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| Our home for Wednesday till Sunday |
I have remained largely silent throughout Clarence's running commentary on Historicon but having put both feet back on the ground in Blighty, it is time to commit some reflections of the trip to the blog.
The first 10 days of my trip were spent writing stuff about 1690s Ireland which means new pdfs shortly and some fairly major progress on the Ireland publications front.
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| 10 days of this in FL whilst my family party-ied! |
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| Steering the Kestrel was not achieved with universal success! |
Pile on top of that our once in five year opportunity to talk face to face about our joint projects and trying to keep Dan Faulconbridge, Bill Thornhill and Dave Taylor out of trouble and the bar(s) and we definitely reached the end of the bungee cord on this trip.
It is a measure of our busyness that when confronted with a free afternoon to tour the battlefields of Spotsylvania, Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville we instead decided to sit at a coffee table with two pieces of teddy bear fur and work out new rule mechanisms... oh that sentence could have gone so wrong!
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| Serious Playtesting! |
Historicon was a very uplifting wargaming experience. Total immersion gaming I would call it. The players are hungry for new rules, fun and dice rolling. Each one of our seven games was different and we watched teams of minds puzzle out (or not) how to solve the problem of the Penny burn. The final score was 5:2 to the Jacobites but the last game was settled by a game of Blackjack 21:20 - couldn't have been closer and another of the games could easily have gone to the Williamites so it could have been 4:3 or even 3:4.
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| Attention to detail - Clarence's model map was actually of the table! |
We made excellent use of personal duels. Adam Murray fought General Maumont at least once but I think actually twice. In another game Lord Galmoy was wounded on the cheek and ran away to tell his mum or something. Maumont's mistress Molly Malone was abducted to be tutored in the Protestant faith in another game. A sea captain was left in port for being drunk, some officers changed sides and deserted the Jacobite positions and six Jacobites fell off a landing stage into the Foyle and drowned. A Jacobite sniper picked off most of the Kestrel's crew and annoyed the owning player Rich so much that he decided to broad side the rowing boat. That's when you know you have really got under someone's skin!
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| A beautiful model on a realistic river |
We had camp raiding, house burning, ship wrecking and in the last game Adam Murray drowned in a bog! It was clear that pike and shot gaming is an untapped reservoir for American gamers and we were so encouraged by the response that it is tempting to consider doing it all again next year even though for me it involved eight flights from Glasgow via Heathrow, Tampa, Charlotte and Richmond and return.
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| See! we do BOTH exist in the same room at the same time! |
Running some talks on wargaming/historical topics and managing an open mic session within those events was a very interesting experience. Listening to the views and questions from gamers really did add a lot of value for me and I enjoyed hearing the perspectives of several very knowledgeable people.
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| Murray - 'liberates' Maumont's mistress |
The most curious element of it all was the Hilton Hotel cluster without bars or restaurants, well except one which was well worth going to just for this....
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| Immediately knight this barman.. this is a Glenfiddich! |
A Fredericksburg barman, bless his soul and God preserve him until my return, thought the above was the measure for a 10 year old Glendfiddich. My smile as he continued to pour greatly amused my drinking companions and the people who hadn't yet bought a round because you will not be surprised to hear, this lasted me about two hours and it cost about $8US. All you Brits out there take a really good look at the best $8 I never spent as it wasn't my round!
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| Was it all about religion? this chap seems to think so! |
Historicon was perhaps not at its shiniest but my own personal experience was of the highest level. Recommendations: Hilton Hotels should upgrade their broadband, install bars and promote the barman mentioned above.
I am off red meat now for about a year and sugar too! Well maybe till Claymore anyway. Now, I'm off to finish my All American birthday cake.....
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| Diabetics look away... NOW! |