13th October, Crystal Palace National Sports Centre

SELWG 2014

So, in all the years I've been going to SELWG*, I've never said anything about the Crystal Palace, after which the park in which the SELWG venue stands, takes its name.

The Crystal Palace, of course, was the poetic name given to the truly vast glass and metal pavilion built in Hyde Park to hold the Great Exhibition of 1851.   At the time it was the biggest glass building ever erected and was a wonder of the industrial world.    Just look at the size of it.

After the exhibition, it was disassembled and moved 8 miles away, south of the river, to a specially terraced hilltop in leafy Sydenham.   Piece by piece.  What a triumph.  

And there it stood from 1854 until it was completely destroyed by fire in 1936.   Completely destroyed.   I found this photo:

Click on it.  Astonishing.   Today all that remains is the stonework of the terracing - epic, like the ruined centre of an ancient city - and the name, a permanent fact of London's geography.

It is a fantastic venue for a wargames show and has free parking.  There was even a funfair on the old exhibition site but I did need to get home after the show.

I was down to help out on the Society of Ancients stand, and to collect trophies to take along to the next weekend's national DBA event (just gone, by the time you will read this).

(the Lost Battle of 2nd Mantinea with the Society of Ancients)

After the distinctly medieval feel of ancients at recent shows, SELWG had a more ancient ancients feel ... up on the balcony, SoA (Phil Sabin/Eric C and Alan W) were putting on a participation version of the 2nd Battle of Mantinea (that's the famous victory of Epaminondas one) ...

(scenes from the Mantinea game)

Downstairs, there were permanent clusters around the chariot race and Simon Miller's (To the Strongest) Romans in Britain game.

(the Crawley club's AD SPATIUM ACCEDIS)

(To the Strongest, this time featuring British resistance to the might of Rome)

But what I noticed in particular was a naval theme ...

(SEEMS presented Hotham's First action, March 1795)

(Tonbridge Wargames Club's refight of the Battle of Cape St Vincent - 1797) 

Also I was pleased to see ...

(Peter Pig's latest version of PBI ... PBI Company Commander ... available soon)

(a simple but attractive SYW display from the Essex Warriors - if 28mm always looked like this it might even catch on!!  Give or take the casualty rings)

The biggest plane award probably went to the B52 over Vietnam ... hmmm

(Deal Wargames Society's Mayhem on the Mekong - nice brown river too ...)

But I think easiest on the eye must have been the sprawling 15mm Marlburian game ...

And the splendidly stylistic First Battle of Ypres 20th October 1914 ....

Another good show - thanks to all those contributors whose work is featured above and to everyone who supported the show.    By and large an entirely different selection of games and themes to Derby - so certainly worth the trip.

Thanks to SELWG for inviting us and whoever organised the weather so it didn't rain all day.

And an engaging variety of visitors chatting to us on the Society stand - thanks for stopping by.  

Also apologies to anyone we failed to notice or who we thought was happy browsing but actually wanted to talk to us.   I know this does happen despite our best efforts to pay attention.    It isn't intentional so do feel invited to give us a nudge.  

*which actually dates back to Catford, but that's another story ...

Donnington Park Exhibition Centre, 4th - 5th October

The Northampton Battlefields Society and WD at Derby World Wargames 2014

This outing, we took the Northampton battlefield presentation along to Derby's annual event as a Participation Game for up to 4 players based on the Society of Ancients classic De Matrica Bellae.

In this variant of Politics by Other Means,  players are given cards which they can use in building their narrative into what starts as a very basic figure wargame.   This means really quite sophisticated ideas can be woven into the game if that is how the players see it developing.   It is your game ... you decide what happens.

By an odd coincidence, the Border Reivers game on the next table to us was using a similar, if simplified, matrix game approach inspired by the same SoA Publication to run their cattle raiding game.

As well as the rules and cards for DMB, the games pack also contains a full multi-player map game, Londinium's Burning.    If you are lucky, there may be some stocks left at the Society webstore otherwise catch up with us at a show (we should be able to find a copy).

So ... The Northampton Battlefields Society was formed to research, explain and protect Northampton's battlefields - principally the 1460 site at Delapre Abbey, but also the other military history of the town and the further off Wars of the Roses battlefield at Edgecote. 

Neither battlefield has been archaeologically surveyed so there is much more to do to understand them.   

