Blog

Ben Drago

Darkmoon Faire Orlando

Remember to pack some frost resistance this weekend if traveling to Orlando.

A truly nasty storm is pounding the eastern half of the United States. If you’re on your way down to Florida this weekend, please be careful and don’t take any chances, especially on the icy roads of the Midwest and Northeast. We’d love to see you there, but there’s always the DMF in Chicago.

Geek Cred

So I guess it’s my turn to talk about how I got here, writing this blog?

It started when I bought the original Dungeons & Dragons Red Box back in the summer of 1986. Soon after I discovered my local hobby gaming store, and over the next few years added AD&D, Battletech, Car Wars, and the Paranoia RPG to my resume. I dabbled in painted minis including Warhammer 40K, blew up the world regularly in Supremacy, and dominated my play group in Axis & Allies. I even got to the point where I knew about 80% of the rules for Star Fleet Battles – if you’ve ever played this game, you know just how scary that is.

The next step was Origins 1993, which was held in Fort Worth, Texas. I had just graduated high school and was working that summer in Dallas, so it was an easy drive out that July weekend. The highlight that weekend was a brand new game by a company we had never heard of called Wizards of the Coast. Two very nice gentleman named Peter and Richard were showing off a new card game that wasn’t even for sale, as they had just gotten the first printing of “real cards” from Belgium.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Ben Drago: the original Trade Prince, wheeling and dealing. 

That fall Magic: The Gathering exploded, and we were in on the ground floor. I bought Alpha booster packs, witnessed a trade where two Forests were exchanged for a Mox Pearl because the playgroup was short on land having only found a few starters, and built lots of bad decks. I also found that buying and selling cards could generate more than just beer money, and paid for about half of my college tuition dealing cards on USENET.

Skills to Pay the Bills

College got pretty busy, so my games got packed away for a couple of years until after graduation.  I ended up taking a job in the Bay Area, and that’s where I started got involved in gaming again as both a player, and then in December 1999 I got certified as a DCI judge by Mr. Ray Powers.

The next few years I traveled around the world working professional level events. Judging these tournaments was incredibly hard work, but I would end up meeting some awesome people like Scott Elliott and Alex Charsky.

These two ended up at Upper Deck helping launch the Vs. System TCG, and after about a year of nagging by Scott we left Austin in 2004 and moved to San Diego, where I took over OP for North America and became a hobby gaming “professional”.

Looking back, I can’t believe it’s been twenty-five years since I colored in the numbers with a crayon on my first set of polyhedral dice. But it sure has been a lot of fun getting here.

What’s your story?