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Contributed by Darran Sims
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Nov 07, 2005 at 11:13 AM |
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A report of my first time at an Irish RPG convention [though I attend many cons in the UK].
Gaelcon 2005. Clontarf Castle, Dublin.
Saturday 29th - Monday 31st October 2005.
http://www.gaelcon.com/
So I was looking forward to going to GenCon UK but was dissuaded by the expensive travel costs [plus having to change trains three times during the journey], the prohibitive charge for the accommodation at Butlins and the large price to get into the convention itself. For the same amount of money for me just to go I could take both my wife and myself to Dublin for a long weekend and still attend a RPG convention instead. So that is what I did. I signed up for Gaelcon and promised to run some HeroQuest sessions.
The trip to Dublin was fantastic; we enjoyed having an evening and a full day to go around the city, taking in its sights and the bars!
We went to ‘Dublina’, a museum about the Norse, Norman and Medieval Dublin that built inside one of the city’s cathedrals. We went to Dublin Castle, walked along the quays of the River Liffey and we toured the Old Town before hitting the Temple Bar area. It is refreshing to go into bars and pubs that are not filled with smoke. We could breathe easily and stay for as long as we wanted as our eyes were not streaming and we weren’t coughing or choking on the fumes. We got distracted so much by the bars that we didn’t take in as many of the sights as we had planned.
We met a nice couple that were staying at our B&B who were also attending Gaelcon. They travel across the Irish Sea to attend every year as well as other Irish conventions like Warpcon and K2. They informed us how the Irish cons were the most friendly, not only the organisers but the attendees as well. With that we were looking forward to the convention more.
To the Convention itself. The venue, Castle Clontarf, was only five minutes away from our B&B and is one of the best-looking venues I have seen a convention held at. The castle has been converted into a five star hotel, but still retains its medieval character. The main hall is large and delectable with plenty of tables that were arranged in rows. The main hall had its own bar area located in a separate are along the hall’s longest side. There were gaming tables set up in the bar area. There were quite a few meeting rooms downstairs in the basement that were also used as gaming rooms.
There was also another bar open to the public, called the ‘Knights’ Bar’ that was also very picturesque. It had a carved stone relief of the Battle of Clontarf as its back bar wall and large stone fireplaces. It was a good place to go to escape from the bustle of the convention and have a pint or two!
We arrived shortly after 10:00am on the Saturday morning and entered the main hall. They were still trying to set up. I helped with putting chairs out [a busman’s holiday] while I waited to find out where I was going to setting up myself. I did try asking at the front desk but they weren’t very helpful and rather snappish. However Aidan Walsh, the committee member in charge of the RPGs and to whom I had been communicating with prior to the convention, was very helpful and did sort me a table out in the main hall and get us our convention passes. Unfortunately I was moved to let a stall set up and was repositioned next to the war games control desk so not in a prime location to attract narrative-style gamers.
Some of the few things I did notice is that they do not issue actual name badges, but generic passes, either for each day or for the whole weekend. Also the age of the attendees [and the organisers as well] was a lot lower than the UK conventions I go to. Most were in their early twenties or in their late teens; I did feel quite an old grognard. The convention was very well organised, a little too well organised as everyone knew what games they were signed up for in advance. A problem for me as I missed the five month deadline for contributing the scenarios to be in the programme. All scenarios had to be in at the end of May 2005 for an end of October 2005 convention. Quite a long lead-time for me as I am busy attending five RPG conventions a year. The deadline for Continuum for example is end of May 2006 also for an end of July 2006 convention.
I had scheduled two games of HeroQuest on the Saturday, one to start at 11:00 and one at 13:00. Unfortunately I didn’t get the response I was hoping for. The people on the front desk were reluctant to have my sign-up sheets based there as they were concentrating on their sign-ups. They did allow me to leave my sheets there but later on I saw that they had been thrown in the bin. I managed to get several people expressing an interest in the game I didn’t get enough players at any one time to run a game. It seemed that every time I got someone prepared to play the other people that I found earlier had disappeared. If I could have ran games for single players on a one-to-one basis I would have been fine. Many of the attendees didn’t know what HeroQuest was or thought it was the old MB board game of the same name. Only a few even remember RuneQuest and only one remembered the setting Glorantha ‘the world with the ducks’.
I did take part in a ‘Wizkids’ demonstration of ‘Mage Knight’, a fantasy version of ‘Hero Clix’. It is a rules-lite miniature war game with each pre-painted figure having its stats on a rotating disc in its base. As the figure takes damage or over-extends itself, the stat disc is rotated or ‘clix’ so that lower stats are shown. As more damage is taken the disc is clix until it shows the figure is dead. The demo was a ‘Kill and Keep’ with three small armies, each controlled by a different player, attacking a huge dragon. Whoever killed the dragon could keep that figure and when their figures were killed they could keep them. An excellent game and a good way of demo-ing games. I ended up with 21 figures as prizes!
By 18:00 on the Saturday I had enough and was feeling a little despondent so I decided to take my wife out on the town instead of staying at the con.
Sunday went a little better as I managed to get two players for my morning game despite the unhelpful front desk. I ran my ‘Into the Trees’ scenario toning down some of the combat as I had only two characters. I explained the HeroQuest mechanics to the players in the first fifteen minutes and by that time they had grasped the basics and were ready to play the scenario. They liked that the character is defined in its 100-word narrative and found it helpful that the description of their deity they were trying to emulate was also on their character sheet. They liked the augment rules, using other abilities to boost up the main skill being used. They enjoyed the scenario, concentrating on more of the investigation side of things as both players avoided the red herrings and worked out who was the wrongdoer. They had a good climatic fight at the end and brought the whole game to a satisfactory conclusion.
We had played for four hours, which surprised the players, as they hadn’t thought the game went on for that long. Time flies when you are having fun.
As I got no more sign-ups for the afternoon game I had a late lunch [and a few pints] with my wife before watching the Irish Premiere of ‘Gamerz: The Movie’ later that evening. It is a Scottish independent full-length comedy film about a misfit group of gamers and their geek lust for crazy Goth chick that believes she is an elf. It stars Edward Tudor-Pole and Eileen McCallum and introduces new talent Ross Finbow, James Young and Danielle Stewart as the ill-fated, star-crossed lovers. It is a funny movie and most role-players will see someone that they recognise [maybe themselves?] in the characters portrayed. See http://www.gamerz-the-movie.com/gamerz.asp for more details.
We missed the charity auction, as my wife was a little bit tired from the whole weekend so we had an early night. I was told though that the charity auction raised over thirty thousand euros!
The charities are Crumlin Children's Hospital, Debra Ireland: The Butterfly Children, CARI, Canteen, and CABAS School.
So in all a very good quality con, the venue and its staff were superb, the attendees were very friendly, the atmosphere great and the organisation of the event was good. The only major flaw was the front desk were unhelpful in getting me players for my games. I am used to having con-organisers providing an area for sign-up sheets or allowing my games to go into the main sign-up system so that I am ‘competing’ with other GMs and games on a level playing field as it were.
Would I go again? Yes I would but I think that would have to prepare more well in advance. I can’t make next year, too busy helping organising Continuum to think of that end of May deadline but I might go in 2007. It seems that Ireland is virgin territory as far as HeroQuest, and soon Questworlds, demonstrations go so it might be worth a few HQ GMs going along. There are also many other RPG conventions in Ireland that I might try one of them as well.
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Comment by Guest on 2005-11-14 12:42:20
And we in W.A.R.P.S stole the top spots in the wargaming events. We'll be back next year to claim them again!!! |
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