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After spending over 8 hours playing the core special at Origins, I must state that this was simply the worst gaming experience in nearly 30 years of playing DnD. A combination of a poorly written final encounter (designed to challenge the big power gamers, without consideration for even above average combat effective players).
It was my son's first experience at Origins and he got to play with his father. We planned the trip for six months. We wanted to end LG on a high note. Instead, he acted one time (a bite from his animal companion) and I was able to shoot some mirror images with my bow (a arcane caster archer type).
The rest of the time, one player dominated with his uber character, with +40 initiative, d-dooring to attack and his bonded summoner Earth Elemental doing over 400-500 points a damage in the surprise round.
The final fight (without giving away much) was a nearly 3 hour situation, in which we did not act once. The bad guys acted and acted and acted. We stood there waiting for an action. Then I was able to D-door away nearly dead with my son and my character.
We traveled to the event and wanted to make sure to visit the dealer room before it closed. Due to the uber character, we were ahead of schedule. We told the DM that we wanted to go to the room. After never acting (except for one small attack roll) in 9 hours, we told them we were leaving the table before the vendor room closed.
During this time, the DM, who was friends with the uber character and one other, questioned everything we did in precasting (like the so broken spells like Deathward (A druid has that? she asked), Kuo-Toa Skin (how can a non-bright sands character have it?), but the bonded Summoner doing the mega damage when virtually unquestioned.
Not one time have a walked away before the end of a module but this was a disaster for a game experience for both my son and I.
Nearly three hours of watching the DM roll dispel checks and rolling saves against this and that, then realizing that they were ruling the spell wrong and doing too much damage, backing it out and so on.
Finally when the answer to the story was obvious, the uberplayer wanted to hit something and spent 30 minutes deciding what to do, when it was obvious. That was when we stated, we have to leave as we planned. The event was scheduled to 5:30, but we took only a 15 minute lunch and actually eat at the table. There was no real break. I understand that the mods were to run over, but honestly keep it to the time limit. 9 hours is more than enough time.
The DM actually took the time to write down every spell they dispelled on 6 15th level characters, mostly casters. It was mindnumbing boring experience and after not acting all day it was simply the worst experience I have ever had at a game table.
My wife attended to help my son, so that he was not an impediment to the game. The game should be encouraging the youth to play. Given he basically only attacked once in 7 encounters and set quietly for the nine hours, well you get the picture.
I was asked by the uber player and the DM, "Are you having fun?" what are you to say, how could anyone have fun when you don't act. I even died once (no big deal) without even drawing a weapon or moving in the surprise round. I made both saves btw and still died in the surprise round.
Bad module showing the worst of the system combined with a DM that actually stated at the beginning how they needed to kill my son's animal companion. (hey kill the tiger while the Uber Bonded Summoner Earth Elemental is playing by himself). Of course the Uber character (who was a nice guy btw) had a cohort, so three characters playing by themselves.

What a horrible end to LG for myself and my son. I should have taken him to KeoCon which was a blast,well run, very dangerous (actually more than this) and everyone was involved.

I'm very sorry to hear about your experience. It sounds like a poor judge caused it more than anything else. Players like that are all over the place and it is the judge's responsibility to keep them under control so as to ensure the fun of the other players at the table.

I can understand the final encounter being challenging, perhaps even a bit unfair (there are far too many players that want to be challenged in their final LG encounter ever), but I can't comment on it until I have a chance to play it.

For the life of me, I cannot fathom how a DM could run that last encounter without their head exploding or overheating. I followed the NPC tactics and they cast something in the vicinity of 120 spell levels before the PCs even got to act.

It took twenty minutes to resolve the first spell (at APL 16).

...but then again, I've never been the 'math' type of DM...

Joe

Make sure you address your comments to the CONVENTION ORGANISER -including the name of the GM. From what I've seen and heard, they don't get a lot of feedback.

I can't comment on the module but I will say that if the Bonded Summoner was a friend, the GM probably already know how that character worked so he wouldn't need to question it.

I had fun in the finale. It was epic. It was hard. We didn't (quite) win the day. But our APL 16 table made it through the whole thing without a perma-death.

Our DM was Lynn Register. His wife, Laura, took the time to design and build some really fun props and figures for the game. Lynn took the time to prepare for the adventure so that it went smoothly, even through the parts (like those 120+ spell levels before we could act) that were hard to do.

I'm sorry you had such a bad time. Given the plot line and the challenges in the module, I can understand why you feel that way. But not everyone was displeased.

I found it to be a fitting, epic conclusion to a long story arc. It was tough. But we were tougher.