Hammerhead

[Mike Headden]

Set off at 5am this morning to go to Newark for the day – yes I am probably certifiable.

Taxi, train, taxi got me to the George Stephenson building for 9:45am.

Taxi, train, taxi, once again, got me back around 10pm.

I have piles of photos to sort, memories to transcribe and purchases to sort.

Haven’t been to sleep since 8am Thursday  so am about to crash out.

Once I recover I will put something more coherent in this thread!

Highlight of the day was definitely meeting up with Andrew Beasley (of this parish) for lunch and a delightful and wide ranging discussion of Life, The Universe and Wargaming.

Sleep beckons!

There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

[Mike]

Andrew is good people.

[Andrew Beasley]

Sucks – blush…

Glad you got back safe – have a good sleep.

Unlike Mike (Headdon) I only have one pic so I’ll put that and a few thoughts on my original post but I have to say if you get a chance to meet Mike (either of the above come to that) take it 🙂

 

[Mike Headden]

OK, twelve hours sleep leaves me feeling somewhat less like I’ve been hit with a cosh 🙂

I’ve uploaded my pictures of the games from the day to ImageShack and they are available here

https://imageshack.com/a/CvKW7/1

at least I hope they are. Any problems viewing them please let me know.

There are 141 images. I try to take a shot of the show label just before or just after a shot of the tables so hopefully you can marry the two to work out what you are looking at.

Apologies if anyone finds I missed their game, not intentional I assure you.

So, on to my thoughts on the show.

First up, I’m 70 in the summer, my hips, knees, ankles and lower back are shot. At no point during a long day on my feet did I fail to find a seat to take a much needed breather. “For this relief much thanks” 🙂

As for the games on show, there was, inevitably I think, an emphasis on 28-32mm stuff but with a couple of 54mm games and a scatter of smaller scale stuff.

The landscapes on which the games were played ranged from the awe inspiring Imjin River game, through through carefully sculpted foam or Hexon to flat and purely functional.

Likewise the scenery ranged from beautifully painted confections of 3D printed resin or laser cut MDF  to the most basic items imaginable.

It did occur to me that the most basic games seemed to be generating the most excitement. Perhaps a thought there for those of us intimidated by the spectacular creations on many tables.

Historical games were predominant but with Fantasy and Sci-Fi well represented. The bulk of the games were ground based but there were four naval games (including a rather dinky recreation of the action between Serapis and the Bonhomme Richard), a WW1 Wings of Glory aerial game and at least one space battle.

So if not, perhaps, “something for everyone” then certainly a good mix of periods, theatres and terrain types.

In the centre of the hall were the Bring & Buy tables. My wallet was spared by the offerings seeming to consist largely of things I might have wanted a eye-wateringly expensive prices and things I already have (and should probably be selling off too) at ludicrously low prices. YMMV!

As to the traders, once again 28mm dominated but Warbases had their 2mm Antonine Miniatures Range, Baccus were there with their 6mm ranges and Pendraken with 10mm and Kallistra with their 12mm. At the other end there were some very impressive large scale fantasy figures – out of reach of both my finances and my painting skill!!

If there was a gap it seemed to me to be in 15mm stuff.

As well as figures there were several stalls selling terrain/ scenery and plenty of books on offer. Especially rule-books. The range of rule books made me feel that there will soon be more rule sets than gamers.

What did I buy from all these traders?

I discovered Warbases had sneaked out some 2mm scenery and a couple of new units without me noticing so I grabbed a small fort and a vicus pack plus a Republican Roman legion and another pack of skirmishers.

Brigade Models provided another fort set, their recent forum model, some grave markers and a triumphal arch. All from their Small Scale Scenics range.

Finally, some very tiny ships from Tumbling Dice’s 1/4800 Anglo/Dutch and Napoleonic naval ranges. A mix of dhows, long boats, snows, xebecs and the like.

