Meeting the public

 Another year has flown by and once again the club are putting on their annual show. This Saturday the 6th we will once again be running the Colours Wargame show at Newbury Racecourse. There is little left for me to say about the show that I have not said over the last couple of years on my blog. It is a great day out and I really enjoy myself working on the Bring and Buy stall, meeting the punters and catching up with regular and new traders later on in the day. This year we are going to be jam packed with no spare trader or demo game space, filling all three floors of the racecourse pavilion. 

A couple of our club had a bit of a practise chatting to the public a couple of weeks ago now at the Corn Exchange in Newbury. This is the second year they have put on a geeky gaming day, kind of like a mini show with a couple of traders, D&D sessions and model painting. We were invited to come down again and put on a large Warhammer demo game and without blowing our own trumpets, I think we had a great looking table. 

Here is a photo dump of some shots from the day.

The battle was the siege of an Empire town by a large force of Orcs and Goblins. The Greenskins outnumbered the Empire, but still struggled to breach the walls. We were happy to chat to punters and let them join in with some dice rolling, so the game was not running at any particular speed. It was a fun day though and we happily offered advice to peeps on how to get into wargaming (or advised parents on how to save money when their children were already super enthusiastic!)

I think hobbyists are at their happiest when sharing knowledge, even better when the recipients are actually after that knowledge. I really enjoy seeing the smiles on peoples faces when they explore a hobby, whether it is wargaming, at a Wool show or collecting football stickers. It comes as no surprise to me that people say having a hobby is good for your mental health and I think the world is a better place if people go to these events and share their enthusiasm. True the enthusiasm does mean some of us get a little too excited and we got hot and bothered, but if we all put on plenty of deodorant and make sure not to swing our backpacks into other peoples faces I am sure we can all have a great time at shows, cons and events.

Hope to see you there, if you do come, pop upstairs and say hello!

And its all over for another year

 

Saturday the 14^th of September saw this years Colours Wargames show hosted by Newbury and Reading Wargames Society. This being the club’s 50^th year we wanted to put on a great show. The club are not specifically a historical society as we have had to change with the times to keep up membership. Three floors were taken up at Newbury’s racecourse main grandstand, two floors crammed with traders and a third floor full of excellent demonstrations of recreations of battles from history in various scales. Battles included Salamanca in 28mm, Abbeyville in 3mm (a crazy scale if you ask me) and the Battle of Downham Station pitting the Prussian ArmyKorp against the home Brits. The overall winner of best in show however went to Magrathea group and their Burrows & Badgers game, Siege of Lunedin.  The Leggatts, father and son, came second with Salamanca.

Attendance numbers were significantly up from last year, to where finding a space to park a car nearly became an issue. The club have been making a pointed effort to make sure the day has something for everyone, including a board game café where families can sit for a spell and maybe build railways across Europe. This was a brand new idea last year which I admit was under used in its first year, but this year it was super popular. In this authors opinion I think clubs need to start thinking about the changing trends in the hobby. Yes it would be great to have a show that was entirely focused to just historical gaming, but I think it would be tricky these days to maintain that. If we want enough people to come and support the show, things like the board games café can encourage a wider demographic to attend, we can then show them the virtues of the more traditional tables and keep the hobby going. It isn't just wargaming, a lot of hobbies are in danger of ageing out and not appealing to younger people. I'm not saying we have a bank of XBoxes and Nintendos set up at the show, but a bit of sci fi and fantasy at the show won't do any of us Grognards any harm. The weather was on our side for the day, sunny but not too hot. Feedback from traders and attendees alike was mostly positive with everyone seeming to have a great day. 

Traders of note included Perry Miniatures, Empress Miniatures and Warlord Games. Plenty of choice for someone to obtain some brave redcoats in whatever scale your eyes will allow you to paint them in. David Lanchester books also had the largest selection of military history books you will see anywhere. (Apart from maybe in the private collections of some of you dear readers.) We had a couple of new traders as well, one of my favourites being Beowulf Miniatures. I grabbed one of their wizards towers which will look great on a Mordheim or Oldhammer table. I did manage to grab a couple of other purchases, some Lord of the Rings models for a recreation of Weathertop and some very old school Space Orks that I am looking forward to getting some paint on soon. (Once they are out of their strip bath.)

