Lons Lair

02/21/2024

Now that we have caught up on much needed sleep, here is Polar Vortex 8 by the numbers. Total attendance reached 465, our largest ever. Over 170 events were offered, again our most ever. Our heart felt thanks to all our attendees, judges, vendors, artisans, and volunteers who made this the biggest and best Polar Vortex ever.
Planning now begins for Polar Vortex 9, February 14-16, 2025 at the Sheraton Lisle. Hope to you all join us again for a fun filled weekend of tabletop gaming.

10/31/2020

Being a History person, (MA in US Diplomatic History and taught US History for 36 years), I have several favorite historical topics. One is the Seven Years War in North America, or as the Colonials called it - the French and Indian War. So, when the Second Edition of Martin Wallace's "A Few Acres of Snow" was released it became a must buy.

Sadly, it took quite some time for it to finally come to the table, but I am very pleased it did. This is a card based strategic board game representing the struggle for dominance in North America between the French and the British from 1754-63. The mechanics are driven by card play between two players, taking alternating turns. This is an easy game to learn and play. And, there is more than one for either side to achieve victory. It is a keeper.

10/13/2020

A while back I came across an article that included stats showing more TTRPG players in Germany were playing "The Dark Eye" RPG - a German Fantasy RGP - than D&D. So, several years ago I made picking up the core book for The Dark Eye one of my must have purchases at Gen Con. It has only been during the Pandemic that I actually sat down and began reading the book.

If I find making up a character for an RPG interesting, I know that I then want to play it. Such was my reaction to The Dark Eye. The rules system is more crunchy than D&D 5E and also different from Pathfinder. Skills are more involved and character creation and advancement focuses on "purchasing" with Adventure Points further enhancements/improvements to your character. This appears to help make characters much more individualized than it's American cousins. There is much more that can be said on how this rules system differs from D&D, but that is too lengthy for this post.

The photo shows the Core Rulebook, the Campaign world Almanac, two free adventures given to me when I purchased the rulebook, and a Quickstart pamphlet from a past Free RPG Day. Oh, and my character record sheets.

10/04/2020

It has been too long since I have posted what I have been playing lately. So, I am making an effort to play through games in my collection I have either not yet played or have not played in a long time. This week I have been playing Alhambra for the first time. This won the coveted Spiel des Jahres award in 2003. I picked up my copy of the 5th Anniversary Edition (released in 2008) at a dinged and dented sale so long ago I forget where.

This medium weight strategy game has proved to be quite enjoyable. I find the acquisition of money and purchasing just the right tiles to fit into your Alhambra an intriguing duel level mechanic. The goal is to score the most points over 3 scoring rounds. Points are awarded by the length of the wall around your Alhambra and having more of one type/color of building. than your opponents.

Alhambra makes a great game to smoothly step up to after experiencing gateway games as it is easy to learn and with a little more strategy to get your teeth into.

05/26/2020

Been playing games to help pass the time. With non-gamer family member at the table, Dirty Pigs and Meditate. And for the gamers, Clank in Space: Cyber Station.

04/01/2020

Being one of the people who bring you Polar Vortex Game Convention, I hope you can find a way to help out Tabeltop Events.

Tabletop.Events is the software that runs hundreds of your favorite tabletop game conventions, and it is in trouble, and we need you to be our champions. The pandemic has shut down all conventions for the past month, and the near future, so that means all of our revenue has dried up. But what's wors...

08/12/2019

Been planning on taking Concordia out for a tabletop trial for some time. That time is now! Using the 2-4 player side of the board to get my feet wet. Really liking this mid-weight worker placement/resource management game so far. It will clearly take one full play through to figure out the strategic aspects of the game.

06/14/2019

06/14/2019

03/31/2019

Revisiting an old friend this week. The first worker placement/resource management game I ever played, The Pillars of the Earth. Played it years ago at the Mayfair booth at Gen Con. This is the most recent printing from Komos.

05/04/2018

Yes, it has been a long time since my last post. Just had to give this news a shout out to anyone interested in a Sci-Fi RPG using the D&D 5E rules mechanics. The full finished edition of Esper Genesis: Heroic Sci-Fi Roleplaying 5E game is now available as a PDF on DriveThru RPG, or you can pre-order a copy among additional titles on the Esper Genesis home page.

02/10/2018

Here at Winter Fantasy 2018. A new look to the convention this year is setting up specific play areas with both short and tall pipe and drape. Here are two of the six areas: Epic tables and Special Event tables. Also, the Gen Con Board Game Library is starting to attract more players every year.