Drum roll please…
The ticketing site for RinCon 2025 (October 3-5 at Casino Del Sol in Tucson) is NOW OPEN! You can get early-bird RinCon badges until 8/25; after that, the price goes up to the same cost as for onsite purchase. If you’re going to be volunteering or running games (and we hope you do – this 100% volunteer convention doesn’t run itself!), hold off on purchasing your badge until we send you your discount code. We’ve also got deeply discounted meal tickets for sale (~30% less than onsite cash prices)! Why walk all the way to the various food venues in the casino area, when you can get them right in the conference center! Wouldn’t you rather not worry about anything once you get to RinCon? Menu choices and hours for the different meals are available on the ticketing site, and we’ve made some ticket bundles for your convenience. See the very end of this newsletter for a Q&A about badges, meal tickets, and general RinCon info.
And don’t forget to get your hotel room sooner rather than later. There’s a Kevin Hart comedy show at Ava Amphitheater that weekend, and the Casino del Sol hotels are likely to be in a full sell-out situation earlier than usual. This means that we’ll only be able to add rooms to our block IF WE SELL OUT EARLY – so go ahead and make that happen! Instructions on how to get a hotel room are here.
Fundraiser Family Game Day
Saturday August 23rd, 10AM – 10PM
Casino Del Sol Conference Center
5655 W. Valencia Rd. Tucson, AZ
Join us one more time before RinCon itself for games, raffles, and tons of fun! The theme for this year’s RinCon is CITIES. Have a soft spot for a TTRPG in an urban setting? Or a classic board game named for a famous city? Get that game out and do a trial run with family and friends this weekend, so you’re all ready to run it at RinCon. Otherwise, come check out all the restaurants and amenities Casino Del Sol has to offer, borrow a board game from our library, and enter the raffles we’ll have going all day long.
Special event: Premium RPG sessions at 10:00 AM & 2:00 PM
Professional GM Malcolm Brewmaster of Encounter: Mastering Dungeons will be offering two private, “bespoke” RPG sessions with gift bags and gourmet snacks for players and table props and special effects to set the mood. At 10:00, he’ll be running Cyberpunk: RED and at 2:00 he’s got Call of Cthulhu on offer. Seats are limited, so click here to get your tickets to these one-of-a-kind events.
Special event: Murder Mystery LARP at 7:00 PM
Did you miss the murder mystery adventure at RinCon 2024? Love to solve mysteries? This game day will include a repeat run of last year’s murder mystery adventure: An Untimely End in the Enchanted Forest! Click here to choose which of the woodland denizens you want to play and reserve your spot.
VOLUNTEERING
RinCon is a 100% volunteer-run convention, and it can’t happen without the support of the whole gaming community! For every 4 hours of volunteer work you do, you get one free day at RinCon or 1/3 off the price of a pre-registration weekend badge; for 12 hours of help, you get a free weekend badge. You can also accrue hours for a badge for a friend or family member, so the sky’s the limit! Sign up for volunteer slots in the following areas:
Registration desk/Games HQ at RinCon: Check people in, sell badges, help attendees find their games
Games Library/Play-to-Win Area at RinCon: Help attendees sign out board games and enter the drawings
RinCon Rover (general roving helper) at RinCon: General logistics help throughout the event
Shifts before and after RinCon: We need all kinds of help with all kinds of things – check out the list of tasks and shifts
8/23/25 Family Game Day Fundraiser: Help with set-up, tear-down, and registration desk. This is a great way to get familiar with duties you might do at RinCon and decide if they’re for you.
As we get closer to the event, more shifts will be added periodically as we figure out what we need help with. Check back regularly to see if we’ve added any tasks you’d like to help us with!
