January Update—Welcome 2019, Spotlights and Conventions!!
Wednesday, January 9, 2019
Last Wednesday I was on a plane bound for Washington, D.C. and MAGFest. I returned Monday from one of the highest energy conventions I've attended. Trevor and the tri-state crew, as well as help from Pennsylvania and further afield, delivered four days of Starfinder Society and Pathfinder Society adventures. This week, I'm catching up on tasks so that I can fly out to SCARAB next week. Come hang out and say hi! If you're interested in which conventions Paizo staffers will attend in 2019, check out the listing at the bottom of the blog.
I received multiple queries on when the call to volunteer would go out for PaizoCon and Gen Con. With the formation of the Organized Play Foundation and their oversight of volunteers, the call will originate from the OPF and Paizo will boost the signal. At this time, Paizo is requesting OPF solicit volunteers for PaizoCon, Origins, Gen Con, UK Games Expo and PAX Unplugged. It is our hope to have everything coordinated by next week so that we can receive questionnaires and respond quickly.
Finally, as we move into 2019, I want to say thank you to the community that keeps making Paizo organized play programs - Starfinder Society, Pathfinder Society Roleplaying Guild, and Pathfinder Society Adventure Card Guild - fantastic places to play. Without the volunteers and players, we would not have the renaissance in RPGs we are currently experiencing. Huge huzzahs and I look forward to meeting more of you in 2019.
Campaign Coins
December was a quieter time for travels, as I only attended PAX Unplugged, and did not present any campaign coins. There is still the one outstanding coin from PaizoCon Asia-Pacific that has not yet reached its recipient. As we are in the turning of the year and the last few months of our original Pathfinder Society campaign , I thought this a fitting time to list all those who've received a Campaign Service Coin for their dedication to our hobby.
Recipients
Name New Number Con Received Kyle Elliott 701 PaizoCon 2014 Kristie Schweyer 702 PaizoCon 2014 Stephen White 703 PaizoCon 2014 Alistair Rigg 704 PaizoCon 2014 Art Lobdell 705 PaizoCon 2014 Myron Paul 706 PaizoCon 2014 Eric Brittain 707 PaizoCon 2014 Michael Azzolino 708 PaizoCon 2014 Robyn Nixon 709 PaizoCon 2014 Auke Teeninga 710 PaizoCon UK 2014 Dave Harrison 711 PaizoCon UK 2014 Rob Silk 712 PaizoCon UK 2014 Zrinka Znidarcic 713 PaizoCon UK 2014 Jon Cary 714 Gen Con 2014 Steve Miller 715 Gen Con 2014 Joe Jungers 716 Gen Con 2014 Seth Gipson 717 Gen Con 2014 Garrett Gottschalk 718 Gen Con 2014 Dominick Trascritti 719 Gen Con 2014 Todd Morgan 720 Gen Con 2014 Bob Jonquet 721 Gen Con 2014 Del Collins II 722 Gen Con 2014 Lucas Servideo 723 Gen Con 2014 Andrew Christian 724 Gen Con 2014 Dan Simons 725 Gen Con 2014 Brent Jans 726 Gen Con 2014 Jon Dehning 727 Gen Con 2014 Jester Deren 728 Gen Con 2014 June Soler 729 Gen Con 2014 Michael McNerney 730 Gen Con 2014 Karim Majeri 731 PaizoCon UK 2015 Benoit Gros 732 PaizoCon UK 2015 Mark Langereis 733 PaizoCon UK 2015 Chris Brockley-Blatt 734 PaizoCon UK 2015 Gael Aubort 735 PaizoCon UK 2015 Brett Sweeney 736 Gen Con 2015 Eric Clingenpeel 737 Gen Con 2015 Jason Roeder 738 Gen Con 2015 Richard Gilbert 739 Gen Con 2015 Michael Costello 740 Gen Con 2015 Derek Boobyer 741 Gen Con 2015 Seth Brummond 742 Gen Con 2015 Michael VonHasseln 743 Gen Con 2015 Daniel Flood 744 Gen Con 2015 Martin Shelby 745 Gen Con 2015 Dan Cornett 746 Gen Con 2015 Chris Hays 747 Gen Con 2015 Vanessa Hoskins 748 Gen Con 2015 Angus MacLennan 749 Gen Con 2015 Tersha Choy 750 Gen Con 2015 Michael Meunier 751 Fall 2015 Sebastian Schirrmeister 752 Fall 2015 Wolf Vituschek 753 Fall 2015 Florent Fournol 754 Fall 2015 Ray Diaz 