At Delapre (a park just on the edge of the town if you are not familiar with it: it is a couple of minutes off the A45, and has plenty of free parking so is one of the easier battlefields to visit) there are plans to establish football pitches and club buildings on part of the English Heritage designated area so we must be vigilant.

(the other side of the board ... Wargame Developments and some information about CoW)

Edgecote is on the route of HS2, so we must do what we can to preserve as much of the elusive battlefield for posterity as we can.

Wargame Developments is, of course, the host organisation for the Conference of Wargamers.   By coincidence also in Northamptonshire, CoW can play an invaluable role in developing and testing wargames and approaches to historical battles.  

Ideas such as running the game to the canonical hours being rung in the abbey come straight from CoW and have been incorporated into the design of my sundial game clock.

(improvements for Derby: the model of the Eleanor Cross is almost finished - inset: the real one)

At CoW we also decided to use the furlongs of the open fields as the measurement for the game mechanism (and coincidentally, effective range for a longbow is a furlong, so using contemporary measurements does seem useful).

(improvements for Derby: the sundial game clock marked off with the canonical hours)

Nevertheless, it was quite ambitious running a matrix game at a busy and noisy show like Derby, so we had to learn as we went.

At times we may have got the balance of attention wrong - perhaps not giving enough to the casual browser ... then again getting distracted from the game which needs some thought and which needs to push along.

(listening to the punters ... there is quite some knowledge of medieval warfare arrayed around the Northampton table)

We got two multiplayer games played and a one player aside blitz version, and the possibilities developed as we warmed to the task.

A number of historical possibilities were explored - but in 2 of the 3 games the Yorkists got into the Lancastrian position, fulfilling the criteria for a historical result.

(panorama of the Lancastrian position ... standing to during what was, in 1460, a morning of rain)

In De Matrica Bellae, the final phase is that every player gets to make a case as to why the won i.e. bearing in mind their briefing and the events of the game, why they did the best.   So the loser of the on table battle may well be judged the player who did best if they can make a sufficiently powerful case.

(a couple of shots from Game 2: Fauconberg repelled, Warwick breaking the barricades)

(scenes from Game 3: Fauconberg finds a weak spot in the defences, breaks in and tackles Buckingham)

The choice of winner is, of course, resolved by the Matrix argument ... it will be adjudged 'your day' because (3 reasons supported by a randomly drawn card) ... judged on strength by the Umpire (equals a die score on D6 you need to make or exceed) ... The player who exceeds the target by the most is the winner (so an outstanding argument and a good die roll are required - wargaming at its purest perhaps).

In the meantime, of course, we were also trying to interest casual browsers in the issues of the battle, explain the history and possibly recruit new supporters.

If we missed you on the day, apologies ... perhaps you will give us another chance:

There is a Facebook Page here (... you ask can join the group)

There is a wordpress website here (... click on a topic that addresses your questions)

Other Ancient/Medieval tables at Derby ...

A couple of views of Graham Fordham's snowy Participation Game for the Lance & Longbow Society ... blending Saga with the activation mechanism from Bolt Action ...

(Northern Crusading from the man behind the Fluttering Flags)

A popular opportunity to play the Gladiator game Jugula ...

And that other matrix game raiding cattle ...

Here's a couple of selections of other stuff worth looking at around the show ...

(Both world wars and either side of the cattle raiders, Tamara poses with the WRG dinosaur and the L&L yellow banner)

(some big buildings from the FIW and Jugula tables; some tanks and a ship)

But I'll finish with some views of the super French and Indian War table ... very inspiring ...

Joint winner of the best display game I believe ... well, for once, I agree ...

*******

All in all, a very rewarding outing ... it seemed to fly by and thankfully the shows are coming thick and fast as I already know there was plenty of shopping I needed to do but hadn't made a list.

Great chatting to Ron Kay at Irregular about when he was stationed at Hardingstone in the 1940s (walking back from a night on the town past the battlefield and up past the Eleanor Cross) ...

Great making some new plans with Warbases.    And great meeting up with the Armati players for the first time in a while.

Many thanks to players and supporters ... thanks to the organisers for allocating us plenty of space - and thanks to everyone who helped.

See you at the English DBA Open in a couple of weeks (you are going, aren't you?)

7th September, Kelham Hall, Newark

THE OTHER PARTIZAN 2014

The Society of Ancients and The Lance & Longbow combined as usual at Kelham Hall for The Other Partizan, Newark's early Autumn show.   

