I heard word about Free RPG Day a while back when Paul of Cthulhu mentioned that Goodman Games was offering a free Call of Cthulhu adventure. I intended on going to my regular game store Hobbytown, but they were not participating this year. My friend Stewart has a game store local to him called Rainy Day Games, but he ended up being unable to attend, so I decided to find a store nearby to go and get free stuff. The nearest was Ancient Wonders. I’d been there once before and didn’t have a high opinion of it. It was dim, kind of a hole in the wall place, etc. I decided to go there anyways because it was close.
I walked it and it seemed brighter than I remember, so that was good, and the guy there asked how he could help us. I asked where the goodies were and there were two tables and he said the stuff on the first one was up for grabs. The thing I wanted was on the second, and he was worried that if people grabbed it all they wouldn’t have enough for their events later. I said the main thing I wanted was the Call of Cthulhu item and thankfully he didn’t object to me taking one. I snagged some stuff for the Warhammer 40k RPG, a DnD adventure for Stewart, since he couldn’t attend, and a Legend of Five Rings book that looked interesting.
I continued to look around the store to see if there was something inexpensive to buy. I didn’t want to just get free stuff and run. The problem was while I was browsing, I was essentially ignored while the store guy complained to his friends/coworkers about not having read a book because his annoying customers kept bugging him. While I don’t want to be smothered in a store, I don’t mind, and prefer, being asked if I can be helped in finding something, and I certainly don’t want to hear the shopkeeper complain about having customers. While I didn’t get ‘bad’ service personally, I didn’t find the experience enjoyable at all. I did end up buying Zombie Dice from Steve Jackson Games, but when I left I felt like I had given my money to the wrong place. I wont be returning there. While I wanted Zombie Dice, I think I would rather have bought it from a place that wont complain about customers and has better service, like the Hobbytown I normally go to. Also the Free RPG Day site mentioned some Q-Workshop and Chessex dice and they said they didn’t have any dice, (or they were on the more ‘hand’s off’ table,) so I didn’t get any of those, which would have been nice.
I did get the one thing I most wanted, and a few other interesting things, so overall I my adventure was a success. I’ve looked at the Call of Cthulhu adventure a bit and what I read looks good.
Links:
Free RPG Day – http://www.freerpgday.com/
Paul of Cthulhu – http://www.yog-sothoth.com Twitter: @ysdc
Goodman Games - http://www.goodman-games.com/ Twitter: @GoodmanGames
Stewart – Twitter: @LeStew
Rainy Day Games – http://www.rainy-day-games.com/store.html
Ancient Wonders – http://www.ancientwonders.net
Steve Jackson Games – http://www.sjgames.com/ http://www.sjgames.com/dice/zombiedice/