RUNNING GAMES AT RINCON
Another way to get a discount on your RinCon badge and help shape the event itself is to run game sessions. You can sign up here. We always say that the best way to ensure that you get to play your current favorite game is to run it! And if it’s a board game, just click the “GM will be playing in the game” box to reserve your seat at the table. You have until September 5th at 10PM to get your GM discount: for every 4 hours of programming you run, get one free day at RinCon or 1/3 off the price of a pre-registration weekend badge; for 12 hours of games, you get a free weekend badge. And if you enjoy teaching minigamers, sessions run in the Kids’ Track area count double!
Other upcoming conventions in AZ:
MaricopaCon
THIS WEEKEND!! August 15-17
300 E Wigwam Blvd
Litchfield Park, AZ 85340
Tucson Comic-Con
August 29-31
Tucson Convention Center
2605 Church Ave., Tucson AZ
Q&A about RinCon badges, meal tickets, and general convention info
Q: How will I get my badges and meal tickets?
A: They will be available for pick-up at the RinCon registration desk once you arrive onsite at the Casino Del Sol conference center. Be sure to bring either a printed ticket or an electronic device that can display your confirmation email.
Q: How/when/where do I redeem the meal tickets?
A: They can only be used at the concessions area inside the conference center. A meal ticket (breakfast, lunch/dinner, or late-night pizza) is redeemable for one meal of its type on any day of the convention. Breakfast hours are 8:30 – 10:30 AM on Saturday and 8:00 AM – 2:00 PM on Sunday. Lunch/dinner hours are 12:00 – 8:00 PM Friday, 12:30 – 8:00 PM Saturday, and 8:00 AM – 2:00 PM on Sunday. Late-night pizza is 8:00 – 10:00 PM on Friday and Saturday.
Q: What does the RinCon schedule look like? And when can I sign up for games?
A: You’ll be able to view it at https://rincon2025.sched.com once we’ve gotten all the submitted games finalized and placed on tables. We’ll have that viewable on 9/14, with game sign-ups opening on 9/21 at 2PM. Set your alarms – high-demand sessions fill up fast!
Q: Badge prices have gone up a little bit from last year – why?
A: We decided, after observing first-hand the effects of an event cancellation (Wild Wild West Con), that we needed to protect ourselves and you from the repercussions of such an occurrence. Event insurance isn’t cheap, but we think it’s worth it.
Q: Meal ticket prices have also gone up – why?
A: First off, we all know that food costs have gone up everywhere. Second, the casino has reorganized the way they do food/beverage and our concessions area now falls under catering, which is a higher price bracket. The benefit, though, is in efficiency and quality – the meals will all be prepared in the kitchen adjacent to the conference center instead of the venues spread around the casino, and on a daily basis rather than pre-made in advance. Restocking on the fly will be easier, and they’re able to have more staff at the concessions stands to get you through the line more quickly. Finally, we took your input from last year and negotiated hard to get the quality and variety of the food options increased while still keeping the cost to you as low as they could be within the casino’s new pricing structure. We’re paying some of the difference, and it’s a pretty great deal if we do say so ourselves!
Q: What are the hours of RinCon 2025?
A: Friday, October 3rd: Registration opens at 10AM, scheduled game sessions run from 11AM to midnight.
Saturday, October 4th: Registration opens at 8:30, scheduled game sessions run from 9AM to midnight.
Sunday, October 5th: Registration opens at 8:30, scheduled games run from 9AM to 6PM.
Open gaming is available throughout the convention, including Friday and Saturday nights until the last diehard gamer leaves the gaming rooms! Just be kind to casino staff as they clean and reset the rooms overnight.
Q: What should I bring to RinCon?
A: An electronic device on which to display the ticket and QR code, or a paper copy of your ticket;
Items to manage your own needs: water bottle, extra layer of clothing (it gets chilly in the rooms), medications, comfort seating like lumbar support or cushions, headphones if you need them, mobility devices (even ones you use infrequently – the conference center is large and spread out), comfy shoes (ditto), a handheld fan if you tend to overheat, glasses (the print size on game materials can be obnoxiously small);
Gaming supplies (dice + tray, writing implements + paper, games you want to get to the table);
Your sense of fun and excitement to create community and play games!