How Tabletop helped save Easter
seenontabletop:
When I first heard about International Tabletop Day, I was very excited. Every day I typed the postcode of my nearest city into the page and was thrilled when I found an event listed. Growing up in regional Australia meant that I wasn’t exposed to gamer culture growing up - as an adult living in a city means there are opportunities to find other like-minded people and to share the joy of gaming with friends and family.
But when the date drew near I realised that International Tabletop Day was on Holy Saturday. I couldn’t attend the big function I was so excited about. The Easter Holidays have always been spent at my parent’s house in a small coastal town. And this Easter was going to be a particularly difficult one. My father passed away suddenly and unexpectedly in December, just before Christmas He was only in his early 60’s, and seemed healthy. His death has devastated our family, especially my mother. She has really struggled to come to terms with his death. There have been a lot of challenges in the past few months, especially with my younger sister leaving for a semester studying abroad in America just three weeks after Dad’s funeral. So this Easter would not only be spent without Dad, but without my sister as well.
The rest of the family all headed down to Mum’s house for Easter. I wondered what could be done to make it less of a gloomy occasion. Inspiration struck - International Tabletop Day could still be marked. After dinner everyone sat around the dining room table and played Fluxx. It was suitably chaotic (I was the only person who had played Fluxx before) but soon everyone was laughing and groaning when the rules got more and more complex. Even though Mum had never played the game before, she won every game but two. I hadn’t seen her laugh so much or so hard since before Dad died. It helped bring everyone together for something joyous, a fitting was to pass the Vigil before the joys of Easter Day.
So thank you, International Tabletop Day, for helping make our first Easter without Dad that little bit easier.
I’ll be right back. I have something in both of my eyes.
I started watching Tabletop a bit before Christmas, and it made me want to play boardgames.
When I went back to my parents’ house for the break, I suggested that we could buy a couple games and play together. Now, you have to know that my relationship with my parents has never really been great. It’s only recently that it got better, and I believe that playing some boardgames with them helped reinforce that. For once, we didn’t spend every evening with me on the computer and them watching tv. For once, every once in a while, we spent an evening together, having fun. We spent New Year’s Eve together playing games when I usually would try and go anywhere to escape the family reunion.
If someone’d told me that a year ago, I would not have believed them. So yeah, thanks, Wil.
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Comment on my blog about Tabletop.
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While I was watching a rough cut of the Lords of Waterdeep episode of Tabletop, I twittered: “‘Arcane Mishap Blamed for Owlbear Situation’ - Headline in the Waterdeep Gazette”.
My editor responded by sending me this screencap from the episode.
Thank you so much for Tabletop. It helped me change a bit from a die hard video gamer to a die hard boardgamer as well. It has done nothing but improve my life and relationships with my friends and family. My wife would like to thank you as well she was always disappointed that I didn’t play that many games now she loves how much I want to play.
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Comment on my blog that gave me a lot of feels.
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seenontabletop:
Do you love Settlers of Catan? Do you love Star Trek? Well have the best of both with Star Trek Catan. Right now it’s a four player game but I hope they develop expansions for it. This picture was taken after I had won the game. Great fun!
I can not overstate how great this game is. I was skeptical, but it’s way way way more than Catan in cosplay. If you like Catan, you’re going to love Star Trek Catan. You don’t even have to like Star Trek, but it helps.
seenontabletop:
Whew that was close! We found the final cure before our last outbreak on Pandemic!
The best games of Pandemic are the ones that are won or lost on the final turn.
