Just recently, I ran a gaming weekend for the young adults in my family and their friends. At our height we had 20 people who came and went and there were a core of 7 or 8 that stayed the whole weekend (my own kids couldn’t escape of course). My parents own a vacation cottage about 3 hours away from us, so I decided to use this to get away from the hustle and bustle of the real world and run our weekend devoted solely to board games. Truthfully, I was disappointed because I wasn’t able to attend either Origins or GenCon, and wanted my own mini-convention.
So I’m sharing some of my thoughts and experiences from the weekend.
I of course provided food. I wanted to keep everyone there as much as possible, so I had food. The first night we had a nice spaghetti dinner. It was inexpensive, filling, and with everyone’s help we also had some delicious garlic bread and a cake for dessert. A few watched TV while it was being prepared, some read rules (I brought a bunch of new games), and some played games we already knew. The rest helped with dinner and it was a great success. Breakfast and lunch was cereal and sandwiches and dinner on night 2 was hamburgers and hot dogs on the grill with smores for dessert. Making sure that everyone ate was important, as it kept us sharp for gaming and also provided a break when we needed it. I made sure to select food that could easily be adjusted for the number of people we had and no one went hungry.
The gaming started shortly after we arrived on Friday afternoon. It was just the core of us on Friday, the balance didn’t show up until Saturday morning. We got in a game of Infinite City, and enjoyed it so much we played again. After dinner we decided to do our first marathon game, and played Arkham Horror with the Innsmouth expansion. The first few hours were great, but as the night went into the wee hours we were happy when the Ancient One woke up and tried to eat us. We managed to kill him and went to bed tired but content.
Note to remember: Make sure everyone has pillows and blankets. There were plenty of pillows and blankets there, but they were tucked away in a cabinet. I didnt find out until the morning that some of the youngsters (not kids mind you, minimum age was 16) slept without them.
Next morning, my son and I were the first ones up. He was very allergic to something, and sneezed most of the night. we were in the country so there was no such thing as a 24 hour anything anywhere near us. We went out, got him some generic Benadryl, had a nice breakfast at a litle cafe, went back and discovered that everyone was still asleep! Geeze. We were able to get in a game of “The Island of Dr Necreaux” (which was ok, but not great) and “Warhammer Invasion: The LCG” (which was fun, about a 7 out of 10) before everyone else got up and others started arriving.
Note: Have Allergy meds, plus pain reliever, and antacids next time.
Note: Teens and young adults hate coffee, but instead have to have the heart bursting caffine beverages like Rockstar or Red Bull or Monster.
We got in full swing, everyone picking games and having fun. I’ll be posting some reviews later, because I had everyone fill out a short review sheet after each game they played. Basically I asked for their name, the game they played, their rating from 1 to 10, and what they liked and didn’t like. Less than 5 minutes to fill out each time and no one seemed to mind.
I handed out a few games as prizes, and everyone in the Dominion tournament (really just a bunch or people playing Dominion) got a pack of Stash cards, which they thought was really cool.
I got a group together and we played BattleStar Galactica with the Pegasus expansion. I love the game, but it actually kind of sucked. One of the players started as a Cylon leader from the get go, and we discovered the other Cylon player within 3 turns. From then on it was a matter of one bad thing after another while they cackled over our distress and plotted the destruction of humanity. It led to 4 hours of depressing gaming and we were glad when they finally wiped us out. I much prefer the Cylons to remain a mystery for as long as possible and dont like the Cylon Leader rules, not that they were that easy to figure out.
After dinner there was more gaming. The last game we played after everyone else had departed was Arkham Horror again, which was a bad move. People were tired and got annoyed and started arguing. We finally won and happily went off to bed.
Note: Play fast games at the end of the day. You can always play another one when you are done if you have enough energy.
Note: Don’t forget the camera next time, sheesh.
The next morning we packed up and left. We overall had a good time, despite the mistakes in game choosing. Everyone got to take a little something home with them and I had a blast with my kids, who are difficult to keep around now that they are older.
Next year though, I’d like to go BIGGER……
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3 Comments
Sounds like a lot of fun. Did you charge your fam / friends money? Seems like it could get pricey. Spaghetti is great for gaming get togethers I've also found 🙂
No didn't charge any cash. If I can get it to catch on then possibly I'll ask for a "Snack Fee". We did have an awesome time and I am hoping to do it again. You know, once you start getting the gaming bug, you find yourself getting all these games and then realize a few months later that you have a bunch of games you have never even played. I'm hoping to get some quality play time in with all of my games and this weekend that we had helped out a lot.
Great tips for hosting a gaming weekend, it must be nice to have that vacation home put to good use! Did you have a rough plan of the games you'd play or was it mainly impromptu? Looking forward to the reviews you collected, probably something I should try and get my friends to do in the future to help plan future purchases.
BGG: Thornshield