Dorktoberfest ‘24
Once a year, a magical event happens, whereupon a small group of secretive, sophisticated, and slightly odd men all converge to discuss matters of grave importance, including (but not limited to) whether or not to cosmic zap another’s alien power, the proper number of mad scientist flamethrowers required to explore Devil’s Tower, and, of course, whether or not the son of a devil can really be trusted even after providing excellent rosé wine.
Yes, once again, my friends and I met up to play games for the weekend, in what we call Dorktoberfest™, sort of like our own mini-GenCon, except it’s cheaper, the food is better, and the sleeping arrangements often involve couches and cots.
Now, to be wholly honest, I was doubting my ability to go this year due to my unemployment – it seemed more than slightly irresponsible of me to be spending money on the usual AirBnB that we would book while I was still without a viable income. But, in a bizarre and amazing move, Dex managed to secure his own house as the meeting place. His wife and kids were going to be out for the weekend, so he got the all clear to use the house.
While we prefer to use locales away from everyone’s home so they can “get away from it all,” there was definitely some pluses to this arrangement:
Aside from the normal costs of food and spirits, this was much cheaper overall
It was closer to everyone, so the drive times were reduced (Dex didn’t have to drive anywhere, after all)
We were right in the middle of suburbia, allowing for easy access to food, liquor, and medical supplies.
Pete is training for a marathon, so Dex was able to point him to an “easy” 10-mile route.
One lucky person was going to be able to sleep in one of Dex’s kid’s rooms where the walls are plastered with Taylor Swift, making it easier to sleep at night knowing that the eyes of a Pop Star Goddess will be watching out over you.
And there was another benefit: we were getting a private chef for our Friday dinner.
…the hell? How in the world did this happen? I mean, it was literally just a side comment Dex made on the Discord channel. “Oh hey, by the way, we have a private chef on Friday. Anyway, about the air mattresses….”
But hey, best not to ask too much about such gifts. Just accept it and party on.
Thursday
I drove over on Thursday, and it was mercifully smooth. One of the downsides of living on Long Island is that any time you want to leave, you pretty much are forced to drive through NYC, or at least around the edges; either way, traffic is always a gamble: maybe it’ll be some mild congestion around the major off-ramps; maybe a truck carrying rocket fuel got hit by a bazooka in a mad car chase to steal a Brinks truck. This time, at least, it was the former.
Dex’s wife was still there, but both she and Dex were working, so I stayed out of their way as I brought my stuff in, drank some of my water, and introduced myself to the two dogs, Linus and Mercy. Linus I had known from when he was a pup, and as an older dog, he was more interested in just laying down and Sleeping, something I wholly relate to. Mercy, however, was a classic beagle and Would. Not. Stop. howling at me for about 20-30 minutes. Didn’t matter if I knelt down to let her sniff my hands, or petted her a bit, or talked about how Snoopy was the greatest comic character in human history – she kept going back to the howling like I was a full moon that just waltzed in.
Nick arrived next, also bringing in his stuff and getting the greeting howl from Mercy. When Pete and Ace arrived, Mercy was not around, but apparently they had heard her from outside, as Pete asked where the Beagle was.
“How did you know Mercy was a beagle?” I asked.
“Oh, I had a beagle,” he replied. “Nothing howls like a beagle.”
Ace had his own small dog, Rook, there as well, so when Coray would finally arrive, we had 6 friends and 3 dogs roaming around the house. There was also a cat that Dex tried to keep in the basement, but later admitted that the cat figured out how to work the one-way pet door from the other side and had escaped.
“It’s like the Predator,” Dex calmly reassured us, “and will just jump out at you from nowhere.”
Swell!
Dex also warned us to keep our doors closed as Mercy has some sort of attachment to his wife, and when the wife is gone, Mercy will start “spite pooping” in rooms even though the dog is fully housebroken.
Even better!
While we waited for Coray to arrive, we decided to break out the classic game HeroQuest, which is basically D&D the Board Game. Pete fired up the companion app and we had a really good time. Despite there only being one game board, each time you went into a new “dungeon” the doorways and walls changed, so each time was a new exploration.
