is it? It's, it's a really, really nice

collection in the in the thousands.

I'm I'm sure they actually do also have a hot games area where

they have about 10 tables or so with hot games that are already

set up and just stay set up that we can go to.

It was pretty crowded. I think they could have done

with some more tables there. But then there's the the library

itself, which you can, you go in and you can check out a game

much like you do at BGG area of Gen.

Con. But the cool thing is, so you

have either a four hour rental or an 8 hour rental, depending

on the game. Mostly 4 hours is for the brand

new games that obviously are going to, you know, see a lot

more table time and you have 8 hour from for games that are a

little bit older and you can actually take those and play

them anywhere. So you can take them up to any

of the ballrooms. You can take them to your room

to play like it is fully you haven't checked all of the way

out like a library book. OK.

And which I thought was was really interesting when?

You're saying take it up to your room to play?

Did you stay in the same hotel? I didn't, but I had some friends

who did and we actually did end up playing a game up in in one

of my friends one of my friends rooms.

Nice. Yeah, that's can always be

tricky, I don't think. No, not one time have I actually

stayed in the hotel where the convention was happening here in

Indy for Gen. Con it you know, it's, it's

bigger than any hotel. Many connect to it, but we stay

downtown one time and far away. And when I went, no, when I went

to dice tower, no, I stayed at an Airbnb when I did dice tower

West and then for packs. I've also stayed at hotels that

are it's more similar to Gen. Con.

They're close to the Convention Center where it happens or, you

know, an Airbnb, but not actually in it.

So did you have like a walk or was this where you having to

like get a ride back and forth? Oh, no, it was it was very

walkable. It was, it was basically maybe

about a block away. Oh, nice.

So it was really, really not, not too bad.

And what was what was nice is our hotel had free breakfast.

The hotel where the convention is held did not.

So I mean that's worth A1 block walk in my opinion.

I I was walking with with a friend, another female

presenting friend. We never had any concerns about

safety, which is important to to consider just walk around to an

area, especially in a city that I, I don't know Dallas well at

all. Exactly.

Yeah, I know for PAX now, I wasn't concerned, but I'm all

you know, I'm not looking for trouble either.

So I'm kind of like I'm going to keep my head down and walk fast.

I'm not going to find any trouble.

One time we stayed, it was like, I mean, 5 minutes might be

pushing it, but it was a little bit of a walk.

And then the other time we were super close.

That is a good point because you're going to a city that you

don't know and where they may have chosen a hotel.

That's one of the convenient things about actually staying in

it. Where they may have chosen a

hotel doesn't necessarily account for people needing to

travel in or stay around it, because those blocks usually

fill up. If you're not kind of an early,

if you're not committing early to going to a convention, you

may not be able to get a room in that hotel even if you want one.

Yeah, wasn't even an option when when we were looking at at

hotels that hotel was was fully booked up.

So there wasn't really an opportunity can to consider it,

right. But I think they had like one

room available and it was like a suite $4000 for the week or

something crazy. It was, you know what?

We. That's, that kills all of your

savings from not going to PAX because right, wow, I tell you.

And I think as conventions are getting bigger it there's a

balance because when you're going to a Bayer convention,

there are more vendors there, there's more events there.

There may be other things kind of happening around that

convention, certainly for Gen. Con, which is kind of an

outlier, but I think even for PAX now as it continues to grow.

That's definitely growing a lot. Right.

That can be like a a benefit of going to those bigger

conventions. But with that seems to come

rising demand, rising travel costs and right now things are

just things are just inflating in price anyways, let alone when

you start talking about doing sort of the extra and fun

vacation, sort of travel to things like conventions.

So that said, for BGG Con, were there what kind of events that

they have there? Is it a really event focused

thing or is it purely just you were all here to sit down with a

game? There were definitely events.

I didn't really look into them a whole lot.

There was some sort of event that was held outside of the

ballroom and we only noticed because we were hearing all

sorts of commotion that was like look like a Beyblade tournament

or something. It was wild looking.

