Con of the North 2012; The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly!

Wow, this weekend flew by! I guess that's what happens when you are playing on some of the coolest tables ever built. This weekend my family, a buddy, and I drove the 4 hours up to Con of the North in Saint Paul, MN. It was an epic weekend of gaming with old and new friends! This was also one of the fewest RTTs I have played in where every game was "the best game ever!" In the end it could all be summed up as The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.





The Good

Invite Zombie Apocalypse game. Best game of the year here!

The "Good" has to be the games and company I had the pleasure of playing in and with all weekend. Like all Cons their was the "Bad" gamers but for the most part everyone was fun to be around. The games were definitely the highlight though.

Alice and a SWAT team member face down some zombies.

Game of the Year has to go to the Zombie Apocalypse invite game Terrain Specialties ran Friday night. 16 survivors trying to reach the top floor of a skyscraper full of zombies to get to a chopper that can only take 6! AWESOMESAUCE! The board, zombies and scenario were top notch. The game was light hearted with tons of movie moments. The cool characters for everyone to run from Alice (Resident Evil), Ash (Army of Darkness, Evil Dead), Snake Eyes (GI Joe), to the thug in Raiders of the Last Ark that gets splatted in the airplane. Random zombies "Easter eggs" was over the top, from the girl in the Ring, to randomice cream truck drivers, and the 20 man Hoards of zombies that killed everything and everyone without rolling! Man I hope they run this event next year!

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While I did not get to play in the "Halo" style event, my buddy did and had a blast. So much so, I have decided I need to check it out next year. The board is definitely really cool and probably the best looking interior I have ever seen modeled.

Still Good...

Terrain Specialties Dungeon Crawl 2012.

Next up on Saturday was Terrain Specialties Dungeon Crawl. It was an home made system taking alot from 2nd edition DnD but making the damage and HP part very easy. It was fast and very cool. Dan used a large set up of Dwarven Forge dungeon sets and some very cool painted up villains and heroes. Some quick shots of the action in the game....

Next up was their Legends of the Old West game. This was their coolest looking table with an entire wild west town of Cotton Gulch! Unfortunately I left my camera in the Hotel room! Here is a picture of their 2011 table that was very similar to 2012. They did add some cool buildings including a two story bank.

Last but not least was the RTT they ran on Sunday. As always they have the coolest looking tables. Here are a couple shots of them, the army pictures and other shots will follow in a separate article.

The Bad!!

Now for the Bad of the trip had to be Sunday during the third game of the RTT. My wife came in to tell me our laptop had been stolen from our hotel room! My buddy forfeited his game, which he was on the top table too. I ended my game, and my opponent was awesome enough to give me a draw. Thank you Jorell for being a great guy! I owe you for that one. The real ugly was dealing with a front desk that did nothing to help us. They didn't even want to call the cops! In the end the GM of the hotel made it right with us the next day for our bad treatment, but our computer is still likely gone for good.


The Ugly.......

As always this goes to our luck with the weather. From Worthington to Sheldon we had to drive in slush/snow covered  roads in rain. While this was by far the best weather we have had for our annual trip to CotN, it still slowed us down and generally sucked for an hour. It does keep our weird streak of snow storms on the CotN going. Someone up stairs must think that is funny.

So the con is over. Good times are still fresh memories in my head though and proves to me that CotN is really some of the best 3 days of gaming anyone can find! If you find yourself in the Twin Cities area in February, I highly recommend checking out this con. Just don't leave your computer in your room!