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Unpublished Writings
I also like to write. I used to be the editor of HMG Magazine until it was strangled by a lack of advertising money. So here for the first time are the pieces I had written for HMG issue 12 which was supposed to be published in the fall of 2008.
Unpublished Editorial for Issue 12
I’ve been having bouts of gamer nostalgia lately. Pining for the games of my youth when everything was new, exciting and a dozen Aifix Cuirassiers became Ney’s cavalry divisions sweeping over the ridge at Waterloo. Sometime back in Grade 7 or 8 I discovered Peter Young’s book The Wargame (1972) in the school library. This slim volume gave brief descriptions of some of the great battles of history from Thermopylae to El Alamein. But the really exciting bit was all the pictures were photographs of wargames! One page at the back gave a brief description of what wargames rules were all about and that was enough to set me off writing my own.
A slightly older friend was quite derisive. He had superior knowledge, being a regular traveler to the Squadron Shop in Detroit. He had seen some fellows playing a REAL wargame. You couldn’t just make up your own rules, you needed proper lead figures, hex-mapped playing mats and lots of complicated charts and I would probably end up being an embarrassment. I probably am. But I’m not friends with that fellow anymore, so who cares?
Fortunately, my local public library had several of Donald Featherstone’s seminal books in their collection and I started picking up the occasional issue of Wargamer’s Digest along with the Rocco Minitanks and Airfix troops. Soon my unpainted Airfix Napoleoics were getting glued onto stands cut out from old cereal boxes and were marching across the dinner table. Mom used a green check vinyl cloth for everyday and I thought this was just great. Dad used his jigsaw to cut out some plywood hill contours for me and we painted them a rather glossy dark green. A friend has since beveled the edges for me, and they’ve had a new coat of matte khaki paint, but I still use those plywood hill sections. I saved my pennies and sent away for TSR’s Tricolor rules as advertised in the middle pages of Wargamer’s Digest. So with half a dozen wooden hill contours, about 8 trees and 5 hand-made paper houses I was having a blast, making things up as I went along. Some snapshots I took in my youthful vanity of those early games don’t look nearly as good as they do in my memories!
I think many other gamers out there are also going through a nostalgia phase as well. I’ve been reading a lot about “Old School” gaming. When I think "Old School" I can't stop thinking of crappy figures on plain unflocked bases fighting over painted plywood terrain while using really cumbersome, make your eyes bleed sorts of rules.
Last summer a friend was clearing out his gaming stuff and gave me his tattered copy of The Wargame. Oh, rapturous joy! It spent several nights by my bedside as I just looked at the pictures again. The mass effect of the glossy painted, undetailed figures on plain card bases, maneuvering over some stunning terrain is still really quite splendid. I have to wonder about the weight of all that plaster and sand however. I also recently acquired a copy of Bruce Quarrie’s Napoleon’s Campaigns in Miniature (1977). More gloss coated figures on unflocked bases fighting to rules that require an awful lot of math.
Yet, I don't see anyone hankering after the old loads of charts 70s style games.
Some players do advocate gloss coating just for the nostalgic look of them. The ‘three foot’ rule for figure details is still pretty good advice. But I’ve also seen some avowedly “Old School” games that featured extremely nice figures and terrain. A year or two ago at Hotlead a fellow put on a Waterloo refight. 25mm figures, many with a basic, yet tidy paint job. Fairly simple rules (Shako I think). Nice terrain though and the over all effect was quite exceptional. I thought to myself “This is the game I wanted when I was 14.”
Maybe the Old School thing is more nostalgia and wishing for the innocence of youth when everything was new and exciting? I see it as a 60 year old guy finally driving the sports car he wanted as a 20 year old. But usually he’s driving a new sports car, with all the modern amenities. Now we gamers when reaching older years can now finally get the armies we were trying to build when we were young, had no money and our painting skills weren't so good.
I don't know if I'm Old School or New School. Maybe I'm just in Detention.
Whichever way you game, Old or New, I hope it’s a good one!
The Editor Gets to Historicon (Finally!)
I was sitting in the living room with the family, and my wife and daughters were discussing underwear. Bras I think. I was glazing out and getting a far-away look.
“Uh oh! I think we’re disturbing dad.”
“That’s OK honey. Soon I’ll be off for 5 days of men, miniatures and mayhem. It could only be better if I had sausages at every meal.”
Yes, at long last. Historicon was coming.
I had been hearing about Historicon for years. How great it is. How all the other conventions really pale in comparison and only total losers like myself would get excited about going to regional conventions. But I’d never been able to get there. Bad time of year. Not enough vacation time or money left over. No one in my area was able to go to share expenses with. Fortunately this past summer was different. All the elements aligned fortuitously to get me in the back of a van with 5 other friends for 4 days of shopping, rolling dice, eating badly and having so much fun your head explodes! Now for anyone living under a rock, or in Europe, Historicon is the biggest historical wargaming convention in North America, with approximately 3000 attendees. Conventions with SF or Fantasy RPG focus like Gencon or Origins are much bigger (like 20-40,000 attendees!), but you miss out on all the cool historical minis in the sea of Klingon costumes, Dungeons & Dragons, collectible card games and Anime booths. Peter who is from the UK says Historicon rivals Salute, the big UK show. More games to play at H-con but at Salute you get the European manufacturers to shop from. So a bit of a trade off really.
