Since my first son was born, I have been excitedly waiting for my kids to get to the age where they could become my movie buddies. That time has finally come and it was worth the wait.
Over the holidays, my two boys, a friend of Tristan's and I went and watched The Hobbit. We ate McD's, laughed, talked and watched a movie and it was amazing. My boys and I have also watched G.I Joe and Star Wars Episode 4 over the past couple of weeks. Furthermore, we are planning on going to watch a pile of movies at the theater this summer starting with G.I Joe 2 in March.
I have learned that most parents struggle through the teenage years but this is what I am truly look forward to because even though I am looking forward to the movies themselves, it is the time together and conversation that makes these trips truly magical. Leading and guiding my boys through the path of life and all of its landmines. Having the opportunity to answer the hard questions away from the ladies. This is the work that I enjoy.
Thank God for movies and roadtrips :)
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Monday, January 14, 2013
Collectible Card Games, Acquisition Disorder and Me
I love card games. This love starts back when I was a kid.
My dad played cards all the time. He taught me math by playing crib and we
frequently went to tournaments on Friday nights. Then in 1994 when I was
attending high school, I discovered a little game called Magic the Gathering
and the hobby of Collectible Card Game (CCG).
Let’s pause a moment and explain CCGs. A CCG is a
collectible game where you buy a starter deck of cards to learn the game. From
there, you can buy randomized packs of cards, rarely more than 15 but usually
10 cards to a pack, to build and expand your decks to be better, stronger and
win more.
We would play every day in the school library. There was a
thrill to opening a new pack of cards and not knowing what was inside. From
there, I ventured into my all-time favorite CCG which was Star Trek. I love
Trek and this put me in control of some of my favorite characters from the Next
Generation mythos. Over the next several years, I bought into several different
card games because I could and because the art was cool and because I had to
have them.
Let’s pause again. My name is Cory and I have an Acquisition
Disorder (AD). This means that it is almost always a losing battle when it
comes to stuff and the acquisition of said stuff. You see, I am like a dwarf
... I see something shiny (like a diamond in the stone) and even if it means my
demise (the wall falling on my beared head) I cannot help but acquire the shiny
bauble (even though I am now dead).
And there is the problem with CCGs, they are addictive. The
pursuit of better cards which are hard to find and expensive to acquire becomes
all consuming. Furthermore, I person with AD will be forever in pursuit of more
in a CCG because there is always more. This lead to my burnout from card games
for the better part of 10 years. I did not believe I would ever come back. But
I did ....
Once the Giddy Goblin in Hanover opened up and I began
working there, the cards began to call out to me because of my AD. Around the same time, I discovered a little game published
by Fantasy Flight Games called Lord of the Rings. They were marketing it as an
LCG with the difference between it and a CCG being that the Collectible part of
the hobby had been replaced by a fixed distribution where individual packs of
the same name all have the same cards as well as a full play set (maximum number
of the same card) for deck-building purposes. This definitely spoke to me since
I am now married with 3 kids and can no longer afford the collectible market
like I once did. So I did the math.
Magic releases 4 sets a year and to acquire
everything, I would have to buy 3 boxes of each set and probably still need to
do some trading to get the rest. A booster box is 36 booster packs and costs
about $120. So that is a yearly cost of $1,440.
Lord of the Rings costs about $35 for a core set and
I needed 3 to get everything. After that it is a monthly commitment of $12 for
an adventure pack and a semi-yearly commitment of $25 for an expansion. This
works out to a year one expenditure of about $299 and a yearly expenditure of $194
going forward.
And the conclusion is that for less money a month, I could
acquire all that an LCG had to offer and still be able to play a great game.
But I told myself that I would only commit to one.
And that lasted for the last year because now I am
considering getting into 2 more LCGs, Star Wars and NETrunner. So I have again been
doing the math taking into account for my AD. I have not bought either yet
because once I do I am all in regardless. This will be a struggle to determine
enjoyment versus cost.
Hmmmm, What to do ...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)