Gaelcon 2026

Last week-end I attended Gaelcon for the first time. The Merry Mushmen had a booth in the trade hall, and I wanted to demo Dungeon, Inc. to players who hadn't been exposed to it, so it made sense. It turned out to be much more fun than I even imagined. 

In large part, this was due to the incredible atmosphere of the event. Run entirely by volunteers, I felt an immediate sense of welcome despite knowing virtually no one, and a wholesome vibe that I promptly fell for.

Gaelcon hosts all kinds of games, not just RPGs, so there were areas devoted to wargames, boardgames, etc. Obviously though, my core interest was on the RPG side, and I also spent a fair bit of time on the trade floor keeping company to Sarah who was manning the Mushmen's booth. 

I ran three games of Dungeon, Inc. one each day. On the saturday and the monday, I ran Blood & Mushrooms which is a full-blown mission I'm currently playtesting. Good fun was had, and it highlighted something I hadn't anticipated, which will mean some rewriting, but that's good. It's probably not an ideal mission for conventions, because it's more easily run in 4 hours than 3. On the Sunday I had the (pleasant) constraint of speaking at an OSR panel in the afternoon, so I ran Clean-Up Operation which is a shorter mission I designed specifically for newbies to the game and I know works a treat at conventions.

The feedback was universally good from players, appreciative of both the concept of the game and the fun that was had. Quite a few people came to the booth on the trade floor afterwards and bought the game, so I think it was sincere feedback. 

On my end, I had fun seeing how some of the characters played the corporate card. One PC pulled-up Dungeon, Inc. safety rulings to force an NPC employee into escorting them through a dangerous area while another took his mission chief role super seriously, clearly as a means to an ambitious end.

The OSR Panel on the Sunday was an interesting opportunity to talk about a game-style I love without being as devoted to the movement than other OSR fans might be. It also gave me the opportunity to plug my favourite OSR sandbox, the amazing Times that fry men's souls by Seann McAnally.

The vibe on the trade floor was also super pleasant, all booths were manned by self-employed people, no big corpo to be seen. Gave me the opportunity to discover the fantastic linocut art of Elisabeth Neveux. I bought a large print for my daughter's birthday. 

On the saturday evening, we went out to dinner with Eric Mushman, Sarah, mapmaker Jog Brogzin, Wythe Marschall of Stillfleet Studios and his wife, and Laurie O'Connel of Twelve Pins Press. Very cool conversation, although I often felt inadequate both in my knowledge of indie games and (more surprisingly) in the breadth of my science-fiction literacy.

I was a very reasonable attendee in that I only bought one game (a second-hand copy of Kobayashi's FLEAUX) and the print for my daughter and linocut bookmarks. I suspect Dragonmeet next month will be a much more dangerous proposition for my wallet...

All in all, I loved my time at Gaelcon and can only express my thanks and admiration to Rob Brennan and the incredible team at IGA that makes this event happen. While it's not particularly convenient or cheap for me to attend, I will seriously consider coming again!