There's definitely events, there's whole spaces that were

dedicated specifically to certain events, but I was

interested in going there and playing games, so I I didn't

look into into them quite as much.

I know they had, I was looking at the map and they have a whole

room dedicated to blood on the clock tower.

So you know what? Love it it.

It's great. Though it could be a very loud

game and I didn't notice them at all.

I didn't even know that there was a room until I saw it on the

maps. Right.

Like is it exclusive or did they get complaints?

And it could be both. Yep.

Yeah. So does it have like operating

hours or was it sort of a 24/7 thing?

Open gaming areas, as far as I'm aware, I, you know, I'm old and

need to go to sleep, but as far as I'm more the open gaming

areas, Yeah, right. We're open 24/7.

The library closed at midnight, but there was a little shelf in

the lobby of the hotel where you could return games after hours,

which was nice. But even if you didn't have to

like, Rush to turn the game by midnight, yeah, which was

awesome. OK, That makes sense.

Especially if you take, like you said, the way that you can check

them out and you have a good amount of time to do that,

right, Right. If you can just return them at

your leisure. And this was also, I think this

was a longer like this convention goes for more days.

Like didn't it start? What day did it start?

Yeah, it was Wednesday through Sunday.

Yeah, it's a little long, so it. The Sunday was much quieter than

I expected, though I'm used to, you know, Sunday.

The Sundays are kind of always quieter.

It was a little bit interesting because the vendor hall closed

at 3. The library had to have all

games returned by 1 so it it cleared out pretty much by 1:00

and honestly most of the vendors were even packing up or already

packed up right after 1:00. We stayed through Monday just

because I didn't want to. Oh yeah.

Rushed and, you know, do all that stuff.

Yeah, yeah. Next time we'll probably just

fly out on Sunday. It seems like most people most

people left on Sunday. Right.

If there's not really, you know, if you're not going to also take

in Dallas, then you may as well. Did you do any like in the city

anything? Not really.

We talked about there was an aquarium super, super close and

we talked about going since we were leaving on Monday, we

talked about doing that on Sunday, but we were tired

honestly. So we actually just went, we

went to the Miniature Market booth on Sunday and just picked

up a box of unlock and then just sat around in the hotel, in our

hotel lobby, played all three of those cases back-to-back and

then just kind of. Chilled.

Yeah. With a longer convention like

that and it not being like super dense with events, I think being

able to chill on the last day, it makes also more sense that

people kind of pack it up on the last day.

It's different than if it's like a Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

Convincing. I feel like people are really

still there on Sunday. But if you think starts on

Wednesday, by the time Sunday rolls around, you are, you know,

you might be a little maxed out on gaming.

And if you've been enjoying the library, you might be learning a

lot of new games too. So by the time Sunday rolls

around I can see it being like or I could just chill.

Right, right. Yeah.

That was the only thing I found that I really enjoyed with BGG

Con because it's longer and because you kind of don't have

the same stress on time because the the sure, there's the hours

for the vendor hall and there's the hours for when you can check

out games. But since there isn't a

limitation on when you can return games and since the

vendor hall is not really a big deal, there isn't this rush that

there is with like a Gen. Con or a pack that you want to

be in the vendor hall while it's open.

It gave me a lot more time to feel not so rushed and playing

long games. I actually played a lot of long

EUR, which I was kind of surprised by because I I tend to

play shorter games at conventions generally.

It was a really nice departure because it it didn't feel so

rushed so didn't feel like you were missing out on anything.

Right. It can be a really big

commitment if even if there's a lot to do or the convention is

short to say that you're going to take, you know, you take a

big year. You might take an hour or more

to learn it collectively, if you haven't already figured that out

before you decide to play it. And then playing through the

first time can take many, many hours.

So that might be an entire entire morning, entire afternoon

that you have to sort of sacrifice to the game.

And unless you're really hype about it, that could be a hard

choice to make if you have more of those time constraints.

But if there's, if you're going to be there for nearly a week,

then that's a that's a lot easier to commit.

To absolutely, yeah. And even Even so at conventions.

