Dear List
There were many things that outweighed the bad that made the convention a success for me.
First of all I got to do a lot of Christmas shopping for this year in the Lancaseter area, with its unique blend of stores and shops. I shall not detail these as they are particular interest only to myself.
Of course the top of the convention was seeing all my friends again, especially Bob and Cleo who after a particularly terrible series of hospital visits and operations were on the mend and bouncing back to their old delightful selves. I must say that IF (and this is a huge IF) people were REALLY interested in making the hobby better, growing it, and bringing more people in, and especially recruiting for the HMGS, then the Liebl's should be named BOD MEMBERS EMERITUS and have a permanent voting seat on the BOD with veto powers. But they aren't interested in that part of things and continue to put on great games (which they did at this Cold Wars-- a sure sign of recovery) at the convnetions. I also got to spend time with Eric Turner, Mike McVeigh, and a host of others and sat down to a wonderful and delightful dinner with the Turners (we met his wife) and the Liebels and Peter Frechtling at the Restaurant at the Host.
I was especially happy being able to put on a training game for the Liebl's on Saturday to teach them how to play "OGABAS!" in the Renaissance. I had mailed him the game but he was having a lot of trouble internalizing it and I hit on the solution of putting on a game for him for I knew that with OGABAS if you have someone coach you through and demonstrate it for a turn or two, after that you play like an expert, and you did. In saying this I must also note that is one of the problems with OGABAS. Bob told me after that he just wasn't getting it when he was reading it. I saw however that when he was learning, he kept asking questions about the game, all of which indicated that he was EXPECTING certain things to be in the rules that are in every other set of war game rules, and because these are NOT in OGABAS and the system flows so swiftly and smoothly without them, he could not, in his mind alone put it all together. When coached and he saw it , all was made clear and he gave me a great compliment by his enthusiastic response, likeing it very much. For me, praise from the Liebl's is, in war games, second only to praise from God.
Of course, it was an easy scenario. An Italian army of Feudal levies backed by some mercenary companies faced a massive Swiss Froce, so it was for the Italo-Condottieri something like bare-knuckle boxing with a bush chipper. I also had excellent help from George Deppner and Mike McVeigh, who are masters of the game, and all friends of Bob and Cleo who helped enormously in the tutorial. Bob and Cleo could do little wrong with the Swiss, and were though quite schocked when George made an off the board movement with his heavy cavalry o come in on the rear of the swilss. They noted how fast things happen in the game. This did not at all alter the eventual course of the game. I was originallyt just GOD as the GM but Mike had to leave towards the end for another game, and I took over on the Italo-Condottieri side George and I were slaughtered and though we managed to destroy two of the six Swiss Pike Blocks by forcing them to retreat when surrounded by heavy cavalry and in one case -- SCUM by a retreate card that got through the Swiss saving throws of 1 to 5, we were by then a thin besilkened and befeathered line and when we got our last iniatiative on a 1 to two we decided to "beat feet" and surrender the field. Still we had chewed up the Swiss a bit which to us, is a strategic victory when you are fielding crummy feudal levies and second rate Condottieri.
The libels thoroughly enjoyed themselves and it was a wonderful game full of excitement and laughing. I of ourse played it in my usual "ham-it up outrageously , chewing the carpet" bit of acting, one example of which when the time came in the turn I took over for Mike, it came time to deal out cards. I grabbed the deck, ran over to Bob and leaned against him chanting loudly and dealing out cards "KILL THE WIEBELS! KILL THE WIEBLS, KILL THE WIEBLS, in my best Elmer Fudd impersonation. Shortly thereafter when Cleo rolled a six and one card got through of the 18 I had piled on one of her Swiss pike blocks and it was a retreat and so it was eliminated I bellowed out in the Dystlefink lobby "YES! YES!! YES!!! GOD IS GOOD GOD IS GOOD!" it brought half a dozen other games to a dead stop. I then got up and in a less avuncular tone, said , leaging againt there in my deepest forced basso voice said in an astonished tone "You've KILLED them." like the guard of the Wicked Witch of the West from the Wizzard of Oz.
Of course I was playing to the Small audience who was watching, and many asked for the rules, even Pete Panzeri.
When I kept it going by doing the Wicked witch impersonation as if I were Cleo "Just you wait, my pretty wops, I'll get you, and you're little Condottierie too!"
This is what war games are supposed to be like.
I also was able to distribute a pile of bulletins from "The Weekend." I put out a pile on the tables as give aways, but they were thrown out by the BOD.
On the purchasing front besides the Christamas shopping and some personal stuff. I got artillery from DPC for my army of Flounce, and In the Flea Market I hit the Jackpot.
You all know of my inheritance many years ago of the Colonial and American Revolutionary War collections of Brother Henry Otto, and you all recall I just completed (well almost) the rebasing and reconditioning of the American Revolutionary troops. I have only infantry form his collection (the guns and cavalry were stolen, which to sadly reiterate, broke his heart for the hobby, and I would need to replace them. I have replaced the guns, but it is the cavalry that was a problem. Tradition of London makes Greenwood and Ball figures which are the same as the S.A.E's that Brother Otto's troops are.
Well I was going through the Flea-Market and I saw Bob Piepenbrink who is a Weekend regular and he had five bags of 24 cavalry each, all Spencer Smiths. Spencer Smith are the plastic recasts of the S.A.E's and Greenwood and Ball's and they were PAINTED and painted in a style that was not materially much better than the SAE originals, which was a staggering find! I bought them all which means as my cavalry Regiments are only 13 to 14, I had enough out of each bag to field TWO regiments of ordinary troopers and could buy officers and trumpeters from Tradition which will be lead and will weight down the stands. Thus for $50 USD I got 10 regiments of cavalry which is paractially all I will need.
I also picked up from him about 8 years of Don Featherstone's WARGAMRS NEWSLETTER. This was the old clunky magazine Done put out in the 60's and 70's and by todays standards it was clunky and horrible but back then it was the best thing sincesliced bread and I remember how like hard core addicts we waited and sweated out the days till its arrival in agonies of withdrawl. Nowdays they sneer at this.
Anyway, I picked them up for the ridiculously cheap price of $10 USD ,and when I got back to the room and was looking through them, I discovered that they were not just any Wargamers Newsletters, but FRED VIETMEYER's Wargamers Newsletters. They had his return address stamp in many of them, and Fred aloso underlined whrever his name appeared in the text. God, I thought I was an egomaniac!!!
Anyway, not only that, but in the box were a few of Scruby's Table Top Talk, and War Game Digest, and several copies of the MANUSCRIPTS of stories Vietmeyer wrote for Don!
I was however even after these miraculous finds, a bit disappointed that a few of the dead sea scrolls or H.G.Wells second book of wargames was nto found, but well, one can only have to much good luck in one day
Otto
