Gen Con announcements Day 1

So not a huge amount of news coming out of GenCon today. You know the best thing about not going to GenCon, is the not assault on my nostrils....heh. But seriously, I'm really hoping next year will be our first GenCon!

Paizo announced that Steve Jackson Games' next Munchkin set will be the Pathfinder Munchkin set!

From the Paizo Blog:

Lisa Stevens signs the contract with Steve Jackson Games for Munchkin card game!

Thu, Aug 16, 2012 at 02:57 PM Pacific
   The Pathfinder Roleplaying Game™ from Paizo Publishing is one of the world’s best-selling fantasy roleplaying games, in the true spirit of the classic dungeon crawl. Now Steve Jackson Games is proud to announce that Pathfinder is getting the full Munchkintreatment in a brand new core set...combining the unique features of the Pathfinder setting with Munchkin's irreverent sense of humor.   "We’re honored to be working with Paizo on Munchkin Pathfinder," said Andrew Hackard, Munchkin Brand Manager for Steve Jackson Games. "Pathfinder is a wonderfully rich world to play in."
   Steve had no direct comment, as he was snickering and rubbing his hands together in contemplation of parodying TWO of the most popular fantasy roleplaying games of all time.
   "We all love Munchkin here at Paizo Publishing, so this is a match was a no brainer," Lisa Stevens, CEO of Paizo Publishing stated matter of factly. "But of course," she whispered conspiratorially, "I really just wanted to see John Kovalic draw our iconic sorceress, Seoni!"
Munchkin Pathfinder will be a 168-card set, designed by Steve Jackson and Andrew Hackard and illustrated by John Kovalic. It will be playable as a standalone game or with any other Munchkin set. Look for it in stores in Fall 2013.

Privateer Press of course is debuting the Iron Kingdoms RPG!! Now this is something I'm really excited about. After talking to Simon at SDCC, I know that the game is based upon the Warmachine/Hordes  miniature game rules, rather than the OGL 3rd edition rules. Can't wait to get a good look at the rules.

Wyrd miniatures delayed the release of one of their Malifaux miniatures, due to Quality Control issues, that's reassuring, as quality is more important than a GenCon release!

When I find out more, so will you!

Listen to This Just in from GenCon!

Gaming at San Diego Comic Con

   I remember the old days of Comic Con. Those were the halcyon days, gamers sitting in the aisles playing games, wait, no I don't actually remember those days too well strangely enough. I remember my first Comic Con was in the late 80s, I remember there were a LOT more game companies on the floor back then, but I don't really remember gaming, I think possibly because I didn't know where the game room was, and I was only at Comic Con for one day and I spent it mostly on the convention floor; looking for comics, talking to the artists and buying games with what little cash I had.

   Well Comic Con still has gaming, if you haven't gotten to the back of the program before you might not know this unless you're part of San Diego's Pathfinder Society, then you might have known to go to Marriott Marina Ballroom E. There were a full 11 Pathfinder society slots run at SDCC this year, I will confirm with Eric Brittain the total number of players who played in the PFS games this year at con, and if any special boons were granted like at KingdomCon earlier this year.

   Gaming at the Marriot also included the Wizards of the Coast area. There was plenty to play, from the DND Next playtest (under an NDA), the D&D Convention Delve (Lair of the Dread Witch), D&D Learn to play, D&D Rise of the Underdark, D&D Dungeon Command Tournament, and the new Euro style Lords of Waterdeep. So if you were a 4th edition fan, and you missed SDCC, you missed quite a lot of gaming. I'm sure Wizards of the Coast will be back again next year, and with a probable release of D&D Next coming at  GenCon, there's a good chance that will be featured again at SDCC 2013.

   If CCGs (Collectible Card Games) are your thing, then you would have wanted to check out the Marriot Hall F for Magic or Mezzanine Room 14AB for Pokemon, perfect place to bring the younger kids if you're looking for a respite from the Con floor.

   But if you really wanted to get away from the Con floor sit down, maybe even eat your lunch, there was really no better place than Mezzanine Room 15AB. This was the Steve Jackson Games MIB game room, featuring many of your favorite SJG Games like Munchkin, Zombie Dice, Frag, even out of print stuff like Knightmare Chess was present (This is one of my all-time favorite SJG Games, and I still have both of my copies excellent condition.) In the SJG Room was also SoCal Malifaux, running demos and tournaments all con. Tanto Couro the Dominion 'style' anime fan service game was being demoed as well as many other smaller games.