We left Wednesday bright and early (we would have left earlier but Barry was working until 7AM and needed to get cleaned up), 6 of us packing into Peter's van and wondering where we were going to fit the inevitable purchases. I was teased for my 'ludicrously' large suitcase, but I remembered buying only three books at Fall-in last fall and having trouble fitting them in my bag. I knew I'd be getting more this year and really, preparedness is everything.
Between my excitement, the usual convention upset and Patrick's snoring I slept horribly all weekend. Waking up around 4-4:30 AM and then lying in bed until about 6 before I'd go shower, which would get Pat and Barry up. So the three of us were always all dressed and showered, sitting around discussing the previous day's events or plans for the coming day by about 6:30 or so. Around 7 we'd go knock on the other door and be met by one of them in a state of sleepy disarray uttering curses. Once everyone was awake and ready we’d hit the breakfast buffet. Money saved not buying food was more money I had for toys, so I loaded up on enough greasy protein to keep me going until dinner time.
Thursday things didn't open until noon, so the morning was spent milling about, talking to people and finding out where games were going to be etc. About 11:30 we went out to the dealer hall. Big line up. We see our friend Walter sitting calmly in the shade of the hotel. "Don't line up. Wait until about 12:05 and you can walk right in"
"Tell us more O sage one."
So we spent half an hour sitting at the Master's feet getting advice on handling the dealer's area (which can be pretty overwhelming to the novice- I think I only did as well because I had been familiarized with a lot of it at Fall-In). I’m pretty sure my friend Mike spent a few hours running about in an excited daze.
When you walk in the Hall you come in on a mezzanine level and you can see the whole dealer area laid out before you. You see a glow. You hear heavenly choirs. You want to dive over the balcony. Don't, no one will catch you. It's better to take the stairs.
Of course one sees lots and lots of things one needs and wants at these events. The lust levels were built up to levels I hadn’t experienced in a long time. I’m talking miniature lust here, although the cute blonde at the Opsrey booth did make me feel all wiggly. Wanted some of the Pontoonier British colonial figures. Wanted some Miniature Building Authority buildings. Wanted the new Peter Pig Battles in the Age of War for Samurai (I don’t own any Samurai). Wanted Shako 2 (I don’t own any Napoleonics either). Wanted Bill Protz's and Jim Purky's new SYW rules Battles of the Ancien Regime (at least I have some SYW Prussians). Castaway Arts was there too. Had a nice chat with Gerry Webb and he tried to sell me a unit of Bengal Lancers, but at $70 that was too dear. Very nice lancers though. Damn layoff. I also had to keep reminding myself that I'd just gotten a bunch of stuff from RAFM via Dan, a unit of the Perry's Blackwatch from Peter's trip to Salute and we'd just gotten the latest Hotlead Old Glory order, so I had lots to paint really. I didn't need anymore. Really. So I tried to concentrate on neat stuff that would be a pain to mail order or I wouldn't be able to get up here or through Old Glory. I still think I deserve a medal for showing Heroic Restraint though.
With that in mind I did splash out and get myself The Campaign in Tirah 1897-1898 by Col HD Hutchinson. It's one of George Nafziger's reprints of old primary source books. Pretty cool. If you want to know the name of the veterinary officer for the 3rd brigade of the Rawalpindi Reserve Column, I can look it up. I also got myself some other little bits and bobs, like Hindi dice and some guns for my nascent Boer Commando. I was pondering my last purchase and debating between the various rule books and some buildings. Don gave me more sage advice “Don’t spend money on rules you’ll never play. Terrain is always useful and a good investment.” So I went over to 19th century Miniatures and bought three of the lovely prepainted Landmark 15mm Normandy buildings for WW2. I got myself the Cafe, the Grandcamp house and Breville house. Someday I’ll get my 15mm Canadian force ready for refighting the Normandy battles.
I didn’t spend as much time in the flea market as my friends did. I don’t have the patience for rummaging through stuff and braving the heavy crowds that they do. But Mike B. found some OG dead Indian troops for me. I wasn't as excited as he'd hoped but after closer inspection at home I’m quite pleased. Peter found a pair of Foundry Indian officers which will come in quite handy since my Madras Pioneers don't have any IOs presently and I picked up a broken 1/72 scale M155 SPG for a buck to turn it into a VSF steam tank. Saw lots of junk. Saw lots of interesting things if I had money to burn and saw a lot of high priced prepainted figs.
The main excitement for me was the gaming. I like to go to conventions to try new rules or play new periods, or even satisfy gaming urges that my group doesn’t want to play. I managed to play my brains out I think. Got into four games over 2 and a half days.
