Giving Thanks to Our Community

Today is Thanksgiving in the United States, and several other countries celebrated their day of giving thanks over the past months. While celebrations look very different for all of us this year, we wanted to take a moment to give thanks to our Paizo community. Without you all, the worlds of Pathfinder and Starfinder would be just stories we told ourselves. We’re grateful for all your support, and wish you well as this year comes to a close. We also want to thank the Organized Play community organizers for supporting our programs in the face of tremendous adversity. Without the venture-officers, we would lack structure and without GMs, games. To all of you who spend time planning schedules and completing tasks behind the scenes, a huge shout out of thanks!

Every year we have several dozen conventions/events which support charities. We developed the charity boon programs to support these efforts. This year, without physical gatherings, we thought the support for charities would diminish. In light of this year’s adverse conditions, we’re especially thankful for the tremendous generosity of our players. We’d like to recognize a few the events who conducted charitable activities and supported the charities’ good works!

Contingency 2020, Hunstanton, England
This event in February raised £7500, or $9934 USD, for Alzheimer's Society UK.

Owlcon 2020, Houston TX
The Texas Organized Play community ran over 50 tables and raised $260 for Extra Lifein February of this year.

PFS MANCon, Manchester, England
While this event was cancelled due to the start of the pandemic, many of the attendees donated fees and refunds to the nominated charity. The equivalent of $635 USD was donated to the Alzheimer’s Society to help tackle dementia.

CoVcon, Pittsburgh PA
COSCON quickly moved online when lockdown began in March. Through their efforts, they raised $268 to support Royal Family KIDS and the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund for the World Health Organization.

CritterCon 3, Online
The Cosmic Crittermanders ran their third event to benefit Doctors Without Borders in April of this year, raising $6741 and running 76 tables.

PaizoCon Francia, Geneva, Switzerland
One of our few in-person events, this convention raised around 500 Swiss Francs, or $550 USD, for Fonds Mimosa.

Displacement Con, Grand Rapids MI
The unofficial replacement for Grand Con, this event featured board games and Adventurer’s League in addition to Paizo Organized Play games. A total of $225 was raised for Make-A-Wish of Michigan.

Gen Con Online, Indianapolis IN
The charity auction at Gen Con raised $11,008.66, which will be donated to Gen Con Online’s partner charities: Take This, Trinity Haven and I Need Diverse Games.

Pittsburgh Con Online, Pittsburgh PA
A new event, this online convention raised $188 for the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank. The local volunteers hope to run the event again next year!

Tavern Con 2020, Ithaca MI
This event raised $460 for Gaming for a Cure.

SkålCon Online 2020, Minneapolis MN
This online convention was attended by several members of the Organized Play team, and it raised $4700 for local charity Tubman.

Defenders of the Healing Flame, Multiple Lodges
Unable to conduct in-person marathons, 7 lodges teamed up to raise money for Extra Life. Through 55 tables of play, they raised $6,529 for Children’s Miracle Network. Thanks to the members of Bluegrass Lodge in Kentucky, Queen City Lodge in Cincinnati, Virginia Lodge, Boston Metro Lodge, Mid-Maryland Lodge, Central Jersey Lodge, North Shore MA Lodge and the NE Indiana Organized Play community for all your efforts!

CONGlomerate, Online
Just this month, the online region raised $1,070 for Extra Life and the Seattle Childrens’ Hospital.

In total, this year our Organized Play community raised more than $42,000 for charity. Thank you all so much for your incredible efforts! All charities are linked above, if you would like to support your community’s fundraising or learn about the charities’ goals. Your efforts truly exemplify the “Cooperate” portion of the Pathfinder Society motto, and we can’t wait to see what the community will do in 2021 and beyond.

Check back next week for our Monthly Update! Until then: Explore! Report! Cooperate!

Alex Speidel
Organized Play Associate

Tonya Woldridge
Organized Play Manager