Mittens 2012 Anaheim - August 24-31 - Dave G was there!

Started by Disco, Wed 21/03/2012 15:42:05

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Disco

About this Project:

A summer holiday adventure in beautiful Downtown Anaheim, California. Mittens is the annual real-life meeting for adventure game creators mostly from the AGS community.

The location will be the unparalleled Ultimate SoCal Vacation Homes â€" Garden Retreat II.

Arrival Times:

Arriving by car - ETA at Mittens house 17:00
Disco
Esseb
AGA
Jen

ProgZMax - 06:30 at Anaheim Amtrak Station
Dave - 14:57 at SNA, United Airlines 1010
Janet - 14:57 at SNA, United Airlines 1010
Snarky - 18:57 at LAX, US Airways 701
Abstauber - 21:25 at SNA, United Airlines 1177
Christina - 21:25 at SNA, United Airlines 1177
Grundislav - 22:30 at LAX, American Airlines 629
Misja

Snarky

QuoteFriday, March 26th

You might want to change that to "Monday, March 26th".  :)

THIS MONDAY, PEOPLE! Make your payments now!

Disco

Hah! Thanks for catching that. The Kickstarter I based this off ends on a Friday XD

abstauber


Miez


Dave Gilbert

Dutifully paid! Sent you $470 for Janet and myself.

AGA

Paid for me and Jen. Bagsy the master bedroom, since nobody else seems to have done that yet.

Snarky

I've been looking at flights, and thought it might be good to coordinate a bit.

It seems like coming from Europe, most flights are going to arrive at SNA (20 mins from house) or LAX (45 mins from house) in the late afternoon or evening, though if you can get a direct flight to LAX from Heathrow, Amsterdam or Paris, you can get in around noon or 1PM.

Is anyone coming earlier? I was wondering if it was worth arriving Thursday afternoon and going out to the house earlier on Friday. (Last group there always gets the worst beds.) I'll probably stick around for the Saturday after, anyway. And looking at the price of flying there, I'm considering taking another week to do something somewhere in America, to get maximum value for money (either before or after). Maybe drive down to Mexico and check out the drug war.

Grundislav

I was planning on flying in on Friday evening, so I wouldn't have to take an extra day off work. I was seeing some flights into LAX that get there around 8pm.

Disco

Some of us are planning a road trip down from Seattle. I hope to reach LAX sometime around early afternoon the first day of Mittens.

We cannot check in before 5pm, so getting beds should be fine. So far there are not enough attendees to warrant getting the air mattresses out, we might not get to that point.

Speaking of beds, it should be noted that we have three couples so far, and there are three bedrooms meant for only two people. Those should be considered taken now. Left are two rooms of various numbers of bunk beds, and the pullouts in the living and game rooms.

Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens

Will people be around if I book it to show up early Friday morning?  I've not been to Anaheim before (I've been to San Diego) so I don't really have a good concept of where things are in relation to each other, particularly the amtrak station and the property.

Also, I'm toying with the idea of bringing along an Army of Darkness tabletop rping rulebook (or Call of Cthulhu...or All Flesh Must Be Eaten).  Would anyone have an interest in getting a tabletop game going at some point during the event with any of the above?  I have everything needed to play so you won't need anything except maybe some pens and paper.  Please let me know via pm if you're interested and which one of these you'd rather I brought.  

For a quick breakdown, Army of Darkness plays like an interactive movie (either the original movie or a custom scenario) that allows 1-2 people to play 'Chosen Ones' like Ash (or you could be Ash if you wanted), 2-4 people play as Heroes (basically Lord Arthur or Duke Henry), and 2-4 people as Primitive Screwheads (basically low tier characters).  Each tier serves a purpose in the game.  AoD uses limited dice roles and supports special moves (chainsaw slurree) and Drama Points to liven things up.  Drama points basically allow you to interrupt certain catastrophic events (at the leisure of the game master) like your death, giving yourself a couple dice rolls worth of hitpoints to simulate a second wind or 'it's only a flesh wound' type situation (and a lot of other circumstances provided you can justify it).  Likewise, you earn Drama points for witty one-liners, critical successes that result in deadites being blasted to guts, and so on.  It's the most relaxed and the shortest of the 3.

All Flesh Must Be Eaten is a Zombie Infection scenario using the same basic ruleset of Army of Darkness except that it eschews Drama points in favor of a more robust dice rolling system (a little closer to D&D).  The setting can be anything from post-apocalypse with mutants to space stations in the future and allows for seat-of-the-pants gaming much like Army of Darkness.

Edit:  Ken is interested in playing this.


Call of Cthulhu is one of the more cerebral tabletop games on the market and while it supports combat roles it is designed primarily for exploration and puzzle solving (much like an adventure game).  The game routinely pits you against Lovecraftian horrors that aren't going to die from a couple of bullets so instead your characters will study arcane rites and learn the weaknesses of your enemies while fighting to keep your sanity.  Sanity is the most important part of the game as it determines your character's ongoing behavior and you can go batshit insane in the game if you stare into the abyss one too many times.


Anyway, this is just a thought so don't feel like you have to participate, it just sounded like it could be something fun to do.  If I get 3-4 pms interested I'll bring along the materials.



Snarky

Yeah, I could be into that. And if you find a way of incorporating foosball into the game, it might turn out to be my favorite thing ever. (I'm more into the freeform RPGs than the heavy stats-and-dice-rolls ones.)

Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens

All three are pretty much dice-light so just choose whichever setting interests you most (comedy horror/deadites, survival horror/zombies, cerebral horror/lovecraft).  As for integrating foosball...if a situation comes up where it seems like a good way of resolving a situation, who knows?  :)


Some notes about the property:

I contacted the owners and they have told me it will be accessible at 3 pm; however, after 11:30 am you can stop by and drop off any gear you have if you are early.

As I'll be arriving in Anaheim at 7am I'll have quite a long wait so I wanted to know exactly when I'd be able to get into the house.

Pumaman

Good work getting things organised, guys!

I'm a maybe at the moment, as I have a wedding to attend on 25th August, but I may come down and join you on 26/27th for the second half of the week!

Dave Gilbert

Hey everyone! Janet and I have been rejiggering our plans, so we should be able to stay the whole week. So Disco, bagsy us one of them "for two people" rooms!

Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens

A friend of mine might be coming along, so I'll be able to drive there instead of take the train.  He's actually a lurker since 2007 or so and he's posted a couple of times (he even worked with me on a game for awhile but lost interest) so he's not someone pulled out of nowhere.

Also, I've decided to bring All Flesh Must Be Eaten as Snarky, Janet, Disco (and my friend) have illustrated interest in playing it.  I'm sure a couple more of you will get in on it when you see us having fun slaughtering zombies (I can safely bring in 6 players for the adventure(s) I have, and I might be able to work in 1 or 2 more if you're really interested).

That's enough of me hogging the thread for now.  I'll update if/when my friend Paul makes a decision.

Disco

*nevermind*

Disco

Hello again.

This is your One Month warning for the final payment, people! The amount we are supposed to pay this time is $2,350, which is still based on 20 attendees.

Thankfully, since we are at the minimum attendees right now, we are only on the hook for either ourselves or as many more people that will show in the end. The managers will adjust the fee for each person less.

As of right now, those of us who have already paid will have to pay in another $40 if there are no new attedees. This amount decreases slightly for each person toward 20, at which point no one will owe any extra.

tzachs

Man, I wish I could come this year too..  :'(

Have fun, guys!

Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens

But Ken, didn't you just say they'd decrease the price for each person under 20?  I guess I'm not sure where you're getting the $40 extra charge per person from.

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