The display was Phil Steele's Northampton 1460 which was constructed for the Northampton Battlefields Society, formed last year because of the threats to the historic battlefield (which is currently open park land and golf course) - NBS has both a website and a Facebook group.

(behind the displays, the NBS banner lists the battle of Northamptonshire)

The society's principal concern is the 1460 battlefield at Delapre Abbey, but on foundation it was asked to widen its brief to encompass the other battles of Northampton and other important battles within the county such as Edgecote (1469).   

I should add, perhaps, that the great ECW battle at Naseby continues to have its own support network (the Naseby Battlefield Project) but there is considerable interaction between the project and the town and county society.

(The Battle of Northampton at Delapre viewed from the South-West - from behind the Eleanor Cross)

The evidence relating to the battle at Delapre has been collated and evaluated in a recent CMP (Conservation Management Plan) by battlefield archaeologist Glen Foard (the man who found Bosworth) and this has been accepted by the council (though many implementation hurdles remain to be negotiated).

(the Battle of Northampton at Delapre viewed from the North - from the direction, say, of the castle)

The report makes clear that the balance of evidence is that the battle took place in the park (then Hardingstone's open fields) adjacent to the nunnery, overlooked by the Eleanor Cross.   

When de Waurin refers to the emplacements 'behind a little river' he almost certainly refers to the Fullbrook, a stream that crosses the park, not to the massive river Nene that cuts the fields here off from the town itself.

Reconstructions that butt the king's position up against the meandering river are almost certainly wrong according to current scholarship (I should add, perhaps that the majority of contemporary - or 'near contemporary' - accounts place the battle in fields - so in the park - not meadows - which is what flanks the river).

(archbishop Bourchier and the Papal Legate Francesco Coppini watch the battle from the Eleanor Cross)

Yorkist partisans archbishop Bourchier and the Papal Legate Francesco Coppini watched the battle from the Eleanor Cross, so the Hardingstone cross, which remains in situ, is one of our reference points for locating and orientating the battlefield.

(the Hardingstone cross today - shown on the anniversary of the battle)

Frustrated with Buckingham's refusal to grant Warwick and audience with the king, the Papal party on the hill excommunicated the Lancastrian army.   

We have no direct reference to what effect this may have had ... although the Lancastrians did, of course, go on to lose, and there were no permanent memorials erected to their fallen.

(Warwick's cavalry had a sharp action on the London Road in the preliminaries to battle - 15mm figures by Mirliton)

This project is part of an ongoing campaign to understand the battle better and to publicise its historic story and its present challenges.   

We will be taking a playable version of the battle to Derby early next month and we will have battlefield guides and info forms on the stand.

The other crowd pleaser at The Other Partizan was Simon Miller's collosal Pydna game ...

(Pydna panorama)

(more)

This was a huge project but involved a large number of participants and was played throughout the day.  

The rules were Simon's forthcoming To The Strongest (see more on Simon's blog) and feature grid zones and playing card activation.

(Pydna: a view of the battlefield through the gates of the Roman camp)

(Numidians and elephants thunder forward on the Roman wing)

A Society of Ancients member, Simon has done an excellent job of drawing enthusiasts and show organisers into these projects ... Time was when I might have reported from Partizan that ancient warfare was poorly represented.   

Now it is the star of the show.

Elsewhere ... 

I spotted a good looking Dark Age game and a snowy GNW-ish battle in Skane ...

Having laboured hard in the past to get snowscape-compatible basing in the past I was quite impressed how comfortable the visuals were with unmodified 'rock and grass' basing on the white boards.

Also at Partizan, Wargame Developments had their Doodlebuggers game (well most of it) all geared up to to blow V1s out of the sky (usually onto Southend pier or flattening the now famous shed in Bob Cordery's garden).

Great show as ever ... nice to be back in the main building even if that makes photography more of a challenge.   Thanks to the hosts for inviting us of course, and thanks to everyone who stopped by, chatted, took photos of the battle etc.

Please get in touch if you want more details about Northampton or the various Societies or follow the links.

If you are an active enthusiast in the ancient and medieval periods, the Society of Ancients is your society - please consider joining if you are not a member already.  If you are of the more dedicated disposition, please contact the Society Secretary (say, via the website) and volunteer to help.  There are always vacancies.

Or find me at Derby and we'll have a chat.   I can answer many of your questions and put you in touch with the right people.