This author spent most of the day on the Bring and Buy stall, so I did not have a huge amount of time to wander the show, what I did see looked brilliant, and I did get some time away to chat with some friends (including one that came all the way from Norway!) and I also managed to go and play a game with Mrs Lead and the youngest offspring. We had a great time playing a card game called Splendor with a fellow club member and his son. It was a great game that was just complicated enough, but the boys picked it up very quickly. I have orders to add a copy to our wish list for home.

A big shout out goes to the other club members who all gave up their time the day before helping set up and on the day. Some of them have been doing this a lot longer than I have and a lot of work goes on behind the scenes beforehand as well by a few hard working individuals. Shows like this and many others keep the hobby going and allow thousands of hobbyists to have a day out and get a proper close up look at lots of cool toys. Ordering on the internet may be convenient, but nothing beats the fun of getting your loot in person.

 

Overall then, an awesome day was had by all. There is probably one or two people who weren't happy, but you can't please everyone. Now we all just need to find somewhere to stash all our new toys.

Nb. Grumpy comments will be ignored and definitely not published. Go write your own blog.

Getting ready to fly the Colours

 Boy did that summer fly by. Lots of games played at the club over the weeks, lots of Old World Warhammer. (My Orcs and Goblins army is pretty fun, for some reason whenever I successfully cast any spell it always seems to backfire on me). I still have problems dealing with pesky flying models, although my last game, my Doom Diver was man of the match, killing an Orc War boss on Wyvern in two turns of firing, so sometimes the plan works.

The army is growing and growing.

My character riding a giant squig (or rather riding in) isn't really effective in the game, so I have started using the model as a Mangler Squig instead, much more effective. I have been watching various YouTube videos on converting/sculpting your own crazy creature models, so I might have a go at making a bigger squig too.

Painting wise, I have had a rest from my own models. I did do a commission job of some Skaven for a Mordheim gang. |These are 3D printed models and so quite delicate. Combined with the delicate design of some of them, I spent the entire time when painting, paranoid something was going to snap. Luckily they all stayed in one piece and the customer was super happy with the final result.

Next up for a club night, my copy of Worms the board game from Kickstarter finally arrived. I am very excited to play this. The Collectors edition can have up to six players, so it is a great game for our club to play. The rules are pretty straightforward and seem pretty fun. My only slight bugbear is one of the rules involves flipping a coin for a 50/50 result. I have found in other games that there can be an issue with this kind of rule. Some people struggle flipping a coin (especially younger players) or there can be accusations of coins not being "flipped properly". I think it is easier just to replace with a D6 roll, 1-3 or 4-6 for either result. This edition does come with a nice heavy metal coin rather than the cardboard one the basic edition comes with, but I think I'd rather go with the dice. 

The included models are great though. With lots of character and variety, the weapons they are armed with have no game effect, weapons are chosen by cards, but they do look cool.

I think they definitely need some paint, worms definitely have to be peachy, not grey. 

Talking of club business, we have our annual show coming up this month. This is always a welcome day to counter the sadness of the end of the summer hols. Saturday the 14th of September is Newbury and Reading wargames Colours show at the Newbury Racecourse. I shall hopefully be helping out on the Bring and Buy stall again this year, it gives me a great chance to chat to lots of punters and see lots of cool models. I will also be able to catch up with some wargamer friends I don't see regularly enough too. Repeat readers will know that I like to peruse the web pages of some of the traders in advance to see if there is anything I might seek out. I have not had the chance to go through them all yet but some have caught my eye.

Beowulf miniatures look cool, they have some nice looking "Blood Ball" miniatures. (No prizes for guessing what game those models could proxy in to.) The Fiends of Chaos team look particularly cool. Black Scorpion always have beautiful sculpts (I have most of their Tombstone range) their new Foot Knights look awesome. Rok minis seem to be growing their range every year. They now have a five army battle set that looks cool. If you are really feeling flush they can include a giant dwarven fortress in the same scale that looks awesome. For those of you that wish to peruse the web pages like myself I have made a handy list of hyperlinks for you to use below. Full disclosure I cannot be held responsible that they are the correct link, or that they are secure for purchases. These are just the links I found with my google fu skills. A couple of the traders I could not immediately find a site for, so left them out. Nevertheless I hope this list helps you out. If you are coming to the show, please feel free to come say hi.

