Some 600 war games enthusiasts from all over the world will gather at University College Cork next month for the eight Warpcon gathering, hosted by UCC students on the Western Road campus. Warpcon stands for the Wargaming and Role-playing Society in the college - it's a serious business.
The event will take place on the weekend of January 23rd to January 25th next. Participants will be involved in some 15 separate roleplaying events, using board games to re-stage classic conflicts.
For some of the luckier ones, the event will present the opportunity to attend a similar convention in Los Angeles next summer, where prize money of up to $25,000 (£17,200) will be on offer.
The Irish approach to this activity, at the moment, is an amateur one. But in America, where they take such things much more to heart, they have professional enthusiasts. So, after the Cork games are over, the Irish amateurs who qualify will find themselves pitting their wits against the big boys.
One of the activities involves a player reading from a story - be it fantasy or science fiction. The five or six opposing players must then ad-lib the characters as they are revealed by the narrator. And, says Mr Gordon O'Keeffe, one of the Warpcon organisers, "there will be continuous social events, including costume competitions and pub quizzes". It all sounds like fun. No doubt about it, the student life is a hard one.