MACE 2008 Pre-Con thoughts and my Schedule

MACE 2008 starts this Friday, and I am heading down Thursday. This year, I decided to ease back on some of the things I have done for MACE. In particular, I am not doing a Stargate LARP. In fact, I doubt I will do a Stargate LARP again anywhere. I am running two games – one RPG and one board game. but I wanted to ease back and make sure I am there for the con and its operation.

This year is going to be a hard year for us. With the economy in the tank, RPGA changing over to D&D 4e, and us moving to a Camarilla LARP, it looks like attendance is going to be down. Preregistration is alreayd about 25% to 30% down.

We knew that the RPGA would be down. 4e hit the industry pretty hard. There are some people that like it, and others that do not. Plus the fact that they are starting up a whole new living campaign. This eliminated the possiblity of a Battle Interactive, one of our big attractions in the past.

The Camarilla LARP decision was not an easy one, but this will have to be a building year for us. No Vampire LARP group (with any kind of reputation) stepped up and said they would run, we had contact information with the local Camarilla so we pursued it. It has potential of growing to something big, but definitely not this year. Both Jeff and I both wanted to give them a chance because we think they can tap into untapped areas for attendance and I think they could be consistant year by year.

The economy is scary right now, and its keeping people away for sure. The cost of a hotel has always been the biggest expense. We can’t say that gas prices are a factor though and I guess that’s a blessing.

My plans for this weekend – Run Etherscope Friday night and BSG board game Sat night. I may have to fill in for an AT-43 game on Sat afternoon, but not sure i have enough models, and I do not know the game well enough. I will try if need be.

There is a day LARP despite me not running one. My cousin Jessica is running a Serenity LARP, which may or may not get people. Right now, I think there is one preregistrant.

Part of me dreads this weekend because I am setting myself up for a disappointment. Will registration be down THAT much? I can only hope that it is not. I usually look forward to MACE pretty strongly, but this year just feels different. I hope that’ll change by Thursday.