Role Call:
Andrew "Iziz" Carson (won Babylon 5: A Call to Arms)
Christina Lauro (won Camarilla LARP)
Hugh Adams (won Red Storm Rising LARP and In Absentia LARP)
Andrew "Narchy" Gordon (second in ACTA, go me!)

It was a rather reduced Dragonslayers' expedition that set off for Dublin on cold Friday evening. For various reasons, our numbers were about half of that of the previous year's trip. But we were all glad to see university and work behind us, and a weekend's gaming in front of us!

The bus trip down (£12 return, what a bargain!) involved a combination of watching Team America on Iziz's laptop and sleeping. Once we reached our B&B, more sleep promptly followed.

Day One
We arrived at Clontarf Castle pretty early on Saturday morning, the place has been spruced up a bit since last year. The addition of a heated smoking area was met by approval from my nictotine addled lungs. The doors opened a tad late, which is to be honest, the norm at any convention. I don't know why we even bother designating an opening time. Once the doors were opened, there was an extended period of queueing for most people. I managed to wangle my way to the front of the queue quite quickly - where I was relieved of my entry fee plus the money for my chosen event that day. Iziz and myself decided that, despite our lack of miniatures, we would enter the Babylon 5: A Call to Arms tournament.

The numbers in the tournament were down a bit from the previous year. Eventually, after waiting to see if anyone else was going to enter, the tournament began. After the dust had settled, Iziz himself was declared the winner. A good result indeed!

The tournament last most of the day so not much else was done. Since my head is full of useless knowledge about chemistry, and we were missing the expertise of Jonny Glover, I didn't think I would perform well in the Pub Quiz and ventured into Dublin for food.

Day Two
The morning slot was POW! SMACK! KABOOM! affair as I entered the Mutants & Masterminds RPG competition. The scenario was a very clever affair, involved flashbacks through the decades of the Avengers. I had the part of Captain America... which was fun. Although, my lack of comic book knowledge may have lead me to play him more like Zapp Brannigan. Great game!

The afternoon slot saw me lose my convention GM virginity (not as bad as it sounds... well maybe). I volunteered to GM a Weird Wars RPG, it was a system I had never played but since it was a d20 game I figured, "How hard could it be?" Well, with 10 minutes to go before players arrived, I was handed a rather large document that was the adventure that I was to become intimately familiar with. I just had time to read the character descriptions when 6 eager faces appeared before me, waiting to be entertained. I did my best, the scenario was quite long but well written - it involved Nazi werewolves. I'm not sure if the story I told bore much relation to the one in the scenario, but the players still seemed to have fun. One of my players was even declared the winner! Huzzah.

I had planned to play in the All Flesh Be Eaten RPG that evening, but I was a bit knackered after spending 3 hours switching between a Russiand and German accent. Instead I caught up with the rest of the Dragonslayers and some friends, just in time to watch them eat a lovely indian meal.

Day Three
Played in a D&D game in the morning. A fantastic adventure, the party felt like the A-Team and my character seemed to be MacGuyver with more spells. A prison break, followed by a double cross requiring many hair-brained schemes to get us out safely. The GM for my group was also the author, and I have to say he was fantastic. So fantastic that I instantly signed up for another game he had written in the afternoon. Mick Fitzpatrick, I salute you.

The afternoon involved a Conspiracy-X scenario that had me sitting at the edge of my seat. Nanomachines, not-so-dead corpses and zapping local authorities with memory wiping lights - awesome! I think I was very lucky to end up at a table of great roleplayers who all seemed to get into the game almost instantly. Probably the highlight of the convention for me.

In Conclusion...
So that was my experience of gaming at Gaelcon this year, I think the quality of the RPGs was fantastic. The ACTA tournament was fun, though the numbers were slightly disappointing.

Right... this paragraph originally contained a few issues I had with the convention. Registration desk mess, poor use of space, lack of advertising - but knowing how these things can be, I decided against posting them here. If anyone from Gaelcon wants to know what a young pup like me had to say, feel free to get in contact. :)

Alas, as with all conventions, you'd love to try everything. I didn't have a chance to attend any of the seminars, or steal Iziz's laptop to try out the LAN, there was no where near enough drinking on my part either! So this is review is written from my own perspective, everyone else had very different experiences I am sure. Overall, I had a great time - the games I played in were brilliantly written, fantastically GMed and the other players were a great bunch. It was also great to meet up with a few convention buddys that I only see at cons. However, the cost of going to Gaelcon was a bit too much for my student purse and I will have to put serious thought into whether or not I will go next year.

We'll all be at Warpcon though, so keep watching for a review of it in the New Year!