So I mostly play EUR at at two to three players.

Longer games tend to play at two or three players, but I played

pretty much all of my games at four players that also added

some length. And I think that would normally

bother me more, but because it was just kind of, we're all just

hanging out, making new friends. You know, I, I had, like I said,

I had some, some friends that were there, but they also had

friends there, right? I made some new friends and it

was all like, we're all just hanging out and playing games.

And so it didn't, I didn't feel like I needed to try 20

different new games because there wasn't really an end goal.

It was just hanging out and playing games.

There was one day, I think we played like one or two small

games in between, but I played Gaia Project and I played Seti

with the expansion and that's like kind of all I played that

day. Nice.

So just the whole pace and energy it sounds like very

different and you and you would say different of course than

Gen. Con, but also different than

PAX. Yes, it was.

So over the last couple years PAX has definitely gotten so

much bigger and starting to feel more like a mini Gen.

Con. So, so this is more similar to

the way that I felt about PAX the first year I went, which I

think was like 2020, 3 or 22. I don't, I don't remember, but

it felt much more like that, but even more relaxed.

And you could just go grab a game, sit down, learn it, maybe

play it, maybe not just wander around like it.

It I felt relaxed, you know, I didn't feel stressed.

And so I, I definitely think that I did love pax.

But honestly, if PAX and BGG con are going to continue being, you

know, pretty much overlap, even if they're not on the same

weekend, if they're close, I'm not going to do both.

Let's let's be honest here, I don't want to live that kind of

lifestyle. I'm going to pick Ugg con to be

completely honest. It was great, nice.

And that's I found that we have a, a very small local convention

here that we've gone to. And I'm when I say gone to, I

mean we've we've gone and played a game or two and and then left,

but it's also like a hotel convention.

And then I've gone to Dice Tower W, which is like hotel

convention. I do kind of like that energy

and vibe of a hotel convention. It is.

Different than when you're in a Convention Center, despite the

benefits, it's quieter. And that's even what I like

about the hot games room at Gen. Con, which I now do a ton of

because you are you're in like, you know, I'm assuming these

hotels design these ballrooms and spaces for meetings and for

a bunch of people talking and stuff.

So the acoustics in them are better and you don't feel quite

as loud of just a lot of the Convention Center spaces are

very reflective sound wise and there's not.

And they're industrial. Yes, yes, they're very

industrial. So yeah, I I like that thought

about it's just a different pace.

It's a different energy. And I think some of that maybe a

lot of it comes reinforced with a hotel convention.

I just one of these days I'm going to stay actually in the

hotel. But usually I don't, I can't

commit to going until that's like until they're long gone

because I'm like, will I will I not, I mean, it took me years to

go to Gen. Con and I live here.

All I had to do was drive 15 minutes.

So yeah, one of these, one of these, I'm going to have to get

on really early and do the full hotel convention experience.

Yeah, that's, that's fair. That's fair.

Yeah, I think, I don't think it's it, it didn't seem like the

those hotels booked up particularly fast.

I don't, I don't think it's like a mad dash to to book a room at

at the Regency, which is where the con was held because I think

we bought our plane tickets and flights like mid-october for a

late November on. So like we were very late,

right. Yeah, even if you're like a

month earlier, which is still a lot of time to plan, Yeah, it

wouldn't have any issues booking a hotel in the specific hotel

center. Nice.

Now I'll say about Dice Tower W because both of these that were

kind of these are similar size conventions, which is why I keep

bringing it up. Dice Tower is its own YouTube

channel, of course always talking about board games, their

own personalities. BGG also has a YouTube channel,

has personalities, and then of course runs the website that is

unofficially the official home of board gaming, runs that that

database that everyone is using in some way or another to

manage, keep track of, learn about games.

When I went to Dice Tower W now, they did some live stuff and if

you wanted to see the Dice Tower people you definitely could, but

it wasn't like it was everywhere.

