Sunday, July 27, 2003
Hey hey hey!
Nearly all summer travelling is done. Just one short jaunt over to Harrisonburg to do one last cleaning of the apartment and to hand in my key. Huzzah!
Alright, so the Phi Mu Alpha conference in DC was wonderful. Great experience. I got to meet a lot of cool people, see a lot of cool things, got to hang out with Alice and Paul some, blah blah blah, fun was had. But that was nothing compared to this past weekend.
OH MY GOD. Historicon was the greatest thing, ever. It's a giant wargaming convention using tabletop miniatures. It is the largest such convention in the US, possibly the world. And it was heaven. There were just SOOO many tables and SOOOO many games. Some things were so elaborate, it was unbelievable. I cannot beign to say enough about how cool it was.
I played in a DBA demo game against Tom on Thursday twice. DBA is a system for fighting during the ancients time period. Tom was the infidels, and I was the heretics. The first battle had the largely foot composed heretics attacking the infidels. My foot actually did virtually nothing. My little bit of heavy cavalry and my peasant militia-esque troops kicked some major ass, though. The second battle had the infidels attacking the heretics, and I decided to have my cavalry charge the infidel knights. If I won the charge, I'd win. If I lost, I'd lose. We went back and forth for a few rounds, but Tom was able to eventually flank me and slew my leader, os the heretics ran for it and lost. It was fun though. THEN we recreated the battle of Salem Church, which is REALLY close to where I lived. Tom and I were the flanks of the Union army while this other guy took the center. Tom, incidently, was controlling the 96th Pennsylvania (which did not run and was actually his most useful unit), of which my great great great great great who nows how manys greats great grandfather was a member. I spent most of the battle running through the woods at high speed on the flank in an attempt to completely outflank the rebel scum whilest the rest of the union army tried to apply as much pressure as possible. This worked, and the Union forces won the day, routing the Confederates. We changed the course of history!
Friday morning I played in a big ancient Caesar game, and controlled the gallic forces which Caesar was trying to convince to join his side. Unfortunately, the guy playing Caesar was something of an idiot and I basically had to wait forever to get to the action. In fact, I only had one piece of cavalry engage in battle, charging across the river into some other cavalry, totally routing them and causing the rest of the army to become disordered. In fact, I think I did more than Caesar actually managed to do. But to his credit the supreme commander of the opposing forces was really good and had a brilliant plan to counter the romans. I then played in a game set in the French and Indian War game, which was really chaotic and fast paced, assuming you weren't the wagon train, of which Tom had the most unfortunate role. Woo hoo for sitting around wandering aimlessly because you had no point in existing. We then did the Battle of Princeton from the Revolutionary War between the two of us, and history repeated itself. My british got the crap kicked out of them. So march for effective charging. The battle of Fredericksburg was also fought using a board game, and my confederates successfully pounded the union forces back across the rappahannock with artillery, which happened 150 years ago anyway.
Saturday was WEIRD. I played in a Rennaissance game with all of Leonardo's inventions come to life. Tanks, aircraft, knights, thigns that blow up. It was bizarre, but a lot of fun. We iddn't take the bridge, before time ran out, but we did completely wipe out the left flank. But our right flank was gone too, so it was just nothingness on that side of the field. Then, in what was most certainly the most bizarre game of all time, I played in The Lost Skulls of Atlantis. Basic idea is that we're all characters from the 30s pulp fiction era, (Indiana Jones, The Shadow, The Phantom, Tarzan, Sam Spade, a bunch of other weird guys) starring in a movie and just trying to be as ridiculous and over the top as we could. It was lots of fun, and I shot a bunch of nazis. And for the first time ever in recorded history, there was NOT a secret passage behind the waterfall! What gives??
The convention rocked. I am SOOOOO going next year. And in November too, when a smaller one is in Maryland.
w00t.
TWO MORE WEEKS!!!!
Nearly all summer travelling is done. Just one short jaunt over to Harrisonburg to do one last cleaning of the apartment and to hand in my key. Huzzah!
Alright, so the Phi Mu Alpha conference in DC was wonderful. Great experience. I got to meet a lot of cool people, see a lot of cool things, got to hang out with Alice and Paul some, blah blah blah, fun was had. But that was nothing compared to this past weekend.
OH MY GOD. Historicon was the greatest thing, ever. It's a giant wargaming convention using tabletop miniatures. It is the largest such convention in the US, possibly the world. And it was heaven. There were just SOOO many tables and SOOOO many games. Some things were so elaborate, it was unbelievable. I cannot beign to say enough about how cool it was.
I played in a DBA demo game against Tom on Thursday twice. DBA is a system for fighting during the ancients time period. Tom was the infidels, and I was the heretics. The first battle had the largely foot composed heretics attacking the infidels. My foot actually did virtually nothing. My little bit of heavy cavalry and my peasant militia-esque troops kicked some major ass, though. The second battle had the infidels attacking the heretics, and I decided to have my cavalry charge the infidel knights. If I won the charge, I'd win. If I lost, I'd lose. We went back and forth for a few rounds, but Tom was able to eventually flank me and slew my leader, os the heretics ran for it and lost. It was fun though. THEN we recreated the battle of Salem Church, which is REALLY close to where I lived. Tom and I were the flanks of the Union army while this other guy took the center. Tom, incidently, was controlling the 96th Pennsylvania (which did not run and was actually his most useful unit), of which my great great great great great who nows how manys greats great grandfather was a member. I spent most of the battle running through the woods at high speed on the flank in an attempt to completely outflank the rebel scum whilest the rest of the union army tried to apply as much pressure as possible. This worked, and the Union forces won the day, routing the Confederates. We changed the course of history!
Friday morning I played in a big ancient Caesar game, and controlled the gallic forces which Caesar was trying to convince to join his side. Unfortunately, the guy playing Caesar was something of an idiot and I basically had to wait forever to get to the action. In fact, I only had one piece of cavalry engage in battle, charging across the river into some other cavalry, totally routing them and causing the rest of the army to become disordered. In fact, I think I did more than Caesar actually managed to do. But to his credit the supreme commander of the opposing forces was really good and had a brilliant plan to counter the romans. I then played in a game set in the French and Indian War game, which was really chaotic and fast paced, assuming you weren't the wagon train, of which Tom had the most unfortunate role. Woo hoo for sitting around wandering aimlessly because you had no point in existing. We then did the Battle of Princeton from the Revolutionary War between the two of us, and history repeated itself. My british got the crap kicked out of them. So march for effective charging. The battle of Fredericksburg was also fought using a board game, and my confederates successfully pounded the union forces back across the rappahannock with artillery, which happened 150 years ago anyway.
Saturday was WEIRD. I played in a Rennaissance game with all of Leonardo's inventions come to life. Tanks, aircraft, knights, thigns that blow up. It was bizarre, but a lot of fun. We iddn't take the bridge, before time ran out, but we did completely wipe out the left flank. But our right flank was gone too, so it was just nothingness on that side of the field. Then, in what was most certainly the most bizarre game of all time, I played in The Lost Skulls of Atlantis. Basic idea is that we're all characters from the 30s pulp fiction era, (Indiana Jones, The Shadow, The Phantom, Tarzan, Sam Spade, a bunch of other weird guys) starring in a movie and just trying to be as ridiculous and over the top as we could. It was lots of fun, and I shot a bunch of nazis. And for the first time ever in recorded history, there was NOT a secret passage behind the waterfall! What gives??
The convention rocked. I am SOOOOO going next year. And in November too, when a smaller one is in Maryland.
w00t.
TWO MORE WEEKS!!!!
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