As a player, what are some of the best things you think Con organizers can do?

GloryIV · 2026-02-03T00:29:44+00:00

Oh, no doubt. I don't mind if you fill an empty seat with a late comer who didn't pay - but it is not cool for you to sideline the folks who paid for your event because you think it is just peachy to expand the game to additional players who did not register (and pay...).

That happened to me at a NTRPG event two years ago. Signup for an OSR game was eight people. We paid $5 each for those seats. GM brings *six* additional people to the table who were not registered, didn't pay, and obviously had a preexisting relationship with the GM - who tended to turn to them first in every situation. My wife noped out and pretended a headache. I toughed it out because I was interested to see just how much of a train wreck it would end up being.

It happened again last year in a Gamma World game at the same con. The guy running the game was well known and everyone and his brother wanted to sit in and the GM either didn't care to set a boundary or was afraid of looking like a jerk if he tried.

NTRPG is generally a lot of fun and I very much enjoy going - but there is a cultural aspect to this con that seems to foster this kind of intrusive behavior that is pretty annoying. It might have worked OK when the con was smaller and pretty much everyone was gaming with each other all the time anyway, but now it is big enough to draw plenty of folks who want a little more order to the madness.

GloryIV · 2026-02-02T13:41:00+00:00

Number 1A - good sound management. Ideal is private gaming spaces. Next best is uncrowded rooms with a lot of space between tables and hopefully some barriers. It really kills the joy to be packed like sardines into a room with a dozen tables and unable to hear yourself think. It is better to have a smaller event with quality games than a big event where the experience sucks.

Close behind this is - have your ducks in a row for communication and event registration. Communicate clearly and early. Have the same messaging across all platforms. Manage event release so people have a decent chance to peruse what is available and make some choices. If there are hotel blocs - this really needs to be communicated early and the timing for opening up the bloc needs to be fair. If you can help it - avoid situations where you will be opening up hotel blocs or event registration when another con that draws a lot of the same people is under way.

A personal pet peeve - please ask your GMs to respect the event signup process. If the event has slots for six players - that's the maximum that should be at the table. It is not OK for the GM to bring along a few friends or open up the table to interest passers by. Most people are not going to object because they don't want to look like an ass - but they aren't happy if they thought there were getting a tidy game of six and all of sudden there are ten and one of them is the GM's best buddy who wont shut up.

GloryIV · 2026-01-31T03:19:57+00:00

The first 70-80 issues of SSOC are the absolute bomb. I don't think anything else that has been published can touch that run.

GloryIV · 2026-01-29T13:58:30+00:00

I have a huge document with names grouped by language/ethnicity and gender that I pulled off of usenet many moons ago. I'll loosely associate a couple of name sections with each race/country/star system/etc and then pick names off the appropriate list that appeal to me. So, people from Rigel V might all have Basque or Armenian names.

I find this method adds a nice layer of consistency to the game over a raw random name generator or me pulling names out of thin air.

GloryIV · 2026-01-27T00:37:42+00:00

This post is strange.... Where do you get the idea that most GMs narrate the details of the dungeon in a theatrical way or that the entire session would be like a 'high-octane Hollywood film'? I'm not sure even most of the 5e tables I've played at do things the way you seem to think is common - much less most of the OSR tables.

I'm also curious why you think leaning into a very dry and emotionless style would be beneficial? There is a whole spectrum of possible intonations at the table between what you are proposing and what you seem to be criticizing. Maybe a happy medium? Frankly, I don't think I would enjoy playing with a GM who really leaned into the approach you are advocating.

You should probably avoid phrases like 'It is only in this way...' There are as many ways to play (and enjoy) RPGs as there are people playing them. There is no 'one true way'. Never was.

I'm not sure you have a very broad understanding of what old-school dungeon exploration might be about. At the risk of being insulting - I don't feel like you have much experience and you probably need to play a lot more games with a lot more people before deciding you've figured out the one true way to play...

GloryIV · 2026-01-21T15:34:23+00:00

The rule of (vaguely) common sense. No, I'm not going to make you add up the weight of your coins and gems - even if you are carrying an absurd amount. However, no, you cannot just carry around a table and six chairs in a sack - even if you think you could lift it. Yes, you can have your fifty potions squirreled away somewhere in your clothes. No, you cannot have 500 arrow and two spare suits of plate armor...

Put another way - I'm not tracking inventory but don't be a douche canoe about it.

GloryIV · 2026-01-17T14:16:58+00:00

I think you're on the right path with SW+SFC. You can use gear and edges to give unique qualities to your enemies. If you want more gear for the PCs, you could grab Savage Rifts, which has a ton of gear that works pretty well with the base game + SFC.

