n00bcon 13: Organizer's report

There was this Guinness commercial around the turn of the millennium. I think I saw it before I ever tasted a Guinness, but for some reason I still vividly recall it.

In the commercial a fit but aging Italian man is swimming from a buoy in the ocean towards a small harbor. The beach town is cheering him on as he desperately races to a pub, trying to get to it before the bartender finishes pouring a perfect Guinness. He gets to it just in time, and the pub erupts in cheers. The town's annual tradition is a success. But the voice-over continuous. "I'm getting older, he says. One day I'll lose, he says."

I related a lot to that man in the weeks before n00bcon 13, more so than I've ever done before. Apparently I had it in me to organize n00bcon three years ago, but could I still do it? Even back in 2019 I was getting older, eager to pass the the World Championship torch to Italy, and planning for n00bcon 12 to be a scaled-down Scryings event with a more narrow appeal. 

A tournament that never was.

Since then I've been socially distant, living out my days in my apartment, avoiding most gatherings of any setting. My daughter is three now, so for the last three years my main concern has been has been fatherhood. That, and that whole pandemic. It barely felt like I knew what a large group of people looked like anymore.

Day after day, day after day // We stuck, nor breath nor motion:
As idle as a painted ship // Upon a painted ocean.

Then there were those external factors. The Rotary Pub had been closed since the start of the pandemic. When I tried to contact them in January to look at the prospects for a potential n00bcon 13, I was eventually informed that the pub had no beer and no one had worked a shift there for two years. So that looked like a problem. Then, in February, I was informed that GothCon - Sweden's largest gaming convention which also takes place in Gothenburg during Easter - was to be "remote-only" due to the pandemic. So the other physical convention in the city decided to close its gates as the pandemic appeared too daunting, the Rotary Pub was flatlining, and I personally was a socially phobic hermit that had forgotten the taste of craft beer. It wasn't looking super.

I don't know for sure where we should start, but it is likely that Erwin Demmer is the first guy to blame. On October 6 - more than half a year before the Easter 2022 mind you, and no less between a Delta and an Omikron variant that may hamper planning for the less crafty - Erwin emails me with a list of eight Dutch player that he'd like to bring, and asks how the allocation of spots are going. At this point I'm uncertain if there even is a Rotary Pub anymore, but I know I have eight Flying Dutchmen ready to rumble. So I tell him that I don't know what things will look like, but I'll do something. If the mad Dutch come here during Easter to play Magic, I will provide something for them to do at least.

A month later BSK happens. We're not that many players, 20 or so, but these are the oldschool OGs, and we haven't seen each other for two years. Something is in the air for sure. A couple of them expresses how they look forward to return to n00bcon in the spring; that this gathering of old friends in Borås is but the appetizer in the budding post-pandemic tournament scene. I answer something non-committing, what with the pub being likely dead and all, and me being a bit of a husk.

But from there it escalates. Around Christmas The Reindeer emails me and shares his plans for Siab00rg, a tournament for which he has rented out Skansen Kronan. Skansen Kronan ("the Crown Sconce") is an old redoubt in the Haga district of Gothenburg. The fortress and its twin, Skansen Lejonet, were built in the late 1600s to protect the city against the Danes. Danish attacks was a whole thing back then.

The redoubt is also a literal stone throw away from where I had my last apartment in Sweden. The place I called my home when I finished my studies, and then acted as a harbor for years while I was commuting to Munich and later Oslo. I used to walk up to Skansen Kronan to watch the fireworks each New Years. I have stories and memories of that place too plentiful to share.

I used to live here, you know.

 

And now some mad Wizards from outside the city have decided to rent it for a tournament the day before a yet non-existing n00bcon. And inviting Danes nonetheless! Didn't they get the text about what happened to Old Älvsborg? Or, perhaps more recently and globally, a text about the new Omikron variant? That we're not supposed to gather and travel?

In the pit of my stomach there's this fear that people will try to get to Gothenburg, expecting a good a time, and that there will be nothing for them. Perhaps that I, personally, will disappoint by not being able to deliver what we yearn for, and that I will accidentally fuck up the OS culture by virtue of sucking at organizing a post-pandemic tournament.

 

You're gonna die here, you know. Convenient.

