[MR] Gulf Wars - A 'Review' by a first time attendee.

[Siegfried]

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Gulf Wars - A 'Review' by a first time attendee.

   I just got back from attending my first Gulf Wars.  I've heard all
the rants and raves about how great this event is, and therefore decided
to attend this year for the first time, after about 10 years (at least)
of 'wanting to attend', but just not getting around to it.

  For those that don't know me (or know me well enough), I'm a target
archer, A&S junkie, combat archer, heavy fighter ... roughly in that
order.  I've been in the SCA for nigh 12 years now and been to Pennsic
12 times, 10 of those times, for the full 2 weeks.  And I attended the
event with my lady (also target archer & A&S junkie), and my 2 year old
son (junk food junkie).  We had approximately a 15 hour drive to get
there, not counting numerous stops (with a 2 year old).

  In general, I'm sad to say that Gulf Wars just didn't seem to meet my
expectations, nor the hype that was being based around it.  Let's talk
about a number of points.

  First of all, was a general lack of planning.  Actually, let me change
that, there was plenty of planning, there was even a nice book that
tried to rival the Pennsic Book.  However, you might as well throw it
away, since very few things were done exactly as what was in the book.
Battle scenarios were changed, timing of various activities were
changed, prices for food were different, etc.  Without going into
details, I was just really surprised that it didn't have the 'Book is
Law' attitude that Pennsic does.  On top of that, there wasn't a daily
paper, nor 'daily announcements', to let everyone know about these changes.

  This especially fed into the battle scenarios, where combat archery
was removed from one battle, Siege was essentially removed from all
battles except for the last one, victory conditions at the end of a
battle were changed, etc.  Also, while Pennsic is often known for it's
hurry up and wait attitude, Gulf Wars seemed worse.  It is a small site,
and small event, giving an impression that things should happen more on
time.  However instead we seemed to wait long times for the battles to
begin (especially the one where we had a horse demonstration put on
beforehand, which granted, was neat ... but did the entire bulk of the
army need to be on the field in armor for that to happen?)

  The marshalling also seemed a bit 'lax', causing issues such as 'lay
on' always catching people off guard, causing people to not have their
helms on, or no one really knowing what the res point was, for res battles.

  As far as the battles themselves went, well, again, I was a bit
underwhelmed.  Now granted, they were nice, big battles, lots of
fighters.  However, you see, I had heard of the 'great Gulf Wars fort'.
  Which when seen after the Pennsic fort, kinda pales in comparison.
It's at a much smaller scale. (even if it does have better 'sides').  I
had also heard of the 'fun stuff', like foam anvils, war elephants, etc.
 None of that existed.

  I had been told about how there was so much combat archery, and how
the skys darkened with all the bolts and arrows.  Yes, there was alot of
combat archery; however, there wasn't 'massive amounts', at least,
compared to recent Pennsics.  Yes, there was always a combat archer on
the other side of me, sometimes 2 or 3 ... but that is always the case
at Pennsic as well.  It was impressive seeing the huge piles of ammo at
the end of the ravine battle; however, that seemed more due to unlimited
ammo, and people showing up with hundreds upon hundreds of ammo each ...
not there being a much larger percentage of archers, and again, if there
was, it wasn't significantly so, to the point that I 'felt it'.

  I had also been told of how much siege there was, again 'darkening the
skys' analogies had been used.  Instead, I saw FAR LESS than at Pennsic.
 Not only was siege really only allowed in 1 battle, instead of many
that it's allowed at Pennsic, but there were only a few engines ... In
fact, I think I saw 1 onager, 1 treb, and 2 ballista.  At Pennsic there
are dozens of engines in use, and it grows each year.

  So, for now, I've been talking about the fighting aspects ... but I
wanted to touch on the other aspects as well.  The shopping, was great
... really ... and the food excellent.  Those I cannot fault.  However,
the A&S class schedule was lacking in breadth and quantity.  The target
archery range was very limited in it's capacity, and it's variety.  (It
also was being run very strict, not allowing the traditional
before/after shooting that Pennsic does).

  And that seemed to also be the end of it, there was none of the rest
of what seems to make 'Pennsic' so great ... performing arts, so many
activities going on at all parts of the day and night, etc.  A good
indication of this, was that My Lady found herself without much to do,
at all.  Very little of the A&S schedule intrigued her (and the few
classes that did, of course, happened to conflict with battles) ...
after spending a few hours on the archery range, she had experienced
most of what she would have wanted to there.  And that was it.  In fact,
had there not been the battles for me to fight in, I would have found
myself in a similar situation.

  In general, for an event that has been hyped to us as the 'must go to
event!'  'Better than Pennsic!'  and so on ... we found it to be
slightly lacking.  For an event in it's 16th year, we expected it to be
run more professionally, more organized, more defined and planned out.
Less 'fly-by-wire'.  I think someone really summarized it well for me.
A fellow Atlantian (also first time) was walking around the site and
talking to 'locals', and they were all talking about 'Gulf Wars' as an
'event', not a war.  Saying how it was a great 'event', and how they
liked the 'event'.  They didn't talk about it as a war, and were
constantly surprised when you mentioned you weren't from Glenn Abhan,
Trimaris, or Meridies.  Basically, in the locals mind, this is what
'Kingdom Crusades' is to Atlantians.

  Basically in the end, it was a fine event; however, I'm not sure it's
worth a 15 hour drive to get there.  If it was 5 hours or less away, and
I had the vacation, I'd go every year, but at 15 hours, it's a huge
commitment without as much 'payback' as I would like.

  It did really do one thing for my wife and I.  It really made us
realize how special Pennsic is.  And how amazing it is and how well it
runs given how large it is.  We realize we've taken it a bit for granted
given that we've always lived within 5 hours drive of it.  And by going
to Gulf Wars, it has re-invigorated our love of Pennsic.

  I may do Gulf Wars again in the future, but if so, probably solo,
planning on being a 'fighter-only' at the event, since it seems VERY
geared towards the fighters (and fighters that don't have any other
schedule commitments, besides fighting)

In service,
Siegfried
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