Thursday 18 April 2013

Fishing Village WIP and PRE Salute Game Anaysis.

 As you will note on the Pictures to the right the fishing village is coming on quite nicely now, still a huge amount to do of course, but you can now see the intention much more clearly. You will be able to see blobs of glue as the pictures were taken in the drying process. It will dry clear and not be noticed (I hope). The section of the beach which is deliberately left unfinished will turn into a small harbour, wait and see. I will try not to show any more of this for the time being so that when BROADSIDE comes it will be fresh, well that's the hope. I have put enough photos up to give not only the layout but the location on the board and to a lesser extent a scale. I have left out walls and boundaries because they would be so small, about 0.35 mm. That being the case I will most likely either paint or draw them onto the boards.

But that's not want to talk about today. I do want to talk about Salute. Firstly let me say I have not been able to get two of the ingredients that I would use to make my recipe of chocolate Fudge. So no free food from me this time out. It's a shame, but never mind.

But that's not what I want to talk about either. Yes I still want to talk about Salute. Or more accurately the games that are being hosted at the show.  Here's my disclaimer! I have taken all the information from "Miniature Wargames Magazine" issue 360. Not all the information is complete and if you do your own version of this analysis you will also realise that I will have miscounted. I kept getting distracted and losing my place.

Going down the games list I was struck by how many Participation games there were and that's why I did the count up. UK readers will know that there are usually at least one wargames club within reach. So playing games at shows is not as important as, for example the states. In the US because of the size of the country (so I am informed) playing games at shows is more important. A quick count-up  informed me there were about 34 demonstration games and 57 participation games. Nearly twice as many, which I found interesting. I, personally, find it easier to run a demonstration game than a participation game at shows. So I was expecting the results to be reversed with more demonstration games than participation games. Well as you already know I was wrong!


Which meant I should look a little closer at the results to determine why I was so wrong. So I broke it down by adding another parameter. How many of each type of games were run by wargames companies as opposed to clubs.  20 of the Participation games were company lead and only 10 demonstration games. This is a little out of skew because some companies (like Crooked Dice) are running more than one game but only on one game table area, while others are getting their associated clubs to run the game for them. I mean no critism by stating this  as I am sure I would be encouraging this If I ran a games company. So follow the trend and not get too caught up in the small details. In my opinion many companies are using participation games at shows in preference to Demonstration games as it gets players more closely involved. This should not be a revelation to anyone who attends the bigger shows in the UK but it is still worth stating as it introduces the question "Where will this trend lead?" Given that it would be impractical to run a large, for instance, ACW, game with hundreds of figure on the table top as a participation game and keep all the players interested for an extended period at a show with all the trader distractions and temptations. Smaller games like Saga which can yield a result with many less figures in a fraction of the time do yield themselves more open to public participation. As twice as many participation games are being put on by manufactures this year does that mean that big battle games are in decline and that skirmish games are currently on the rise from a manufactures point of view?

I also broke down the periods being played. I did this because just skimming the list there did seam to be a lot of "Steampunk" games.

Here's a rough list, again I can't be too precise because some games straddle two periods. In Order of numbers.

  • Science Fiction 21 (including 7 "Steampunk"/VSF Games)
  • Ancients 14 ( Including 8 dark age and Medieval)
  • WW2/VBCW 13
  • Fantasy 13
  • 19th Century 10 (including 5 ACW games)
  • 17th Century 5 (Including 2 Samurai games)
  • Napoleonic 3
  • Modern 3 (including horror and other similar things*)
  •  Other 2 (Snits Revenge and Those Magnificent men and their flying machines.
  • Zombies 2 (Dedicated zombie games and not horror!)
  • 16th Century 1
  • Wild West 1
  • WW1   1
If you so choose you could clump certain categories together in different ways, Horror with zombies, Wild west with 19th Century for example. There are more options of course and if/when you do the Analysis I am sure you'll do them in your own way.

I am most interested in noting what game genres are missing. In the Modern section it's mostly horror and 70's TV shows. No Afghanistan, no Falklands, no Vietnam, no Cold war battle games or Korea or Arab Israeli. If there is a ECW game on the list I must have missed it as well, which is not to say it's not there, but if it is I will have missed it.

I will draw no more conclusions before going to the show, I'll leave that to you.

I would normally post on Saturday this week, but due to the show I will leave it until Sunday. And probably do my show report on Monday. I hope you have found something of interest. Be kind to yourself and hope to blog again after the show. All the best Clint





19 comments:

  1. I guess thats a sign of the times with games companies, especially the larger ones, getting more savvy and support more clubs to help sell their produces.

    What surprised me is that out in the sticks at the regional shows like Partizan, there seems to less of this and more games by clubs, which is a good thing.

