Tag Archives: Conventions

Crossposted, Journal

Serendipitous Departure

I really like it when I get the chance to properly say “thank you.”

On Thursday I discovered, after walking around the Phoenix Convention Center, that my barely-bruised-but-no-seriously-I-smashed-it finger was swelling up just enough to put pressure on a nerve. This was resulting in severe hand pain, plus a pulsing conduit of fire that played merry hell with the neurochemicals I depend on in order to be happy.

With my slightly swollen hand hanging by my side I was miserable and depressed to the point of being almost non-functional.

My friends suggested that maybe I should get a sling, and this seemed like a great idea, except that I was in an unfamiliar place, in a hotel, and was deeply depressed. I scraped up just enough presence of mind to talk to a hotel staffer who was doing crowd control around the elevators. Her name was Erica.

Erica put out a call to see if the hotel had any slings. When they did not, she hailed a cab for me, and handed the cab driver a voucher that would get me to CVS. She handed me another voucher which I could use to summon a cab to get me back to the Hyatt once I had what I needed.

The cab driver, a very friendly man whose first name I can’t remember the spelling of, and whose last name was Singh, zipped me over to the CVS pharmacy, and told me exactly what to say when calling for pick-up.

At CVS I found what I needed, strapped my arm into a sling, and began feeling better inside of about two minutes. Rather than call for pickup I walked the four blocks back to the hotel, and I arrived happy in spite of the blistering heat of the Phoenix afternoon.

I left a thank-you message for Erica at the desk. One of her aides (apparently she is a staff member with an office, and aides) left a message for me the next morning, but I didn’t get it until late Friday night, and Erica had gone home for the weekend.

Monday morning, before I hailed a cab to Sky Harbor, I checked at the desk to see if Erica was back in the office. She was, and she very enthusiastically greeted me, asking if we could get a picture together. I agreed, and then I took it up a notch by drawing a picture of Erica as an airborne, first-aid-kit-carrying superheroine. It kind of made her day, but really *I* was the one whose day was being made. I like getting to properly say “thank you.”

I collected my luggage and hailed a cab. The cab driver looked familiar.

“Did you drive me to CVS on Thursday?”

“You are Mister Tyler?”

(close enough.) “Yes!”

I shook his hand in both of mine and thanked him. Once aboard I said “this time around I will get to pay you for the ride myself,” and he laughed. I may have overpaid him a bit upon arrival ($40 for a $15 flat-fare ride,) and that’s no substitute for being able to draw a picture, but it would have to do.

I don’t like being injured, and I don’t like needing to ask for help from complete strangers, but once the crisis has passed (my hand no longer hurts my brain now) I very much DO like being able to express my appreciation for that help to some new friends.

It is Monday, and the serendipity of this morning’s departure has set a pretty high bar for the rest of the week. I got to say “thank you” to Erica and to Mr. Singh, and I’m still smiling about it.

Announcements, Crossposted

Find Me at Phoenix Comic Con

I’ll be at Phoenix Comic Con this weekend. My schedule is pretty light, and I don’t have a permanent seat in the exhibition hall, so I may be difficult to catch up with.

Difficult, but not impossible:

Thursday

  • Writing Excuses Signing: 4:00-6:00pm, Booth 1378

Friday

  • Writing Excuses Podcast, 12:30-2:30pm, West 301a
  • The Lighter Side of Sci-Fi, 6:00-7:00 pm, North 128a
  • Booth 1378 (Brandon Sanderson/Writing Excuses): See table for schedule

Saturday

  • Where are My Aliens? 1:30-2:30 pm, North 128b
  • Official Signing, 3:00-4:00pm, in the author autographs area
  • Booth 1378 (Brandon Sanderson/Writing Excuses): See table for schedule

Like I said, it’s pretty light. My merchandise can be found at the Brandon Sanderson/Writing Excuses booth, #1378, through Saturday evening, and I will be there from time to time to sketch in your stuff. My schedule will be posted there, and will include the times when I’ve promised to brave the madding crowd and return to the table with my sharpies.

I need to get a lot of work done this weekend, including penciling and inking strips for late June. It’s possible I’ll be doing some of that in places where I can be seen. If I’m in public, I’ll tweet my location. Follow @HowardTayler on Twitter for that information, as well as for random noise, some of which might be pretty entertaining.

Announcements, Crossposted

Come find me at Salt Lake City FanX!

FanX, the spring installment of Salt Lake Comic Con¹, is this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I’ll be in Artist’s Alley with my friend Jim Zub at tables  Berry 5 and Berry 6. Jim and I also have three panels together! My schedule is posted here on the official FanX site, and I’ll break it out for you below.

