Phoenix Vul-Con Convention is No More

Sorry to say the latest attempt to establish an ongoing yearly tabletop gaming convention here in my adopted home has ended. The announcement was made earlier today that Vul-Con 2013 has been cancelled as well as the future Dust World Expo here in the Valley of the Sun. The announcement is below and I have to say I previously took a lot of heat because I pointed out, at the time of the con, there were gaming stores and individual folks who actively worked against the show’s success. It’s really too bad that mind set exists out here as to me it’s very shortsighted to have such a selfish attitude toward a convention “stealing” away your customers for a single weekend when the long term benefits of a healthy yearly gaming show can only be good for growth of the hobby – and business – for the other 51 weeks of the year… All I can say is Vul-Con had our full support as will any other future  attempt to unite a rather fractured and dysfunctional gaming community here in the Phoenix area.

From Jay Mann and Rick Ivansek:

It is with heavy hearts that we have to announce the disbanding of Vul-Con. Over the last two years, we’ve had the great pleasure of bringing some unique gaming experiences to the Southwest. When we set out on this venture, we did so with full awareness that it would not be self-sustaining for 3 – 5 years. We consciously chose to weather this startup period from personal funds and determined that this would be possible. Unfortunately, we had not counted on the severe depth and length of the current recession and financial setbacks have forced us to abandon all future plans for Vul-Con and related ventures such as Dust World Expo.

The hardest part of shutting down is that there are a few stalwarts out there who have put their hearts and souls into this venture with us. We will not list you here, for fear of missing someone on the list, but you know who you are, and we can not thank you enough for your support and friendship. The easiest part is that some folks have worked at odds against us either through apathy or purposeful desire towards some other end. We will not list you either, but want you to know that there are no hard feelings and all is forgiven. The best part is that we will now have an infusion of time into our personal lives, which have largely been placed on hold for the past few years, leaving us free to spend time actually playing games with you.

Please know that we are not fading away from the gaming community. As many of you know, we have a particular fondness for miniatures and wargames, especially Paolo Parente’s Dust. We will continue to support and promote the growth of this product line, starting with the formation of a new alliance of Dust fans – The Dust Devils. Be good, be well, and we’ll see you around,

Rick and Jay
Retired Vul-Con Co-Consuls

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Jeff McAleer

Founder/Editor-in-chief of The Gaming Gang website and host of The Gaming Gang Dispatch and other TGG media, Jeff tackles any and all sorts of games but has a special fondness for strategy, conflict sims, and roleplaying games. Plus, he's certainly never at a loss for an opinion...

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