 

Shortly after, KungMarkus announces that he will run the Arvika Festival at the start of March. That also appears to be a wildly close call (location- and pandemic-wise), but he will jump through the hoops to make it happen. 40 players, a tournament of proper pre-pandemic size. "So now you'll have to organize n00bcon, you fool!" as he eloquently puts it. And then I suddenly get a message from Kalle, where he shows the newly created art for n00bcon 13 without me having nagged him - nor in fact even asked him - to do it.

Wow.

It had become tradition for Kalle and I to enter some sort of mutual panic over the pin design a few weeks before Easter each year, but now he just opted to create a ridiculously sweet design in early January. 

Later got the chance to buy his original. Wall, meet art.

 

I can't say which was the last straw to break the coffin, but around the end of January it was clear to me. There will be a n00bcon this year, and I'll just have to see if I still have it in me to coordinate something enjoyable.

Now, my core principle for organizing a tournament is to try to organize a tournament that I would personally enjoy playing in. These days there are a hundred voices with a hundred ideas on these InterNets, and catering to everybody would be impossible. So I start by reflecting on my own preferences and abilities. I will not have fancier prizes than Vintage Champs, or more famous guests than Nebraska's War, or a nicer location than Fishliver Oil Cup. But my aim is not to compete with these gatherings, as there's no goal is to be "better" on some arbitrary scale (so that others may be "worse"). n00bcon can be good at doing one thing, while ViennaGeddon is good at something slightly different, and LepreCon is good in a third way. We can all win here; organizing unsanctioned tournaments is not a zero sum game.

So the first thing I really wanted after the time in cold storage was a proper gathering. To hangout with the people I've missed hanging out with in the last years. As such, n00bcon 13 started out as NepotismCon of sorts. There were no public forum posts, Facebook events, nor even clarity on this blag. I wrote a web 1.0 homepage, as is tradition, but that was about it. Invites were pretty much solely resolved via people emailing me and asking if there was a n00bcon and they could come, or me emailing people to ask if they'd like to come. That made this the first n00bcon in many years where I had a personal relationship with pretty much everybody in the pub. There was a couple of new guys from the US that I hadn't met face-to-face before (but came with excellent reputations, which I quickly realized were well deserved), and a pair of Danes that joined on short notice after breaching Skansen Kronan the day before n00bcon. Other than that, it was all guys I'd consider being on first-name basis with before the tournament. We also cut down the participation a bit, to make the hangout a bit easier and the event a bit less crowded. Moving from 120 to 90 players felt great, and I seriously can't really grasp how we managed to fit 30 additional heads during previous events.

This year there was even a path to walk between the tables.

Step two was thinking out random stuff I wanted to do, now that I had the chance. And I had a few stupid ideas. 

Many years ago, during the earliest days of Oldschool, a friend named Arvid Grahn used to joke that one of the least strategic things you could do while playing 93/94 was eating soup with your bare hands. Soup in general is a bit of an antithesis to Oldschool Magic; it is a cheap and kinda sloppy food, standing in stark contrast to the expensive and immaculate rectangles we use as game pieces. Also it is a liquid, which may or may not be the most strategic choice of food while drunkenly battling $50k decks. So I thought the concept of giving everyone at n00bcon unlimited free soup would be kinda funny. #SoupCon.

Will Magrann, Soup Fan.

The next thing was to run a run an open side event for the truly crazy, and have that tournament have far better EV than n00bcon itself. Wizards' Tournament scratched that itch a few years ago, but these days Alpha-only had evolved to something much different than five years ago. At present I think I'd argue that the best way to have wizards give zero fucks about their cards as collectibles and fully embrace the game casually is to play for ante. You cannot play a format like Ante 40k and be overly attached to card ownership, or care too much about playing the best deck (playing something like The Deck in a format where Darkpact is legal is scary). I've played casual ante for many years now, but 40k as a format was properly formalized just four or five years ago, after some good games with Markus Lundqvist in particular. Regardless, it was high time for a World Championship, and I would provide the biggest of trophies for the occasion.

Having a trophy that require that the winner purchases extra check-in luggage is funny. 

