My most humble apologies for not posting this sooner, but life has a way of being hectic when you least need it to be. But anyway, on to THE blog post about our Guns of April game at AdeptiCon 2014.
As we infrequently posted before the event, we chose to tackle a skirmish project for this year. Something that I feel was a double-edged sword. By electing to have everyone only paint 10-12 models (after our 120-150 model efforts the last few years) we could cut everyone's preparation time considerably, but this also meant that there wasn't that big rush of excitement as massive armies neared completion. Additionally, when you zoom in on skirmish action you must dial up the detail of the terrain. Our previous efforts (Salamanca 1812 and Gettysburg 1863) were relatively sparse on terrain, but I had a vision for Alexandria 1801 that I really wanted to see come to life. This meant that Alex Landing, Rob Chandler, and I had loads of work to do to pull it off successfully. When this crunch time arrived, we were simply too busy doing that we had no time to take photos and actively promote a sense of excitement amongst the rest of the team. That's all really a time management issue that we need to keep an eye on for future projects.
The end result, however, looks absolutely spectacular and completely fits with what I had in mind. I only wish I had taken as much time and care over the gaming preparations as I did the terrain.
Here are some photos from the night, captioned as appropriate.
Two French Hussars duel across the rooftops of Alexandria.
Ottoman Turks (painted by Tim Kulinski) head into a bazaar to combat the French.
Ottoman Turks (painted by Jamie Welling) advance through the "rug district".
More Ottoman Turks (painted by Tim Kulinski) cautiously advance..
Men of the French Dromedary Corps (painted by me) prepare for a firefight.
The French Dromedary Corps (painted by me) lope forward in front of the mansion of a wealthy merchant.
Crewman from the Royal Navy (painted by Rob Chandler) are in place to defend their building.
His Majesty's Marines stand atop another mansion (painted by Rob Chandler) waiting for the French to approach.
Leaping from balcony to balcony, these French Dragoons (painted by Merle Delinger) rush into combat with the British.
Everyone takes a break for some well-earned Chicago deep dish pizza.
A French Cavalry force of Dragoons, painted by Merle Delinger.
A French Infantry force (from the 22me Demi-Brigade de Legere), painted by me.
Crewman from the French Navy, painted by Alex Akers.
Crewman from the Royal Navy and His Majesty's Marines, painted by Rob Chandler.
Ottoman Turks, painted by Jamie Welling.
Obviously I'd like to thank everyone involved in this game: the members of the Guns of April, Lon Weiss from Brigade Games (for sponsoring the event), Beth Landing (Alex's wife) for creating the rugs and 40+ throw pillows that were scattered around the table (each hand-stitched and filled with sand), and Alex Landing of Ironheart Artisans for all his great work designing the buildings that were the standout feature of the table.
Alex plans on having laser-cut MDF kits of these buildings available from his website in early May. I'll be sure to let you know when they are available.
Cheers
Dave