https://www.1-72.co.uk/

https://www.abcbrushes.com/ 

https://anschlusswargames.com/

https://www.athenaminiatures.co.uk/

https://www.baccus6mm.com/

https://www.battlezone-miniatures.co.uk/

https://www.beowulfminiatures.com/ 

https://www.blackscorpionminiatures.com/

https://blotz.co.uk/

https://brigademodels.co.uk/

https://www.charliefoxtrotmodels.com/

https://crooked-dice.co.uk/

https://www.culverin-models.co.uk/ 

https://www.davidlanchestermilitarybooks.co.uk/

https://www.debrisofwar.com/store/

https://www.deepcutstudio.com/

https://www.disainstudio.com/

https://www.forgedinbattle.com/

https://eaglefigures.co.uk/

https://www.empressminiatures.com/

https://entoyment.co.uk/

https://www.essexminiatures.co.uk/

https://www.greatescapegames.co.uk/

http://www.gringo40s.com/

https://www.grippingbeast.co.uk/

https://www.grubbytanks.com/

https://headbunny.games/

https://www.heroicsandros.co.uk/

https://www.imperatormodels.com/

https://ironcladminiatures.co.uk/

https://irongatescenery.co.uk/

https://www.krcases.com/

http://www.lastmanlastbullet.co.uk/

https://www.magneticdisplays.co.uk/

https://www.mammothminiatures.com/

https://www.mcmodelpainting.uk/

https://www.model-army.com/

https://newlinedesigns.co.uk/

https://www.oakbound.co.uk/

https://www.parkfieldminiatures.co.uk/

https://www.paulmeekins.co.uk/

https://www.pendraken.co.uk/

https://www.perry-miniatures.com/

https://www.peterpig.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/paintspirate/

https://productsforwargamers.com/

https://www.valiantminiatures.com/

https://www.rokminis.com/

https://sarissa-precision.com/

https://sheppeymodels.co.uk/

http://www.tablescape.co.uk/

https://www.tangentminiatures.com/

https://thepitgamingshop.co.uk/shop/

https://tumblingdiceuk.com/

https://voidscarminiatures.com/

https://warbases.co.uk/

https://store.warlordgames.com/

https://warpaintfigures.com/

https://www.westwindproductions.co.uk/

Colours 2023 recap

Well it's over again for another year. The annual show from Newbury and Reading wargames society. I can honestly say it was great fun. This was my first year attending as a club member rather than a punter and I was not disappointed. 

Our weekend started the day before the show helping the traders as they arrived to set up at the grandstand. Despite the heat, not too many issues and everyone was very friendly. It was fun to get a sneak peak of some of the stands before the day too.

On the day of the show it was predicted to be a hot day, so plenty of cold drinks and fans set up, we braced ourselves for the heat and fun. I had volunteered to help on the Bring and Buy stall and on arrival I ended up being on the booking in desk, a very busy but fun task. With very minor exception everyone queuing to book in their lead and plastic were great fun to talk to and happy to indulge my excitement at seeing all the things they were selling. Highlights include a first edition warhammer, a full set of Sharpe DVDs that immediately sold (I really thought everyone that does this hobby would already have their own copy by now!) and some beautifully painted terrain (each piece immediately sold the moment I booked it in they were that good) The shock of the day was a boardgame that I used to own called Dragons Quest. I had sold it on the Bring and Buy a few years back and as I explained this to the current owner I realised the price label affixed to the box had my hand writing on it. It was the exact same copy!

I may have been tempted by a couple of items as they came in and reserved them for myself to buy later, one in particular were some original sculpt Adeptus Arbites that I just could not resist getting.

For the afternoon the Father in Law brought my youngest to come see the show and after we bought everything he had off his shopping list. (Including Roboute Guilliman which he has decided I have to paint for him) we popped upstairs to choose a participation game to play. We settled on a Star Trek game run by these chaps who were super enthusiastic and made it a fun game. Youngest took control of a Klingon fleet and I was left with the Romulans. Needless to say I managed to play a terrible game, at one point rolling three ones in a row to fail to do anything to the Warbirds bearing down on my fleet and the Klingons wiped out all my ships apart from the fleeing transport.

The Guilliman himself,  a beast of a kit.

The traders I spoke to in the afternoon all seemed to agree they had a good day despite the heat and I personally had some good feedback from visitors about the day. Unfortunately we had to leave before the end due to family commitments and when we left there will still plenty of browsers.

The next day my body definitely did ache, but that kind of ache that makes you feel like you achieved something. I am already looking forward to next years show, hopefully it will be a little cooler though!