PAX East 2013 Report

Once again, I will report that PAX East is awesome.

I actually attended two days this time around.  I was there for eight hours on Saturday and four hours on Sunday.

Saturday: I arrived a little late -- 10am -- due to the Silver line running slow.  I spent the first hour or so re-assembling most of my squads and stations as I had to run and catch the Green line for the first leg of my trip.  Which led to my Lego bouncing around inside my bag and turning into a pile of random parts.  Sometime between 11:00 and 12:00 things picked up with people stopping by and asking to try the game.  I ran three short demos back to back.  This lasted 'til maybe 2:00.  Then we managed to start up a full game with four people.  Let me say, a game with four people on the tables we were using was claustrophobic.  I much prefer the round table we were using last year.  The tables this year weren't as heavy as the round table we used last year so they moved if you leaned into them.  That game played out over the next couple of hours.  I was lucky to have an experienced player at the table and he helped to move things along.  It also allowed me to talk to passers-by who had questions.  After that I ran another demo for four people.  Later I transitioned into another game for six (!) people.  Luckily they were split into three teams of two.  That was the last demo I ran for the day.

Sunday: I got in a little after 2:00.  This was planned as I wanted some time to recover and relax in the morning.  I met a friend and we talked  for a bit before I grabbed my kit from the both and found an empty table.  When I grabbed my kit I ran into someone looking for a demo.  Between my friend and myself we got the table set up pretty quickly.  Teams were chosen and the battle joined.  It lasted three rounds before the gentlemen had to go.  Luckily a trio of young kids had come along looking to play.  We hit the reset button, the kids chose teams and we went to battle again.  One of the kids had to leave right after we started but the other two stayed right to the end.  They even gave impromptu names to the mechs in their squad!  I really hope they picked up a copy of the rules.  This was the last game of the day for me.  It was a shame because the kids came back for another try.

I got to meet a lot of cool people this year, among them a couple of people from the Mobile Frame Hangar.

I did take some photos with my smartphone so those will be posted later in the week.

See Y'all next year!