If there’s Schlock Mercenary merchandise you’d like to acquire at the show, email schlockmercenary@gmail.com and Sandra will make sure we’ve got it on hand. we’re packing a little light this year, because there’s just not much room at these tables, but that doesn’t mean we can’t bring the stuff you want².

FANX-Generic-Event

My FanX Schedule

Thursday

  • 1:00 PM—Why Webcomics Matter, 255E: Aneeka Richins, Howard Tayler, and Jim Zub talk about what twenty years of webcomics³ have meant to the industry, and the world
  • 3:00 PM, 255E—Funny Books Can Actually Be Funny: Howard Tayler and Jim Zub tell you how to write comedy for comics
  • 5:00 PM, 255F—Real Science in Sci-Fi Literature and Film: Charlie Pulsipher, Sarah E. Seeley, John Steiner, Eric Swedin, and Howard Tayler help you put enough science into your writing to sell the story to the reader.

Friday

  • 12:00 PM, 255E—RPGs and Empathy: Aaron Burton, Laura Hickman, Tracy Hickman, Whitney Johnson, Josh Lee, Daniel Swenson, and Howard Tayler discuss how role playing games can turn us into better people. For real.

Saturday

  • 2:00 PM, 255C—Spotlight on Jim Zub: Howard Tayler holds Jim Zub’s feet to the flames and leads the audience in a quest to find out everything there is to know about the enigmatic word-putting storysmith behind the Skullkickers, Wayward, and Samurai Jack comics
  • 6:00 PM, 250A—Writing Excuses, The Panel: Brandon Sanderson, Howard Tayler, and Dan Wells talk about writing, and then go meta by talking about talking about writing. Lots of talking, but it’s going to be way more fun than I just made it sound.

Table Times

We don’t have posted table times yet, but Jim and I will definitely be there a lot, along with Stacy and Sandra. If we’re not there (like, if we need to put food into our selves) we’ll make sure to have a sign up letting you know when we’ll be back.

Artist’s Alley is literally° the first thing you hit if you come through the General Admission door on the south (the left side of the map). If you follow the crowd due north along the avenue between the tables and the booths, Berry 5 & 6 will be the fifth and sixth things you see on your left.

Tayler@Zub

We should be pretty easy to find.

 

¹ Full name: “Salt Lake Comic Con Fan Experience,” which is too long and kind of confusing. FanX will get you there.

² Assuming that what you want is something we still have in stock at the warehouse, of course.

³ Actually, it’s been twenty-three years. As far as I know, the first comic to be posted online for http access via web browsers was Doctor Fun, which appeared in 1993. But even if something beat Doctor Fun by a few weeks or months, 1993 was when the Web was born, so that’s our start date.

° Two things here. First, we mean “literally” as in “actually.” Not “literally” as in “your head will literally explode.” Which it will not, no matter how cool our tables are. Second, I ran out of alt-key codes for superscript numbers, and was too lazy⁴ to look up the HTML codes for a superscript 4.

⁴ Somebody else found it for me. 

 

 

 

Journal

ConFusion and Planet Mercenary

Confession time: the Planet Mercenary session at ConFusion was the first time I have run a Planet Mercenary game. I’m familiar with the system, and (obviously) the universe, and I’ve played the game several times as a player, but I’d never before been the Game Chief.

To the game’s credit, it worked just fine in spite of me. We identified a lot of small problems with things like layout and wording, but the mechanics of the game did exactly what they were supposed to do, and encouraged some brilliant role-play.

Granted, 90% of that came from the brilliant players: Saladin Ahmed (Ob’enn quartermaster), Delilah Dawson (Ursumari medic), Mur Lafferty (Esspererin engineer), Brian McClellan (Unioc legal counsel), Cherie Priest (Human pilot), and Brent Weeks (Fobott’r captain).
Brent managed to role-play “four-armed and in charge” with some hilarious pantomime, and Delilah got so into character as “Doctor Murderbear” that on a couple of occasions I thought she was mad at me. Brian put that big eye to use and spotted a spy, who he then bent to the party’s aid.

Cherie got down with the tactics; her roguish pilot did some mad stealth work, cutting off the enemy’s escape route. Mur’s engineer then performed some spectactular disassembly on the enemy getaway vehicle, reducing it not just to pieces, but to pieces of jewelry.

And Saladin’s  bookish, persecuted, expat Ob’enn bet large, and managed to turn a nasty piece of enemy gear into a nasty piece of bookish, persecuted, expat Ob’enn gear.

I can’t thank these folks enough. They sawed a huge chunk of time out of their convention schedule to play this game we made, and they provided lots of suggestions about how to fine tune it.