Well, we had a record number of people here playing D&D on Saturday. As a matter of fact, if we get any more people we will have to start a third table. 14 people played D&D on two tables DM’d by Justin and Don (thanks guys!). On another table were 5 people playing Magic. Wow, noisy and amazing!

This is just a quick note to let everyone know that we’ll be closing early tomorrow, July 24, for the holiday. We’d like to have a picnic and watch fireworks with the kids. Have a great holiday, and see you all soon!

Dawn

Winner Rob!

Our Magic 2010 Launch Party was a blast (not to mention quite successful). Thank you to all the players and to James for organizing and keeping track of everything. We had 8 people playing: Kendel, Jordan, Stacie (girl power!), Alex, Rob, Jay, Dean, and Greyson. Congratulations to ROB for first place and a nifty fat pack, ALEX for second place and a wonderful white intro deck, and STACIE (first time player!) for third place and some beautiful card protectors! All players got a set of DCI exclusive cards to add to their collections.

Rob was definitely the man of the evening with his unbeatable white/green combo. All sets were played as best 2 out of 3 matches, and Rob only lost one game, going 2-0 prelim, 2-0 semi-final, and 2-1 championship round. All games were played in the sealed deck format, with each entrant getting 6 sealed boosters and making the best possible deck out of the cards they got. Win or lose, everyone ended the day with some killer cards.

Peace.

Well, here are the promised pictures of A Gathering of Strangers. Top left: Formula De, a game of racing (won one, lost horribly 2nd). Top right: Steve (in blue), the organizer of AGOS. Bottom left: Sean MacDonald (game designer and 4th place winner) being interviewed by a reporter from the Deseret News. Bottom right: entry table.

Congratulations to all the contestants of the Strangers Choice Award boardgame design competition.
And the winners are…
4th Place: Crow and the Pitcher, by Sean MacDonald
3rd Place: Bandits of Persia, by Mike Compton
2nd Place: Queen’s Garden, by Sandeep Kharkar and Dave Haslam
1st Place: Crimelords, by Dave Haslan and Sandeep Kharkar
CONGRATULATIONS!

For those of you I saw at A Gathering of Strangers–it was great to see you! For those of you who chose to come and play at the store instead–great to see you too!

Utah’s gaming convention, A Gathering of Strangers (AGOS), went off without a hitch this last weekend. I got to judge the board game design competition along with 9 other people (all men, what’s up with me being the only girl?). Grats to the designers who won both first and second place with their great games. If they haven’t already been picked up for production, they will be soon. I’ve got some great pictures of the judging and the convention itself that I’ll post as soon as I remember to get them off the camera.

In local news, we ran Munchkin night without our MIB, Dennis, and still had a great time. 6 people played Munchkin Quest all night long. Grats to Rob for finally winning.

This week we have the Magic 2010 launch party on Saturday. We’ll be doing a sealed deck tournament along with legal-only side games. Entry is only $25, which gets you $25 worth of cards and the possibility to win even more (fat pack anyone?). Besides, it’ll be a ton of fun. In the meantime, we’ve got a killer deal on booster preorders. Get a box, get $50 off. You can’t beat that. 10% off any other preorders. Give us a call or come in, and we’ll get you on the list.

And lastly, we still have a few Dominion Intrigue left for those of you interested.

Dawn

Yay! My saintly bro-in-law made pictures possible again. Bow before the greatness that is Chris and enjoy the pictures he made possible:

This is the RPGA event two Saturdays ago (6/28).
This other one is the same event…but from a different angle.<

And now for the barbeque:
Our intrepid cook, James.

Crazy-looking mom. She’d kill me if she saw it, but luckily she doesn’t actually read my blog. (Wait, my own MOTHER doesn’t read this? What the he…er, nm.)

Gamers of the evening: Kendel, Robert, Stacy’s head, James, Rob.

And just think, you too could have enjoyed free hot dogs and lemonade if only you didn’t have a life! Wait, did I say that out loud?

This picture features Stacy’s head (and the rest of her), Rob, Jordan, and Robert.

