Weekender XLBS: Who’s Your Daddy And How Does He D&D?
July 21, 2019 by lloyd
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Happy Sunday!!!
Happy Sunday CoG/Backstagers!
It’s the XLBS Show!!!
I can’t wait to see what the boys have been up to this week.
Have Gerry and Justin recovered from their trip to America?
Does Lloyd have any surprises up his sleeve involving SAGA?
Let’s get stuck in………………….
I for one say “Yes” to OTT doing HistoriCon coverage again next year!
Morning/afternoon/evening (please delete as applicable) All ??
@brucelea – At work, we’re a global company so we’re always e-mailing people in different time zones. I use “Good Day,” or “Greetings” to cover all my bets. 😀
Yup,. I tend to use “Greetings”. ??
I can’t wait to see the SPQR content. I’ve been on the fence about it. I’m curious how well it could convert to fantasy, medieval, dark age, etc.
The SPQR boxed set seems sold out on the store or am I doing something wrong, not that I need more unpainted Romans and Celts!
The Historicon coverage was really good. Joe Hack is now my hero! That game was like a good railway layout, every time you look at it you see something new. The whole Kingdom of Dalriada and the settling/invasion of Scotland is a very ignored part of Irish history and Ireland certainly wasn’t the backward place that has been implied through the years.
I love @lloyd’s logic on the wait to respawn given the size of the current population, was going to ask/make the same point myself. Great minds think alike and all that.
Trafalgar was against a combined French and Spanish fleet. As Spain weren’t the big rival of Britain at the time they seem to get forgotten. I think nearly half of the fleet was Spanish.
Sorry about that @robert and thanks for pointing it out. SPQR has the right setting applied now and can indeed be ordered lol
No need to apologise, I just really want the Gaul Leader model, otherwise I would just have bought the rulebook, it really is that lovely!
Shame D&D is registered trademark as with the rising popularity of D&D, boutique gaming sets based on your DD&D would probably be quite popular.
Don’t feel bad, @warzan – at the Osprey’s Fighting Sail table I completely got the battle wrong – I THOUGHT it was Trafalgar but it was a preliminary action 2-3 months previously. In my defense, many of the ships were the same. Thank God I asked the gentlement running the table what the battle was BEFORE the camera started rolling. 😀
https://www.beastsofwar.com/liveblogentry/osprey-fighting-sail/
Loved the Boston joke.
Happy Sunday one and all.
Happy Sunday!
Working out a) what games to take and b) how to pack a hobby bag for a series of three weeks of trips away from home… Doing my FoW hobby league would be ideal.
Hy-Brasil is probably what you are looking for @warzan
http://hoaxes.org/archive/permalink/lost_island_of_hi_brazil
Happy Sunday CoG!
Looking forward to seeing how SPQR plays. Completely agree with the comments on the Historicon coverage. Good call to go.
Cheers
I know Gerry knew this really but forgot with the pressure of being on camera but the Colosseum was built by Vespasian around the ofthe last quarter of the first century AD.
I wish I could say I did. But I didn’t. Don’t know if I’ve ever paid attention to much of romes history.
We didn’t do any ancient history at school at all
They did Classical Civilisation at my old school but I choose something different as 2 years of dictation was not my idea of learning… History was bad enough with that particular teacher. There was 6 months of the History of Medicine being read out to us, in between bites of apples and cups of tea… Put me right off the subject for a while.
me neither, American politics and early 20th century europe got most of the focus.
Well, in @avernos ‘ defense, I don’t think that playset is supposed to represent THE Colosseum (it doesn’t really look like it), which yes … was built in the second half of the 1st Century CE. Smaller gladiatorial ARENAs, on the other hand, were all over the place long before that.
Great Show.
Historical Spartans are actually really cool but they’re pretty much the opposite of what we think of them. They were Warrior’s yeah but not really that much better than anyone else but their political system was excellent. This Video is brilliant and out of all the Greek City States I think our Modern government borrows far more from the Spartans than from the Greeks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppGCbh8ggUs
Remember that of course Spartans are not Greeks they saw themselves as foreign invades (they’re from Crete) and were constantly living in fear of a Helot (the Greeks they kept as slaves) Uprising. Women could inherit and a Wife took precedence over a child which basically turned Sparta into a Politically Female Dominated Society since they had the cash to throw around. Sure the Society was entirely reliant on slaves but apart from that the Spartans had a very Modern Political System.
