Last week I spent two days at a ski lodge in Utah.

View of Cliff Lodge

The lodge was about 8700 feet above sea level, and while a lot of attendees kept mentioning they were suffering from altitude sickness, what had me dizzy were the conversations and presentations I participated in.

I wasn’t there to ski, but to take part in the inaugural Tabletop Network conference, along with a group of other game professionals and soon-to-be game professionals. The Kickstarter described this as:

A conference for tabletop game designers, focused on learning, collaboration, and inspiration.

I had high hopes for the conference.

All the presentations I saw were not just well done, but educational in a way that exceeded my expectations. I hoped this conference would be the equivalent of all the professional development conferences I’d attended while working in higher education, and it was!

Rob Daviau started us off with his “Firsts” talk, setting what would be a great precedent for the rest of the sessions.

There were some competing talks, so I haven’t seen them all yet, but they were all recorded, so I’ll be watching those I missed (and some I didn’t miss) as soon as they’re available.

In addition to Rob Daviau, I had a chance to learn from (in no particular order) Raph Koster, James Ernest, Eric Dodds, Ryan Laukat, Tom Lehmann, Tim Fowers, Jennifer Graham-Macht, Travis Hill, Jonathan Lestiko, and the power panel of Kathleen Mercury, Adrienne Ezell, and Theo Strempel.

Topics ranged from design focus, system design, diversity in gaming, breaking games down into their smallest pieces, designing with the industry in mind, metaphysics, and even defining fun. Plus the eight sessions I missed (but will watch as soon as the recordings become available).

In addition to the information offered in the talks, I also had some incredible conversations with people in various positions and levels of experience in the board game (and video game) industry.

Sitting down to eat lunch on the first day, I found myself accidentally intruding on the Diversity in Board Game’s panel as they prepared for their post-lunch talk. Fortunately, Kathleen, Adrienne, and Theo were quite welcoming, as you’d expect from that group of course, and we had a great conversation about diversity, not just in the gaming industry, but also in the games we make.

Thanks to Kathleen, Adrian, and Theo for welcoming me and for the panel itself.

I kept stumbling into great conversations the entire time, chatting with many other attendees and quite a few of the conference speakers.

The venue was also in a gorgeous place, with windows that looked out at the mountains all around the hotel, treating us to views like these:

So many amazing new connections — I can’t wait to see these people again and to continue these conversations!

I found the event to be very inspirational, so it’s time to move my ass and work on some prototypes!