The Saturday seemed a bit busier than the Friday and this all added to the fun. I’ll happily claim that it was because several people had come specially to play Tribes of Legend, (which was rather flattering), though it could also have been that they were leaving wives to do Christmas shopping while they rummaged through the bargain blisters.

Nigel Stillman came back with a bronze shield he’d made as well as the helmet and several people had a go trying it on. Here’s Nick’s war face. Sorry the picture’s a bit fuzzy – I couldn’t hold the camera still cos I was laughing so much 🙂

Thanks to Nick for being such a good sport. He’s actually been mentioned on Quirkworthy before, sort of. Nick is a very talented modeller and was responsible for the brilliant Sedgemoor display at the Derby World Wargames show I reported on earlier.

Not one to rest on his laurels, Nick is planning another monster game for next year. This will be the 1914 battle of Mons, right at the start of WWI. Apparently this will be something like 30 feet long! Nick’s gaming buddies are all helping out with models and suchlike, but I think the lion’s share of the scale architect jobs go to Nick. Here he is working for the Lord, building himself a nice big church. In the grand tradition of such things, he even has one he did earlier to show the sort of end result you can get.

He’s already drawn the elevation of his church (using photos as reference), cut out the shape from foam, and is now scribing in the layers of brick (in case you were wondering).

While Nick was being creative, I ran several people through games of ToL with Centaurs and Amazons running about wrecking things. Anything to retain the balance of the universe. Here is an overview of the table we fought over. The huge temple is a resin piece (I think from Monolith), while the big rocky outcrop on the right is actually a kid’s playset, converted to amuse dad (Matt) when it was discarded 🙂

All the battles were fairly close, though nobody managed to capture any objectives: they focussed instead on obliterating the enemy forces. This is about as close as anyone came: the scene in front of the cave is Amazons sacrificing a goat and was one of the objectives the centaurs could have taken. Note that you don’t have to try and take objectives in Tribes of Legend. It’s just one of the options.

This next one is from a different game, with the centaur heavies just checking they’re in range to pile in (which they did). As this is a family internet I’ve spared you the carnage that followed.

This last shot is Nigel again (and his hat) contemplating the battle from more of a model’s eye level. We noticed that some of the Amazon models have very similar headgear! Now you know how to paint it.

As well as Tribes of Legend, there were other games to play. I had a go at Condottiere – I’d forgotten how entertaining it was. It’s a really colourful period, in character as well as costume. Here it is, about to kick off. Note the tower on the right. I discovered later that Nigel made this too. It’s even got paintings hanging on the inside!

It doesn’t take long for the mayhem to set in with Condottiere. I think this is turn 2. Turn 3 at the latest.

I was rather too busy to follow much of the last game – a section of the Austerlitz battlefield, but it seemed to go well. There was certainly a lot of smoke by the end. This is after a single turn of movement. They’re using Matt Fletcher’s Napoleon Rules. Matt is not only running the game, but made the terrain and painted the armies too!

In the picture above, you can just see this small walled enclosure at the far end of the 10 foot battlefield. This became something of a focus for the fighting and below is how it ended up. The counters track damage on the units. As you can see the assault has been costly.

A more general view of the battlefield at the end of the game. It’s not camera shake – it’s the haze of battle. Honest ;P

On top if these games there were piles of discounted models and paints to rummage through as well as free drinks and mince pies. As Wallace & Gromit might say, a grand day out.