More Kapcon

I have written an official post Kapcon report for the Kapcon blog. It pretty much says that Kapcon was awesome, and that we did all right financially (as in made the smallest possible profit). I have also been posting on nzrag.com, as have many other people. I really enjoy the post-Kapcon enthusiasm. It's one of the nicest things about the convention. Although I only played in one game at the con, it was quite possibly the best con game I've ever played in. Dale is a genius, and Debbie, Nick, Jenni, Luke and Morgue are brilliant roleplayers. I should also remember that I actually got to play in a total of 7 Kapcon games this year, through the wonders of playtesting. Ah, I am a lucky man. The past couple of days have been really interesting from a stress point of view. I have been, understandably, very relaxed and quite chuffed with my efforts over the weekend. I think it will be a while before I commit myself to a long term stress generator like the LARP again. It was actually fun to write, and I'm very pleased with the way it went (a lot of people have said very nice things about it, in person and on blogs and such), but it was weighing on me for the past few months. It's a lot of work for 3 people to do, and it is to Debbie and Svend's credit that we managed to get 60 characters written, all the props bought, and the actual running of the game fairly smooth. I am very grateful to both of them for all their hard work, and I am deeply impressed by how excellent Debbie's LARP was. I remember, back in the innocent days of March last year, when Debbie conceived of the idea for the LARP. She had a vision of how the game ought to be, and I think we managed to stay pretty true to that vision, doing even better than we'd expected in some ways, and the awesome players who brought the whole thing to life added a depth and variety that we are entirely grateful for. And now, a brief word about something that I thought went very well over the weekend - the announcements. I actually quite enjoyed doing all the greetings and in between round announcements, but probably my two stand-out moments as an organiser were the pre-LARP briefing and the prize ceremony. Before the LARP I gave what I would estimate to have been a semi-formal introduction to the LARP. As Sam commented, it had a bit of a story-time feel to it, with people sitting down in a big semi-circle listening to my rambling set-up. I think, despite being quite exhausted and having not a little anxiety about how the evening was actually going to go, I managed to do a pretty good job. I was pleased with the way it went. Svend's explanation of the name badges was hilarious and tone-setting, which was most impressive. Of course, Debbie was hard at work on set-up while we were lounging about soaking up the spotlight, something I feel was in some small way less than ideal. It is interesting to be one of the people ulitmately responisble for the LARP. Over the past 2 years Debbie and I had written many characters for LARPs, and had played NPCs, but were not really the ones who'd be blamed if everything went to custard. It certainly adds an element of stress. Of course, that also means that we're the ones who get to bask in all the praise now :) The other part of the weekend that was really enjoyable was the prizegiving. I liked explaining how we decided who got what prize, and being able to ask people to explain little stories or demonstrate the things they had done in a public setting. It was especially nice because the scores and prizes made sense, and I felt really happy to be able to award them. It's a really nice tradition, and I'm glad that I got to be a part of it. There was only one thing that I want to say more about today, and that's Debbie's amazing contribution to Kapcon. I got lots of spotlight time, and I enjoyed it, but there's no way in hell Kapcon would have been half as good, and there simply wouldn't have been a LARP, without Debbie. I invited her to take the spotlight for some of the con, but she very kindly said that I was doing a good job and that was fine. People have thanked both of us, and I've thanked Debbie personally, but I want to give her the mad props she deserves here. Debbie - you are amazing.