Geek.Kon is only nine days away here in Madison, and they already have more than 600 registered geeks. Of course, who knows how many people will just show up on the day of this free two day geektacular (October 6 and 7). Dane101 has been slowly highlighting various aspects of Geek.Kon (click "Geek-Kon 2007" above to read our other articles) leading up to the Geek oasis. Today we bring you an interview with Jonathan Bolte who will be heading up the roleplaying portion of the event. RPGs being played at the kon include Colonial Gothic, Scion, Obsidian, Battlelords of the 23rd Century, Legacy of the Blue Wizards (A J.R.R. Tolkein based adventure), and BESM (Big Eyes, Small Mouth - a game designed to imitate the action found in anime and manga).

How did you get involved with Geek-Kon?

I have been going to the UW anime club with my girlfriend (Staci - volunteer coordinator) and she mentioned that the first meeting for the con was happening. And, well, it sounded like fun.

As the RPG coordinator do you feel a special connection with putting this event together considering Wisconsin is the birth place of GenCon?

Not only Gen-con but the original RPG (Dungeons and Dragons) was born in Wisconsin. In all honesty I had not thought of it in those terms. In truth part of the reason I wanted to help with the Role-playing originally was to help me get to know the Gamers around town better.

Will there be roleplaying available for newbies who may have never experienced it?

Yes, the whole Idea of Geek-kon is to let out our type of geekness and let others enjoy it also. I mentioned I was going to Anime club, and I had always liked Anime, but had no idea what to look for if I went looking for Anime on my own - I am slowly learning about it. But Geek-Kon came around and I thought what if there are Anime Fans out there who always wanted to role-play, but never knew where to start. So I decided to help do what Anime Club is helping me do.

Are there any misconceptions associated with roleplaying you would like to take a moment and quash?

That we, as gamers, are not a single type of group teen boys huddled in the basement. I have known gamers that include Frat boys, college football starters, ballet dancers, CPAs, and police officers. I have even been in one campaign that was all Black Belts. In short, all you need to play is an imagination.

How many GMs (Game Masters) do you have and how many campaigns do you expect to run?

At the moment we have 6 GM's signed up, and 8 specific games set up, along with one person (well group) doing on demand gamming. BUT we will continue signing up people to run games until we run out of time and/or space. My personal thought is that a lot of people will wait until the last second - being a free con and all.

Will most of these campaigns be from a book or from your head?

A bit of both. All of them will be organized ahead of time.

Are you looking for more GMs?

Yes! We will even have a space the day of the con if people want to run a game they brought at the last minute, or for people just trying to find other people playing the same system.

I see the systems you are running are listed on the site; any others not listed yet?

Theoretically, no, although I am trying to work it out so I can run another campaign myself, Deliria, a modern fairy tail setting (I am also helping run Security) and talking to someone who wants to run a Classic Battle Tech game but that is closer to Miniature or Board Game.