It is this time of year again, when GenCon is looming ever closer and our thoughts turn toward that great gathering of gamers in Indianapolis, from August 3rd to 6th.

I’m happy to announce that Profantasy (myself included) will be attending again. You’ll find us at booth #515 together with Pelgrane Press, and I’m looking to forward to meeting as many of you mappers there as possible. I’m always happy to answer questions, demo our software, and hear what you might like to see in the future.

Please stop by to chat and check out our latest products! See you there, Ralf.

Here I am back in Germany from GenCon, finally over the jetlag, looking back at my first transatlantic journey in three years, and trying to think of how to describe the trip.

It’s strange, in most ways it was totally the same as other GenCons (take a look at my detailed description from 2016), but on the other hand it was new and exciting, as I was finally able to meet so many friends again. Seeing them in person is so much different from just communicating vial email, phone and video.

Travel to and from the show was mostly painless. I missed a connecting flight on the way to Indy, but got on the next easily and arrived just a little later than planned on Tuesday evening. Wearing a mask all four days was a bit annoying (if of course warranted), but discipline was high, and everyone I know and know of managed to avoid getting Covid at the show, so I count that as a clear win.

It was a bit quieter than usually, with only about 50,000 visitors as opposed to around 70,000 before the pandemic, but still lively enough and the vibes were good. Everybody was just happy to be back at the show.

Downtown Indianapolis has definitely suffered a bit in the last two years, with several restaurants going out of business and other springing up in their place. I did miss the Rockbottom Brewers, as it had been my favorite haunt on recent visits, but we found another great place to eat: Nada’s a Mexican place with excellent salsas and tacos.

As usual I didn’t get to game much at the show, but managed to sneak in a session of “The Thing” with Canadian friends on Saturday evening. It’s an excellent adaptation of the 80s John Carpenter movie and we had great fun with it, though us humans lost and brought the alien thing out of Antarctica to take over the world.

If you want to see my personal gallery of pictures with lots of miniature and game pictures, you can find it here.

The first game convention (for us) since 2019 is getting closer … GenCon Indy is happening early next month (August 4th to 7th). We are excited to finally go out and meet many gamers again!

Here is the exhibitors’ hall map with our booth marked. As usual we are sharing the booth with our sister company Pelgrane press. We hope to see you there!

Dragonmeet, London’s friendliest gaming convention, is held again this year on the last weekend of November (November 30th) in London, at the Novotel in Hammersmith, like last year. ProFantasy will be there and you’re welcome to stop by to check our products, talk mapping, or just say hello to yours truly (Ralf).

Look for us next to the Pelgrane booth, pretty much across from the entrance into the exhibitor’s hall. Look for the maps!

GenCon 2019 is just around the corner – next week in fact – and ProFantasy will be there of course! Visit us at booth 1417 to chat about mapping, check out our products and get a sneak peek of the new Symbol Set: Cities of Schley.

For the first time, ProFantasy will be exhibiting at UK Games Expo in Birmingham this coming weekend.

The show has been constantly growing in recent years and we are excited to see how the gaming community comes together for this event. You will find us in hall 1 at booth 1-697 as show in the hall map below. If you are visiting UK Games Expo, please stop by to say hello, check out our software and just chat a little about mapping!

You might be wondering what yours truly has been up to now that the first Token Treasury is out. Here’s a little update about what’s on my desk.

There is of course the Cities of (Mike) Schley you’ve all been wondering about. Progress has been a little slower than expected for a while, but we are now moving along nicely again, with Mike regularly submitting new house symbols – check out the gorgeous little orcish hut here. Of course the map (shading) files for all these houses need to be created, but we do have an expert on this now, don’t we?

Secondly, after the Token Treasury is before the Token Treasury. We are very happy with the artwork that Rich Longmore has produced and our customers seem to agree. So we’ve commissioned him for a second set and the first pieces are rolling in. Check out the gorgeous Papa Croc (my nickname) on the left.

There are a few slots left on our monster list for issue two (the list of monsters for the first issue is here), so if you have any wishes, post the below!

Finally ProFantasy will be exhibiting at a new convention (new for us that is) this year. We’ll be at UK Games Expo in Birmingham, and that wants to be organized including travel, rooms, booth space and everything that goes along with that. I’m certainly looking forward to being in Birmingham for the first time!

Dragonmeet, London’s friendliest gaming convention, is held again this year on the first weekend of December (December 1st) in London, at the Novotel in Hammersmith, like last year. ProFantasy will be there and you’re welcome to stop by to check our products, talk mapping or just say hello to yours truly (Ralf).

Look for us next to the Pelgrane booth. Final booth numbers have not been assigned, but the exhibitor’s hall should be small enough that we are easy to find. Look for the maps!

This week is Spiel time, i.e. the world’s biggest boardgame consumer fair takes place in Essen, Germany. ProFantasy has been exhibiting there since at least 2000 and it is always great fun, if also a busy and tiring time.

For this year, the organizer (Merz Verlag) has vastly improved the available documentation and guides. The “Spiel Guide” is an actually useful piece with the hall plans and all exhibitors listed alphabetically by hall. Hopefully that should make it easy to find our booth 6G113, which is smack in the middle of hall 6. If you are looking for board games, it also contains a list of all the new games announced for Spiel.

Yours truly (Ralf) will be there and I’ll be happy to demo you any of the software, give you a glimpse at the upcoming Token Treasure and Cities of Schley, or just chat about maps, map-making and gaming in general. Hope to see you there!

GenCon 2018 – the Best 4 Days in Gaming – is coming up next week, and of course ProFantasy will be at the show.

Stop by at booth #1317 (we are sharing the booth with Pelgrane Press) to check out the new Dioramas 3, get a glimpse of what we are working on, or just chat with Simon, Ralf or Doug. We are looking forward to seeing you there!