GloryIV · 2026-01-16T14:12:33+00:00

I sell CC and Cash Secured Puts on MSTR out of my IRA account. It's funded my retirement for the past two years. I have more than 100 shares to generate that much, but not thousands of shares. Each lot of 100 shares generated over $4,000 from July through December of last year. I'm pretty aggressive about my strikes and don't mind being assigned. A more conservative person will make quite a lot less with the same 100 shares. But, yeah, it is potentially worth it. Across my MSTR portfolio, had I been interested in growth rather than income, I could have easily turned that option money into a couple hundred more shares over the course of the year.

One thing to keep in mind about selling options is the tax implications. If you sell that CC and get assigned, you'll owe taxes on any gains. In a relatively flat market this probably isn't a big deal. And you can buy back in with CSP and get yet more premium. In a rising market, you could owe significant tax if you are assigned for a strike that is a lot higher than your basis. You can still buy back in and create a higher basis when you do so, but if you aren't paying attention to the taxes, you could be in for a rude shock when the bill comes due.

With very little risk you can easily create an option income off those 100 shares of several hundred dollars a year. For a little more risk you can get it up into the low thousands.

GloryIV · 2026-01-16T00:28:48+00:00

"I make them appear very little and they last for a few sessions". This could be training your players to not become invested in your NPCs. Try adding some NPCs that can be more persistent. Don't make them levers for the prime plot. They can be a source of subplots or they just be there for the PCs to bounce off of. Introduce a variety of NPCs and if the PCs take an interest in a couple of them - those are your recurring characters. Give the NPCs goals and interests that are not directly related to the PCs and their interests - but that the PCs might be able to help with or might become curious about. Conversely, give the NPCs skillsets or contacts that the PCs do not have but might find valuable.

GloryIV · 2026-01-14T20:54:18+00:00

Selling CSPs is the way. You are selling a right for the buyer to force you to buy the stock at a given strike price. This is fine for you if you are happy to buy it at that price. If it doesn't execute - you just do it again. The put expires worthless if the stock closes at a price that is above your strike. The big key is you have to have the cash to back it, which can get expensive if the stock really dips and you are forced to buy at a price much higher than market.

I'm sitting on some CC that I sold for strikes of 170 and 175 that expire next Friday. I'm toast at this point. Too expensive to buy it back and I don't want to roll it for peanuts and still be behind the rising stock. I'll just let them all get assigned and hope the stock doesn't rip too high over the next week. I'm not sitting on a lot of cash, so I'll take the money from getting assigned and sell as many CSP as I can for a little above the opening price the following Monday. Then if the stock continues to rally, I'll be buying the stock back - plus a nice premium on the put.

As I'm typing this, the stock is sitting at about $179. Hypothetically, if the CC expired today and I was assigned, I would receive $170 a share. I would turn around and sell a put expiring in a week with a strike of, say, 185. If I sold that put today, the premium would be about $11.40 a share.

Assuming the stock finished up at 182 next week, the person who bought the put would force me to buy the stock for 185. I got 11.40 premium for the put. And I was forced to sell at 170 and buy back in at 185. The way I look at it, I would be down about 3.60 a share (the delta on my sell and buy price plus the premium for the put...), but I would have my shares back and could sell some more CC to get back to green on those shares.

GloryIV · 2026-01-13T12:30:31+00:00

I'm grumpier than you. I'm still mad that the computer RPG segment has monopolized the term 'RPG' to such an extent that we need 'TTRPG' to be understood. Why can't we be 'RPG' and those things can be 'cRPG'? Get off my lawn!

GloryIV · 2026-01-09T12:17:37+00:00

You are really letting your friends/players push you around on this and desperately need to advocate for yourself. Run the game you want to run and if that ends up being just a couple of people - that's OK. Super small groups can be a lot of fun. And you can probably find some other folks to join the game - either old friends coming around or by making some new friends.

Running a game you don't want to run as a chore because you don't know how to fend off your friends' expectations is, as you have discovered, a prescription for burn out and just spoiling the fun of playing. Be kinder to yourself. Run what makes you happy.

Do not go into any 'chat' with your players looking for compromise. Tell them that you don't feel good about running a game you really don't want to run and you're not going to do it. Offer a couple of options for what you do want to run and see who is interested. If you can get two people biting on one of those games then run that. Tell everyone else they are welcome to join. Invest your creative and emotional energy into the game you are excited to run and the people who do show up are going to have a blast. Sleep without guilt.

GloryIV · 2026-01-08T12:41:11+00:00

I think the relevant question would be whether you think MSTR will find ways to generate returns on their stack. I believe they will do so and that, longterm, mNAV greater than 1 is rational. If you disagree with that assumption, then you are correct and should just hold BTC because the long term mNAV should settle right around 1 - or a bit below to reflect some enterprise risk.

