Charlottesville, VA
I just went to Prezcon for the first time today. Even though I had lived in Charlottesville for several years, I had somehow been unaware of the fact that this convention was only a few minutes away. Apparently, they have been having the convention at the Double Tree in C'ville for at least ten years. Now that I live 3+ hours a way, I decided to make my first visit. Well, better late than never.
The convention runs for most of the week, with the majority of the events Thursday through Sunday. The main reason most people go to the convention is to find opportunities to play games with other people. It sounds like those who regularly attend all know each other and look forward to meeting up for another week of gaming. There is "open gaming" throughout the entire convention. They have set up many large tables in some of the big rooms at the hotel and make them available for anyone to use. You can bring your own games, or if you registered, you can borrow games from the library. The library is a great opportunity for people to try out games without investing in them. The library also contains games that are now out of print.
While open gaming is fun for everyone, there are those who are even more competitive. The other main reason for going to the convention is for people to take part in tournaments and championships. Prezcon puts on LOTS of internal tournaments, but they are also the designated convention to hold certain national championships for a few games. If you win a tournament you get a nifty plaque. I guess you might think they were cool if you were one of the regulars. Me...I think they look a bit silly.
I did not take part in any of the gaming. I mainly went to see what the game auction was like. Prezcon had the auction split between Family Games, War Games, and Collectibles. Attendees contribute games to the auction. Then the auctioneers collect the money, take a cut, and give the remainder to the person who left the game. I guess it is basically like a consignment shop. The auction is a great opportunity for people to get rid of games they no longer play (or often times NEVER played) and recoup some of their money to undoubtedly go towards new games. It also is a good chance for people to snap up games that have interested them, but they did not want to pay full price. Most of the games went for very reasonable prices, however there were some of the older, out-of-print games that went for a pretty penny. Still, nothing I saw sold for more than $100.00, which is what you will pay for some of the games being released in today's market. There was only one or two obvious dealers there who were interested in buying the games in order to resell them for a profit. They got a lot of the games, but were not too obnoxious about out-bidding people who might actually want the games to play.
For those who might be intimidated by the prospect of bidding, or for games that are not "worthy" of being auctioned off, Prezcon also has the Auction Shop. It is a big flea market in which all the games are already priced. Each game has three prices that go down incrementally throughout the course of the afternoon. Some games were in both the shop as well as in the auction proper. It seemed like you were probably able to get a better deal by bidding in the auction since the shop prices tended to be a bit higher than how the bidding went.
[As an aside: I was very intrigued to witness the people who were "game collectors." There were many old war games from the 70s and 80s that excited these guys. It was also significant when the games were shrink wrapped or at least the pieces were "unpunched." One game, called Seelöwe, was listed as being "unpunched" and sold for $52.00. The buyer looked at it and noticed that the pieces were in fact already punched. The auctioneer, realizing he had led the buyer astray, agreed to take it back and sell it again with the new description. The second time it sold was for only $24.00. According to eBay, other people are trying to sell it for $70.00. These collectors must understand what it all means better than I do.]
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