"A truly unique (and revolutionary?) wargames product" Topic

Hey all!

I am happy to say that a gent I know (who happens to love history, wargames, and reenacting) has finally launched his own home-grown business, Gordon and Hague Historical Wargames.

gordonandhague.com/index.cfm

And his first major product? A full line of plastic 10mm ACW figures that come prepainted and ready to go straight out of the box (or the blister!)

Not only that but he has developed a complete (and completely free!) set of rules complete with pictures and diagrams worthy of any of the current rule sets out there, and has sections on his website dedicated to Hobby projects, Wargaming for Newcomers, and a host of other neat things… and yes, he is even carrying a number of the goods needed in the hobby, thanks to the Army Painter folks.

And to top it all off? Gordon and Hague is donating portion of their profits to charity!

All in all, it is a really cool and totally new product unlike anything else that I can think of. I wrote up a bit about it on my blog, but please do stop by his website as well and support a fellow wargamer who is following his wargaming dreams!

My blog, with some more info:

link

The website for Gordon and Hague Historical Wargames:

gordonandhague.com/index.cfm

And if he does well… I heard him already begin to think about something similar for the Zulu Wars, or maybe the Crusades… who knows? I know I'd LOVE a big boxed set of Zulu!

What a great idea.

Yeah… it is pretty crazy, because he literally started it up himself. When we got in touch with each other (he had seen my blog and sent me an email to say hi) it turned out he actually is a member of the same reenacting unit as my best friend. I said I'd take some photos for him because I just think it is a really, really cool idea, and I love seeing it start in such a "grass roots" style, you know?

Anyway, I really hope it catches on, because I think it is a great idea, and I hope us wargamers can help him with that! I know that if I were wandering Gettysburg as a kid, or with my own kids, and I saw some of these in a store… well, you can guess what would be under the Christmas Tree that year!:D

Absolutely bonkers. Great idea.

But are they painted, or is it coloured plastic?

Jaz
6sided.net

The whole thing looks great!

There's a lot of work gone into the whole idea and it's turned out very well indeed.

I've paid for rulebooks that didn't have as much effort put into them as the one I just downloaded for free :-)

Do you think it will make it to the UK? I've always wanted to game the ACW but never found the time for the painting…

Keep up the great work and I'll wait to see if a UK distributor turns up.

Dave

That's pretty awesome. I wish I could find out somewhere what size the rectangle bases were….

I would kick in for a good Zulu set.

EDIT: A lot of the product links are broken right now…

Jake

Looks like a great product. Seems simliair to the FOW model, one stop shop for all you need(except FOW are not pre-painted of course).

Wow, that's looking good!
I think we overwhelmed the website!

So, how much is an army box?

Very, very cool – I hope they get the site working again soon. Can't wait to check it all out!

I agree with Caesar on both points.

This looks interesting.

I'm interested to see more. I hope the website comes up soon.

Hah! How funny! I am sure he'll have the site up soon:)

He has a facebook profile too, which has some more photos… here is the link:

link

A superb idea. Do we know the default base sizes?

Looks good, I could use them. I wonder how basic the paint jobs are?
VR
James Mattes

James, I saw a set; they are basic. However, I actually tackled a single unit with a paintbrush to add just a SMIDGE of detail, and I grassed them, and a whole unit and command took something like 6 minutes to "finish." He has a whole section about "spicing them up" on his website.

Oh, and according to Facebook he is trying to get the site back up:)

Any info on the pricing scheme? Looks good.

hey gang you crashed my site : )
working hard to see whats going on haha.

be back shortly

Hey guys,

Not sure on the base size, sorry:(

Pricing also I don't recall… a hundred and something for the army set, two hundred and something for the grand army set I think? There are also deals where you can buy one of each side and get a discount.

As for the number of units, I don't exactly know… the army set is something like 13 or 14 units plus generals and such… the grand army set is something like 20, 22? Honestly I don't know though, I am just counting off of the photos… I think I may be off. I'm sure the site will be back up soon though.

EDIT: Ah, that is the guy himself! I am sure he can answer the questions better than I:)

I think the big army box was something around $250 USDus per army. So $500 USDus-is to get going, unless you'd be content with the "Starter set", but who wants one of those? :)

WHAT IS THIS ??? DO I ACTUALL:Y GET A WHIFF OF GENIUS COMING FROM SOMEWHERE IN OUR INDUSTRY ?????? Someone who knows that it is not enought to just create the same old product and think that just because it is a different medium it will be a revolutionary product?
Someone who does just not declare their own genius, but also displays it?
Dare I believe that there is someone else who has recognized the real "elephant in the room" with regards to the painting, modeling,basing,basic time and hassle required and time constraints so many people have today and has actually created a product that will be a perfect "introduction to the hobby of wargaming", possiblly attracting 1000s that would otherwise pass by??
Do I actually see some marketing talent -- the old ammo box packaging looks really great --the price looks good and it does appear, as mentioned above that it would not take much to spruce up the painted figures to a higher standard --although I do think there are many who have never played a wargame who would not care much about the basic paint job supplied -- almost a "spruced up game of Stratego".
Nice website, plenty of info -- looks very, very good?

Very impressed and interested so far.
Regards
Russ Dunaway

Congrats Brian, looking great! I'm taking 2 grand armies for myself and plan to give some starter sets to the nephews for xmas.

