Welcome to the 10th Annual North Texas
RPG Convention! The NTRPG Con focuses on old-school Dungeons & Dragons gaming (mainly OD&D,
1E,
2E, or Basic/Expert) as well as any pre-2000 type of
RPG produced by the classic gaming companies of the 70s and 80s (TSR, Chaosium, FGU, FASA,
GDW, etc). We also support retro-clone or simulacrum type gaming that copies the old style of
RPGs (Swords & Wizardry and others), and newer versions of some classic
RPGs (D&D 5E, for example). All
RPG games are welcome at the Con, but we do not schedule card or board games except in special circumstances...unlike most other cons we are primarily old school
RPG focused! Our sponsors this year so far are Frog God Games and The Royal Dragoon Guards, with more to follow. We also have general con sponsorships and you can even sponsor the serving girls!
Our convention dates are: Thursday June 7, 2018 @ 9am until Sunday June 10, 2018 @ 6pm. You can register for the convention now at Ntrpgcon.com, where the link for Game/Con Information links to our site on Tabletop Games (who are handling our registration this year; same company that does Garycon). We also have a Pre-Con-Get-It-On every Wed before the con, admission is free for playing games and hanging out. Early Bird registration is now through Halloween, which is $20 off the walk-up price of $80 this year ($60 with the coupon you get at checkout) for a weekend pass. Registration will go up to $70 starting November 1st, and late registration will start April 1st, 2018. Single Day tickets are available for each day and will run $30 to $40. Note that registration fees are non-refundable, but can be carried over to a future year.
Please look around, read up and register if you plan to attend. You must pay for one day or a weekend before you are able to register for a game or run a game of your own. 1/2 of all seats are available at $5.00 per seat. Any seats that don't sell along with the remaining 1/2 of seats will be free on April 15th, 2018. Certain events (like the Return to La Quinta) may run more. Room sponsors are allowed to charge for events or items sold in their rooms.
If you want to sign up to run a game, please buy your badge, then select the "Host" drop down box and submit your game. You can also submit games through the link, Doug will approve them, and they will be up for registration as soon as we can get to it.
We have moved a few miles north to a bigger hotel! The Con will be held at the Westin DFW Airport Hotel : 4545 West John Carpenter Freeway, Irving , Texas 75063. It's just north of the airport. We have a special rate for con attendees ($108.00/night) that is in effect until May 15th, 2018 so don't delay in getting your reservations. This is our 2nd year at the Westin, and it was highly praised for it's roominess. We will have all the breakout rooms starting Wed, and everything but the Trinity Ballroom, Gallery and Lecture Hall starting Thursday morning. It is only a couple of minutes north of DFW airport and easily reached by shuttle. This venue also features a full restaurant and bar, and is five minutes away from an area containing almost two dozen places to eat.
We have many confirmed special guests from the early days of the hobby attending in 2018: Wolfgang Baur, Bob Bledsaw Jr., Jason Braun, Jeff Dee, Chris Clark, Matt Finch, Ernest "Skeeter" Green, Allen Hammack, Kevin Hendryx, Mary Hendryx, Jack Herman, Tim Kask, Doug Kovacs, Stephen Marsh, Frank Mentzer, Erol Otus, Steve Perrin, Stefan Pokorny, Dr. Dennis Sustare, Jim Wampler, James Ward, Bill Webb, and Steven Winter. More guests may be added as time goes on!
This year games include AD&D
1E and
2E, D&D 5th Edition, OD&D, Basic D&D, Gamma World, Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperboria, Top Secret, Metamorphosis Alpha, Swords & Wizardry, Traveller, Boot Hill, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Gangbusters, Bunnies & Burrows, Paranoia, Shadowrun, Aliens, Classic Battletech, and many more! Included will be our 9th annual Mythrus Tower game run by Matt Finch and Bill Webb; Also this year we will feature our 8th annual chariot racing classic Circus Maximus (trophy awarded); classic man-to-man combat game Gladiator (trophy awarded), and more. Raffle, Silent Auction and Live Auction will again be back, with lots of prizes and goodies. Another art panel is being planned, and back for another trip into the bizarre is the Weird yet Sexy Midnight Auction, hosted by Badmike and Lloyd Metcalf and co-hosted by that infernal jokester Satan....every year this gets less family appropriate, and this last year might have set a standard that can never again be crossed (or lowered), but we will do what we can....
We will again be having a special "Pre Con Get-it-On" Wed night June 6th in most of the break-out rooms we have reserved, some scheduled games but hopefully lots of pickup games. This is the time to run board games or anything else you might want before the "real" con gets started. Best part is you don't need to be registered to attend this night!
In 2016 we debuted the amazing new Gladiator trophy by Dave "Diesel" LaForce, in 2018 we will debut the new Chariot Racing trophy by Diesel!
One of our special events in celebration of our 10th year will be LQ1: Return to La Quinta. We have rented the same room at the La Quinta we used for the very first NTRPG Con (55 attendees), and have gotten four people who ran games there that year (Matt Finch, Jon Hershberger, Tim Kask and Frank Mentzer) to run the same games they did back in 2009 for one morning session. The event will be Friday morning the 8th, and there will be a bus ride to the hotel, a catered lunch, and some goodies (limited edition modules, shirts, and maybe more). Both NTRPG con co-founders, Doug Rhea and Mike Badolato, will be attending. Badmike has promised to wear the same outfit he did back in 2009 (he's washed it since then, promise). Cost is $60 a seat, and there will be only around 30 seats available. This event is going to sell out.....sign
ups are open now.
In honor of our 10th anniversary, we have commissioned many artists to do their rendition of the classic NTRPG con logo (made famous by Jason Braun and, for the last 7 years, Jennell Jaquays). So far, Bob Bledsaw Jr., Darlene, Diesel, Doug Kovacs and Erol Otus are doing shirt designs in addition to Jennell. Check back often to the Tabletop gaming merch page for a look at each design as it is finished (shirts will run $30 each). We will also have a limited run of 50 dice bags made especially for the 10th Anniversary, high quality bags that will retail for $50 each.
Besides Garycon, this is the premier old school style convention in the country with more classic gaming available than any other con in the south, run by some of the giants of the industry. NTRPG Con has quickly become the best place in the south to meet and game with the past icons of the industry that typically only attend conventions in the midwest or northeast. Last year our attendance was over 400, and we anticipate selling out this year with 450 spaces available. Don't wait until the last minute because depending on space available we may or may not take walkups!
Discussion of Con events, guests, games, and misc is now back a the original forums, along with lists of raffle items, special guests, games being run, and much more. ntrpgcon.com is the place. The facebook page dedicated to the con:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/310434204630/...has the most up to date info about all things pertaining to the convention.
Mike B.