Quick Question on SPQR. What makes it unique? As far as I can see this game looks almost Generic? Why should I play this over Mortal Gods, Men of Bronze or Clash of Spears.
Genetic Memory is 100% Real. We can take Chickens and keep them 100% safe for 20 Generations and make them unafraid of danger but if you introduce a snake or fox into the room they all panic in a way they wouldn’t for something equally dangerous but was not a natural enemy of the chicken. Even us as humans we have genetic fears built into us like an aversion to snakes and the like.
Think Assassins Creed but far less interesting.
What Happened at Trafalgar wasn’t Genius it was a tried and tested tactic that the British had come up with and is unbeatable no one has come up with a valid counter to it even to this day (using the ships of the era). Nelson used an auto Win strategy invented by other people hardly a genius.
The irony of the sniper killing him was that Nelson was adamant about not letting men shoot from the rigging since he was scared about fires.
By Trafalgar the British are just the Uber Elites. The French and Spanish (it was a combined fleet) had been bottled up in harbor for years not getting experience meanwhile the British have been sailing and fighting all over the globe. The British gunnery was absolutely unbeatable, they could fire multiple Broadsides for each French Broadside.
A great man to look at for Trafalgar is the 2iC Lord Cuthbert Collingwood who was famous for being the most Rate of Fire obsessed Captains in the RN his men were the best trained Gunners in the Royal Navy, he was also against corporal punishment (floggings) and had a dog named bounce. He was a good parallel to Nelson. Nelson was a Glory Boy whereas Collingwood was a “Good of the Service” man.
Yup totally agree about the Spartans. Athens gets the plaudits for democracy but in reality they were much less progressive than sparta in many respects.
As far as SPQR goes it’s a standard generic warband game. In the way bolt action drew 40k players into WW2 I suspect that they are hoping for something similar. There is a mordheim like campaign system, with talent trees for the heroes. If you’re already playing some form of historic skirmish warband game you’re unlikely to grab this. As an entry for new players it’s engaging enough.
Great point I honestly had never thought of that before. Better get my army based before the book drops next week.
I guess Historical Gaming has been so “Mainstream” now (since Bolt Action) I completely forgot that there are still heretics to be brought into the light of the one true genre.
re: Spartans were progressive: Can we really get past the fact that Sparta was almost 90% a slave state, which is a touch much even for societies of the day? Or is that an overgeneralization (I’m CONVERSANT with Ancients, but certainly not an expert).
I can’t recommend Steven Pressfield’s novel: GATES OF FIRE enough – its the Second Persian Invasion and Thermopylae except done right … not the way it was positively butchered and mocked in that train-wreck “300” movie. In that novel I believe (although again, not an expert) that Spartan society is well-represented, virtues and warts in balanced measure.
Progressive in the ancient sense absolutely. Apart from slavery it was eaily the most progressive nation in the ancient world. When you came of age you got given a farm and slaves from the state and you never had to work again which is where the myth of a warrior society comes from, state education, state gauranteed income,
I should clarify the things I like about the Spartan state are the executive and legislative branch. Dual executives with regularly rotating random oversite (who had veto powers too) with a council to propse and hear actual legislation, the Athenians get all the credit for modern democracy but he Spartans gave us more than they did. The executives could actually face very serious consequences via an impeachment type proceedings compared to the Romans with their blanket immunity for office holders.
That’s not a good thing by the way (the policies of female inheritance and basically turning your male population into decadent sloths by removing incentives to work and develop your stte owned land) it destroyed their society. By the time of Alexander Sparta was a complete joke it was an extremely small weak state run by extremely rich women who had no real interest in external politics and no threat they could ever make was seen as credible. The Spartans were the only Greek Sate to not recognise Alexander as hegamon and he basically just laughed at them.
So for clarity Progressive and Conservative in this case don’t mean what they mean today. Caesar was considered a massive progressive in his day as was Alexander the Great while someone like Marius would be a more Conservative reformer.