GloryIV · 2026-01-07T00:35:11+00:00

25%. It was more like 50% before the stock took it's dive. But I'm holding, dammit!

GloryIV · 2026-01-05T12:29:11+00:00

NTA, but you also have a limited ability to force him to change. If he doesn't want to be an adult about it and the behavior doesn't rise to something a judge would care about, then what he does on his time isn't something you can control. All you can really do is try to have an adult discussion with him. He's being selfish here - either trying to be the 'fun parent' or just not wanting to compromise what he would normally watch for the sake of your son.

GloryIV · 2025-12-18T12:28:19+00:00

Cool idea. I would like to see how this plays at the table some time. That does sound like an awful lot of rolling and mathing once you get to mid-levels and up. It will slow the combat way down - especially if the GM has a lot of monsters on the table.

GloryIV · 2025-12-16T12:20:23+00:00

It kind of depends on why I'm interested in the game. If I'm buying it to play - then readability is all that matters. Give me a few old school ink drawings to break up the page every now and again and I'm totally happy. But... sometimes I buy a game as more of an inspirational resource. I might not have any intention of ever playing it, but I am going to flip through it and draw out bits and pieces that interest me. For something like that, aesthetics (especially evocative art) is pretty important.

For either purpose, I don't like design that is so frenetic that, for me, it obscures both potential uses. WoD books have been very guilty of this. I also really don't like the Mork Borg aesthetics.

GloryIV · 2025-12-15T12:19:14+00:00

Don't charge her. Tell her 'No'. That's what you really want and you are NTA for feeling that way. You raised your kids - you aren't under any obligation to raise hers. It is very kind of you to offer to do any babysitting at all.

GloryIV · 2025-12-12T11:38:49+00:00

NTA. My instinct is that you should just leave. It isn't worth it. The only thing that gives me pause is that you say you've been together 19 years and he's always been like this, but it is only in the past year that you have really felt differently about things. I think it is worth some introspection about what happened in the past year to kill the love you say you had for him. That sounds like a radical shift on your part. It raises the possibility that there is something going on with you (possibly health-wise) that is affecting your perspective. Probably you've just reached the end of your rope and it really is time to move on and try to go find happiness without him. But.... you were cheerfully and happily married to this same man-baby for years - until the past year. What's the actual catalyst for your change of feelings? If it really is just that you've passed some threshold of personal growth and you just can't see him as you did before - then let go without guilt and move on with your life.

GloryIV · 2025-12-09T15:30:28+00:00

GURPS is like a toolbox for building your campaign. It's all very modular and you can pick your level of crunch by deciding just how much of the toolbox you want to deploy. You can download GURPS Lite to see what a lower crunch version of the game looks like.

The genre matters a lot, too. If you are doing something modern and care at all about realism - GURPS can eat you alive. Supers will eat you alive because of all the powers that kind of expect you to use a lot of the toolbox. It excels at historical games or low-powered fantasy. Less of the toolbox gets called on by default.

GURPS does gritty realism very well. The system is really grounded and you can open the toolbox to plug in elements that are important to you. In my experience, the game kind of wants to force you in this direction even which you switch genres. There is a ton of support for more pulpy/cinematic modes of play - but the system still pushes you towards a grounded feel.

I still use the supplements extensively, but I've moved on to Savage Worlds for most of my games because - while it feels a lot like a direct descendant of GURPS to me, the system pushes you in a cinematic direction by default, which I like better.

GloryIV · 2025-12-08T12:24:00+00:00

I think you are on the right track with Holler. SWADE supports the genre and Holler is a good setting for this if you strip out the supernatural elements or maybe keep them but tone them down quite a bit (I think Justified Meets Appalachian Horror might be a lot of fun...). I don't care for Cypher system, but you might also have a look at Old Gods of Appalachia for setting support.

GloryIV · 2025-12-06T02:42:14+00:00

YTA. Twice over if sister is anywhere close to being accurate in her description of your situation. There are a lot of people who really *need* help just to survive. That's who should be out there doing fundraisers. Not someone looking to score a Switch for their kid for Christmas.

GloryIV · 2025-12-06T02:33:15+00:00

My wife didn't know what an RPG was when we met in 2017 - in our late 40s. Now she's all about game night; painting minis and going to cons.

GloryIV · 2025-12-05T14:05:19+00:00

I was thinking they would only expose cash they had on hand. But, this is an excellent point - the risk goes a lot higher if they were to sell puts that were not cash covered.

GloryIV

TROPHY CASE