Speaking of side events for crazy people, The Wizards' Tournament has become a bit of a thing since its inception four years ago. A joke that landed a bit too well, perhaps. As Wizards' Tournament II in 2019 may have been a little too large for the "health" of the "format", the plan for WT3 was to try and be a bit more somber. 

After a quick chat in late February, our hero FloVo mantled the responsibility to organize Wizards' Tournament 3. We had schemed plans for him to take the lead on WT3 already back in 2020, but those ideas evidently had to be rain-checked for a couple of years (during which FloVo valiantly organized e.g. n00bcoM 1 & 2 to keep the Easter magical). So FloVo, backed up by Jason, did pretty much everything here. KungMarkus made a 5 kg heavy trophy, and all I personally contributed with was to write a new webpage (now with hyperlinks!).

My planned deck for WT3. In the end some personal stuff made me skip the tournament, but I'll be back with at least as rad a pile the next time it's August 1993 again.

The last planned side-event was the Wednesday ALICE tournament, traditionally hosted by David Chambers. It looked like it was on for a long time, but just a week before n00bcon it was clear that Chambers didn't get to renew his visa, and hence couldn't travel to Sweden. We opted out of running the tournament without him, and on the plus side he got to do some sweet hiking in the forest with his girlfriend during Easter instead.

Then there was the streaming. Gordon had asked to play for once, so I needed someone else to host the stream. I figured it was no harm in just starting at the top, asking the most popular and handsome oldschool streamer out there if he wanted to join, and then work myself down the list after he'd presumably said no. So I started by sending a mail to Timmy Talks. And to my great pleasure and surprise, he was all game! Life is kinda cool sometimes.

Gordon and Timmy, legends of oldschool streaming.

And then I wanted some gear. Somewhat useful gear if possible. Last IRL-n00bcon we had tokens, the one before that t-shirts, the one before that playmats. Two early ideas for n00bcon 13 were dice bags and bandanas (thanks for that great tip Brother Ben!). But then, an anonymous wildcard in the community revisited a years-long plan to finally create Juzam Gin, and I realized that there could be only one option for n00bcon 13. Shot glasses. I always keep a foldable shot glass I got from the first Viennageddon in my dice bag, and it is one of the trinkets I’ve gotten the most positive comments about. Everybody needs a telescopic metal shot glas when they play magic.

The search for branded shot glasses turned out a bit trickier than I initially expected. None of the Scandinavian branding sites I perused offered metallic (nor foldable) ones that you could put in the dice bag. Eventually I found a US site, but there the price tag was something like $8 per glass, plus trans-Atlantic shipping and tolls. Not cool. But then, in a rare instance of thinking, it dawned on me that these things almost certainly were made in some factory in China, and those manufacturers almost surely had profiles on Ali Baba. I’ve never used Ali Baba before, but this seemed like a great time to sign up. Long story short, I quickly found a guy that could do it, he only wanted like 83 cents per glass, but the smallest order he could accept was 500 glasses. That’s like 15 kg of metallic shot glasses traveling from China, so the postage would be an extra $400 or so. Still, seemed legit.

Pro tip: If you're a private individual and don’t have a VAT number, order stuff via Ali Express instead.

Some stuff happened, and I didn’t manage to close the deal until about 40 days before Easter. That should still be plenty of time, as manufacturing was expected around 15 days and shipping another 15. But due to various armed conflicts, and me as an individual not having a VAT number, shipping got slightly delayed. So a few days after n00bcon 500 metallic shot glasses arrived at my parents’ home outside Gothenburg. Oh well.

I'm currently the proud owner of a lot of shot glasses.

I guess we’ll give everyone at n00bcon free shot glasses next year instead or something. Luckily they don’t say “n00bcon 13” so they are a bit flexible as gear goes. And hey, I don't think anyone at the tournament got disappointed that they didn't get them, as it was intended as a bit of a surprise.

 

Speaking of drinking things, the Juzam Gin turned out insanely well. A few people have asked about how to get hold of a bottle, but they are unfortunately not available. The bottles were never really for sale in the first place, and no more will be created. These are not really the kinda things you make in a larger scale or sell for profit, both with regards to rules on fan art and laws regarding alcohol in Sweden.

 

Ok. Almost done with the things that I can affect.