Did was there like a a real spirit of board game geek there,

or could you have just as easily been at a small Dallas

convention? Oh definitely a small

convention. I know they were around, some of

my friends met up with some of the BGG gang and I actually did

did get to meet ALDI, the creator and founder of Board

Game Meek so that. Was kind of cool.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, they were definitely

not a presence there. They were around.

I'm sure they were playing games and stuff, but I didn't really

see anybody walk, you know, wandering around.

Yeah, yeah, Yeah. That's interesting and I know.

It's more of a focus on the games and not as much the

people. And I think that's for Dice

Tower. There is a kind of more focus on

the personalities of the Dice Tower, which is, whereas BGG,

they have all these different contributors and I think they do

focus more on the games. And I, I felt that really shined

through at the con. Right.

The only events that I I I'm sure there were more events at

dice Tower W the only ones that I knew of.

I think they had some kind of panels and I don't know how many

were actually recorded or not, but I think they recorded some

of their videos there. They may be live, you know, and

they were also also some other little like fun video type.

It felt like a live video type things going on.

And there aren't, you know, when you, I guess when I'm thinking

about something like Gen. Con there, there's no, there's

no threat of it selling out. Like when you're going to these

events, it's it is very much just kind of like walk in or you

walk by a room and you kind of poke your head and like, oh,

wait, I've seen that. That's that person.

I'm going to go in there and see what's going on.

So yeah, even the events and things like that that still do

happen when you get into this small mid size convention are

also that same spirit of being just a little more casual and a

little more relaxed. A big deciding factor if I was

to decide, you know, if I wanted to go to BG Con as opposed to

something like PAX or Gen. Con is whether or not I have

someone with me because I did you know, they have those usual

looking for player signs, but they were rarely used.

Like it seemed like people really came in groups with

partners and really kind of have their gaming groups set out for

the most part or were gaming with friends that they only see

at conventions. It definitely, I think going

solo, you'd have to be pretty outgoing to to sit down and join

in a game with people. There's the high games room area

which I think. That's.

Kind of lend itself, but it's still I think it it makes a big

difference having people to play with.

So that that is 1 caveat I will say.

Oh, interesting. I felt like when I went to dice

tower and maybe that's there are, you know, there's probably

some small cultural differences in between these.

I, I feel like I saw a lot of the looking for players and it

may have been that came together that were very often open to

additional players. Like maybe that's what was

happening. I'm not sure.

I can't say that I joined hardly any games like that.

So I can't really speak more to it.

But I do feel like maybe that was a, a bigger focus there or

something they promote a little more heavily.

So that's interesting that even if you are kind of hitting these

conventions of the same size, they're still going to have

their own kind of different culture and feeling.

And I also think about this Board Game Geek 1.

I believe that this one, they have two a year and that one of

them is sort of like everybody plus family.

And I think this one was specifically not.

Yeah, yeah. So the BGG spring is open.

Everybody I think you know, families are encouraged to to

come and bring kids, but BGG Fall is specifically for adults.

Yeah. And I wonder how that kind of

changes that that mood as well. I wonder how if they're of

course kids running around is going to definitely change

things. But I wonder if that also makes

it more of a thing that people are going to together as groups

of adults versus like, yeah. Right, I also noticed even with

the amazing library, a lot of people brought their own games.

To play. So because I saw people carting

around whole carts of stuff that I know they didn't, you know,

you could only check out one, one game at a time.

So it wasn't it wasn't all library copies, but certainly it

seemed like a great gathering place.

Maybe they live close to each other and just wanted experience

the library, or maybe they live on other sides of the country

and. Want to have?

A place that they can they can meet and play some games

together. So they definitely got a little

bit more hobby gamers as opposed to kind of more like friendly,

like family style games. You know, usually when you've

you've gotten in deep enough and you're you're going to something

like BG Con. I think that's a little bit less

enticing for brand new board gamers then something like Dice

Tower. They're hoping that they can,

they can get recommendations, they can see the personalities

and it's a little. Bit I get what you're saying.

I get what you're saying because it also sounds like to some

extent, and maybe this is just maybe this is more common than I

realize, people might just treat board this BGG con like their

local convention if they're vaguely local.

