During the past months, my gaming has been limited due to my work/school/practicum schedule. Working 14-16 hours a day during the week meant that all gaming was shifted to the weekend. I have two games going, Apocalypse World set in the Hudson River Valley and Burning Wheel on the Sword Coast. I stubbornly refused to give either of them up but my schedule took its toll on both games. There were weeks I had to cancel because I was just too shot and needed to re-coup for the coming week.
I really like playing both games on the weekend and having the week to myself. In 2011, I’m going to keep my gaming on the weekend, with the exception of one House Game with the house-mates.
But in the coming year I’m hoping to move to New York City. I’ll be in the same city as Olde Guard buddies I have gamed with for a decade or more (Jay, Witt and Janaki) along with lots of other folks I’d love to sit down and make shit up with (BWHQ, Matt and Matt and Terry and John and Bret and more). It is going to take real discipline to keep that shit contained because I will also want to make rocking my new job, doing crossfit, wrasslin’ and more than those having lots of meals, hang-outs and make-outs with Janaki my priorities. I will want to ease into the gaming scene. I’d imagine getting together with the Olde Guard once a week and just staving off the desire to do more for a few months to a year.
I haven’t even begun to think about saying good-bye to the friends with whom I romp around in fictional places every week. That will likely be its own weepy, overly dramatic post or series of posts.
For now I am looking at the tail-end of my practicum work, finishing up certification and graduation requirements odds and ends and resume re-writing and job applications in the real world.
Meanwhile in the Realms, we will soon see the fall-out of what happens when a Demon Prince and an ancient Red Dragon clash on the Sword Coast.
Meanwhile in the post-apoc Hudson River Valley the HRV crew are going after the cannibals on their own well preserved highways.
And in the coming year I’ll continue to get together with friends and make shit up because I have found very few things that are more fun to do with buddies but I am going to be more careful about when I schedule our visits to our fictional playgrounds.
How was your 2010 in gaming?
What are you thoughts on 2011?
Githyanki Diaspora 
I think after I move I’ll try to set up a game via Skype with some folks. Probably Dresden Files.
Any word on local gaming in the Rochester area?
No, but to be fair, I haven’t looked that hard. There’s a comic shop and a good used book store a few blocks from where I’m moving to, which will be my starting points, I think.
2010 was a real roller-coaster for me, with gaming helping me make it through weeks that were otherwise spent in abject misery.
I made my Dreamation pilgrimage where I did some of my best gaming ever. A Penny for my Thoughts was the high point there.
With the Games on the Hill, I ran and played games I wanted to play for years. As a player I got to be the K-Fed of the elven world, as a GM I saw a tiny piece of Marr’d get saved.
But on a whole it was a lean year for gaming, with maybe 25 3-hr sessions total outside of Dreamation. Better than years before but far less than it takes to make me satisfied.
2011 will be different. I am moving from the wasteland of an-hour-outside-Toronto-with-no-car to the very heart of Toronto. I’ll also be trading 3 hours of daily commuting for less than 30 minutes. I have many friends among Toronto Area Gamers, and that gives me a lot of hope.
Good luck in Toronto!
I wrote mine in a blog post as well:
http://goo.gl/fb/mKwTa
All the best, Judd.
New York City can be a dangerous time sink! In good ways because it’s fun but bad ways because it’s easy to become distracted. Just look at Time Out NY’s website and the list of unique events to participate in on any random day is… tempting!
I once had 4 weekly games which was a bit out of control (I’m at 2 now with random 1-shots). The flip side is that many jobs can become all consuming with 10+ hour work days. The sweet spot is definitely 8-9 hrs with a flexible schedule (can work from home some days) and less than a 40 minute commute. Although commutes aren’t bad when you don’t have to drive, plenty of time to read!
Gaming in 2010 was really good for me, as have the past few years. We have a really nice gaming community here in Tucson. The gaming organization I’m in charge of is starting to run itself. I’ve usually been hosting the monthly Tucson RPG Guild gathering. It’s a great chance to try out new games and one-shots. I’ve also presented at one of our GM Conferences and helped run our local gaming convention.
My home game of Mouse Guard never went off, so I had to be content with just two regular game groups, the Monday group and the biweekly Pathfinder group. The Monday group is great. We’ve been playing short-run (6-8 session) games and my wife finally GMed a game (post-apocalyptic space colony action using DFRPG). We’re now playing a Dresden Files game, set in Dublin. Before that, we wound up playing a CthulhuTech/Shadowrun mashup, Lady Blackbird (love!), and my wife’s game. And I wound up closing the year playing in my first ever Skype game, Dragon Age.
For the upcoming year, I’d like to continue Dresden Files: Dublin as a longer game. There’s a few other games I’d love to run at the monthly RPG Guild gathering. But the thing I really want to do is get our long-planned Speed Gaming event up and running to get local gamers into groups. Think speed dating, but with a GM at one table running a scene or scenario for a new group of players every 30-45 minutes. If things work out correctly, you’d be playing with different people every half hour or so.
Oh, and I want to get back to GenCon this year and get in on some gaming goodness.