Event cancellations are starting. Looking for options
Posted by jigreene

Now that we are less than a week away, event cancellation notifications are starting to hit my group's mailboxes. Apparently some of those groups that would only come if Gen Con implemented their draconian safety measures aren't coming anyway.   I am looking at options and have a few questions.

1.  Naturally, the cancelled events use paper tickets.  If I understand correctly, after we get our tickets at will call, we will then have to go to the events desk to return the tickets.  Is that right?  And when we return them, can we get a refund or do we have to get system credit?  Honestly, unless I can find alternative events, I am not interested in Gen Con holding my money indefinitely.  This will be the last year I attend until Gen Con defaults to local health ordinance policies.

2.  Is there a way to search events based on the number of tickets available?  I can filter out the events that have no tickets, but as we want to buy as a group, I also want to be able to filter out the events that have fewer tickets than we need.

3.  In past years, some of the bigger game companies had rooms where they demoed/ran games even after the exhibit hall closed.  No tickets were needed; you just walked in.  I see those rooms on the map again this year.  Are the hours for those rooms published anywhere or does anyone know how late they go?

Posted by austicke jigreene

jigreene wrote:1.  Naturally, the cancelled events use paper tickets.  If I understand correctly, after we get our tickets at will call, we will then have to go to the events desk to return the tickets.  Is that right?

Yes.
And when we return them, can we get a refund or do we have to get system credit?

Your choice. You could also use it as a generic ticket, but there's no change if it's for a large amount.
2.  Is there a way to search events based on the number of tickets available?

I'm not sure. Perhaps with one of the many third party sites.
3.  In past years, some of the bigger game companies had rooms where they demoed/ran games even after the exhibit hall closed.  No tickets were needed; you just walked in.  I see those rooms on the map again this year.  Are the hours for those rooms published anywhere or does anyone know how late they go?

Many of them are listed in the event catalog (even if they're free).
 

Posted by quarex

A lot of cancellations are happening because it is hard to recruit people to run games when a big subset of gamerdom is extra-vulnerable to COVID-19, whether elderly or obese or immune suppressed, and staying away during the current spike.

Posted by twilightknight

Disappointed with Magpie. Four of the five sessions we registered for to play the new Avatar RPG have been cancelled. This late in the process, there are very few options for mainstream RPG games

Posted by jigreene

Thanks for the answers Austicke.  As always, you are a wealth of knowledge.

And yes, Magpie is one of our cancellations.  Looking at the number of tables they cancelled, it appears they grossly overestimated the number of volunteers they could get.  I just wish they had accepted this problem much sooner; there is no way they were going to get the number of volunteers needed at the last minute.  It wouldn't have been as much of an issue if they hadn't waited to the last minute to cancel.

RPGs are mostly what we do, and the RPG options are very limited at this point.  We are looking at board games, demos, and shopping to fill our gaps.
 

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