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| Morning in Nottinghamshire shimmers... |
After a decent night's sleep (now there's a novelty!) I checked out of my hotel early to head for the bus station, there being no early trains from Mansfield on Sundays. Thanks to some iffy directions, I very nearly ended up getting on a bus to the local Amazon warehouse, which would have been awkward. Happily this was averted and I enjoyed a pleasantly quiet 40-minute ride into Nottingham. It was a bit chilly, but the weather looked like being reasonable.
Breakfast this time had been arranged in advance, and there were five of us at table in the Roebuck – which was also pleasantly quiet. Wetherspoons Large Breakfast certainly lives up to its name, but it's rather handy for cons when you're never quite sure how you're going to fit in lunch. With our UKPC badges already sorted out and around our necks, we strolled in leisurely fashion to the venue and were inside pretty quickly to enjoy another day of small horses.
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| Five minutes to opening! Featuring Griffin's hat (bottom left) |
I'd asked online whether anyone would be interested in playing Chase the Ace, and Ace (fittingly), Zen plus one or two more had said they were up for it. This is a simple card game that we play at nearly all Worcester meets. I'd always wanted to play it at a convention, and I'd nearly managed it in 2019. Of course, you-know-what meant a long delay after that, but at last it actually happened! Unlike two years ago, I had a proper MLP pack which really does make things a lot more fun.
As with Saturday, the Sunday morning was fairly quiet, so we found a spare table on the upper floor and got cracking. This was a non-competitive game, so we didn't bother with the usual "three lives" setup. As time went on, more and more people wandered along and joined in or spectated. By the end, I think we had something like 13 people, making this something not a million miles away from a "renegade" Chase the Ace panel! :P Sounds silly I know, but this was a big highlight of the con for me.
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| Chase the Ace: I suffer the Curse of the Cakes, averted only by Twist (right) |
Around 11 am, some people headed off to Reskell's panel comparing the furry and Pony fandoms – they're a member of both, which gave them a useful insight. I was thinking about going, even though I'd watched Reskell do a similar presentation at one of the online UKPCs... but it was at this point that my second (and last) minor attack of social anxiety hit. As with yesterday's, it wasn't a big deal, but it was just enough to put me off wanting to go to a panel that I suspected would be quite well attended. Ah well.
I reprised my plan from the Saturday of going downstairs to look at the vendor hall, since that gave me plenty of space and allowed walking around, which helped a lot. There were some highly impressive lots on the charity auction table, and I'll certainly be returning to that in the next part of this report. I also had to cast a proprietorial eye over the Newcomer Customs entries, given that I was the sponsor of that contest! Not a judge, thankfully, as I would have found it pretty hard to pick a winner.
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| Some of the impressive Newcomer Customs entries (eventual winner on the left) |
Definitely time for lunch now. As most of us (now including unexpected Sunday arrival Oilyvalves, who'd kept that quiet!) weren't really up for a walk, we stuck with sandwiches and snacks from the café pod. The chocolate cupcakes were very nice! Slightly later in the afternoon (temporary jump ahead because I can't edit properly yay!) I did a bit more shopping. Jowy's Hitch prints had definitively sold out, but at least I managed to get an Izzy. A bit later on, I also spent £1 on a charity tombola spin and won a Fluttershy EqG doll. Could be worse!
Back to the present! At 12:30 quite a few of us, this time including me, headed for the Tails of Equestria panel. This was about the popular licensed MLP role-playing game sold by River Horse, and was given by game designer Jack Cæsar. He proved to be an excellent presenter, talking interestingly and in quite some detail about the process of working with Hasbro to make the game work to everyone's satisfaction. One little snippet he shared: Hasbro were adamant that players should not be able to have an alicorn character!*
* As Cæsar pointed out, you can hack this by giving a character earth pony, pegasus and unicorn abilities...
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| Applying the concept of RPG balancing to a world containing an all-powerful chaos lord. And Flurry Heart |
Next time: auction stare-outs, angry mobs and Fluttershy really letting herself down
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