Last weekend I took part in the first ever Online Megagame Con, or OMG Con. Put together by the Megagame Coalition and supported by some of the biggest names in megagaming, it took place Friday to Sunday and featured three full-length megagames, plus plenty more short games, playtests, social games, panels and talks.
Naturally I got well into this, and took part in a bunch of different things. Due to the time commitment and a family commitment, I couldn’t take part in any of the full megagames, but I made up for that by taking part in pretty much everything else! Here was my schedule for the weekend:
- Friday – As Thou Commands playtest
- Friday – Social gaming (Blood on the Clocktower)
- Saturday – Watch The Skies watch party
- Saturday – Gender Inclusivity Panel
- Saturday – The Great Game Podcast
- Sunday – Going Off Map talk
As Thou Commands playtest
My weekend kicked off with a playtest for Peter Nixon’s newest game design, As Thou Commands. Take King’s Dilemma and throw in some Aye Dark Overlord and a whole lot of roleplay.
The playtest was broadly split into three parts. First up was drafting, but not the Draft Night 3077 sort of draft (also a Peter Nixon design). Instead this was a opportunity for players to jointly generate a narrative for their Duchy. (There were 5 players to a Duchy, and 5 Duchies in the Kingdom.)
We were presented with a list of “assets” our family could possess, from a Large Castle to a historic feud with one of our neighbours. We were encouraged to find links between our assets with other players, and rewarded with Influence or Wealth for doing so.
The second part of the game was a Council session, again with the fellow players from our Duchy. Here, we were presented with a dilemma by our Control. The Noble players would vote on the side they supported, using the Influence and Wealth they had accumulated. I, as the Liege, had the final vote. This is a very fun roleplay part of the day, where I made several decisions based on my interactions with players and the character I had built up during the first part of the game.
The final section was another Council, this time with only the Liege players and the King. This featured yet more dilemmas, but with bigger stakes – do we go on a Crusade, for example.
Overall the game was a lot of fun. It did need changes in some areas – but this was exactly what the playtest was for! You can see my full playthrough of the game here:
Blood on the Clocktower
Large swaths of OMG Con were demarcated as “social gaming” time, with games such as Two Rooms and a Boom, Werewolf and Secret Hitler on offer.
I am sad that I didn’t get to take part in more of these games, but I did utterly enjoy the one I did get to play – Blood on the Clocktower – even if it did mean staying up until 2am!
Blood on the Clocktower takes the classic Werewolf formula and turns it up a notch, amping up a lot of the abilities and giving the ghosts something to do after death.
I was the Fortune Teller and died on night two, and then managed to singlehandedly cast suspicion on… a guy that turned out to be 100% legit and good. Allowing the baddies to grab a win.
It was a blast, and I look forward to playing it again and hopefully screwing it up a bit less…
Watch The Skies watch party
Fast-forward to Saturday. I watched a few of the earlier talks and then, at 6:30pm, I joined Mr Megagame and Fraser to host a watch party of the most well-known video in megagaming: Shut Up & Sit Down Play… A Goddamn Megagame!
We stuck the video on and chatted about how this video helped shape the community. It brought back a ton of good memories, and I even dug out my own news reports from playing Press at the game. You can watch it on Mr Megagame’s Twitch.
Gender Inclusivity Panel
Next it was time for the Gender Inclusivity Panel.
The panel was comprised of some key figures within the hobby: myself, Leslie Loy from West Coast Megagames, Seumas Bates from True North Megagames, Matty Robinson from Reading Megagames and Stefan Salva Cruz from Magic Coffeehouse.
Our conversation spanned casting, marketing, behaviour at games and a range of other topics about how to strengthen the megagame experience by being more gender inclusive. You can watch the full talk here.
Debrief with The Great Game podcast
Saturday was finished off with a chat with Jack and Patrick, two Australian megagamers who run The Great Game podcast. The topic was As Thou Commands, and they interviewed myself and designer Peter Nixon.
We talked in detail about the game, how we thought it went, what improvements could be made for next time, and
You can listen to the podcast episode here.
Going Off Map
Finally, I gave a talk myself titled “Going Off Map: taking megagames beyond wargames”. This 30 minute talk looked at the growing subgenre of megagames that don’t feature maps or have a reduced or absent wargaming element.
I’ll probably transcribe it into a blog at some point. For the time being you can watch the talk here:
Other OMG Con activities
As I mentioned, there were a ton of other talks and panels throughout the weekend which I dipped in and out of. Rather than pick any out in particular, have a browse yourself on the Megagame Coalition YouTube page.
Overall, I had a fantastic time at the Con. It was a very full-on weekend, and due to the fact it was designed for East Coast time, we were absolutely shattered at the end of it. But it was also so much fun, and I got to know a bunch more people in the megagaming community a lot better over the weekend.
Here’s to OMG Con 2021!