That’s it for now. Sorry about the haphazard placement, but I’m still getting used to this thing.

Dawn

Well, we were bored on the 4th so we had a barbeque here at the store with Robert, Kendel, Jordan, Rob, Stacy, and…my mother (hi Mom!) Hot dogs for all (tofu dogs for Robert), and boy did you all miss out on the $35 we spent on fireworks fountains (buy one get one free, baby!) Then we played games till midnight and called it a day. We had a ton of fun, so maybe we’ll do it again next year.

I do have pictures, but of course it won’t let me add any since we upgraded our Java version. We were able to add pictures on the laptop until James updated that Java too. Annoying. If any of you stop by and know how to fix that, let me know.

On an entirely different subject, we’re getting both Dominion Intrigue and Race for the Galaxy: Rebel vs. Imperium in this week by Friday. I’ll post if we get them sooner. Either way, the usual preorder discount of 10% applies to both games. Let me know before Wednesday so I make sure to order enough. If you don’t preorder, it’s your own fault if we run out, so don’t come crying to me.

Pictures all around when we stop being lame, so check back soon!

Well, we had an RPGA event last Saturday that was a blast. Thanks to Don & Justin, our intrepid DM’s. We were so excited to see everyone again after a month off, and we were super excited to see all the new faces too! I do have a couple of pictures, but once again I will have to get them posted later when I have the laptop available.

Our Munchkin night two Saturdays ago was also amazing! I think at one point we had 8 people playing one game, which was hilarious. Dennis & I shared bragging rights for winning that one.

The best news ever, though, is that we’ve got a ton of people coming to our game nights now. We even had an extra night last week on Friday when we played late with some great people. Thanks to Meike, Melissa, Chris, Robert (welcome back, and grats on the new car!), Jordan, and Kendel for coming in and entertaining me. And as always, thanks to Joe and Gary for having the best game collections ever. We never get bored because we’re always playing something different.

Next week is A Gathering of Strangers up at the U on Friday and Saturday. We get to help sponsor and promote this great event this year. I even get to help judge the board game design competition, which is awesome! It should be a fun couple of days, so be sure to come by and see us. For more information and to sign up early for a discount, go to:

http://www.gamesforthemind.com/AGOS/index.html

Make sure you come and support Utah’s own gaming convention!

And lastly (but not leastly), we have two new games in today, both published by Z Man. Bridge Troll is a new game designed by a Utahn, Alf Seegert! From the Z Man site:

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In BRIDGE TROLL, you and your friends are hideous trolls who each guard a troll bridge. Each turn, you throw boulders to bid for travelers, who vary in number depending on the weather for that day.
Travelers include fat merchants, pilgrims, poor monks (who make good eating), and if you are lucky, royal personages. As travelers come to your bridge, you use them to collect tolls. But watch out! Knights, bandits, dragons, and vicious Billy Goats Gruff prowl the countryside. You’ll have to use some of your boulders to chase them away (which means you’ll have fewer left to use on your bridge!).

Although you need to collect tolls from travelers so you can buy building supplies, working on your bridge makes you hungry, so you will have to eat some of your travelers instead. It is important to
balance tolls with food in order to make your bridge very appealing to travelers. If you eat too many travelers or just collect money, you won’t be able to fix up your bridge. The player who uses toll-money,
food, and boulders to build the most impressive troll bridge operation wins the game.

The other game, Long Shot, pits you against opponents in a horse race. Once again, from the Z Man site:

And they’re off!

Long Shot is YOUR ticket to the track. In this exciting family-friendly horse racing board game, up to 8 players bet, buy horses, and develop strategies as the race unfolds. Long Shot includes over 100 unique cards allowing players to combine strategies and resources for maximum control of the race.
Will you buy a horse or two in the hopes of winning some of the purse, or will you bet it all on the long shot? Whether a novice or a horse racing enthusiast, everyone’s a winner in this interactive strategy game where anytime is post time!

The game is accessible to families and plays in an hour or under.

We also finally have the Killer Bunnies: Green expansion, for those of you waiting for it.

That’s it for now. More pictures later.