Fear the Con 8
Grant and Peter, co-hosts of Saving the Game, are both going Fear the Con 8 in June. You should be there too. Here’s why.
“Where two or three gather in my name, there I am with them.”
—Matthew 18:20
Since its inception, Fear the Con has never been a typical gaming-and-culture convention. In fact, neither of us have attended any other convention like it. There’s no huge dealer’s hall, there are no industry figures giving talks, and no company announces new products at Fear the Con. Instead, it’s full of warm and wonderful gamers who consider each other practically family, hilariously clever and deeply emotional games, affordable hand-made food, free beer, an informal annual gathering of RPG podcasters, and extraordinary fellowship. Only a couple hundred people attend each year; and yet every year, people travel to Maryland Heights—a quiet suburb of St. Louis—from as far away as Canada and Australia to attend. That’s because Fear the Con isn’t so much about the convention itself as the community within it.
It’s All About the Booters
Fear the Boot is the granddaddy of tabletop RPG podcasts these days. They weren’t the first, but they’re the oldest and biggest podcast still regularly producing RPG content (and good content, at that.) Over the years, the listener community —collectively known as “Booters”—grew up together in the Fear the Boot forums, and they’ve become one of the warmest, most welcoming, and most inclusive groups of gamers you’re liable to find anywhere—on or off the Internet. Many, if not most, of the people we currently consider friends are people we met through the Fear the Boot forums. We (Peter and Grant) both quickly figured out that we could be good friends, having similar interests and similar theologies, despite having never been in the same state at the same time.
The Fear the Boot forums have two simple rules—no religious debates and no political debates. (The hosts and moderators tend to be a bit lenient with honest questions, but they quickly close any such thread if it starts turning rancorous or troll-baity.) It’s telling, though, that we both have Booter friends across every religious and political spectrum, and that both of us can have honest conversations about how our faith and our hobbies intersect with them. Booters are essentially an interesting, engaging, supportive, self-sustaining group of friends covering the whole spectrum of ideologies and representing every part of the globe. We’re all proud to be Booters; we’re a family of our own making, and Fear the Con is our annual family reunion.
Sadly, Fear the Con 8 (June 12-13, 2015) is going to be the last Fear the Con, at least in the convention’s current form. Fear the Con is organized by the Fear the Boot hosts, and it’s to the hosts’ tremendous credit that they’ve put the convention on for seven years while losing money every single year. Still, that’s unsustainable. They hope to put on a Fear the Con 9 in 2017, but only if they can reorganize and make the convention a less draining project for everyone.
This year, to make sure Fear the Con 8 (“The Octocon”) could happen at all, the Fear the Boot hosts decided to crowdfund the convention to cover their costs. That Kickstarter’s funded, and the convention will happen. To give back to the folks who made that possible, there is no ticket cost for anyone at Fear the Con 8. Anyone can show up, sign up, get a badge, and start gaming. Especially you.
Welcome to the Family
If you’ve never been to a gaming convention before—even if you’ve never played a tabletop roleplaying game in your life before!—Fear the Con is perfect for you, and you belong there.
First, the costs of attendance are absurdly low. There is no ticket cost. There’s a free supply of fresh fruit throughout the convention (part of the Fear the Fruit drive, which a Booter manages each year to make sure we’re all healthy and happy during the con.) The beer is free too, if that’s your thing, and the food isn’t marked up like it is at most big events—everything’s reasonably priced. There are even forum threads to help you find carpools to the convention and people to split the cost of rooms with. If you’re in the Drury (and you should be, as you’ll read below), there’s a great breakfast included each morning. You can attend Fear the Con from practically anywhere without breaking the bank.
Second, new gamers are always welcome at Fear the Con. Plenty of Booters run games specifically for first-time gamers, and everyone loves having new players at their tables. Since signups are managed online, finding a game that looks fun and appeals to your own personal fandoms is easy. You can even comment on games you’ve signed up for to ask for help ahead of time, and most Booters will happily do so! Plus, rules-light systems—which we generally think work best for new gamers—are very popular at Fear the Con, and those games let new gamers enjoy the fellowship of roleplaying without having to learn a system ahead of time.
(Note from Grant: My wife had never really played a tabletop RPG seriously before Fear the Con 5. She signed up for only one game in one slot. She ended up playing in five different games, and having a blast in all of them—despite being six months pregnant at the time. Everyone accommodated her pregnancy and made certain she was comfortable the whole time.)
