Ancon convention and loot report

ANCON has ended,

Pretty good convention overall, although Friday was a bust. Having no players for my 40K demo I played the Nercomunda demo which didn't get any players either and watching new Doctor Who episodes with the roll-up a Silvervine character who had one sign-up, who since he already knew Silvervine had the judge check his new character for about 5 minutes and was done. The Silvervine folk tried to convince me that Silvervine was easier than Dungeons and Dragons, but since they needed an entire session for rolling characters I was not convinced. Picked up some Dungeons and Dragons Gazetteers, Gaz2, Gaz11, Gaz12, and one that just says Gazetteer (probably paid too much but they are long out of print) got Realmspace and some spiral bound thing called Goblin World thrown in for free. I had turned my nose up at the Gazetteers when they first showed up, because they were BMX D&D and not AD&D. However, after reading Harvards Blackmoor/Mystara, and Bruce Heards blog feel I may have missed out on something good. Once WoTC releases them as .pdfs for $5 each I'll feel a bit foolish. Paid 1 pound 50 ($3.25) for best of White Dwarf Scenarios 2 (I have 1 and 3 already, may have 2 already, but 3.25 was worth the risk of repeating myself) Old white dwarfs seam to go fairly cheap in the US, not sure people understand that before issue 100 or so there are a lot of Dungeons and Dragons articles. Realm of the Penguinmancer on Sunday was not too full. However I had good time teaching 4ed D&D to two folk from Toledo who had sseen game for half-off in the Game store and wondered how it played. Got to help out the damsel-in-distress. She was getting ready to DM a second edition D&D game, when of the players asked her if it was true that in first edition D&D elves and dwarves were both character classes. I both revealed the existence of an earlier 0th edition, and explained the difference between 1st edition AD&D and BMX D&D. I am as yet unable to explain, why the heck TSR kept both versions going for close to 10 years, or why the one that was harder to read and understand was more popular with my friends. I'll and get some reviews up of the gazetteers, once I've read them, and perhaps Silvervine too (once I've found my copy).

P.S. The Silvervine folk assure me the revised edition has been actually proofread by someone who is good at it, but since they have gone to an online purchase model, they didn't bring any copies to sell at the convention.