As to the site itself, the hall is large and felt busy but not crowded. Perhaps due to the low outdoor temperature it didn’t feel hot and muggy as some of the other shows I’ve visited have. The lighting was good enough that my camera flash never kicked in.

The Bistro catering was good. Decent grub at sensible prices IMHO. Several vegetarian options for oiks like me. 🙂

All in all, a very enjoyable day. I hope to get back down next year.

There are 100 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who can work from incomplete data

[Andrew Beasley]

You found my missing mushrooms 🙂

Totally missed the Battletech board – always had a hankering for a game but no one locally was interested in the unit management side after going potty for years on SFB.

Was seriously spooked by the ‘great turkey’ in the Great Turkey Hunt game – they where bigger than the brown bears! Forgot to ask them how well the rules worked for this (seen mixed reviews on the 1 hour skirmish set) – I remember a sheep herding game but this was a nice small game (sorry).

 

[Tony S]

Forgive my ignorance as a non-UK gamer, but a lot of the games  seemed to be participation games – is that a higher percentage than for other shows, or is that about right?  It was my understanding that most games at conventions tend to be display games?   Has that changed over the years, or have I just been completely wrong?

And thanks for taking the time to take and upload all those photos.  I enjoyed scrolling through them.  Some were very impressive indeed!

With respect to your age and infirmaries, I’m still well shy of 60, keep myself in shape, eat right…and just had a gout attack.  Gout!   I feel very medieval, but empathize with your joy in plentiful spots to rest.

[Andrew Beasley]

Hammerhead is a special show – they have specifically restricted the games to participation ones.

I think this is the first year they have run the tournament game but I forgot to ask if anyone could enter or if it was closed TBH

To quote from their site:

Every game at Hammerhead is visitor participation, which means that you are very welcome ‘to have a go’ at a wide variety of different historical and fantasy based games run by intrepid gaming clubs, historical societies, wargame companies and enthusiastic groups of gamers. You will be able to play a full game or simply move a few miniatures, roll some dice, have a chat with the people running the game and then move onto the next. The show provides a great opportunity to try out new or familiar game systems and spend a day indulging yourself and friends in this absorbing and fascinating hobby. Whether you’re interested in Napoleonics, WWI and WWII, Ancients, Medieval, Fantasy or Science Fiction, we are sure that you will find a selection of games you would like to play.

Very unusual even in the U.K. – even some of the club shows I visited years ago had ‘backs to the visitors’ style demo games. IIRC Mike (the esteemed owner of this site) ran a show that was participation games only – maybe the first in the country…

[Tony S]

Interesting!  I was thinking some of the more spectacular games were demonstration ones, but apparently I was wrong.   I’ve never actually ever seen a demonstration game here in Canada.  The closest analogy was years ago, when they had a separate room for an ancients tournament.  In the main hall were all the regular games (participation of course) and the din was deafening.  People shouting over good rolls and bad, laughing and generally enjoying themselves.  I walked into the tournament hall…and the only sound was an eerie rattling of dice cups.  Serious faces all round.  And they were quite reluctant to engage in any conversation.

I didn’t stay long.

But I still remember one game, where one of the players – defending no doubt – had to supply and place the terrain.  The hills were simply ovals cut from a breakfast cereal box, and helpfully labelled “hill” in marker, together with the all important ridge marked with a line.  How do I know they were from an old cereal box?  Because the player didn’t even use the inside of the box to face up, but rather just wrote “hill” over top of the image of a bowl of Cheerios.

An extreme example, and I’m well aware that many tournament gamers have terrific figure and terrain collections, and joke and have a great old social time with their opponents.   You can’t read anything from the Madaxeman and claim otherwise!    Perhaps they were playing 6th edition!

 

[Andrew Beasley]

…rather just wrote “hill” over top of the image of a bowl of Cheerios.

Those hill markers remind me of the DBA boards in the tournament (here) – if they work it’s good for me 🙂

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