..so, any news / comments / reports for this event? Some interesting questions answered during the roundtable? Some comments about further development of the Board game series / LCG / Battle of the Westeros / Everything else related to Martin's saga?

Not a peep about anything game-wise. Reading by Martin in the morning. Martin Q&A right afterwards. Book signing a couple hours later. Wild cards seminar with Snodgrass and Martin (to which was annoying that such has to be held where it was. If it had nothing to do with AGoT, then people didnt care and continued to be loud. I am annoyed by this because while they paid to be there, so did I.) then a bit later was the HBO seminar where Martin couldn't reveal a whole lot for obvious reasons. He basically all but said at the beginning that he had nothing of import to impart regarding the HBO series.

Game space was worse than arkham nights since suite 5 was not in use. Big drawback. Games had to stop when the HBO seminar was taking place, yet when Snodgrass and Martin talk about wild cards its noisy gaming as usual.

This is the way I see it:

The event was an overall success, but the lack of space killed it for me. If FFG continues to use the other half of the event center as office space then it is just a glorified game shop. Plan and simple.

As a game shop its great and they have broadened their stock to include a myriad of games by vastly different companies which in some instances are their direct competitors. Customer service is top notch as usual from all of the staff. Great quality products in a clean environment. But it no longer continues to be an "event center".

Jaffer warned in the confirmation email that it would be a light day of gaming due to so much GRRM stuff going on. Understandable since there isnt any space for both gaming and seminars without one disturbing the other.

I suppose I am being overly critical, but I just find it odd that there was an excuse made regarding the designers possibly not being able to make it for their seminars due to the 8" dump of snow we got. All I'm saying is that Katja and I made it there just fine from 40 miles away in the same weather... There arent any mountain passes that close traffic in this flatland.

Final Grade C+. Has LOTS of room for improvement, but was otherwise great.

While I agree that space seemed hard to come by, I thought the organization level was far superior to Arkham Nights. The ticket system they used to reserve spots in games, while not completely flawless, did seem to reduce the chaos quite a bit. And they worked hard to make sure that anybody who had a ticket had a game to play even when the wheels occasionally came off. And not having any "official" games going during the seminars was nice.

As for the HBO seminar, there were two things I took away from it. I imagine most people have probably expected this already, but he did a good job at managing expectations regarding the budget. "You won't see the battle of Pelennor Fields." Basically he confirmed that they just can't afford to shoot large scale battle scenes. The show is going to be about the characters. And I'm fine with that. The second thing was him referencing Tom Bombadil and the Bombadillos. He didn't give any detail, but he basically gave me the impression that there's going to be at least one thing that will be omitted from the story that will get diehards just as riled up as LOTR nuts were at the exclusion of Bombadil. We'll have to wait and see on that, I guess.

I give the event a solid B. I think it's logistically better than Arkham, but limited by space. It's a wash. I didn't think either event was better or worse than the other. Happy with them both.

Oh, the gift bag was better at DoIaF. Love the gift bag.

I thought the gift bag was excellent as well.

As a newcomer to both the book series and the games, I thought the event was pretty good. Not having cable, I didn't care much about the HBO series (I'm sure I'll watch it eventually, but it's not a priority). The space seemed about right - it was crowded at times, but I didn't have to throw any elbows or anything to move around. I was mostly interested in the gaming side of the house, and I thought that went well; my wife & I got to play the LCG with some new people, and we were able to try the AGoT board game and two other games.

Some coffee/tea/hot chocolate would have been nice, given the weather, and the no food/no drink policy is killer ($2 for a 20oz bottle of pop!). Still, we both had a great time, and will be gaming at the event center in the future.

ETA: Also, props to the event center staff - they were all super helpful and very friendly. Their courtesy really set the tone for the whole thing and I really appreciated it.

I thought that the event was awesome. Playing in a great card tournament, meeting GRRM, getting a big bag of goodies (the house cards and GRRM card are sweet), being registered for give-aways, getting to meet game developers, and being able to attend various game tutorials all for $25! Plus, the space is clean and there is some open air space which is really nice. And, on top of that, there was ample parking - great location! Many game shops feel crowded, hot, stagnant, and sort of musty. The FFG Event Center is superb.

I will be back for sure. Another epic win for FF.