755 PaizoCon 2016 David Montgomery 756 PaizoCon 2016 Robert Hetherington 757 PaizoCon 2016 Jesse Davis 758 PaizoCon 2016 Luke Woods 759 Origins 2016 Jen McTeague 760 Origins 2016 Pete Pollard 761 PaizoCon UK 2016 Terry Thambipillai 762 PaizoCon UK 2016 Vincent Colón-Roine 763 PaizoCon UK 2016 William Boyle 764 PaizoCon UK 2016 Paco Sanchez 765 PaizoCon UK 2016 Michael Eshleman 766 Gen Con 2016 Brendan Green 767 Gen Con 2016 Joanna Gore 768 Gen Con 2016 Rigby Bendele 769 Gen Con 2016 Kristen Gipson 770 Gen Con 2016 Jean-Marc Comeau 771 Gen Con 2016 David Jacobsen 772 TotalCon 2017 Wendy-Ann Francis 773 Dundra Con 2017 John Francis 774 Dundra Con 2017 Mark Stratton 775 WYC 2017 Carol Tierney 776 UKGE 2017 Allison Ooms 777 WYC 2017 Chad Newman 778 Origins 2017 Alexander Lenz 779 PaizoCon UK 2017 Tesifonte Negro 780 PaizoCon UK 2017 Nils Janson 781 PaizoCon UK 2017 Ian Hawthorne 782 PaizoCon UK 2017 Glen Shackleton 783 Gen Con 2017 Joe Mathos 784 MarsCon 2018 Paul Reese 785 MarsCon 2018 Mike McKeown 786 MarsCon 2018 Troy Schnack 787 Quad City Fest 2018 Jack Brown 788 PaizoCon 2018 Keith Apperson 789 PaizoCon 2018 Louis Manko Levite 790 PaizoCon 2018 Simon Kort 791 UKGE 2018 Sebastian Hirsch 792 UKGE 2018 Brent Bowser 793 Origins 2018 Bobby Harring 794 Origins 2018 Gustavo Cruz 795 PaizoCon UK 2018 Jim Torbet 796 PaizoCon UK 2018 Caner Unsal 797 PaizoCon UK 2018 Lau Bannenberg 798 PaizoCon UK 2018 Walter Sheppard 799 Gen Con 2018 David Shaw 800 Gen Con 2018 Mike Bramnik 801 Gen Con 2018 Will Johnson 802 Gen Con 2018 Russ Brown 803 Gen Con 2018 Glen Irving 804 PaizoCon AP 2018 Redacted 805 PaizoCon AP 2018
If you know a deserving member of your community, please email me at organizedplay@paizo.com with their name, location, and the reasons you feel they should be recognized for their service. If you are able, please include what events they may attend in 2018/2019 so that we can either make awards in person (preferred) or make arrangements for deliver.
Stars and Novas
While December is usually a slower month, gamewise, we still had a couple of GMs achieve the requirements to qualify for their 5th star. To achieve this milestone, GMs run 150 games, of which at least 50 must be unique scenarios and 10 special scenarios, as well as run a game for a venture-captain. A conservative estimate of time needed to reach 5-stars is 650 hours! To the GMs listed below, thank you very much for the time and energy you spend running Pathfinder Society games! Huge congratulations on your achievement!
- Randy Cronin
- Jonathan Farber
In looking at the first draft of the 5-nova qualifications, we realized that we could future-proof our campaigns by coming up with a format that would work for novas, glyphs, and any future recognition system we may need. We also came up with a tech component that automates parts of the process and which solves some of the issues our 4-star and 5-star GMs are experiencing with their stars not showing. This means it will take a bit longer to generate the policy, but I think it will save time and stress in the long run. WE appreciate your patience as we work through this process and will update you as soon as we have more information!
Convention Listing
Want to attend a convention in the next few months? Check out the list below! The list includes all the event support requests received to date. If you see one missing, ping the organizer and have them submit a request for support or have them email me at organizedplay@paizo.com to discuss their event. All of the conventions on the list maintain some type of web presence, be it website, social media page, or Warhorn listing, so if you are interested in attending in either capacity, check out their websites or contact the local venture-officer for more information!