Onward and Upward!
Sean

Seriously… ACW is not really a period I've considered seriously (though the Irregular 6mm offerings were kind of attractive), but I am finding myself salivating at the idea of purchasing a big box of pre-painted Blue and Butternut goodness.

Wow! Plastic 10s? About freakin time!

What is revolutionary about pre-painted figures?

And another thing. Without that great looking terrain those figues would not look nearly so good. I don't suppose the terrain comes with the set.

Just the opinion of someone who doesn't think he's a genius, marketing or otherwise, but is puzzled by the hosannahs being showered on this product.

nice range of plastic in 10mm. have a lot of my work on sale and covers 10mm its worth a look and up for auction

Pre-painted, small-scale figures aren't new (Mechwarrior), but seeing them in a non blind-buy, historical format certainly is.

Russ is just going on because this actually doesn't compete with him. He absolutely HATES 28mm plastic (and pretty much anybody who makes nice metal figures) – whereas he sees this as catering to a different crowd.

It's always fun to watch what he writes?!?!?

;-)

And a huge kudos to whoever is behind this – nicely done all around – package, marketing, presentation, etc.

Quick suggestion on website- on the "enhancing your army in 3 quick steps" page, the pic are rather dark and reddish. Id sugges using your photo suite to autoadjust the pics. It would only take a minute. Currently you cant really tell what youve done to them!

BTW, Russ does sell 10mm ACW figs!

Yes, but he targets the low end on pricing. So this doesn't count for him.

These are rather pricey, really. I wonder if theyd sell them plain? The figs look great, nice sculpts from what I can tell. Id always hoped someone would produce cheap plastic 10s. This gives us half of that equation. Still, its a great idea, and one that I hope takes off.

Now bring on the Naps!

Dunno why anyone would need cheaper plastic figures below 15mm. That said he's certainly missing a trick by not offering bare plastic.

Of course on the other hand, not offering it unpainted figures helps keep the focus on the prepainted you-don't-need-to-do-anything nature of the product. He's selling a mass marketable system and it probably won't do him any good to have much in the way of different but similar product options. One thing you learn in retail is that you can't trust the customer to know what he's looking at.

And looking at the store, he's selling figures in single base blisters? That's just weird. Not to mention wasteful looking at all the plastic on those blisters.

Final point, no prepainted terrain. I realize that he might not have all the funds in the world, but I think that's a fairly major thing that needs to be addressed before they get into more specific bits and pieces.

Despite my complaints, I've been wanting to do something similar for ages (lack of funds) and wondering why no one else has pushed something like this in historicals.

Depending on the quality of the painting, the price per figure is probably less than what you would pay a professional painter. The free rules they provide are more suited to a small action rather than a large battle. One figure equals 10 men, one inch is about 10 yards. Looks like a base should have a front of about one inch to be in scale with the rules.

As for me, I would rather buy unpainted figures and paint them myself. It is a nice idea to offer pre-painted figures, but the price they are asking will probably not generate very many sales.

Not unique and certainly not "revolutionary", but if it brings more people into the hobby that has been my passion for almost forty years, that's great.

Gunner
LPA Games/Signifer Flags

Folks, I'm with Russ…anything that makes the hobby more accessible to new folks is a winner in my book! I always found that giving the younger set the ability to have a starter on the table in record time served to keep them interested…and then, some would stay with it, buy more, and do their own innovations and painting, while others would just stay with the first figs for the joy of playing – and others would drop.

The blister shown at least implies that smaller groupings will be possible, and clubs and stores might be able to purchase sets and break them up for sale to those without the price for Grand Armies.

Moves the FOW pre-packs to new levels and a new period – potential to expand the hobby and enetr mass markets like D&D di (for a while) – so hats off to the man/men behind it sez I!

The pricing does make me pause before buying the big army deal, but it's not like you don't get enough figures.

The incredibly limited time I have free to paint I wouldn't spend on 10mm ACW (got plenty of unpainted 28mm Foundry for that), so while I'm kicking the tyres at the moment I can see myself buying in to this.

Shipping in the US is a flat $6 USD, so it may be worth investing 20 bucks to pick up a few blister packs and see what they look like.

I think this is a great idea and wish him all the best.

Thsi will bring new blood into gaming especially kids which is the future.

M

Well done to this company, great idea!!!

Best of luck with this new and forward thinking product.

Raglan

10 mm pre-painted plastic historicals? I think I have seen that previously somewhere:

link
link

….too slow

Very expensive and very badly painted.

…and nothing to do with Ancients.

Could get excited, depending on UK supplier & the UK price. Its my 40th so might get family to spoil me…

I am moderately excited, but again it's the UK price.

I'm far more interested in the game than the figures (and I'm generally happy to move coloured pieces of card around) and so in that respect I'm an unusual wargamer. I'm also trying to finish a PhD so have no time to paint. If the price is right then I'll consider it.

At 1 base = 500 men I'd need 3-4 grand army packs for the each of major eastern armies (at that scale a grand army pack roughly corresponds to a Confederate Corps or Union Wing, but you'd need a few boosters).

and an especial well done to you and your friend for buying supporting memberships before using this website to launch your product!

Bill will be delighted. Oh? You didn't bother? Big of you.

Pat