The Captain’s Log

Play casual games, take classes, shop vendors, and more to earn prizes!

What is the Captain’s Log?

The CaptainCon Crew believes that all attendees at the convention should have the opportunity to win cool prizes, not just the top winners of big competitive tournaments. The Captain’s Log is our way of making that happen. It runs continually throughout the convention and almost everything you do can help you earn prizes.

How Does it Work?

In your convention program you’ll find the Captain’s Log record grid and achievement list. The achievement list shows all the activities at CaptainCon for which you can earn Captain’s Log points and how many each are worth. These include playing casual games (board games, miniatures games, etc.) with friends, buying stuff from vendors, trying out game demos, etc. The record grid is used to track which achievements you’ve earned by getting stamps in the boxes for each earned achievement. When you earn points, you can take your program book to the Captain’s Log table to have them recorded into the computer system we use to track points. For some achievements (like doing a game demo or shopping a vendor) you’ll simply get a stamp in your book that you can take to the table any time, while others (like playing a casual game) you’ll need to go up to the table right away to record the achievement.

At any time, you can go to the Captain’s Log table to check your current point balance in the system and see what prizes are available in the prize pool. If you see a prize you like and have the points for it, you can spend some of your points right away to ‘buy’ that prize. Don’t worry, you can bank any points left and keep earning more points to get other prizes later in the convention.

What Prizes are Available?

Everything in the Captain’s Log is either provided by sponsors or purchased by CaptainCon in January to fill out the prize pool, so we don’t know what will be in our treasure chests from year to year. You’ll just have to keep an eye on the Captain’s Log table at the convention. You’ll also want to visit multiple times, as we don’t put everything out all at once. Generally, we put about a third of the prizes up on Friday morning, another third or so on Saturday morning, and the rest goes out throughout Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. That way, the person who saved up their points until Sunday still has a chance of getting some cool prizes instead of finding an empty table.

Keep in mind, points don’t carry over until the next year, so make sure to spend your points before the Captain’s Log closes on Sunday afternoon at 4pm.

Example of Earning and Spending Points

Leon, Kim, Steve, and Tracie just finished playing a board game from the Board Game Library together. They all go up to the Captain’s Log table together to report the game. While one volunteer checks their game back into the Board Game Library, another volunteer scans in the bar codes on the backs of their badges to pull up their Captain’s Log records. Each player earns 1 point for the achievement of playing a casual game. Leon earns a second bonus point because this is his 5th casual game played so far. While they’re at the table, Tracie also shows her program book where she’s earned 1 point each for the two demo games she played earlier and hadn’t yet reported in. That reminds Steve that he also has to report in points so he shows his stamps for the vendor booth where he purchased something and for the class he attended.

Once everything is recorded, the volunteer tells each of them what their current point balance is. Kim has already earned 20 points and has her eye on an RPG accessory in the prize pool for 18 points so she spends points right away to buy it, banking the other two for later use. The others in the group decide to not buy anything just yet to wait and see what else gets added to the prize pool later. They all move off to earn more points by having fun while the volunteer helps the next person in line.