| Convention Name | Location | Start Date |
|---|---|---|
| Midwinter 2019 | Milwaukee, WI | 1/10/2019 |
| ORCACON 2019 | Bellevue | 1/11/2019 |
| RetroCon 2019 | Online | 1/14/2019 |
| Arisia 2019 | Boston, MA | 1/18/2019 |
| Betacon 8 (2019) | Wilkes-Barre, PA | 1/18/2019 |
| MarsCon 2019 | Williamsburg, VA | 1/18/2019 |
| SCARAB 2019 | Columbia, SC | 1/18/2019 |
| Con-Tingency 2019 | Hunstanton, Norfolk, UK | 1/23/2019 |
| Dreamers Vault SSC 2019 | Minnesota, St Louis Park, Dreamers Vault | 1/23/2019 |
| Winter War 46 (2019) | Champaign-Urbana, IL | 1/25/2019 |
| GalaxyFest 2019 | Colorado Springs, CO | 2/1/2019 |
| Las Vegas Open 2019 | Las Vegas, NV | 2/8/2019 |
| RapierCon 2019 | Doubletree by Hilton Hotel Jacksonville Florida Airport | 2/8/2019 |
| Vinterfinder 2019 | Roskilde/ Denmark | 2/8/2019 |
| FlintCon 2019 | St Paul Lutheran School, Flint, MI | 2/9/2019 |
| Lodge Con 2019 | Peotone, IL | 2/9/2019 |
| B-CON Winter 2019 | Frankfurt/Main, Germany | 2/9/2019 |
| BASHCon 2019 | Toledo, OH | 2/15/2019 |
| Con of the North 2019 | Plymouth, MN | 2/15/2019 |
| Orccon 2019 | Los Angeles, CA | 2/15/2019 |
| Radcon 7C (2019) | Pasco, WA | 2/15/2019 |
| Dreamation 2019 | Morristown, NJ | 2/21/2019 |
| TotalCon XXXIII (2019) | Marlborough, MA | 2/21/2019 |
| 3rd Annual Boys & Girls Con (2019) | Bellevue, NE | 2/22/2019 |
| Owlcon 2019 | Houston, TX | 2/22/2019 |
| Who's Yer Con 19 (2019) | Indianapolis, IN | 3/22/2019 |
| Game On-Icon 2019 | Plymouth, NH | 3/23/2019 |
| GameStorm 21 (2019) | Portland, OR | 3/28/2019 |
| PAX East 2019 | Boston, MA | 3/28/2019 |
| CoNfUSiOn 2019 - Winter | Gouda, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands | 3/29/2019 |
| Pathcon 5.5 (2019) | Salt Lake City | 4/12/2019 |
| Save vs. Hunger | Maryville, TN | 4/12/2019 |
| EyeCon 2019 | Sydney, NSW, Australia | 4/19/2019 |
| Gaming Hoopla '19 | Mundelein, IL | 4/26/2019 |
2019 Organized Play Staff Travel
As I mentioned in the opening of the blog, we have lots of staff travel in 2019 and encourage you to come say hi if you are attending any of these events. Looking forward, if you are an event organizer and want to invite us out at your event in 2020, drop an email to organizedplay@paizo.com before next summer, as we put our schedule together in August.
| Convention Name | Location | Start Date | OP Staff Attending* |
|---|---|---|---|
| OrcaCon | Everett, WA | 1/11/2019 | Amanda |
| SCARAB | Columbia, SC | 1/11/2019 | Tonya |
| DundraCon | San Ramon, CA | 2/15/2019 | Michael |
| OrcCon | Los Angeles, CA | 2/15/2019 | Linda |
| GhenghisCon | Denver, CO | 2/21/2019 | Tonya |
| MaceWest | Ashville, NC | 3/1/2019 | Tonya |
| GaryCon | Lake Geneva, WI | 3/7/2019 | Jason Bulmahn |
| Emerald City Comic Con | Seattle, WA | 3/14/2019 | Tonya |
| Who's Yer Con | Indianapolis, IN | 3/22/2019 | Linda |
| GameStorm | Portland, OR | 3/28/2019 | John Compton, Jason Bulmahn |
| KoboldCon | Colorado Springs, CO | 4/26/2019 | OP TBD, Stephen Radney-McFarland |
| PaizoCon | SeaTac, WA | 5/23/2019 | All |
| UK Games Expo | Birmingham, United Kingdom | 5/31/2019 | Tonya, Amanda, Cosmo, Erik, Jason B.,Jeff |
| Origins | Columbus, OH | 6/12/2019 | Tonya, John C., Thurston |
| American Libraries Conference | Washington, D.C. | 6/20/2019 | Tonya, Cosmo |
| GenCon | Indianapolis, IN | 8/1/2019 | Most |
| FanExpo | Toronto, Canada | 8/22/2019 | Tonya |
| DragonCon | Atlanta, GA | 8/30 | John C. |
| Delta H Con | Houston, TX | 9/20 | OP TBD |
| NukeCon | Omaha, NE | 10/4 | OP TBD |
| PaizoCon Asia-Pacific | TBD | TBD | Tonya |
| GameHole Con | Madison, WI | 10/31/2019 | Tonya |
| PAX Unplugged | Philadelphia, PA | 12/5/2019 | Tonya, Amanda, Cosmo, Erik, Jason B.,Jeff |
*Staffers scheduled to attend may change without notice.
Until next time—Explore, Report, Cooperate!
Tonya Woldridge
Organized Play Manager