The Wargamer

Day 1 at BRITCON always feels like a bit of a misnomer, as the actual competition doesn’t usually start until around 6pm. As players are arriving from all over the country, we developed a “rolling start” a few years ago, in which a series of “mini” first round draws are undertaken every 15 minutes or so, with only those players who are already here included. As usual there have been a few “lurkers” this year who studiously refuse to throw their names in the pot until some of the particularly fearsome seeded players have already been allocated opponents – no-one wants to start their weekend with a comprehensive defeat, especially when the coup de grace might not be delivered until midnight (when the games officially ended). However this year the tactic backfired spectacularly for one poor Field of Glory player, who waited until the very last minute to go into the draw – and then ended up playing the current UK No1 ranked player and top seed in a game which went on until the stroke of midnight – which is pretty much the exact time his army broke as well!  

Getting in some practice games.

Earlier in the day we’ve had a great turnout of early arrivals, although quite a few of them seemed more interested in catching up with old friends at the bar instead of getting in a practice game – maybe they’ll regret it later! We’ve also set out our last few tables, as some of the rooms in the venue were only released to us at 2pm on Friday afternoon. Of course, they happened to be the rooms up two flights of stairs from where the tables were stored, but as they say, no plan ever survives first contact with the enemy…..

Warming up...at the bar.

 All but a handful of our traders have also arrived today and set up their stands – the rest turn up for the public days tomorrow morning. Some of them do make some sales today, but most are here early to again to chill out and chew the fat with the players, many of whom are regular customers and old friends.

A sneak preview of the Field of Glory PC Game!

One brilliant innovation which has sparked everyone’s interest was from one of our female players, Linda Fairhurst. As well as wargaming, Linda is a keen knitter and she has combined the two hobbies by creating her own set of hand-knitted terrain for Field of Glory! The set includes ploughed fields, rivers, a gulley and a small forest, all cunningly fashioned from coloured wool. August in Manchester is one of the few seasons where it’s pretty much guaranteed to be warm, but should the temperatures drop we may well see Linda (and her husband Dave) opting for rather more open battlefields than usual - but also sporting some new and no doubt very fashionable woolly hats !

The other impressive terrain to arrive was for the Flames of War tables. Each year we have a dedicated band of gamers from Yorkshire’s “Sneaky Gits” club who provide all the pre-set terrain, and the standard seems to improve every year to the extent that it now approaches nearly 100 linear feet of diorama-quality table buildings, hills, trees, rivers and even a railway (which we suspect may actually be up and running by tomorrow !). The Flames of War players really appreciate the effort the “Sneaky Gits” put in, and seem to respond by putting ever-more fantastically well painted armies on the table each year – we’ve included a few action shots for you.     

Flames of War terrain and minis.

As for the competitions, there have been a few upsets this evening most notably in Flames of War where the current International Wargames Federation Champion was beaten heavily in his first game. The surprised victor told us that he was “delighted by the win, but I’m not going to get carried away just yet and will try to approach tomorrow’s matches one game at a time.”

Jagdpanzer.

StuG.

The overnight leaders so far (after one game) are:

DBMM – Jim Gibson – West Sudanese

Field of Glory 25mm Don McHugh – Thracian

DBM – John Fletcher – Medieval Portuguese

Field of Glory 15mm Early – Chris Ager, Palmyran

Warrhammer 40k Lynette Maxim, Sisters of battle

Warhammer Fantasy Keith Wilkinson - Demons of Chaos

FoW late – Jeremy Howison-Howart –German Grenadiers

FoW Mid – Robin Spence, Guards Strelkovy

EA – Kevin Bott – Eldar

Armati – Carl Luxford

Field of Glory 15mm Late – Robert Taylor – Catalan

Field of Glory Renaissance Beta – Martin van Tol – 30 Years War Swedish