Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 13:52:13 -0800 From: "Ted Kim (Random Dude)" Subject: ORCCON 20 report Message-Id: <199702182156.WAA30782@listserv.uni-c.dk> ORCCON 20 was held at the Wyndham LAX airport hotel from 14-17 Feb 97. Overall, the con caused sleep deprivation but was a lot of fun. Attendance was high enough to require me to park in the overflow lot on Sunday. Jeff Albanese the con manager reported that things looked pretty good overall from his point of view. I spent most of my time in open gaming instead of playing in scheduled tournaments. Joe Youst showed off ROAD TO BERLIN and MOSCOW '41. Hank displayed the latest on DESERT FOX DELUXE. Of course, the usual suspects from LA were on hand, including Danny Holte, Al Carpenter, John Spaulding, Perry Andrus, Trow ?, Alan Emrich, Tony Zawleski, Ted Carlsson (designer of CHOSIN from PacRim), Joe Miranda and Doc Decision. Other CONSIM folks included John Kranz, Bill Alderman and John Leggat. The Fat Messiah and Sierra Madre guys were also there. The flea market had some guys selling off large quantities of SPI stuff. I picked up some games and mags, myself, but was dissuaded from purchasing Eric Goldberg's KURSK by some on the spot reviews of the game. The dealer's room had the usual folks including Decision, Weekend Warrior and John Gafni (complete with product in milk crates). While in the dealer's room, I picked up more mags. My own story goes as follows. On Friday, I got a taste of WAVE OF TERROR with Danny, Joe Youst and John Spaulding. Joe Youst really knows this game and was leading a German breakout down the center of the map. Danny was trying to hunker down in Bastonge, while I tried to "fortify goose eggs" in the north against John's attacks, including a loose Pieper KG. On Saturday, I attacked John Spaulding's Germans in RING OF FIRE. I like this game, but I have a lot to learn as the Russians. The mantra for the Russians was "Maximum Effort", leading to a massive body count. I did find a crack in the German defense and got across the river in the south, but GD was definitely cramping my style. In the north, I managed to breach the second fort line in the first turn. But, subsequent pounding by Panzer divisions made it difficult to widen the hole. In the extreme forested northwest, my bad strategy (helped by bad rolls) turned my breakthrough attempt into a maximum effort attrition. Eventually, the fort line was breached and there was a general retreat to the second line. We called the game on turn seven. Using the shorter 6-turn scenario victory conditions, I definitely lost. Later that evening, I played a game of LORDS OF THE SIERRA MADRE. Well, actually I sort of played in two games. I started in a game with Danny, Trow, Tony Z., Mark (Danny's friend), another person (the apparent winner) and the designer Phil Eklund. But when a second game started, I move over there to even out the number of players. Later when the second game ended, I took over Tony Z.'s position in the first game. This was just in time to see a massive revolution in Mexico and to inherit the vendettas against Tony! The revolutionary forces led by Pancho Villa invaded the US and took out the US cavalry (though taking many casualties) to attack the leading player and melt down his smelter. Apparently, while I was in the second game someone really did burn Danny's ranch. Okay, so back to the second game. This game included Jim Gutt (from Sierra Madre games), John Spaulding and two others. I stayed mostly north of the border and developed the Bisbee bank, some railroads and the second smelter. Actually, John started the second smelter, but found the payments so daunting, he gave it to me. Most of the other folks got caught up in very complex deals involving two mines, a smelter and the interconnecting railroads near Tonichi, Mexico. There was a little banditry, but this was all for show to secure the bounty (a ranch) for capturing the bandits. In fact, there was competition between Mexican troops to chase down the bandits (who had been bought just to collect the bounty in the first place). Some bad assays plus hoof & mouth disease slowed the economy for a while. Finding the costs to build a smelter to be too high, John employed some lawyers to steal the first smelter from another player. Unfortunately, this triggered a successful assassination, so John's son ended up operating the smelter. Despite the assassination, this game seemed a lot less nasty than the other game. And no I did not burn anybody's ranch this time. After church on Sunday, I tried to play GMT's new BATTLES FOR NORTH AFRICA. In fact, Joe Youst was going to teach Danny, John and I how to play. However, somehow Joe got sucked into a MOSCOW '41 demo. Danny, Mark and I ended up playing TITAN. John went off to do something else. (For various reasons, I never managed to finish reading the BNA rules while playing TITAN.) During the TITAN game, Danny seemed to have a string of bad luck. Mark started out with above average luck and got his second Angel. But, I had the unfair advantage of playing before and eventually, I reached a dominant position. We, then plunged into a game of RISE OF THE LUFTWAFFE. In this game, I was the newbie, but beginner's luck left me with the last plane in the air when it was all over. Monday was auction day. Overall, volume was slightly smaller, but there was a lot of SPI stuff. The full auction crew was on hand, including a new guy. Some others thought prices were up, but I thought they declined slightly. Our ears were saved by the conspicuous absence of BISMARCK and OH-WAH-REE from the auction. Fortunately, the proceeds from my own items in the auction put my gaming budget back into the black. What a great weekend! See you all next time.