Last weekend I attended Ropecon 2024 in Helsinki. Ropecon is the biggest roleplaying convention in the Nordics organized by volunteers. (The name Ropecon comes from Finnish abbreviation of role-playing games - rope (from ROoliPEli), nothing related to ropes).

And once again, it was one of the highlights of my year. I really cannot put to words adequately how in awe I am of the work that the con organizers and all the volunteers do every year to make Ropecon happen. This year, another attendee record was made as more than 8500 people attended the convention over the weekend.

My con experience, once again, focused on running and playing tabletop role-playing games. I ran two sessions of my Victorian murder mystery game Monsters of the Void Sea. In the Indie room, I got to be a part of a hilarious session of Honey Heist with one of my friends and 4 complete strangers. And we played one session of Desperation’s The Isabel scenario with my friends (including my teen kid and their friend). In addition to those, we played a live session of Call of Cthulhu rpg with our cast of Etiäinen, our Finnish ttrpg actual play podcast.

I also bought some Legendoja & Lohikäärmeitä merch for my teen because they are thinking of starting a L & L group. L & L is the Finnish version/iteration of D&D 5.5ed.

And of course, I ran into and chatted a lot with friends old and new, many of who are members of Hepro, the tabletop role-players’ association based in Helsinki.

Ropecon is one of the things that strengthens my faith in humanity. The amount of effort people, both organizers, volunteers and program hosts, are willing to donate to make something awesome together is amazing to experience.

And on a personal note, my experiences of running Monsters of the Void Sea made me want to work even harder to continue to make a publication out of it. Next step in that direction is to make a playtest version for others to run it.

I’m already eagerly waiting for Ropecon 2025 - 25. To 27. Of July 2025 in Helsinki. Will I meet you there?