GenCon 2010 - Free stuff

Made my lunch after showering this morning. This is something new I'm trying: packing a lunch each day at GenCon.

After that, I traipsed down to the convention centre. There is a massive throng waiting to get into the dealer's room already (and it doesn't open for another 20 minutes).

I'm sitting in a lounge area. They did not lie, they have free wifi! Woohoo (again). I don't have an exhibitor's badge this year, so I have to wait in line like the other peons. While I wait, let's look at this year's free swag.

Well, you can certainly tell there has been an economic downturn. Not much of any worth in the GenCon bag.

There's a free 6-sided die by Crystal Caste. They make a commemorative dice set each year. I bought one 2 years ago. Didn't get the set last year, as I didn't care much for it. This year's is okay, so I'm on the fence on it. (They do this deliberately, of course: one free die to coax you into buying the entire set.)

Mayfair have a free little draw string bag advertising Settlers of America, part of their Settlers of Catan line. I plan to get this, as we are big Settlers fans. I'm hoping the little bag is actually useful for the game.

Other freebies include a card for the Universal Fighting System CCG and a Dungeons and Dragons comic.

That's it for free stuff in the bag. The rest is an oversized Magic, The Gathering card (not sure the use in that, except that it is apparently a "plane" card, and so it might actually be of use in the game). There is a bunch of advertising that's going to get trashed forthwith. And, there's a coupon book.

The coupon book isn't bad. There are a couple of really cheap or actually free things in there, but you have to swing by a specific booth to get it. For instance, Paizo is handing out Pathfinder buttons. They are free, but you have to get them from the booth. That's a smart idea.

Some of the other coupons look useful, most aren't. A couple of standouts:

• An ad for free downloads from DrivethruRPG.com
• A free set of 10 train tokens from a company that sells Eurogame card sleeves. This might be for Ticket to Ride, so I'll swing by there.
• 20% off a Settlers of Catan "gaming surface and storage case". Looks interesting; probably expensive.
• A starter set of The Spoils CCG for $5. I think they had the same deal last year, but I missed it. Might look at that.
• Ah, good ol' Troll and Toad. They are an online game store that has a lot of old games. They also charge collector's prices on said games. ($110 for Glory I from GMT? I don't think so.) If you spend $20 there, they will give you a free game worth $30 from a specific list. One of the games they list is Vapor's Gambit, a hoverboard (like a flying skateboard) race game. They were selling these for $15 last year... then $10... then $5... and then at 3:30 p.m. on Sunday they started giving them away for free. I have a copy (unplayed) from last year. Now it's a "prize" worth "$30". *L*

Now it's 4 minutes until the dealer's room opens. Time to post this, grab a convention guide book, and head inside.

Ciao for now...