 

Things outside my spheres of influence include things like the pandemic and the restrictions that can follow. I should be able to influence things like getting beer and bartenders to Rotary though, even if I can't really control it.

 

So I finish the homepage and add a way too complex and unclear riddle. It was still solved, because some of you guys are mad.

This is a page a few people somehow found at n00bcon.com.

 

I tinker with the invites, and manage to up the number of potential spots from 80 to 100, so all the 90 we've talked to can come. Work on things I can influence but maybe not control. Have a visit from the legendary Slanfan in my home in Oslo where he gives a masterclass in Tolaria. Cross my fingers. Fill up my stomach with nectar to give the butterflies a good home.

.....

Easter week. The wife and kid are going up north to hang out with family in blood, while I travel south to meet family in sweat. Take port in Gothenburg Tuesday evening and go directly to bed. There's a lot of loose threads to tie on Wednesday.

Step one is to go to Aladar, my life-time tier1 hole-in-the-wall barber. I had his Wednesday 10 am booked for almost a month for this occasion. After 90 minutes or so of non-awkward silence my facial existence moves up a notch. Follow it up with a kebab pizza for lunch, the by far most missed food since I moved away from Sweden. Set.

Pez Unholy later gave me compliments with regards to the skill of my barber, which is a remarkably nice thing to say. Especially when coming from a man with such sublime charm as Pez.

There appears to be some trouble with the printer for the nametag stickers I had ordered, but the guy in charge manages to solve it after we’ve talked on the phone. However, a few minutes later he calls back to inform that they’re somehow out of sticker-paper. I try to find and alternative printing store open during Easter, but before any stress sets in he calls me back and says his wife found nine sheets behind a drawer. I only needed eight, so we’re back on.

Swing by the print shop and then take the tram to Vasaboden to pick up like 13 trophies. That worked without a hitch this year. Check out some stuff for the Easter eggs, and buy a bunch of eggs and large newborn's weight in candy. Eventually I find myself walking around with a pretty heavy load, but most everything works out according to plan and I’m back at basecamp with all the stuff I need before 6 pm to have dinner with the parents.

Jason Schwartz calls. He, FloVo and Åland has found a place called Silver Lining, a pinball arcade in the city which I didn’t know existed. Suspect it opened in the last few years when I was been unable to travel, as I’d like to think that I would have been familiar with it otherwise. I do know the area well enough though, so I figure I should be able to find the door without some GPS-infused smartphone along for the ride. 

I find myself in a slightly awkward situation though, as there is in fact no clear name on the door and the arcade is located at the heart of Gothenburg’s prostitute district. Drifting around aimlessly in Rosenlund, looking like I’m searching for a good time somewhere non-descript, is a great way to get odd looks and discomforting waves.

Jason. The Flying Bear.

Eventually I find the entrance, and friends I haven’t seen in years. You know its getting real whenever you bump into Jason Schwartz. He's like that spinning top in Inception; whenever you see Jason topple around reality is confirmed.

Silver Lining has both Medival Madness and Mars Attacks!, and life is good. We hang out for a few hours to play pinball and swap stories. It's days ago, it's a lifetime ago. I share the busride home to Mölndal with Åland. Tomorrow we feast.

Up until that bus ride, I had somehow anchored the starting time of SiaB00rg at six pm. Then, as the day arrives I’m certain that I should be on the site half past one to play. So I am, only to realize that it in fact starts at three. A temporal mishap that perhaps does not bode well for tomorrow.

I talk a walk in the drizzle and spend the next hour or so in great company over at SvenskaMagic a few blocks away. Hang out with the hero known as Flax and pick up some cards for my new CounterPost deck. When it's actually time to start SiaB00rg I feel like I’m in great vigor. Let’s play some Magic!

Weapon of choice.

I can’t really describe the feeling. Time during the last couple of years has really been out of joint. There are just so many faces I've missed, and seeing the people again is, in lack of a better word, revitalizing. No one mentioned, no one forgotten.

My first opponent is Lorenzo, a friend of seven years I hadn't met since Fishliver Oil Cup 3 in 2019. He's one of the guys behind Winc0n, and he's moved from Italy to Brussels since last. There are so many stories we want to share.

I got a poster.