    I myself actually go to Partizan to actually wargame with my friends and a large table, 6'x12', and have a good time. It is a demo game and in a way you can actually say its supported by or rather supporting a games company but in truth its the nature of the "club" as we are all not local to each other and it is organised via the internet. Actually there are some friends at Salute who are actually doing the very same with their VBCW game. I guess we might actually see more of this in future years, internet clubs putting on games, you never know.

    Still Salute is a very important show that showcases the hobby to the max, but it is starting to become a millstone around the necks of some of the smaller companies that can be afford to go to the show, as it costs a fortune.

    Sorry as I am ranted on a bit. Have a great show and I can not wait to see all your goodies.

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    1. Don't worry about ranting or rambling on It's all good stuff. There are some really interesting points you make. I love the idea of internet clubs and their members coming together for the show. Great concept.

      I agree Salute is expensive for companies I can't comment on how much it cost to put on the show, or even how much a trader is charged but I do know some traders are not going for that reason. Which is a shame, but there's not a lot I can do about it.

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  2. Never mind?????? I'm sorry but I'm stunned, do we understand fudge addiction......you make a good point, Salute is the Wargames Shiny showroom for big and small companies to expand or survive or to be born.

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    1. The lack of Fudge would not affect you anyway mate. Ray says you are on a diet and that for that reason you did not want any. (It's in his comment section of his blog. Feel free to check I'm not fibbing.)



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  3. Village looks great as it stands now, your whole set-up will look terrific for the show.
    I've found that the of shows I've attended in the past the demonstration type games lack appeal very quickly if they're not fast moving and participation games tend to have a continual audience. By early afternoon, once you've spent up your last few sheckels after a liquid lunch there is normally very little to retain your attention at a show. Participation games may well help to keep the crowd, so to speak.

    Have fun at Salute Clint and Watch out for Mathyoo (he'll be the one in the Newcastle Brown Ale T-shirt !).

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    1. Bryan has not got Mathyoo drinking "Dog" has he? Damage is done then. he's ruined for life! Poor chap!

      Cheers for your kind words with regard to the fishing village.

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    2. Shame on you, you should know Bryan doesn't touch alcohol, myself on the other hand...

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    3. Shame on me? No surely shame on you! Still Dog is better that Tittys! (Non drinkers please be aware Tittys has nothing to do with female anatomy in this context!)

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  4. A friend of mine is at ReaperCon right now. In the States, the shows go on for three to four days with things like painting and sculpting classes with the biggest names in the industry being given. Another big difference is that there are loads of women gamers and painters at their Cons.

    I am surprised to see so many SF and Fantasy as Salute as I think of it as an important bastion for traditional historical gaming. Hopefully the vendors will have many good deals and lead mountains can grow ever higher. Have loads of fun and safe journey there and back again.

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    1. I am equally surprised by the number of Fantasy and Sci fi games. It was looking at the games list that flagged it up for me. There is also only a few colonial games, 2 I think. But I am really surprised there are no Vietnam games,

      As for my spendz list there is a new set of Gunfight rules which will debut at the show.

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  5. Village looks really good Clint. Its very realistic looking from at the scale the game is being played at.

    Never been to salute so can't really comment. There is a lot of scifi/fantasy gaming but I imagine with moviesbooks etc driving culture of the industry its not surprising really. At least with there being some Historical people may see it and get attracted to getting involved with it.

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    1. Thanks mate. All we can do is wait and see if the more traditional wargamers react, I'm not holding my breathe though.

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  6. It's a fantastic looking board Clint. Well worth all that effort.

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    1. Cheers mate. It's getting there. Once I add the field boundaries, harbour and planting it should look OK. But I have decided to leave all that until the 1st week of June!

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  7. I really like your village, Clint. Very simple but very effective. If Mathyoo speaks in a Geordie accent then Joe and I are both to blame for that! I had nothing to do with Mathyoo's taste for Nukey Broon.

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    1. If Mathyoo speaks with a Geordie accent who will translate? As for the Brown it will take a couple of weeks to get his taste buds back to working order. Oh and you did make it clear that there is a mental hospital next to the brewery didn't you!

      I hope the village will look better on the day, still more to do, isn't there always?

      If you can't use the figure when it arrives no worries I have no use for it so no need to return it.

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  8. Very nice work on this village!
    Phil.

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  9. Cheers Phil it's coming together.

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  10. It’s nice to see fast progress with the place, Clint. I’m pretty sure that after the depressing incident in Boston, you’ll come up with great ideas to make sure that your town is going to be safe all the time. I know all town planners are doing their very best to do so. Anyway, you’ve already given a realistic list of plans, and it’s nice to see that you’re putting everything on your list into practice. Thumbs up!

    Quennie Dolor

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