GenCon 50

Greetings Warriors and Scribes.

I just got back from the best 4 days of gaming on a significant year. GenCon 50 was amazing. As seen above, the gamers took over Colts stadium for the week. This was in addition to the entire Indiana Convention Center and rooms at adjoining hotels.  I did spend some time helping Nathan Marchand with his table but I also played games and cosplayed. I had many great experiences but here are some of the cream of the crop for you.

Sagrada:

This game is lots of fun. I played 2 rounds of it. Rolling and assigning dice to build stained glass windows with limited options that must be chosen carefully to manipulate the dice. This was a lot of fun and it is not a long game.

Warehouse 13:

This was the biggest excitement for me in terms of gaming this weekend. I loved the SYFY show and this game is a faithful exploration of the world. It has a traitor element that is engineered with a similar feel to Battlestar Galactica, which is very fitting to the show. Sitting and talking with the designers was very fun and they are definitely fans of the show. One guy playing with us has not seen the show but he loved the game. This was a major high point of the convention.

This is a semi cooperative game. Each play through is a season and each round is an episode. Through the game you will find clues to figure out what item is causing issues and work to gather the needed tech, intuition,  etc. to stop the situation. However, someone else is also seeking the items to use against your team and one member is secretly working for them. There is a cooperative version for 2 players.

Watch for this to hit Kickstarter!

Buy the Rights:

This is a fun party game where the players are all pitching the movie ideas for the money to make them. Each round a different person will be the "producer" with 20 million dollars to shell out to the other players. Winner is the person with the most money at the end. You will lay out four cards: Genre, Hero, Descriptor of the hero, and the plot. You can elaborate as much as you want to get the attention of the producer and have some fun.

Christian Gamers Guild Events:

The Christianity and Gaming Panel went well. This was a question driven panel that discussed things like planning game nights for churches, how to handle magic and other "dark" things found in gaming, etc.

The Church Service was great. Tom Vasel preached about slowing down for resting and for time with God. We had a full worship band with drums, electric and acoustic guitar and some a great list of songs. This is always a highlight of GenCon for me and this year did not disappoint.

Cosplay

I cosplayed as a Blue Lantern on Friday and Martian Manhunter for half of Saturday (before I went to a Heroscape tournament). Unfortunately the only Lantern related cosplayers I saw were on different days than when I was a blue lantern.

2017 Summer/Fall Con Schedule

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Here is my con schedule for official events for this year. There might be additions or changes, but this is what I currently have planned:

June 18: Nerd Chapel Sunday Service at JAFAX in Grand Rapids, MI. I'll be hanging out at the con all weekend but not with a table. The service is at 10am Sunday Morning in Panel Room 2. You might find me walking around as Martian Manhunter from Justice League/Justice League Unlimited on one of these days.

July 20-22: Christian Game Developers Conference in Portland, OR. Many details still need to come together but this is happening. I'll be helping with the ministry/worship portion of the event and possibly running games.

Sept. 15-17: GrandCon Gaming Convention in Grand Rapids, MI. This will include both a table and the Nerd Chapel Sunday Service. I'm running 2 rounds of Pandemic Friday night and a session for Monsterpocalypse on Saturday night.

Oct. 28-29: Fantasticon in Fort Wayne, IN. with a table.

Nov. 11-12: Fantasticon in Mt. Pleasant, MI. with a table.

Unofficial, I'm sure I'll be hanging out at Grand Rapids Comic Con in October and I am hoping to make it to GenCon in August, but these will not be "official" in any way. 

Thank you Toledo!

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

Toledo was a great success. I met a lot of great people at Fantasticon. My interactions included an adult who came with teens he had met at church. We talked about his concerns with violent movies. A man who grew up Catholic but no longer identifies as a Christian. We talked about a lot of religious topics. He left saying a traditional blessing to me. A group of high schoolers who run a D&D campaign with a mix of religions who have received a lot of flack from members of their church. They were excited to find a Christian nerd out there publicly. A woman who called herself a witch. We talked a little and she thumbed through the devotional and walked away. On one side I had an author who has written a few books a comic (Cutthroat Comics). On the other side a guy who makes custom funko pops for people (Somehow I don't have a name for him or a card).

Many people bought copies of 42:Discovering Faith through Fandom. Some flipped through it and moved on.

One of the more confusing things I had was this. I saw about 4 or 5 people who had Christian shirts or shirts related to Christian schools on. Most of them didn't even look at my table. 1 of them was one of the high schoolers mentioned above. He was quick to buy a copy of 42. Don't worry, I'm not freaking out about this, but it was annoying. Whenever you have a table at a con there are those who just look past your table like it isn't there, even if you say "hi" to them. It happens, but when they have a shirt for something you both agree with it is extra annoying. Sometimes they were so inattentive that I knew if I tried to say something about their shirt it they would not even hear me.

Overall, this was a great weekend. Here are a few pics.

Events of Feb./March 2017

Greetings Scholars and Warriors.

Here is a list of events Nerd Chapel will be at over the next 2 months.

I'll have a table at all of these events.

February 4: Byron Center Rec Comic Con https://www.facebook.com/events/228038290910925/

March 3-5: Michigan Statewide Teen Convention http://mistatewide.org/
Of these events, this is the only one that will use my public speaking skills. I'll be sharing at one of the main sessions and possibly leading a workshop.

March 11-12: Fantasticon Toledo http://www.fantasticon.net/

March 18: Muskecon https://www.facebook.com/events/1102894249776217/

2017 Begins

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Today I want to look at the coming year. I am excited for a few things happening. Some are ministry details and some are just fun nerdy things. We'll look at fun stuff first.

