Dixiecon 2020 going virtual
Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2020 6:09 pm
From David Hood, via FB:
Unfortunately this year's Dixiecon will have to be cancelled. The restrictions in North Carolina and surrounding states will not be lifted in time for the event to be held as scheduled.
HOWEVER, I am here to announce that we will have VIRTUAL DIXIECON on May 23, 2020. The details are being worked out, but here's what I know so far:
We will have a Dip tournament that Saturday morning, starting with a video meeting for everyone (probably using Webex Teams) in which I will get the ball rolling as usual with announcements and so forth, and then the preliminary games will be set up and played using Backstabbr.
Backstabbr allows for draw votes, of course, but only for DIAS (Draw Includes All Survivors). This is not set in stone, but I believe what will happen is that the top seven finishers (using the Dixiecon scoring system or some variant) will advance to a Top Board for Saturday evening to crown the Virtual Dixiecon Champ.
The Top Board will likely be run differently, with more active GMing, and in a way that will allow folk to keep up with the action if they wish.
What about Iron Man gaming, you asked? Dixiecon usually has as many gamers to play non-dip games as to play Diplomacy. Virtual Dixiecon will be no exception. Again, details being worked on, but we know that we will be playing and scoring tournaments in both Terraforming Mars and in Nations, using the app and free website play, respectively, and other tournaments are also likely. Not sure we will do full-bore Iron Man scoring per se, too complicated to deal with given what I suspect will be a large crowd of online gamers.
We will be regularly updating on Facebook and the Cisco Webex Teams platform we already use, and I'm sure folk will be twittering, etc. The idea is to have one big, fun, awesome day where our community can celebrate playing games together in a virtual fashion.
Last, but not least, we will all take a break at 5pm Eastern time so that everyone can eat together whatever passes as BBQ in your local area. No way we will miss our Dixiecon BBQ time just because we can't do it in the normal way. We'll have a BBQ Webex meeting during that time so that I can update on how the tournament is going and so forth, and so we can watch each other eat (like we usually do) and make judgmental comments about the volume and method of food consumption."
Get updates on FB or at dixiecon.com
To help folks who may not have used backstabbr.com before, I put together a short-ish video that goes over the basics of the interface. Diplomacy Academy 8 (CoronaVirus edition): Using Backstabbr.com on youtube https://youtu.be/XVrSKXN6r40,
Unfortunately this year's Dixiecon will have to be cancelled. The restrictions in North Carolina and surrounding states will not be lifted in time for the event to be held as scheduled.
HOWEVER, I am here to announce that we will have VIRTUAL DIXIECON on May 23, 2020. The details are being worked out, but here's what I know so far:
We will have a Dip tournament that Saturday morning, starting with a video meeting for everyone (probably using Webex Teams) in which I will get the ball rolling as usual with announcements and so forth, and then the preliminary games will be set up and played using Backstabbr.
Backstabbr allows for draw votes, of course, but only for DIAS (Draw Includes All Survivors). This is not set in stone, but I believe what will happen is that the top seven finishers (using the Dixiecon scoring system or some variant) will advance to a Top Board for Saturday evening to crown the Virtual Dixiecon Champ.
The Top Board will likely be run differently, with more active GMing, and in a way that will allow folk to keep up with the action if they wish.
What about Iron Man gaming, you asked? Dixiecon usually has as many gamers to play non-dip games as to play Diplomacy. Virtual Dixiecon will be no exception. Again, details being worked on, but we know that we will be playing and scoring tournaments in both Terraforming Mars and in Nations, using the app and free website play, respectively, and other tournaments are also likely. Not sure we will do full-bore Iron Man scoring per se, too complicated to deal with given what I suspect will be a large crowd of online gamers.
We will be regularly updating on Facebook and the Cisco Webex Teams platform we already use, and I'm sure folk will be twittering, etc. The idea is to have one big, fun, awesome day where our community can celebrate playing games together in a virtual fashion.
Last, but not least, we will all take a break at 5pm Eastern time so that everyone can eat together whatever passes as BBQ in your local area. No way we will miss our Dixiecon BBQ time just because we can't do it in the normal way. We'll have a BBQ Webex meeting during that time so that I can update on how the tournament is going and so forth, and so we can watch each other eat (like we usually do) and make judgmental comments about the volume and method of food consumption."
Get updates on FB or at dixiecon.com
To help folks who may not have used backstabbr.com before, I put together a short-ish video that goes over the basics of the interface. Diplomacy Academy 8 (CoronaVirus edition): Using Backstabbr.com on youtube https://youtu.be/XVrSKXN6r40,