(Photo by Wolfgang Baur)

Most gamers get a remarkable amount of exercise at Gen Con Indy, walking along the halls, stairs, True Dungeon, and over the skyways to the various hotels. Imagine, then, the typical Kobold Purveyor of fine adventures, design projects, and magazines who stands and chats and meets old friends and makes new ones for 9 hours or so.

So yes, my feet are killing me, and I don’t care. It was a complete blast to see everyone today. We met the winner and runner-up in the My First Gen Con essay contest, great folks both. I talked about the Mark of Nerath, Bill Slavicsek’s new D&D novel, with the author himself. Paizonians Wesley Schneider and James Jacobs took a look at the magazine with a professional eye (verdict: thumbs up!).

Bruce Cordell and I shared our GM tips  in a very-well-attended Story and Adventure Design panel, and the audience asked some sharp questions about plot, story, how they differ, problem players and so on. I learned a few tricks and shared some of my favorites ways to sharpen a game’s story points while not driving away tactical gamers…

And yes, people snatched up Kobold Quarterly #14, the new Kobold Guide, neither of which will last until Sunday at this rate. Also popular: the collector print copies of KQ#1 and #2, and the small convention-special patches. Nice patches, frankly, with the “Small But Fierce” logo.

The Frozen Empires and Lost Cities projects both picked up major patron interest, and lead designer Ben McFarland talked up Streets of Zobeck. All three projects are attracting attention from RPG bloggers and designers.

All told, it was a great gamer gathering. Heck, one fine freelancer invited us all to roll some dice. Alas, booth hours prevented that, but the offer was so appreciated. Maybe at a smaller show.

What else? We gave away a lot of Q-Workshop Cthulhu, Pathfinder, and Steampunk dice, we sang some kobolds songs, and we held two dire weasel feedings with no fatalities. Given how hungry the weasels were, we’re calling that a big win for Day 1 at the show.