Like what does it actually matter?

It's there. It's not super huge.

So I, I certainly don't have the sort of information to know like

how far do people travel in for it?

Is it a really big, like how dense is it people that are from

Texas or the couple states around there versus how much is

it, how much of A draw? And for me, I was interested in

going because of that. When I, the more I kind of look

at both my game collection, how I want to spend time at a

convention, and then how many conventions I want to go to.

Well, if I kind of blow the budget, then it makes it harder

to go to different conventions. It makes it harder to then meet

up with friends more times to be playing games.

And if the thing that I ultimately want to do is just be

playing games with friends, at some point, it's like, well, how

much do I need the extra convention cost?

Yes, yeah. Well, and I think that one of

the things that some of these conventions like BGG, Connor,

Dice Tower, are there local events, since there's much,

much, much smaller focus on the exhibitor hall.

You're not inherently spending more money than you spent just

to get there and to feed yourself.

Because a lot of these you get there, you feed yourself, but

then you're you're buying games, you're doing all the stuff and

it's it's you're, you're paying for events and things like that.

That's just really not an expense at these as much.

So that's something that that is nice to keep in mind.

And so you can you can do something like even maybe more

of those gaming conventions where you're going around and

just playing as opposed to 1 Gen.

Con, which you know, the rooms are expensive and the you know,

the games you're spending a lot of money on on games and things

like that. Not to say that I'm not going to

come to Gen. Con, spend lots of money, but.

Just you know when I look. More savvy than me.

Right. When I look at the price of

packs, which I know is still less than Gen.

Con, like, I don't know, it would be very hard.

I'm here. So I I'm coming this with a

gigantic bias. I'm in Indianapolis coming to

Gen. Con with a huge.

Bias and you're driving yeah I'm driving different so that that

makes a big difference as well. It's not and being able to to

drive out and buy things, stick them in my car and take them

home so that that you know, I had the same, but it's not, you

know, not quite as strong, but but certainly it's a much more

local for me than than any of the others.

Right. It is.

It's wonderful how many people come.

It's wonderful. That's a nice big convention,

but that is a hard cost to justify.

I know I've heard many times people closer to the coast or

maybe even further complain about what it takes.

Like, yeah, you get there, it's great, it's fun.

But like, what it takes to get to Gen.

Con is no joke. So getting into some of these

smaller conventions and seeing, seeing what they're like, I

think the schedule and cadence of what conferences you want to

go to, how often, how many times a year is going to be different

for everyone. But when you start looking at

them comparatively like that, it sort of feels like, OK, well,

one Gen. Con is maybe now it might not be

two packs use. This is getting close.

It's 2 packs. Use and then every packs U is 2

worth, maybe 2 smaller conventions and and so on and so

forth. Right, but Gen.

Con is pretty easily I I would want to say 2:00 to 3:00, BGG,

dice tower, those kinds of cons. Oh, I think it has to be 3.

I think it has to be 3. And the locations of the cities

being like Indianapolis is not an expensive place, but because

it's so many people come at once, if you come to

Indianapolis any other time, no one cares.

And it's very cheap. Everything is very cheap.

But it's just a matter of demand, these other conventions

that are then in similar sorts of cities if you want to stay

around. That's one of the things that I

liked about Dice Tower W it's in Vegas.

By no means is it the biggest thing happening in Vegas.

It may be among the smallest things happening in Vegas.

So when you're talking about finding a, a room or an Airbnb

at a price, it's not a problem at all.

Like and getting the flight there, Vegas would love for you

to fly there. So all of those costs, like, are

almost artificially lower because of the city that it's

in, which is very different. If you get those bigger things

that start to have a draw on the planes and on like the flights

and on the hotel availability where you're looking at the room

price on the back of the door, it's like, we definitely can't

charge you more than this. You're like, yeah, that's what I

paid. You're right.

It was exactly that much. Thank goodness you have to

legally define it because I think you would have charged me

anything and some people feel like they would have paid

anything, yeah. Yeah.