Robert and some volunteers getting down with some ZOMBIE DICE!

Table 1 of Munchkin

Table 2 of Munchkin at the same time!

Tanto Coure demo...1 love, 2 love, 3 love...

SoCal Malifaux doing demos for newbies

Octave getting annihilated in the second turn of the demo. 

SoCal Malifaux has some nice demo boards

Tanks for a great con San Diego!!! err what??

Malifaux Lightning tournament which went from 7-11pm

Second table at the lightning tournament

   On the floor, there are way less RPG Booths now than in past years, Privateer Press was there again with "Big Blue" so it was hard to miss. Of course the best place to buy games at Con is Adventure Retail!  One of the really cool things I found out was that the, Colt the Outlander of Heavy Metal fame, is going to be having a RIFTS RPG sourcebook according to RC Aradio. I picked up the limited edition reprint from Heavy Metal, featuring a crossover story from Rifts. As you all know, I love the Rifts fluff, not a huge fan of the MDC system.

Colt the Outlander

   I talked with Simon of Privateer Press' booth as well as getting a demo of their new Card game, it was pretty fun. We also discussed the upcoming Iron Kingdoms RPG, which they will have preview copies of at GenCon, man wish I was gonna be there!!

Simon of Privateer Press teaching a Con goer how to play Heap!

All in all, I wish I'd had more time to spend at Comic Con, 1 1/2 days wasn't enough to do everything I wanted to do. So if you're going next year, don't forget to check out all the game areas, they're all listed in the Events Guide, and make a great place to relax when you're not busy doing everything else.

Quick Review - Munchkin Fu

Munchkin Fu
(Steve Jackson Games)

Available Now
If you loved Munchkin . . . look out. Here they come again.
"I'm a Ninja with the Dragon Tooth Katana!"
"I'm a Monk with the Sai of Spleen Mangling. Fear my Drunken Monkey Kung Fu!"
"I'm a Yakuza with a gun. Run away!"
The Munchkins are back! Now the game is chop-socky Hong Kong action. The characters are Samurai, Ninja, Yakuza, and Monks. The foes are mooks, demons, and assorted bad guys from all the worst martial arts films you've ever seen. Collect treasures and learn new styles to build up your character's powers. Kill the monsters, take their stuff, and be the first one to 10th level!
Created by Steve Jackson. Munchkin Fu is completely compatible with the entire Munchkin line.
This product was released after May 2010.


Visit the official web page for more info, resources, product support and links.
Boxed game with 168 cards, rules, and die.
Stock #SJG1412 * ISBN 837654320587 * $24.99



Review
Epic Ian picked this up for himself with some birthday money. I think perhaps this is one of the best base sets we've played. In typical Munchkin style this set is heavy on parody, possibly even offensive to some at times, as some of the humor is definitely stereotypical. If you're familiar with Munchkin the rules will be very familiar. A few new items to deal with but nothing too difficult.

The set is based around Martial arts and Kung Fu action movies. Four classes are included in this set, Yakuza, Monk, Samurai and Ninja. A new introduction in this set is the Styles, 12 unique styles, from the Bull Style, which is based on the headgear you're wearing, to the Banana style, which has a +5 bonus. Mooks use the same rules as normal henchmen. There are lots of cool rule-tweaking cards in this set.

Family
This is a great game, but there are some drug, alcohol and sexual references that you need to be aware of, Cards like "Hopped up on Lotus", "Kung Fu Grope", and the "Drunken" style enchancer. I have no problem with my kids seeing this stuff, because we've had those talks, and continue to have an open forum.

Value  
At $24.99, this isn't too bad for 168 cards, since every card has unique art, even different cards with the same name have different art. It's always good for a laugh.

Rating
Pretty Epic! Better than a couple of the sets, and a family favorite.