Stepping Up Your Game
Now that you’ve decided to attend Fear the Con 8—because of course you have—let’s talk about getting the most out of your time in St. Louis.
Fear the Con is divided up into six events slots, each four hours in length and spread out over two days, but there is plenty of gaming before and after the official con slots. If you’re planning to attend (and you should!), we’ve put together a list of tips from our past few years of attendance:
- Register on ConPlanner ahead of time and sign up for games you’re interested in. Pre-registration is important, and games go fast! Dan (the main host of Fear the Boot) developed ConPlanner and uses it for Fear the Con’s pre-registration. It works exceptionally well, so take advantage of it.
- Look for games you can’t play anywhere else. Grant played in a Paranoia game with an AI—a chatbot seeded with GLaDOS and Timecube excerpts—as “Friend Computer” at Fear the Con 5. Peter has played The Trouble With Rose at Fear the Con 6 and Fear the Con 7—a madcap adventure played entirely with dominoes, with new episodes every year in a continuing story, and he’ll play it again at Fear the Con 8. Grant’s wife played in a Laser Ponies game with hand-customized MLP figurines as roleplaying rewards. Grant’s thinking about running an “InSpectres Gadget” game this year. Things happen at Fear the Con which you’ll never find at other conventions; make sure you don’t miss out.
- Get a room at the Drury Inn. We can’t say enough good things about the Drury Inn Westport near the convention. An amazing breakfast is included, the staff is incredibly friendly and open to gaming, and since just about everyone staying there for the weekend is a con-goer, breakfast conversations are one of the true joys of the convention. We got our new StG logo last year when Ruben Smith-Zempel overheard Peter talking with a couple of other folks about podcast logos over breakfast. There’s constantly gaming of some sort happening during the off-hours. And the staff really is fantastic—they even get pulled into the occasional board or card game at the front desk!
- Get to St. Louis at least a day early. In past years, there’s been a pre-con party called “World-Wide Wing Night” the night before the con—entirely covered by your ticket! This year, WWWN is a Kickstarter stretch goal, but if it happens you will want to be there. It’s a massive party, and every table ends up with a card game going on it. There are also unofficial tourism trips in the days leading up to the convention, and going to the St. Louis City Museum or the Gateway Arch with a bunch of fellow gamers is great fun.
- If you want to buy something, get on the Fear the Boot forums now and find the “requests for the dealer” thread. There’s not a dealers’ hall, but there is a dealer who will happily see if he can find whatever you’d like to buy. His name is Casey, and he’s a community member himself.
- Look for pick-up games and open slots. Pre-registration helps everyone, but there’s always a few games each slot with open seats, or which spring up organically for people who want to play. There’s also a well-stocked board game library for those whose games end early or who want a break from roleplaying games—another great way to mix it up and meet new friends.
- Eat well. Good advice for any convention, but with free fruit, runners delivering your food and drink orders right to your table as you game, and free beer, you can keep going throughout the convention.
- Give generously. Fear the Charity is supporting Little Red Door Cancer Agency and the Ferguson Public Library this year. (The Ferguson Public Library’s head—and only full-time—librarian, Scott Bonner, won multiple awards and much acclaim for turning the library into a sanctuary and school during 2014’s riots. Naturally, he’s a long-time Booter. See what we mean about Booters being generous, awesome people?) There are some great awards in the Fear the Charity raffle this year. Plus, all leftover Fear the Fruit produce not eaten during the con will be donated to a local food pantry, so if you want to chip in to support Fear the Fruit, you should.
- If someone asks who you are, assume they want to know your FtB forum handle. If you don’t have one, just give your name and say you’re new. There are no self-appointed gatekeepers of the hobby at Fear the Con; we just want to know what to call you or what other name or products we might know you by. Many currently-active Booters didn’t even have a forum handle at their first Fear the Con!
Fear the Con 8 is going to be a remarkable event. We’re looking forward to meeting as many listeners as possible at Fear the Con, so come join us there, and say hello!
Grant Woodward and Peter Martin are co-hosts of Saving the Game.
Fear the Con 8 runs June 12-13, 2015 at the Maryland Heights Convention Center in Maryland Heights, Missouri. For complete information, pre-registration, hotel reservation information, and more, visit fearthecon.com.