In brief; got my ticket, went in, took a walk around, nearly walked into a mirror, came back out, talked to the Paradice crew, had a chat with some of the DM Supergroup, did a bit more of a circuit, realized there wasn't anything I wanted to buy, propped up the bar for a bit, chatted to the Supergroup folk again, more people collected and then had a good long chat before I took my leave and headed home.
For background, Harry-con was the long-running annual convention pulled together by the now-retired owner of a very popular and lamented games store in Vienna that seemed to be mostly built around 'Harry summons everyone he knows, which is everyone in any way connected to the gaming space locally'. You used to get your ticket by buying one of these dice to show at the door:
This new iteration of the convention is the continuity con, the torch having been passed on amicably and taken up by others of the local gaming community - officially InCharacter Rollenspielverein Österreich and Ariochs Erben - both 'vereins' which are Austrian hobby-societies - and with sponsorship by Thalia (big local book chain) and Siren Games (Friendly Local Game Store).
On theme with the tradition of odd tickets for this event we got the above laser cut balsa tickets which they snapped on the door to put your stub into a draw.
First impressions
It was a pretty well run, well crewed con with the air of a long-running thing that seemed to be operating in a too-small venue. The actual venue was a dance school where the big wall mirror made me think it was twice as big - and it could easily have been so. I remember the last Harry-con being significantly larger with a lot more vendors and stuff and I think they could easily size up again for next year. I saw a lot of crew, on door and marshalling folk through a packed roster of events - it all seemed to be running smoothly so probably the right amount of folk.
There were a ton of things going on - lots of games on the upstairs mezzanine, a bar with snacks, a corner with talks, a display stand on 3D printing from the local technical museum, a stand, mostly boardgames from the big sponsoring bookstore chain and a bunch of stalls covering all sorts of things in the boardgaming, wargaming, LARPing and TTRPGs space - as well as an artists alley type section.
I personally came to eyeball the place and hopefully snaffle some odd old RPG books but those vendors were not here this time; there seemed to be a lot for you if you were into boardgames, some stuff for wargames and LARPs and then the TTRPG presence were stands for local games societies (Paradice, Athenaes Siegel) rather than vendors. I think better for the local community that we were talking connection and how to find games rather than flogging stuff but certainly potential to do both where space allows.
Activities
The con program was absolutely packed - multiple concurrent things which left me with the impression of lots crammed into the space. There were talks running from a beach-blanket sized stage in the corner, continuously through the day on topics from costume making to aging props to storytelling.
There were two rounds of five tables upstairs - three run by the Paradice crew, two by Athenaes Siegel. The slots were 1100-1300 and 1300-1600/1700 - two 5e tables for each slot run by Athenaes Siegel and a mix of things run by Paradice - For the Queen, Lady Blackbird and 5e in the morning, Root RPG, Blades in the Dark and 5.5e in the afternoon. Not huge amounts of capacity but a good variety.
On just being present at conventions
I had a bit of a moment of personal enlightment too - having zipped around on a first pass, and run out of concrete ideas since I did not have time to get stuck into games nor were there mysterious books stacks to browse, I might ordinarily have just kept moving and trotted on out and home again - things to do, right?
Instead I decided to just park myself at the cafe-bar, have a coffee and crowd-watch to see was I missing anything. That proved to be a great idea - rather than me running around trying to find folk, where I stood still I became a marker for others. First one of the Supergroup who was running coffees and refreshments to the DMs upstairs, then others who saw us, then Paradice folk who knew them but not me - it was a good daisy-chain effect that got me talking to a few folk I had not met before. Got a very interesting run down of a long Worlds Without Number campaign which was fascinating as I always like to hear how these systems change under dozens of sessions of play.
In short, in the absence of a better idea, lurk visibly, see who comes to you. Let yourself be the person other people find.
Looking forward to 2027
I had a brief chat with some of the sponsors much later and they did acknowledge that the venue was smaller than they had ideally wanted. I think a great problem to have - the handover has been successful, the continuity concept proven and they can confidently expand next year.
I feel they could easily fit in more vendors, a chunk more artists alley and throw in some more tables for people to play the games they buy. There were not even any card games or wargames presence either. I would be interested to know if the big technical museum showcase earned its place - it was pretty nifty but ate a lot of scarce floorspace.
For those of you outside of Vienna, there are a couple of other chunky cons that happen every year which have some TTRPG presence, the most relevent of which is 'Spielefest' which is a colossus mostly built around boardgames that typically has ~ two dozen rpg tables running in a niche at one side. We know the demand is present in the city.
All told, I'm glad I went and that it is looking lively. I am glad Harry seems to have passed off the torch and I hope it all prospers. Looking forward to 2027.
No comments:
Post a Comment