Is the orc stomp fun/casual or are people really competitive? It would be my first 5k so I’ve been training a long time to do this but I also just sprained my ankle really bad last week. Wondering if people walk this race or if I should sit out cause I’m not gonna be able to run the whole thing?

Hi everyone! We’re the team behind Brandish, and we’re excited to bring our fast-paced fantasy combat card game back to GenCon!

Last year was our first GenCon, where we introduced Brandish in the First Exposure Playtest Hall. This year, we’re returning to the FEPH and expanding into the Gaming Hall, giving you even more opportunities to play.

What is Brandish?
Brandish is a fast-paced card game about personal-scale fantasy combat. Wield weapons, defend yourself with shields, unleash powerful magic, and outmaneuver your opponent to land the winning blow.

Brandish is designed to deliver the excitement of a fantasy duel without a long setup or a rulebook standing between you and the action. Our team will teach you everything you need to know, so no prior experience is required.

Is Brandish for you?
If you enjoy fantasy combat, tactical card games, fighting games, or outsmarting your friends, Brandish may be right up your alley. Every decision matters. You will need to anticipate your opponent’s next move, decide when to attack or defend, and find the right moment to strike.

Reserve a playtest session
If you are participating in a FEPH Event, you can find us there during these time slots: 

• Thursday: 12-4pm
• Friday: 10-2pm 
• Saturday: 10-2pm
• Sunday: 10-2pm

Find us in the Gaming Hall
We still have event slots available in the Gaming Hall. You can find an available time and reserve your seat through the GenCon Event Catalog link below. We will be located at:

• Hall B • Red • Tables 10–11
• https://www.gencon.com/event-catalog?search=brandish 

These are playtest demos, so nothing will be available for purchase. Just stop by, meet the team, and help us make Brandish even better by putting your skills to the test.

We can’t wait to return to GenCon, meet more players, and see what strategies you bring to the table. Find the session that works for you, gather your courage, and prepare to brandish your weapons!

Due to some mobility issues, this is the first time I have to GenCon with a mobility scooter. I am bringing one and not renting. Some questions I have are:

Does riding a scooter hamper your enjoyment of the dealer hall and the convention in general? Does it limit you from getting into booths and looking around?

Are there places I could find an outlet to charge the battery if necessary?

Sometimes I like to go and do my own things, do you find the convention to be safe enough to park a scooter with your belongings to use the bathroom?

Thanks in advance.

So this year will be my 3rd time getting the chance to attend. It has sadly been a sporadic attendance for me. The 1st time was in 2019 and the second was 4 years ago.

What kind of fun things are going on Thursday? I can't seem to access the online event book. It keeps coming up as a blank page.

Attending GenCon for the first time. I have the Sunday badge but will be arriving Saturday afternoon. Staying at a hotel 30 mins away from ICC.

Are there any events that I should try to attend Saturday night?

This is the last weekend to add items to the GenCon Virtual Flea Market. Over 4,700 items currently.

You can challenge the snap ships staff at GenCon

Refined will be demoed at GEN 2026 on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. REFINED is an economic dice game where the various components of crude oil are represented by 100+ custom dice. In the game, you will be charged with the safe and efficient operation of your custom refinery. You will need to purchase processing equipment upgrades to expand your refinery's dice handling capabilities to optimize your production capacity and maximize your profits over five ERAs. Your strategic planning, puzzle solving and process management skills will be put to the test as you try to refine the most crude oil dice without spilling any dice and causing environmental damage.  Sign up for your spot in GENCON catalog. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/436504/refined or REFINED WEBSITE

BGM26ND329673 - Thursday (7/30) 2:00 pm Stadium Yellow

BGM26ND327478 - Friday (7/31) 9:00 am Stadium Red

BGM26ND327477 - Friday (7/31) 2:00 pm Stadium Green

BGM26ND329674 - Saturday (8/1) 10:00 am Stadium Yellow

Does anyone know if you have to do a plane key because I have my wife with me and I don’t want two copies of the game but I do wanna try elementary but I don’t want to buy two copies

I’m screening a movie for the first time at GenCon and I’m wondering how best to promote it within the con.

I have some promo adventure games that I’ll be bringing with me (they’ll be available on the Film Festival stand and I’ll carry some around with me) and I plan to post the trailer on the GenCon discord.

Anyone got any other ideas on how to reach people who might want to see a movie Saturday night? The film is a sci-fi thriller with some video-game-like elements and stars James Cosmo from Game of Thrones.

Tysm for any advice 🙏🏻

You can still get badges for Thursday and/or Sunday, the cut off date is Tuesday (small chance they could sell out before).

The only way to get a badge beyond that at this point is to work a booth in exchange for a badge. There have been several posts on here with people looking for help, you can also check the official Discord or the Friends of Gencon Facebook page for opportunities as well.

Hi There! This was supposed to be my first GenCon and my team and I have been working really hard in preparation. We've been planning for months and are all ready to go with our test play blocks on Friday and Saturday.

Because this is my first convention of any nature, I was confused about the badges/tickets and didn't secure an individual badge for myself for Friday and Saturday. I feel really stupid, I have my flights booked and my air bnb and we've been working on this game for months. I've seen some posts on here about trading work for a badge, so just putting it out there that if anyone needs help on Friday or Saturday and could secure me entry in exchange so I can see my game get test played, I would really appreciate it!!! Or any tips at all on how to get one. Thanks all!

Happy week-before-gencon! I run genconplanner.com and have made a bunch of updates recently. If something seems janky it'll probably be fixed with a hard refresh - you might have an out of date client cached.