RPG News: GenCon

While I'm not At GenCon, all the big industry news comes at GenCon, as I hear about these news items, I'll respond. I know Wizards of the Coast and Paizo have announcements happening at GenCon. Rumors have been circulated that 5th edition is to be announced, but coming on the heels of "essentials" we'll have to see what happens. Though there is a precedent for releasing consolidated rules, before the new edition. (Rules Compendium released just before the announcement of 4e). Note: While I'm not a fan of 4e, I am a fan of RPGs and anyway to get new blood into the industry is all right by me.
---------------------------------------------------------

Per the SJG Twitter, Steve Jackson Games announce 2012 release of Conan Munchkin!
Pretty cool, now we can play Conan the way it was meant to be played, with Cthulhu!! Pulp at it's finest

---------------------------------------------------------

Per Adam Daigle Twitter: Hardcover re-release of PFRPG Hardcover confirmed.
Good news for the people who are missing the original Out of Print Rise of the Runelords AP. I wonder what the price point will be.

---------------------------------------------------------

Weekend Review - Gam3rCon edition

The weekend review this week is from the games we played at Gam3rCon. (just me on Friday)

Friday night, Well I got my first taste of 4e with a foray into Gamma World, and I must say, the taste was non-descript. While the changes from 3.0 aren't as drastic as I had thought they were, it was about what I expected. But onto the Gamma World front, the changes in the way characters play completely changes the existing world, part of what I enjoyed about Gamma World was the exploration for ancient tech, the secret societies, and the good and the bad mutations. Pure Strain humans, mutant humans, mutant animals, etc, made the game really fun. Exploring to find old tech and the slow progression is what I liked about it. So it was different, kinda fun, but I think I'll take a pass on it. If constantly mutating characters are your thing, by all means have fun. The second game I played on Friday was Guillotine, a Wizards of the Coast card game from 1997,which you take part in three days of the French Revolution as a competing executioner, most the nobles are valued from 1 for a rival executioner to 5 points for Marie Antoinette or King Louis, then there are negative cards such as the -1 Martyr or the -3 Hero of the People. . You take turns using action cards to do things such as move a noble in the line, giving someone the next noble in line with the after you card or even stealing a noble.  After the action phase you take the head of the noble at the front of the line, executing any special actions that card may have. It's a very clever game and I highly recommend it for a quick game.

Saturday, The boys and I started out with Outbreak Undead. Now this is a really fun game, while it could probably be played with other systems, the SPEW-AI character creation rules let you actually create yourself (to the extent you answer honestly) and includes an interesting mechanic called Gestalt dice, which are handed out equal to your age as a one-time bonus, to grant use of specific skills you really know, but aren't on the character sheet. The game is designed for campaign play, and I believe the system really kicks in for extended play, for one-shots, it's pretty easy to blow through your ammo and survive the encounter, but what do you do next time with no ammo, and 20 additional zombies.This is on my future purchase list.  The next game we played was Zombie Munchkin!! You know how much we love Munchkin, and the boys had been wanting to play this. There was no disappointment, the game played pretty fast, and within an hour or so, we were done, I used the tricky card which allowed me to piggy back off Ian's combat and steal the two levels I need to victory! Now Zombies seems slightly higher power level than regular Munchkin. But having Zombie hordes jumping in on combats tends to make it more hectic, I'm curious to see how it plays out.Boys and I played Guillotine to pass the time before we got into the Outbreak Undead game, they really liked it too.

Sunday Sunday SUNDAY!! Well I was prepping for my own Zombie fun running "28 Sleepcycles Later" Alpha Complex under seige of the walking dead in ZOM sector, but while I was preparing my scenario, Sean got to try out his new ICONS RPG (which he won for the Zombie Kill of the Day, shanking a Zombie with a toothbrush in the eyeball) with Ian, as Chris Czerniak ran them through a quick scenario, the boys really enjoyed it, and I believe THEY specifically will recommend it. After they finished, with Icons, that group came over and played PARANOIA! Running the pure mayhem of Paranoia was a blast, from the mumbling mousy violet citizen with the kill first fine second attitude briefing officer to the PLC room with one clerk, and 2 miles of empty line, 500 windows and a 30 minute break, after the brisk jog to reach the one clerk the Hygiene Officer ran a surprise inspection , which resulted in not one but TWO emergency scrubdowns, the trip to R&D resulted in the first clone replacement as a the tiny closet was ripe for theft by the Pro-Tech secret mission, but the 20 rolled on the sleight of hand caused a hilariously deadly incident. Then it was onto ZOM sector, where more experimental weaponry and mutant powers led to more deaths and a brain scrub at debriefing. I always recommend Paranoia. I know everyone had fun, from the newby role player to the veteran of Paranoia, and I know one was talking about convincing his friends to get into it...My job is just beginning....

Game on!