Basically if you radically change the major core of the state in a completely unique way I’m considering you a progressive (Caesar increasing taxes and his huge land reforms along with massve dole increases and that’s before he started the wars. Alexander did the opposite and eliminated taxation yet both were progressing their nations). Marius on the other hand took an existing institution and simply modified it (non land owners serving in the army was not a radically new concept).
@warzan, on that lost Irish Island, did you mean ‘Hy Brasil’?
New Grange was built 3200BC. Oldest still standing building in the world. Pre-date the pyramids by a millenium. So clearly not built by Irishmen. And then there’s also a great bit in the book of 4 cycles where the Tuatha de Danann decend from the clouds into Connacht on flying ships to attack the Fir Bolg. I’m not saying we are decended from Aliens but…..
Also newgrange is currently free as the visitors centre is being renovated. ?
I was lucky enough many years ago to be a winner of the draw to be in the chamber when the sun rose. It was a very special moment
I’m pretty sure there are standing buildings older ths New Grange about
Hello chaps.
The podcast link is missing.
When using AP dip I would always do highlights or dry brushing before appl5 thecfip. I think the dip like washes brings it all together
I would also ,after seeing it displayed on the screen think you are talking about Hy Brazil which was run by Terry Jones and where the horn resounding was kept. Apparently they inhabitants were really bad singers
Happy Sunday!
Happy Sunday, now my question is… did you get the colosseum? It would be interesting to see what you do with it. As for Historicon, I would do it again with a bigger team. The Daddy D&D bag, brilliant idea wish I had thought of that when my kids were a lot younger. Thanks for the show I really enjoyed watching.
Having attended GenCon myself several times, IMHO it is not really worth the effort or money you will spend. There are plenty of outlets that are already at the show with larger crews than you can bring. You are better off having a GenCan’t event on the site that goes deeper into some games.
I would rather see OTT go to Historicon, Adepticon, Reapercon and if you want a board game focused event then look into under reported cons like Origins or PAX Unplugged.
IMHO, next to Adepticon, the only other really good Tabletop Wargaming Convention worth attending is NovaOpen (http://www.novaopen.com/) where you will see plenty of competitive wargaming and I would love to see Justin actually play in a competitive event and see how well he does as the crew follows his progress.
While GenCon is the MacDaddy of board game focused events, it is already over covered as YouTube a month before the event is full of Pre-GenCon and then it will have Post-Gencon as well as BGG and others having almost 24/7 coverage or the event itself. I feel there are other worthy events that could be covered that are more gamer focused that are just not getting the attention they should — also they are much cheaper logistically to attend.
There is also Fall In in November
Thanks very much for the shout-out @warzan @dignity and @avernos . I won’t lie, it was a lot of work. A lot of 1AM and 2AM nights. I basically took all the photos (55 galleries) except the Hobby University photos and a couple of the tables – thanks again @silverfox8 and @warforger – and of course Gerry and I traded off shooting most of the video / interviews (“Do you know anything about this table / battle / war? Because I don’t. Okay, you interview this guy, I’ll shoot the video … I’ll do the next one on Saipan / Oriskany / Saratoga, etc.”). Poor Justin did all the edits, renders, and uploads except for a few of my photo galleries (again, 1AM , 2AM, etc).
I would agree with Gerry that we MAYBE got 25%, at least if you include only video interviews and photo galleries.
For a Modern War / Sitrep angle, I would also agree that the seminar with Colonels Pappal and Hatcher (Battle of Sadr 2008) was one of the highlights, at least for me.
https://www.beastsofwar.com/liveblogentry/2008-battle-of-sadr-city/
Happy Sunday! Thanks for the show.
Happy Sunday!
Totally on board with the idea of sacking Gencon and concentrating on other shows. Interviewing manufacturers is alright, I’d much rather have coverage of what gamers are doing themselves as it is harder to find that out whereas manufacturers do advertise their new stuff in other ways, whereas cons and shows are often the only outlet for gamers/clubs big hobby projects, particularly the quirky stuff. I’d love see coverage of some of the larger 2nd-tier UK based shows as well such as Partizan, Hammerhead, etc., and if sacking Gencon meant there was more resource available for that I’m kind of stuff, I’d behind it 100%.