Oh yeah. They can be very tricky.

Yeah. So how many I I this, I

understand. I just said it changes and it

changes from person to person. How many conventions do you feel

like feels right for you in a year?

I feel very comfortable with two.

I think if as I'm at my job longer and have more PTO, I

would like to consider three. I think that would be really

nice having having some sort of con in the, the spring and then

we've got Gen. Con in the summer and then

something in, in the fall. Winter has been nice.

I don't know what that spring con would be, if it's even, you

know, I mean, if it's if we just bring back shameless con that,

that that'll count for me. I mean, I'm here.

For it last time I didn't have to travel at all and that worked

out really, really well. Got through a lot of games yeah

the the PTO thing I mean, we're talking about cons and fun and

vacation and but that is another consideration and for how long

you can say we said OK, PTG con is really long, but I'm sure

there are lots of people that went that couldn't stay for all

of those days either. Oh absolutely.

So yeah, absolutely yeah, it it can be tough.

I, there was one year where we went to tax U and Jin Con and

Dice Tower West and Dice Tower W is in like March.

So it is a spring sort of thing. So we did do, we did do a

spring, summer fall and it was, it was really good.

And I'm like, this feels good. But I think that it's now been a

couple years at least. I think exactly 2 years since we

did that the way that prices go up.

It's. Yes, it, it doesn't scale with

the way that everything else goes up.

So as much as I like doing it, I feel like that's been, I feel

like that's been the difficult part.

You know, you have to justify the time, you have to justify

the cost to get to these things. And yeah, I don't know where I'm

going with that. It's just an emotion that I feel

right now that I thought was appropriate to voice.

I do have. All sorts of new

responsibilities that you didn't have two years ago.

That aside, that's making all kinds of things different.

That's making all kinds of things different that.

That affects you know sure your your time off but also your

finances in a large way. Well, that's like we're we're

vaguely referencing my kid, but this for one of the reasons I

said, there are many reasons I didn't end up going to board

game Geek BGG con this year. The kid, of course, is kind of

an additional cost and consideration in travelling for

conventions if he's coming and how we're going to manage that.

But also there's just the regular life.

I got a door so I bought a new patio door and I was.

Like what are you talking about? It's like.

Yeah, bought a new patio door and a new patio door from

between saying I'd like this and having it actually in your wall

in your house that cost about a convention.

So yeah, trying. Oh it's fun and really in

Indianapolis it's great. Not only do you have Gencon

here, what a boon. The housing prices, all things

considered, very affordable, but the doors still cost what they

cost. So yeah, trying to.

It's always fun and exciting to go to these conventions.

And that's where you start to look at, OK, here's the small

local 1. Here's one that's small but far

away. Here's a big kind of national

one. Here's a super big national 1.

And I mean, dream scenario. I'd like to go to Essen at some

point. Go to Essen Spiel.

Yeah, me too. And it would have to kind of be

rolled into like a European vacation.

So I feel like it gives you extra impetus to go on vacation

to take the time off to make the investment.

But then it's also extra, it's extra everything else, it's

extra costs. It's made me extra time, a

longer vacation. And then you're trying to make

it more worth it. So maybe you spend an extra day

'cause now you've already, you've already left home.

Another one I'd like to try because I, I thought Dice Tower,

I had a good time at Dice Tower. I didn't really do Dice Towery

things while I was there, but enjoy the convention.

And I know they do another one on a cruise out of Florida.

Yes. And that's another really good

things about it. I'm not a cruise person, but I

can appreciate how much fun that would be honestly.

That's another place where you can layer a vacation on a

vacation, because it is. And BGG also does cruises and

they do cruises all kinds of places.

I think every year they maybe do too.

And they, I think there's one in Australia maybe.

And like they don't Dice Tower, they're in Florida and they

always go out of Florida. But I think BGG, it's called BGG

at sea. They just do whatever they want.

They just go. They just go wherever.

More worthwhile to keep coming back to it, right?