The game pieces were basically minis, and so we naturally were geeking out how cool they looked. The companion app also featured a character voice that would call out actions you were inputting into it, like, “The barbarian is attacking!” or “The orc has died!” The voice was wonderfully over-the-top and honestly really sounded like the Map from Dora the Explorer; well, maybe after the series was over and it was spending its monthly royalty checks on cheap vodka to drown its bitter sorrows.
After Coray arrived, we could really get our party started, and kicked it off with the game Cosmic Encounter. And not the wimpy 4th edition 4 player version either! Oh no, this was my 2nd edition copy from the 90s, complete with 6 players, hundreds of alien powers, and an incalculable amount of ways to completely screw over the other players. This is the game that inspired Magic the Gathering, so pay your respects!
Coray feared for our friendships within the game, and Dex happily backed him up by openly campaigning to ruin everyone’s life – Dex didn’t come here to make friends, and he didn’t come to win, either; he came to blow up the system.
Afterward, it was time to crash for the night, so we all settled into our rooms. I actually slept well on the air mattress until about 4 in the morning when I awoke to find myself folded up like a taco. Apparently, the air mattress had a bit of a slow leak, as my head and feet were still raised but my butt was actually touching the ground.
No worries. I just moved to the couch and crashed there quite well.
Friday
The next day I ran a session of my long-running D&D campaign, Patched Tracts, and fully enjoyed the fact that we were all together and could use miniatures. Between Nick and Dex, we had over a hundred minis, and it was a lot of fun to be able to use them for the battles.
But, we wrapped up a bit early because….
…The executive chef had entered the building.
Okay, I need to focus on this for a moment.
Remember: we are a group of 6 guys, in our 40s and (ahem, early) 50s, playing tabletop role-playing games. I honestly don’t think this is the kind of gig that a chef is thinking about when they are offering their services.
Regardless, not only was he here, we even had a menu.
Cripes, he even suggested wines to pair with each dish.
Yeah, definitely not like gaming conventions I have attended in the past.
So, pardon me if I interrupt my current recap of a gaming weekend with a food blog.
We started with [ahem] Grilled Caraflex Cabbage, Kale, and Kohlrabi Salad, with thai dressing, herbs, fried kale, and peanuts.
Then, it was on to the Spinach and Sunchoke Ravioli with chanterelles, tomato confit, and two year parmigiano. And dear lord, I have had a lot of ravioli in my lifetime, and this was one of the best.
Next, it was the Niman Ranch Short Rib with local bean ragout, little gem lettuce, light bernaise, and pommes maxim.
Finally, to top it all off, Chocolate and Coffee “Baked Alaska” with vanilla meringue, graham cookie, and maraschino cherry.
Everything was delicious. I was worried that some of the dishes I might not enjoy as much because of certain ingredients, but it took all of my self-control from just picking up the plates and licking them clean.
And I cannot state this enough: this was dinner for a group of geek gamers, all middle-aged, in the middle of playing make-believe wizards and knights. Honestly don’t think I would have ever seen this coming.
This very well might be the equivalent of seeing Haley’s Comet; a once in a lifetime event. And all the thanks go to Dex’s wife, who had somehow arranged for this miracle to happen. Woot!
While the chef was creating his culinary masterpieces in the kitchen, we were no doubt equally impressing him with our thoroughly heated debate about music theory, opera, and music school trauma revelations. The perfect dinner conversation.
After dinner, we shifted to the night’s game, Nick’s Deadlands campaign, which takes place in the “weird west.” I was always glad to play this, as I still have noltasia for it back when I played the original Deadlands version back in Los Angeles, with some friends from San Diego, including an actual rocket scientist who was nevertheless completely clueless about human biology, my roommate, and her homemade Mr. Banana Brain doll, among others.
When it was time to wrap up for the night, I went back to the family room, only to discover with horror that the door was slightly ajar. I was positive that I had shut it when I had left, but now I felt my heart catch in my throat as Dex’s words of warning echoed in my head: “Be sure to close your doors,” he had ominously cautioned, “or Mercy might sneak in to spite poop.”