I go from one legendary organizer to another, as I'm paired against FloVo in the second round. We start by flexing our black bordered Contracts from Below as the 61st card in our decks, before we remove them as we're not playing for Ante right now. (Ante cards aren't technically banned in oldschool; you just need to remove them from your deck before playing, and then have at least 60 cards left in your starting deck).

Flex mirror.

Next up is a strong Dane who managed to breach the redoubt.

Unlocked Guardian Beast + Chaos Orb in a sweet match.

And then a familiar face from Norway.

Turn one Su-Chi, meet turn two Sol'Kanar.

I have a pretty good run with Project M, and I'm undefeated (albeit with one draw) when I face Svante Landgraf in the penultimate round. I steal an Atog from Svante using Control Magic, but realize I don't know how to properly play with it. So that was a bit humbling, if not humiliating. I should probably build an Atog deck at some point so I can practice that combat math from the aggressor's side. I'm not sure if that is what costs me the win, but I'd like to think that it was, and I pick up another draw. So technically still undefeated, and either a draw or a win in the last round should give me good odds of Top8.

 

In the final round I face fellow NOSMTG player Blazer. He's on a monored Blood Moon deck without Power, which is obviously fire. I still feel I have a pretty deece matchup. Project M sports a good combination of basic lands and uses for red mana, along with shenanigans like Elemental Blasts and Mirror Universe. But Blazer pulls the longest straw after three tight duels, and the Sword of Damocles finally falls firmly upon Project M.

While Blazer preps for the top8 in the redoubt, I walk out in the brisk Gothenburg night with some fellow losers. I may suck at combat math, but at least I know where to find a good burger in the the middle of the night in Gothenburg. This town is my habitat after all. We're a respectable dozen of jacket-wearing players drifting, but I think this is the point where I must tip my hat in particular to Simon Christie of the Texas Falling Stars and Pez Unholy of the Cincinnati Ebon Hand. Never met those guys before this evening, but Jesus they were a pair of Top Men. Could probably write another 6,000 words in praise of each. I won't right now though, as I suppose it is high time to finally write a bit about the event at n00bcon 13.

.....

Friday the 15th. Game day. I’ve barely slept. Can I do this? There are a few things I don’t have control over. I haven't counted that we have enough chairs. I haven't synced properly with the supposed scorekeeper. I haven't really planned the stream, and I haven't checked that the setup works. I haven't used Tolaria on something like this before, nor confirmed all the players. But in general I feel ok. Technically I've done this before, and should be able to handle potential problems on the fly.

The first challenge when I get to the pub is that the beer trucks have failed to deliver anything to drink. The second is that it appears that we lack like half of the tables and chairs we need. In the grand scheme of n00bcon alerts, I'd put these things at like "yellow" or something. We've surely seen worse. One time we lost the score keeping computer and couldn't register players. Another time everyone who were supposed to work had mixed up the days, and no one was available to even unlock the pub just a couple of hours before the tournament was to start. I expected that something would happen, and these things are solvable.

Now I must tip my hat to the relatively new crew working at n00bcon 13. As the delivery company had failed, and no reasonable distributor would deliver a truck of mixed craft beer during Good Friday on short notice, the crew found the solution in driving down to a local brewery they knew and then borrow a ludicrous amount of beer from their storage. At least that was the story I heard. The tables were a bit easier to solve - there's always tables somewhere - but the beer solution was crafty.

People start to drop in around noon, or shortly before. They get to work at setting up, and I try to coordinate as best I can. Honka and Kalle organize the tables. Danny and Shane carry things. Mitja and Alban set up the traditional store. Slanfan fixes the Tolaria setup. Joel Larsson gets a tiny pair of scissors and is instructed to cut up and alphabetize the almost 200 nametags. 

Mike Sigrist told me Joel is good at handling scissors. (That's a Pro Tour Magic Origins joke, for all y'all new schoolers up in here)

The most important unsung hero of n00bcon is a guy named Knutsson. He doesn't play himself, but the tournament wouldn't even remotely function without him. For the last five or so 'cons, he's been the scorekeeper. The one lone guy to make sure that the tournament actually runs, that the rounds end, and that people get opponents and results. There are no judges at this tournament, and I'm usually busy with the stream, so the floor is solely his.

Knutsson sharing his "graceful loser" face.