If it's always kind of doing different different trips now.

They're doing different trips and it is more exciting to go

back to it, but then back to the cost.

If you're an American, back to the cost, man, the cruise out of

Florida, they, they, it's a, it's as far as cruising is

concerned, very affordable. You go to islands, it's not very

far. They don't charge you very much

money. They go all the time.

There's tons of boats. But if you're an American and

you're talking about going to Australia to a cruise, oh, it's

going to be the trip of a lifetime.

It's gonna take you a lifetime to pay it.

Back. Yeah, that's how you're thinking

out's gonna feel about it, too. It's like, whoa, hope you liked

it 'cause that's it, that's it. Yep, Yep.

Yeah, yeah, it. But I still, even though I'm

kind of putting a cloud over a bit the convention fund with all

these practical matters, there is still something special about

getting out of your house, getting out of your normal game

group and going to be with other gamers and kind of seeing the

physical presence of the other people.

Because this can be a very insular hobby.

You can kind of get into your group, into your little spot and

not really see anyone. And you might watch videos or be

on a forum or a blog or what have you, social media.

But to actually have that presence of being in a room of

people of a good ballroom and they're all gaming, there is

still something really special about that.

And I think that's what draws me back into it.

Every other maybe logical reason that says, you know, you could

just stay home, you have games, you could stay home.

Yeah, but I do like to convince myself that I'm saving money

because I get to go try a bunch of the games and decide if I

actually do want to buy them or not.

Now what percentage I buy or do not buy, couldn't tell you, but

I like to. I like to convince myself that,

you know, I'm actually saving money because I'm, I'm playing

these games here instead of instead of buying them.

Yeah. And I think there is the hard

value of getting to experience those things.

I know in this year at Gen. Con, we burned through a lot of

games in the hot games room, and it absolutely saved me some

money. Oh yeah, 'cause there were

things I was like, oh, I don't, I don't need this at all.

Yeah, there's definitely those this.

Was nice. I don't ever have to play this

game. Right, yeah, that was a nice one

time thing to happen here. But there's all of these

invaluable like things that things you can't really put a

price on getting out to new cities.

I I wasn't going to go to Dallas otherwise if I don't end up

going to BGG Con, getting other cities and meeting up with when

you start to go to these conventions and make friends

that are far away, having this excuse, like a very regimented

excuse. It's not just like let's plan a

vacation together. I feel like some that's that

feels harder and and easier to push off than BGG Con is this

day. Can we all go to BGG CON?

It feels easier to submit into that and be a way to come

together than it does to just sort of create that same

gathering otherwise when people are far away.

Yeah, I think you're incentivized to the other a

little bit too, because as you make more friends at these

conventions, you want to go and see the same friends again.

Maybe they will all come, maybe maybe only some come, but then

you make some new friends. So so the kind of more regular

you are at attending these kinds of things, the more you know

you'll have a game group when you get.

Bigger, right. It's it's a really fun cult.

More, I think. I think that's where we're

ending it. It's a really fun cult.

You should think about it. We have a good time.

Yeah, absolutely. We'll, we'll tell you all the

benefits of this cult and don't, don't, don't mind how much money

you're spending on it. That's it's.

It's fun. You only spend as much as you

want you. Don't have to spend.

Anything. That's true.

That's true. Thank you so much for listening

to episode 192. Be sure to subscribe to know a

new episodes drop. You can follow us on Instagram,

Blue Sky, and Twitch at Varianthex.

We have a website andablog@varianthex.com and you

can e-mail us at podcast@varianthex.com.

As I'm recording this, Gen. Con badges for 2026 have

recently gone up for sale and we're already sinking into a new

year of conventions and gaming. Of course, we'll go to Gen.

Con, but time will tell if we are journeying further to other

conventions this year. Our next episode will be our

Game of the Month for January with myself and Aaron.

Unless you're listening to these in reverse, in which case you

have 191 more episodes coming your way, the next one being the

Game of the Month of the Year for 2025.

And that's all for now. Thank you so much for spending

your time with us today.