SOE Live is quickly approaching, with only 37 days remaining until its official start on August 1, 2013.This year I’ll be arriving in Vegas around 4pm PDT on Wednesday, July 31st, and departing on Monday, August 5th around 2:30pm PDT. My arrival flight got pushed to a later landing time during the first couple weeks of the sequester ordeal, but its time has finally seemed to stabilize.

Prep
My prep is sorely lacking at this point. Several of my friends already are making lists, readying (or finishing) costumes, fleshing out plans, and so on. So far the only thing I have done–aside from setting up my badge, flight, and hotel–is obtain a stash of 100 calorie snacks, which make terrific food for flights, early mornings, and for a quick bite between panels.

There are a couple of things I really do need to get a move on preparing: finishing up my “geek badges” to pass out to friends and finding a new outfit to go with the hilarious “pimp hat” that Amy (Calthine) gave me last year. When it comes time for packing (I usually do it the afternoon before my flight), I’m going to try out this tip for saving space with your clothing.

Hardcore Decorating
This year I submitted a request for my own player panel, calling it “Hardcore Decorating”. I found out last week that the panel is accepted, but at this point I have no idea when the panel will be scheduled for until the official lineup is released. Hopefully it will not go up against any EQ2 or EQ Next panels! We are allowed to have four total panelists, and I received three requests from fellow decorators, though two are still unconfirmed on attending SOE Live. There is even a chance that there may be a special panelist from SOE!

At this point the general plan with the panel is not to teach something like Layout Editor (I use it, and it’s a great decorating tool, but it really needs its own panel). Instead we are going to focus on resources, the Homeshow community, inspiration, creativity, and more. I’m not sure how many attendees will be interested in sitting in on the panel, but it would be awesome if it were a packed room!

Everything Else?
Aside from impatiently checking the SOE Live panel lineup page each day (yup, still no full panel listing, SIGH), I’m not really worrying too much about the event yet. Once it hits the second or third week in July should be about when my panic at preparing sets in.

This year the convention crosses over Tinkerfest again (it also happened two years ago, this year it runs from July 26 – August 8). Thankfully, Tinkerfest is a relatively short event and I should be able to cram my 12 characters in before I head out of town. If not, it’ll still be running for a couple more days after I return home. Amy has already updated our Tinkerfest guide over on ZAM and I’m looking forward to obtaining a lot of the new items added this year!

My only final thought is that I’m extremely curious to finally discover what the big secret of EverQuest Next is. This will be revealed on Friday, August 2, and I’m really hoping it does not disappoint after all the hype that has been invested into it. The involvement of Storybricks makes me think that the game will be extremely open to player development. Mix in Player Studio (I have no idea if Player Studio will be in EQN, but it’s difficult to assume otherwise at this point) and it’s feasible that the game world could be majorly built by just players.