This was its first time in ExCeL, which is very easy to get to, with the Elizabeth line skipping the previous changes I’ve had at Bank/Monument¹. I stayed nearby so I could make the 9am morning game session start. The train drama coming down from Northampton the night before was therefore moderated by merely cancelling my Friday-evening plans 😮‍💨.

I wasn’t given a programme on the way in, but I forgot it had anything other than the hall layout, so I didn’t pick one up after my game. This was a mistake, I forgot all the seminars that were on. There were three tracks, somewhere.

Gaming

I played with Sofinho, and had the pleasure of meeting him in person for the first time! We played his game PARIAH, with four other lovely people.

The organisation of the gaming session had some teething issues getting everyone to their games, which were in little rooms above the exhibition halls looking out over the Thames and former docks. They probably sorted this out for the afternoon session, but I think I’d arrive at least 45m in advance in the future.

PARIAH is a relaxed game, the author prefers a game that is light on rolling, and concentrates more on the exploration of the world. The pariahs in question are paleolithic outcasts from other tribes, starting a small band of their own. This gives the setting for the original exploration/wandering.

We played for probably 3 hours out of the 4 hour session. We lost time to the registration process, and then stopping for a “quick comfort break” turned out that the shops are getting on to 750m of walking from the room, and busy.

Also: buying a ticket for a particular game once you have your Dragonmeet ticket required me to bookmark the release time, and then rushing online and paying £4 for a place. I think it would have been less critical if Sofinho had run more than one session but he had some children to get back to.

Shopping

After lunching with some nerds, I explored the stalls. This took about two hours before I got bored. Expect lots of:

• Dice
• RPG books
• Board games
• RPG vendors²
• Tea

Surprisingly few t-shirts and pin badges, compared to other nerd conventions. Not none, mind.

I bought:

• Pendragon starter set - It was £11! I won’t even play it, but I still enjoyed reading it for that little.
• Acid Death Fantasy - I own the PDF and it’s pretty. I need to do combat in Troika! differently though, it’s just too annoying and unintuitive for me as-is.
• A beautiful jumbo d20 with a floating eye inside it, it’s like the tainted palantír in the film
• Forneus Research Base - Adventure for Stay Frosty. I forgot this has been remastered! If I play this adventure I can treat myself to it!
• The Quiet Year - finally in physical form for me.
• Runecairn Wardensaga - I have a weakness for Norse themes

Appendix

I had to go straight from Dragonmeet onto a work trip to Manchester. This meant more unsupervised time in RPG shops: I bought the DCC RPG hardback, and OSE Advanced.

Uh, whoops.