He asked for hamster meat and potatoes as tribute for his work this year. Didn't find any hamster, but got him some whale instead. I consider them to be interchangeable animals.

With regards to the streaming, the wi-fi didn't really work. Unstable at best, which is not ideal if you're into live coverage. By chance we found a 30 meter long Ethernet cable, which we scotch taped from the router across pub area floor to the streaming computer. That somehow worked. And I can't tell you how much I enjoyed doing the stream with Thomas Meddens. That guy is always welcome back if he wants to.

And so, n00bcon 13 started.

I don't know if there's that much for me to say about the actual tournament. I didn't play myself after all, and if you're interested, there are like seven hours of podcasts here and here, and tournament reports e.g. here, here, here, and here. But I will share a few of my favorite pictures from the day.

Seeing the scattered players hanging out outside the Rotary Pub brings a strange sense of familiarity and anticipation. The sun always shines at Good Friday.

Gordon Anderson, shuffling cards at n00bcon for the first time since 201

6 or so.

International wizards enjoying soup between rounds. #SoupCon

Mari enjoying some of Kalle Nord's original art.

 

Strong wizards.

Richard Veenman. The people's champion.

The Legendary Jonas Twitchen and his UK team finally bests Danny Friedman and the US team at the honorable Ryder Cup.

As there was no n00bcons in 2020 nor 2021, we had no less than three overdue Player of the Year trophies. From the right: Danny Friedman, PotY 2022; Mattias "Slanfan" Berggren, PotY 2021; and Will Magrann, who casually stole the trophy from the Reindeer (who technically won PotY in 2020, but had left the area when the trophies were handed out). I'll get an new trophy for you Reindeer. Will certainly also deserved this one, and one must bow to both his skill and his panache.

Wizards of six nationalities showed up for the real championship of the weekend: The Ante 40K Worlds.

 

I am bested in the 40K finals by Shane Semmens from the US and gracefully accept defeat.

 

In a more intricate and less stupid final, Kaj Buch face down Joel Larsson for the n00bcon 13 Championship. This is a couple of really good Magic players btw.

Congrats Joel! You're the best, at Magic!

 

Joel Larsson's The Deck. 1st place n00bcon 13.

 

Just all the merch and wonderful gifts. I believe these things represent like ten blog posts, so I won't go into detail yet. But thanks a million for all the cool things!

I walk home around half past four. That's not too bad as n00bcon goes. I was supposed to join WT3 the day after, but didn't. Usually the Saturday tournament acts as a debrief of sorts, and missing it made the following days a bit strange. Took my bike up to the pub to pick up the table and other stuff. Located Jason's jacket. Spent some time with family.

Scribbled another year on the Shark behind the counter at Rotary Pub. The ritual is complete.

This post is almost laughably late. And long. I know that it took almost two months for the top8 decks and player profiles to be posted after n00bcon 11, but this is still some sort of record as radio silence on the blag goes. I don't really know why. Maybe I needed a break.

Reflecting over the n00bcon that was, now with a month and a half of hindsight to back it up, it's easy to see a few things that could be improved. I should have planned the stream better; there were lots of things I wanted to do but missed, and it got unclear in terms of responsibility when I left for the ante showdown. I should have followed up on the top8 a bit more; a few people didn't even pick up their trophies. I should order gear from China with a few more weeks to spare.

But one thing stands out, and it's this: Maybe I didn't have to do anything. 

The feedback I've heard from players that participated is that this was a good n00bcon, perhaps even a great one. A few players who had been at the tournament for many years even expressed that this was their favorite one so far. "Everyone was so nice", they say. "All my opponents were great people". "It was fantastic to meet everyone again". 

As a tournament organizer, that's where you should fondly realize that the tournament organizing wasn't that important. It was always about the gathering. We've built a community, a culture, where there never was a real option for n00bcon to fail. We could have played on the floor, the taps could have stayed dry, and the wi-fi could have been out of commission, and I'm now sure it still would have worked somehow. One day I'll lose, I said to myself. Don't worry, they say. You'll never lose.

Next up is a guest post about Alpha printing patterns, and after that we'll finally get into this year's top8 profiles. And it won't take seven weeks 'til next time. Thanks for waiting.