Go Out and Game Out

Hello, Eric here. It is officially Speak out with your geek out week and this is my first post for the event. What is Speak out? It's a pro-geek event that encourages you to be positive about your geeky hobbies and vocations. Blog, post on Facebook or Tweet with the hashtag #speakgeek all week long with us! It was put together by friends of the blog Monica Valentinelli , Jessica Banks and Amanda Valentine. This will be the first in a short series of geek-talk posts.

For today I want to talk about one of the things I geek out about the most, hobby games. More specifically Boardgames and D&D Encounters night at my favorite game store, EndGame in Oakland. The positive message for you today is find a local gaming community and go out and play.

Let's talk about why I go here once a week for seven hours of gaming every week, all in one great evening. It's a great place to meet people who are as excited about boardgames and D&D as I am. We have a very regular group of people who make the core group of the night, but new players are always welcome. EndGame prides itself on community building and Wednesday night is one of the prime examples of this. The environment is a really fun and loose. You'll never have to sit out of a game. People bring lots of new games try out every week. I've gotten to try out many new games(both newly released and older games I've missed) from all different genres here. It is also a good place to meet people who like to design board games. Prototypes of new games can often be seen on the tables on Wednesday nights. It's also where I met my co-designers Evan Denbaum and Chris Ruggiero. We designed Race to Adventure together at one of these Wednesday night events. Check out the blog for the game's origins here: Race to Adventure! aka the wallet game

I also help run Dungeons and Dragons Encounters here on the same nights. We have two tables for the current season Lost Crown of Neverwinter. This is a fun free publisher sponsored event for playing D&D at your local gaming store. At EndGame it is 1-2 hours starting at 7pm every Wednesday. When play is done people are welcome and encouraged to stay for boardgame nights. One good bridge for this group is the D&D adventure board game Castle Ravenloft. We are stuck on the last adventure trying to defeat the evil vampire Lord Strahd.

He's the toughest villian in the game, by far.

I greatly encourage you to find a local FLGS (Friendly Local Games Store) to play hobby games. It is a great way to share your geek hobby with others. If you can't find a FLGS with board game nights, ask them if you can start your own event at their store. Most store owners are more than happy to host events if someone else is passionate in organizing them. And if you don't have a neighborhood game store, try finding gamers in your area on the BoardGameGeek website.