In terms of sheer fun, Historicon highlight for me was the Battle of Freeman’s Farm. Not just the interview with Marvin and Jamie, but later I was able to circle back and actually get some troops in the game. My friends know this is one of my favorite battles of all time, and even getting to command one of my favorite generals and his brigades on this table was beyond epic.
Seriously, I wasn’t going to go to Historicon – 1,001 thanks to @warzan for encouraging me to go and making it so easy once I had finally slapped myself into changing my mind.
https://www.beastsofwar.com/liveblogentry/crucible-of-war-freemans-farm-saratoga-awi/
https://www.beastsofwar.com/liveblogentry/oriskany-plays-at-the-table-freemans-farm/
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The ‘Battle of Freeman’s Farm’ was one of the highlights of the coverage for me. I really want to get my hands on their rules system if they ever publish! Not to mention how great the table was looking and just drew you in to wanting to play on it.
The Historicon coverage was great, enjoyed seeing lots of different games with a bit of trader coverage added in. Sometimes show coverage starts to feel like one long advert for the next new shiney and doesn’t seem to engage with the hobbyists at the show, I know commercial platforms like OTT need to go where the money is but Historicon did seem to prove there is a place for focusing on the hobby. I suppose the trick will be to strike a balance between earning a living and getting into the ‘people’ aspect of gaming.
A good local show that is improving year on year is Hammerhead at Newark; the organisation is focused on participation games and engaging the attendees beyond the trade stands. Might be worth OTT checking out next year.
@warzan does this mean your a DDADDM?
My son is almost 18 now, but we have been playing DnD for years. The games we play now with coworkers, is fantastic as I just treat him as “one of the guys”.
I’m always looking forward to any game I play with my kid.
Sure looking forward to seeing OTT coverage of SPQR, even Warren couldn’t make this game seem exciting. All the play-throughs I’ve seen so far just involves models moving to the middle and just rolling multiple buckets of dice at each other, no tactics or maneuvering for position at all – nothing.
The DnD Bag you have there is fantastic @warzan! Got my creative side looking at what I could set up for my local gamers!
On a terrain weekender… get Mel back in the studio and people will be running in the doors 😉
a fabulous show guys don’t forget the sheriff in stranger things is the new Hellboy.
Happy Sunday and thanks for another entertaining show.
On the subject of Convention coverage, I really prefer the parts where you guys are wandering through the big games to see what people come up with. I also like the unique, small companies you interact with in your interviews. The big industry stuff of GenCon is going to be in the news anyway so I think I actually enjoyed your HistoriCon coverage more this year than last year’s GenCon (which was well done none the less). Can’t imagine anything can compare to UK Games Expo.
I am so impressed with Daddy D&D I immediately described it to a couple friends with small kids and they are already assembling their own collections. One might even hire me to paint his Terrain Crate bits and pieces.
I knew I could always count on Gerry for a Red Dwarf reference but a quote from Snatch? Well played, sir.
Happy sunday guys!
the Irish attempted to invade Canada their known as the Fenian Raids
The Island is: Hy-Brasil: The Legendary Phantom Island of Ireland
Quick note, with all the talk of giving people credit for help with Historicon, one person we should definitely call out as well is @stvitusdancern – who sadly didn’t get to attend the event, but she was still kind enough to ship us much needed equipment without which the Historicon coverage would not have been possible.
Seriously, with no Gianna, there would be Historicon coverage … Thanks very much! 😀 😀 😀
@avernos those wizards look great but 5mm too big! One of these days i’ll update my project with 10mm AoM / WoE… haven’t finished the gobbos yet but some skellibobs have risen up!
@avernos there is a company here in the states that does 15mm fantasy called Splintered Light. Those might be from their product line. They also make all kinds of fantasy armed and armored animal men that could be used.
I just want to say to @warzan that I’m loving everything about DDnD!
Warhammer Quest! A diverse range of minis! Spending time with the kids and expanding their minds! Glorious, you’re Dad of the Year material!
@warzan @justin @avernos @oriskany. Really hope you guys come back to Historicon next year. Would love to help out again like we did this year! If you set it up to stay through Monday ill give you guys my personal guided tour of Gettysburg!
always a pleasure and if I get a chance to go back I’ll be in like Flynn
I would so do a terrain weekend @justin @warzan