Did you set them straight or let them have a go at teaching you the game?
Neither; something like, "I have played that a lot actually, but I have other stuff to do tonight."
For a while I preferred not to advertise that I was that guy. Someone would say, oh it's your own homemade Dominion expansion, and I would say, yes, yes it is. And someone at the table would laugh, and maybe the person would find out the deal, maybe they wouldn't. Certainly other people would sometimes helplessly blurt it out, or point me out if someone brought up Dominion at another table.
But then one evening a couple that was leaving said "huh you made your own homemade copy of Kingdom Builder," and seemed disgusted as they left. So now I just say I'm the guy. I don't lead with it but when it comes up, yes, this is my own homemade Dominion expansion, pause for chuckles, but we are playtesting it for publication, I am the Dominion guy.
So I'm at BGG.con, and I see some guys playing Roll for the Galaxy. In addition to the normal stuff and the expansion stuff, they're using some dice with little paper taped to the faces with do different icons. I ask "is this a home made expansion or something?" One of he guys points to another guy who was teaching the game and says "he's the designer". I look up at the name badge, and there's Wei-Hwa Huang. I geeked out a bit.