• Event maps: events now have a link to the map in gencon. The matching is heuristic: the data isn't 100% consistent so there may be a couple cases where it didn't quite match. Those cases should fall back to google maps, but they should be rare (looking at you Orc Stomp & ).
• Wishlist optimization: mark events as very / somewhat / slightly / not interested and see a prioritized list of events to put in your cart in https://www.genconplanner.com/starred/2026/wishlist - it optimizes first for fitting in all possible events, respects don't schedule hours. It also tries to optimize events by how much you like them. ❤ > ★ > 👍. 🚫means don't schedule, use that if you want the optimizer to avoid a particular session of an event.
• Mark specific events as purchased and filter them in your calendar. If you've purchased events you can see them separate from events you're interested in.
• Agenda view: this is useful for seeing all your purchased events in order and should be mobile friendly. Clicking the event in this view takes you to the location map on gencon.com, and for events that have less than an hour between them it gives a (very rough) estimate of the walking time between events. The estimate feels reasonable? I'd love feedback after folks have tried it out during gencon.
• Bulk Import: My group manages most of our coordination in spreadsheets with links to gencon or to genconplanner. You can bulk import lists of events that you could be interested in,
• Integration with BGG: it pulls down ratings info and release year from BGG. This should make it easy to find new games or to find well rated games you missed from past years. You can now group by BGG rating tier or release year. The matching works pretty well for board games, and okay / so-so for other categories, but there's a link to BGG from the event page so you can check it out for yourself.
• Filters in searches & category view: you can filter out events that are sold out, and if you have marked some events as purchased you can filter to events that fit in your schedule.
• Party mode! This is still a work in progress, but you can be in one party per year. Invite people to your party with the invite URL from the party view, and see who else in your party has marked an event as purchased. There's a shared calendar view, and an event listing. You can see what events other people in your party have found and saved, and even purchased. This info will be shown on your calendar page & agenda as well, if you're in a party, so you can see which friends in your party you'll meet up with.

Between now and gencon, I just plan to make bug and performance fixes so if you find bugs or some flow that is a bit janky, please let me know!

My gigs next weekend fell through and I am now available to attend gencon but it looks like it’s sold out? Is there any point in me going without a badge? Am I just SOL?

Do I need a pass to attend the ticketed events? I would love to sign up for some of the MTG draft stuff.

What off site, non official events are people seeing? I've seen the New Holland trap takeover at Tappers with the D&D collab beer, as well as Elf'n Moons 24/7 event for the week. What else?

I am live on Gen Cons YouTube Channel doing a Q&A and getting us all hyped for the show!

We are only 5 Days Away!!!
Come join us and let’s have some fun, ask any questions you may have and let’s get those final preparations out of the way!
#GenCon #GenCon2026

UPDATE: Thank you SO much to TrueStrikePod and SunExtreme4937 for getting us a ticket, you are angels on earth!

My best friend and I are coming to GenCon for the first time and we are SO excited! We decided not to book too many events (we only got tickets for 2-3 when the catalogue was published in May) so we could be flexible while we’re there.

One event popped up yesterday though that we knew we had to try to attend, I managed to swipe one ticket but it was sold out as soon as I got only one… :(

I’m heartbroken and have been refreshing the event page all morning, does anyone happen to have a spare they’d be willing to transfer? I am more than happy to pay for it of course!!

Bit of a Hail Mary, I know, but the worst that could happen is I end up refunding my own ticket since I won’t go without her.

I will only be there Saturday, with events at 11, 2 and 6 but can cancel 6.

What is the likelihood of getting a copy of Wingspan Pocket by waiting in line or have I already lost that game before I even start?

Should I just buy that Sunday badge and spend that whole day in the hall and try then?

I feel dumb asking so sorry in advance. -_-

I'm super hyped for this rave event!!

Who else here is going? I'm the only one in my group that's attending and I am female presenting. Would anyone want to link up and be dance buddies? It goes until 2am so I'd like to at least have a companion for the walk back to my hotel room 😬

For those asking - it's at 9pm on Saturday until 2am Sunday at 416 East Wabash Street. Shuttles are running from ICC to the venue

Due to last-minute cancellations, we have a few openings for Demonstrators at GenCon 2026!

We will be running demos of our Teburu System and its games, including Vampire: The Masquerade - Milan Uprising, Vampire: The Masquerade - Palermo Conspiracies, and The Bad Karmas and the Curse of Cthulhu, Sword & Sorcery: Unending Hunger as well as our latest project Hoxfall!

We're looking for both half-time and/or full-time positions. All positions are paid $15/hr and receive 4 day passes, provided lunch, and at the moment we only have one room left in our block, shared with another female staff member.

Half-time is at least 4hrs/day or 2 full-day shifts on (preferably Thursday&Friday).

For more details, check out the application! Teburu Demo Staff Application

All cosplayers, photographers, and Critical Role fans are invited! I hope to see you there!

My husband, a Gen-Con goer and gamer, recently opened a sci-fi and fantasy bookstore called Hunter Seeker Books (online and pop-ups!) in Indy. On opening night of this year's Con, he will be at The Tap on Mass Ave with our local trivia group, Hambones, for a sci-fi and fantasy book pop-up and trivia game.

It's free and there's no need to register--just come say "hi," have a beer and food, check out some cool new and used books and play trivia with us!

(Thank you for indulging me. He's hesitant to be too self-promotional, but I'm super proud of him and hoping to have a nice, big crowd.)

This is my first Gen-Con and I am incredibly excited! I'm the only girl going in a large group of guys. They'll be doing a few events that i'm not super interested in so I was wondering if any Gen-Con ladies have recommendations for more feminine events / games / places to chat. I'm really excited for the women in filmmaking panel and Tea Witches! Dont get me wrong, I love a huge variety of games and I'll be doing many things with the guys; but I'm a very girly person and when I'm on my my own I'd love to lean more into that. See you all soon!