I slowly, tentatively, pushed the door open, revealing only darkness. My shaking hand fumbled for the light switch, which flickered on. Fear filling my head, I cautiously made my way down the few steps to the floor, my gaze darting about with terrified abandon.
“Aw, crap,” I said. “Literally.” Sure enough, Mercy had left her droppings on the side of the room.
I told Dex about it, and he very graciously cleaned it up, and this time I made doubly sure the door was closed before collapsing on the couch.
Saturday
After Coray and Pete went out for a light little 10-mile run, we devoured some breakfast sandwiches without mercy (and without Mercy, honestly), and then were back into our Deadlands game. We had a series of tough battles exploring Devil’s Tower, and everything went exactly according to plan. Seriously. We totally planned on having Pete’s character get ripped apart by some creatures that were a cross between humans and lizards. I’m sure Pete doesn’t hold a grudge about Nick killing his character, and that when Pete resumes his own campaign, Nick’s character will not be taking the toll for the outcome of the Saturday session.
As we relaxed between games, Mercy decided to jump up on my lap and flop over so I could rub her belly. I guess she had accepted me into the household. Who knows – maybe her taking a dump in my room was part of the acceptance process.
Linus also came over for some behind-the-ear scratching, but for the most part, he was perfectly content to live out the lyrics from Tom Lehrer’s song “S-N”: “Sometimes I just lay out on the floor! And snore!”
Oh, and Rook, being the youngest and still full of hope and optimism and puppy energy, was just jumping around and licking anyone that got within 5 feet of him. In D&D terms we would say that was his “Reaction.”
Next on our hit list of gaming experiences was Dex’s own campaign, Red Dragon. He had originally started this from one of the official D&D adventures, and like my campaign, has been running it on and off now for several years. Both Dex and I are in the homestretch of the campaigns we are running, so while everyone is excited to see things finally come to a close, there is also a bit of a bittersweet flavor in the air.
We took a break so Dex could cook up a delicious dinner for us, because it wasn’t like he was hosting us or still tending to work around the house for the whole weekend so he had plenty of time and energy to try and follow up on that executive chef.
No pressure.
Truth be told, though, is that while Dex doesn’t officially have the title of executive chef, he is nevertheless an excellent cook, and we all feasted on the beef brisket that he prepared.
We continued playing afterward, but did call it a bit early to go check outside for auroras. We had checked the previous night as well, but once again we had no luck in spotting any. No doubt that small town over the river, New York City, was pumping out a smidge of light pollution, though.
We had heard that some people were able to capture the auroras by using their phones to take a picture, but that feels a bit like a let-down to me. As Pete put it, “If I have to use an electronic screen to see them, well, I can just go on YouTube.”
I guess I still need to plan that trip to Yellowknife. Ah well.
Sunday
Final day, and really more of a clean up and leave day.
We were up early enough to squeeze in a couple more hours for some Red Dragon, at least, but by noon it was time to pack things up and vamoose. Between the board games, boxes of minis, game books, and the many gifts we all received (including an awesome Deadlands coin + carrying pouch for it, and a 3D printed bottle holder/dice tower/dice holder), it took us some time to help with all of the clean up.
As we were doing so, we talked a bit about the other campaigns that are being run and that we want to run, and I suggested (mainly as a joke) that maybe the next campaign we run we can stream online.
“Great,” Nick pointed out. “Just what the world needs. Another stream of a bunch of white guys playing D&D. Never seen that before.”
Hard to argue, really.
Coray, Pete, Ace, and Nick got their gear packed up and headed off around 12:30 PM. Dex told me that traffic around the stadium usually died off around 1 PM, so we sat down at the table and just chatted to pass the time. Pretty much entirely about games and game design, so really the same type of conversation we have been having for about 15 years by now.
My drive home, alas, hit the amount of traffic that I suspected/feared: a lot. But it gave me plenty of time to reflect on the event.
Given that we missed a year due to covid, this was actually our 5th Dorktoberfest anniversary. Not bad that we have been able to keep it going this long, despite all of the other issues happening around us, our lives, and the world in general. True, we may have set the bar a bit high with that private chef, but I think we won’t have peak gaming experiences until we actually play in a castle.
Just need to find that suitcase full of unmarked bills and I’ll be all set.