Thursday night I was playing the Battle of Yatay 1865 using a regimental variant of Fire and Fury GMed by Rick Hasenhauer himself. The battle was an action in the War of the Triple Alliance in South America in the 1860s. I was Duarte, the Commandante of the Paraguayan Advance Guard, which historically was left isolated to engage the Triple Alliance (Brazil, Argentina and Uraguay) Main Force suffering 100% casualties. In the game I was actually reinforced by my Main Force who came in on the enemy right while I held them up in some entrenchments. But there were too many and eventually they turned my flank and bundled me out with heavy losses (but not 100%). I had no artillery and smooth bore muskets against rifled muskets and artillery. But I could 'charge with machismo'... I got bragging rights for holding them off for a long time and having troops left to retreat with, so I died gloriously.
Friday AM I got into a good old fashioned Sword and the Flame game using 25mm Ral Partha figs and some 'cheap and easy' terrain. I played the Pathans defending against the British who had to advance up a valley and attack our fort. My team had a couple of youngsters who we put in the middle blocking the pass and defending the fort while the other adult and I took the flanks to delay the Brits. No such luck. The Brits used their CAVALRY to cap the heights. Granted Indian cavalry could and did maneuver through some awful terrain that would make European cavalry turn around and go home, but it seemed like the Bengal lancers were flying! Of course when the fellow rolls three 6s for his movement, it’s hard to argue. We put one of our guns on top of the biggest hill to shoot down into the pass only to have it swarmed by British lancers. Sheesh. Fun game any way. And I swarmed the remains of the Bengal lancers with two warbands managing to kill the commander whom we called Gary Cooper. We lost our guns, lost the pass, lost 3/4 of our army, Gurkhas were milling about in uncomfortable places and a strong battery of screw guns were coming up, so it was time to retreat. But I killed Gary Cooper, so I died gloriously.
Friday evening I got into a second game. Cold Steel and Cannister GMed by the authors. It's a new set of rules that uses a 1:60 figure ratio, a gridded playing mat and lots of little counters and chits. Like a board game with minis. But it went pretty smoothly. Command and Control, moving and firing etc. was very easy to learn. It's hard to keep Napoleonics from getting overly complex but these guys seemed to have some pretty good mechanics. One nifty thing is little details like having your cavalry regiment in line or echelon of squadrons actually makes a (small) difference. But we lost that one too. Got bundled out of the village on our right, and pushed down the ridge, while on our left things were going even worse. I had a brigade of dragoons with no artillery support facing my friend Mike B who had a line of infantry squares opposite me. Time to go.
Saturday I finally managed to get into Battles in the Age of War; the demo of Peter Pig's new Samurai rules GMed by Martin Goddard (aka 'Peter Pig') himself. Nice toys. Nice looking table. Excellent GM and team. Rules were way cool. Lots of nifty pre-battle stuff to help generate the scenario, so you never have equal points armies just bashing heads. One side is always attacking and there are mechanisms to have units be delayed or even not show up. On my right flank some of my units never showed and the rest were delayed. That clan got annihilated leaving me with only a general who charged across the table to challenge the enemy Daimyo. Fought two duels with him before I lost my head (again). In the center and left we fought and died hard inflicting horrendous casualties but when it came to tallying up the Victory Points we had a defeat of record breaking proportions. So I died VERY gloriously in that one too. Are you seeing a theme here? I'm trying to talk up Samurai again with my local club, but I think I'm the only one interested so far.
After the Samurai game I finally hooked up with Don and Kathy for some hanging out and trading notes on how each other's convention had been Also managed to have a couple of good chats with Howard Whitehouse and Phil Viverito. The boys and I were all wearing our Hotlead shirts so we were generating some interest from gamers in the American border states. I was also passing out business cards trying to solicit articles for HMG and sell ads. This was also the first show where I felt the need to take a break and go for a swim. Peter, Patrick, Barry and I were standing about after lunch on Friday. We had all done the dealer area circuit a few times. No one had a game until 7. We were hot, tired and had sore feet. It wasn't fun anymore. So we got in line for our Saturday game tickets and then headed back to the pool (after stopping at Target so Patrick and I could get swim trunks) for a bit of a float and a cool off. Then we could take stock and plan our final purchases from the dealer's area on Saturday.
I saw lots of other very cool games with really gorgeous terrain. Jim Purky's 30mm big battalion SYW games were always on the top of my list for game selection but they were sold out very fast. There was a very nice Koreans vs. Japanese pirates game with 15mm figures and lots of little boats. Marines attacking a Pacific atoll, Victorian Science Fiction sky galleons over Mars, Civil War ironclads in multiple scales and because the theme this year was the Seven Year's War, loads of very nice SYW games set in both North America and Europe. One was on winter terrain with Courier du Bois and Fur Trappers vs. Indians. Everyone on snowshoes. One could almost see the frost. There was a 15mm North African desert game with so many clouds of dust you couldn't see what was going on. I could babble on like this for hours.
Sunday was the drive home. Left around 8:15 AM after another hearty breakfast and got home about 6:30 after a pretty good drive in mostly light traffic. After 5 days in pretty close quarters we're all still friends.
So great show, good friends, good times. Sounds like the slogan for a chain of roadhouses. I'll do it again next year if I can get the time off, but I’ve had to switch jobs and am back down to two weeks holidays again. So I’m glad I went when I did.
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