On the week-end of August 23-25, 2002, the twenty-second Dragonflight convention was held in Seattle on the Seattle University campus. Dragonflight is a multi-genre gaming convention, with RPG's, card games, board games, miniatures, and networked computer games.

For the past several years, the main facility for Dragonflight was Bellermine Hall on the SU campus. This year, however, the core of the con was moved to Campion Hall due to the renovation of Bellermine. This did not affect the miniatures gaming events, which have been housed in the Lemieux Library since 1996 (approximately). There was a price for this change, especially for the mini gamers, however. Instead of an easy walk uphill from Bellermine to Lemieux, one now had to cross Cherry St. to go between Campion and Lemieux. Fortunately, there is a well-lit cross walk and a brand-new sky walk for people to use while transiting from building to building. It was just a little more inconvenient.

Showing up on Friday afternoon ' I breezed through registration, having paid for this convention at the previous one. (Dragonflight gives a good discount if you cough up money for the next con at the current one.) My game was not until 7pm, so I took a brief tour of the facility. RPG's are held in the upper floors of the building, so I did not go up there. But, the board and card games were on the main floor, along with the dealers.

Even on Friday, there was a lot of activity. (I heard from one of the con staff that there were 300 preregistered attendees for the con, a Dragonflight record.) About 6 dealers were at the con, with Game Wizard, American Eagles- Seattle, and Gary's Games being the most notable. Unfortunately, there was not a single historical mini for sale as far as I was able to determine.

Crossing over to Lemieux, the miniatures gaming area was almost dead. There were some people in the process of bringing in their stuff (including me), but nothing was scheduled until 7pm (my game). An acquaintance of mine, Mike O'Hare from the other side of the Sound, was setting up a pick-up game of Command Decision, so I took his invite and jumped in. We (the US side) were to take three objectives: a bridge on the left side of the table; a town in the center; and a hill overlooking the entire battle area on our right. The Germans were using hidden setup so their units were not on the table (yet).

The thrust on the hill on our right went off without a hitch, encountering only minor resistance. The same could not be said of the push towards the town. Two companies of Shermans and a company of infantry raced toward the town, only to find German infantry and two platoons of Jagdpanthers waiting for us (surprise!!).

The town was taken with high casualties only with the timely intervention of flanking units from the assault on the hill, catching the Germans in a crossfire. At about this time, I had to excuse myself from the game to set up my own. (The US forces managed to stave off counterattacks and hold these two objectives).

I ran a game of ACW naval using 1/600 scale ships and the new Iron & Fire rules. I am lucky that I decided to bring a lot of ships, because 15 players showed up to play it. Wow, talk about a crazy and confused melee of ships; this was it in spades. My collection of ACW naval only covers the ships that were on the Mississippi River early in the war, so the ships were getting punished from the start. Basically, the battle converged on a single spot on the table, only about 10 inches in radius, with most ships either ramming their opposite numbers or being rammed. It reminded me of a huge multi- vehicle accident on an interstate. More Union ships were in a sinking state by the end of four hours, so the Confederates were declared the victors.

On Saturday, there were a few more miniatures events, but the majority of the tables in the minis area were taken by the Warhammer 40K tournament. This event dominated the Saturday schedule, with only a handful of other events and only two historical events - a SYW scenario and another ACW naval game. I spent most of Saturday kibitzing and trying to find the president of a certain northwest historical miniature gaming society, who was supposed to be there that day. The highlight of Saturday was going out to eat at the Kokeb Restaurant (926 12 th Street, just north of Bellermine Hall). This is an Ethiopian place. If you have never tried Ethiopian food, do so. It is a treat to actually be expected to eat with your fingers (no silverware at the tables), and not too expensive. And the beer was good, too.

There was only one event that was even worth mentioning on Sunday the auction. Dragonflight's auction is renowned for its eclectic selection of items - minis, board games, computer games, etc. Many of these are in very good shape. And there are many traditions of Dragonflight that are associated with the auction - the yearly Family Feud game auction, where the audience splits into two sides and pools their change (yes, change - coinage only) together in an attempt to outbid the other side, and the annual Dallas RPG game auction, where the winner of this auction must bring the game back to be auctioned off again in subsequent Dragonflights. Sound silly? Maybe, but think about this - the Family Feud game 'bidding war' alone brought in over $100 directly to Dragonflight's coffers. This year, I bought some items that I have been wanting for some time: a copy of Avalon Hill's board game Trireme, in nearly perfect shape, for only $11, and 1 each of the Irregular Miniatures boxed miniatures rules, one for ancients and the other for Napoleonics (these are the ones where the rules are on 3"x 5" cards) for $6 total.

Although I enjoyed myself at Dragonflight this year, there were some sore spots. The miniatures gaming, quite frankly, was non-existent. 3 historical events for the entire week-end, and maybe 3 times that total, does not a convention make in my opinion.

I'm not certain about why this is, but it is a very poor showing. Second is price. I pre-paid $25 to get into this year's Dragonflight at last year's convention. It was $40 at the door, and these prices did not include parking or t-shirts or any sort of freebies. At this year's convention, the price for the 2003 Dragonflight was $35, which should make the at-the-door price at least $50, again sans freebies. I do not pretend to know anything about Dragonflight's monetary situation, but these prices are just too high for me to contemplate.

I can not whole-heartedly recommend Dragonflight to the typical NHMGS member. If you are into board games or RPGs, then it should be worth your time and money. If you are into minis, especially historical, it might be better for you to save your money for Breakthrough.

More info on Dragonflight can be found at their web site at: www.dragonflight.org.