As we continue what seems to be the "Decade of the Nerd" we have so many things happening on screen this year! I am not doing a "top 3" or anything like that because there is so much happening. The last season of Grimm starts this coming Friday along with a new, darker screen adaptation of The Wizard of Oz called Emerald City. I am very interested in how NBC's Friday night lineup these next couple of months will do. That will add to the shows I already keep tabs on (no, I am not going to list all of them). We also have Iron Fist and the Defenders coming for the Netflix MCU and 3 MCU movies this year! Also, we have Skull Island, both Wonder Woman and Justice League, Star Wars Episode 8, etc.

Boardgames? Well, I am not sure what games are coming out this year beyond the 2 I have coming from kickstarters. Unreal Estate is a card game about building a fantasy style city and Zephyr:Winds of Change is a cooperative game where you have a skyship that you take on missions. Honestly, I have not caught up with 2016 yet as I still have yet to play Scythe, Terraforming Mars, or Seafall. Gaming wise I am just excited to get back to Gen Con this year. I had to miss last year so I really don't want to miss this year!

In March I will be at a Christian youth convention called "Michigan Statewide Teen Convention" in Kalamazoo, MI. This will be my first time taking Nerd Chapel and 42:Discovering Faith through Fandom to a youth convention. It came about because I have been volunteering at this convention as a lighting tech for the main sessions for a few years now and they were interested in bringing a locally based non-traditional ministry to show students that ministry doesn't always mean working at a church full time.

I will also be at the Byron Rec Center Comic Con and Muskecon. These are both 1 day shows within driving distance of where I live that I'll have tables at. I do not have complete details on what shows I'll be returning to this year for Nerd Chapel. GrandCon is always a sound bet for me for a service. I expect to go back to Jafax, Midwest Media Expo with services and Fantasticon Fort Wayne with a table as well but we shall see what transpires.

Yes, I am going to be working on a sequal to 42. We have a direction to go in but we have not started the full writing process quite yet (although that will be soon).

My first Fantasticon

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

This last weekend I had the privilege of a table at Fantasticon Fort Wayne. This convention is a travelling convention that goes to markets with little to no con experience available. I was selling 42:Discovering Faith Through Fandom and just being a friendly face for the Kingdom. This convention did not feel comfortable with a chapel service but I did get to do some networking as other Christians who were vending different items came to talk with me. Nathan Marchand, my co-author for 42, had the table next to me with author Nick Hayden. Nathan's brother also joined us with a table to sell his artwork.

Since I arrived way early during setup on Friday, I went around and managed to help a few other vendors in with setup. Then Nathan and I went to a Halloween dance party at the Fort Wayne Ballroom Company. He went as Spock and I was Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Over the weekend, I got to talk to many people. Some were just appreciative to find Christians who embrace nerd culture gracefully. Some were Christians who were excited that someone had written a devotional for their sphere of influence. A couple of guys who were there as part of Huntington Universities Digitial Arts program thought the book would be a good resource for a ministry major who runs their D&D group and were hoping they could use the entries to start off their game nights.

One girl I talked with was so glad to see a Christian embracing nerd culture. She doesn't go to church any more, partly because a youth pastor had told her she was a "blasphemer" for reading science fiction. My head immediately dropped in frustration toward those in the church who make extra rules because they don't understand another person's hobbies. Didn't Jesus Himself have a few words about extra rules?

Did I have an amazing conversation that led someone to Jesus? Well, not in the sense of a huge prayer and drastic life change. I did start to build some bridges, though. I think I also helped chip away at walls that have been built against faith simply by being friendly.

Warriors and Scholars

Greetings Warriors and Scholars.

Next week I leave for Europe for one of several adventures this year. I'll be hanging out in Germany for a week with Fans for Christ Europe. We will be attending Fed Con as a group. Our hope is to meet people and be a presence of Christ at the convention just by being friendly.

This summer I have a couple of things I'm running lights for, such as a kids camp at my church and probably a youth camp for my church as well. But then I get to go to Gen Con and hang out with the Christian Gamers Guild. I'll be volunteering at their booth so stop by if you are there!

There is always a question of how our relationship with Christ is both part of our daily life and how it impacts those around us, even as we attend conventions or just hang out in comics shops or gaming groups.I'm sure you have noticed that I have begun using a greeting on most of my posts. "Greetings Warriors and Scholars." Today I want to use that to share a few thoughts.

Warrior: This can come across as harsh, or even aggressive for those who are not following Christ. Sometimes when they hear us talk about being a "warrior for Christ" they are rather put off. Partly because some Christians have tried to use politics or various communication stuff in some bad ways. And should we forget the horrid acts of many "Christians" during the Inquisition and the Crusades? So what do we mean by this? Paul tells us in Ephesians 6 that our battle is "not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces in the heavenly realms." Again, this can sound a little weird. "Rulers" and "authorities" in here does not mean human governments. These are all words that Paul used to describe different ranks of Satan's cronies. We are warriors not against any people, but against a spiritual enemy that often uses people and encourages poor choices to do great harm. How does one be a warrior? By not causing harm. By praying for others. By helping people. When we do helpful things, it moves against the harm in the world. When we pray, it should always be about redemption, not "us vs. them".

Scholar: What do scholars do? They learn stories and tell them to others. You could also infuse "scribe" in here. Part of our life should include study of the story of God. How he has been involved in the world in history and how He is involved right now. We do this when we read the Bible, when we sit with others and listen to their testimonies, even as we take in various media. The scribe part, of course, would come in with sharing those stories. Telling people the amazing feats of our God and even of His presence in our difficulties.

This year Nerd Chapel is excited to be once again at Grand Con but we are expanding. This year not only will there be a chapel service (which is currently submitted and waiting approval) but we have already been approved for having a table in the exhibit hall.