Bring out your Lead 2023
Last weekend we were in Nottinghamshire for Bring Out Your Lead 2023! And that gave me the opportunity to cross two items from my bucket list, visiting BOYL and visiting Foundry, as we never had the chance to do the later, not even in our initial Lead Belt trip in 2010. Brief warning - this article covers about 90 images.
What is Bring Out Your Lead?
Bring Out Your Lead (affectionately and unfortunately known as 'BOYL') is a celebration of all things Oldhammer; old games, old miniatures, old ... well, people too! We get together once a year to put on amazing narrative games surrounded by these old rules and miniatures - just like the pictures of the games we stared at in those various gaming magazines all those years ago before there was an internet.
And, whilst it gets harder to bring any more definition to BOYL, you can rest assured: Bring Out Your Lead is NOT A TOURNAMENT!
Wargames Foundry is kind enough to provide a venue for this event, the Carriage Court Stoke Hall, so we put on proper boots due to the weather and went from Nottingham towards Newark.
Throwback – RPC 2010 Cologne Tabletop Demo Area
I somehow missed the proper opportunity for this throwback in 2020, as it would have fit the 10-year anniversary.
During my studies, while I was editor-in-chief for a German wargaming portal, I was approached by Michael Kränzle, back then with Leuchtameisen and owner / editor-in-chief at GamesOrbit, before being head of marketing at Pegasus Spiele and now fulfilling this role at Heidelbär. GamesOrbit was one of the media partners of the RolePlayConvention that moved from Münster to Cologne in 2009, and the show had its troubles to integrate tabletop wargaming into its portfolio.
Michael has a soft spot for miniature wargaming and wanted to push that hobby within the spectrum of tabletop games and was looking for somebody who could support that vision. And for that reason, he got in touch with me. He thought of some kind of christmas market, with small booths and lots of space for participation area. And that was kind of a problem, because usually you book a booth at a fair and depending on the pricing or the size of your booth, the venue may give you some space for that kind of activity. But it's usually pricy.
Warhammer Fest 2023 Recap and Comments – Part 3
And the third and final part of our Warhammer Fest 2023 recap and comments, focussing on the Monday reveals. With them being only labelled as Kill Team and the rather "light" content of the Fantasy skirmishes from Saturday, I didn't expect that much. But was happily surprised.
There will be a narrative campaign for Kill Team called Ashes of Faith. It is not part of the current season Gallowdark, but an extension of its own, I assume a bit like Rogue Trader back in 2018. It covers no terrain, and a repack of the chaos cultists sets from the 40k Chaos range (Dark Commune, Cultists and Accursed Cultists), as well as a few Sisters of Silence and Scions to support the new Inquisitorial Agents, who are a new plastic kit, that will give you the option to build 7 different miniatures (a few variants shown here).
These are a nod to the Inquisitor 54mm miniature roleplaying game by Games Workshop in the 2000s, among them most noticeably Sergeant Stone, who had his 54mm miniature and even a rumour engine teaser a while back on Warhammer Community. The new model really catches the artwork by John Blanche and Adrian Smith.
Warhammer Fest 2023 Recap and Comments – Part 2
Picking up after day one of Warhammer Fest 2023, Games Workshop started with Age of Sigmar, we actually received a three part reveal.
The first one, covering a well-deserved update on the Imperial Knights, now known as Cities of Sigmar Freeguild Cavaliers. Quite the tall horses and stunning barding on these. I like the different armour pieces and variants for the helmets. The old kit is 25 years old and did some heavy lifting back in the day, but it is time to send them into their well-deserved retirement. It will be interesting to see if the Demigryph cavalry will be phased out as well, as they don't really fit with the scale and who would ride demigryphs if you can have these horses? Impressive kit and I can imagine an impressive kitbash potential for Astra Militarum rough riders as well.
Warhammer Fest 2023 Recap and Comments – Part 1
This prolonged weekend (April 29th to May 1st 2023) was the Warhammer Fest 2023 hosted by Games Workshop in Manchester. This is the annual big Warhammer party, currently only held in the UK, but all the reveals and a lot of coverage can be found as well directly published by Games Workshop on their twitch or Warhammer Community page.
The last time we had a Warhammer Fest in Central Europe was in 2018, when it was hosted in Düsseldorf, Germany. We were there and covered the event on this blog.
A visit to … Fantasy-Spiele Würzburg e.V.
Last year, Dino started to combine his business trips with visits to tabletop clubs. We covered our visits in Bedburg and Aachen, and now with me attending a summit in Würzburg, I did the same and got in touch with the local gaming club, Fantasy-Spiele Würzburg e.V.
Fantasy-Spiele Würzburg is not just a wargaming club, but they do board games, pen & paper and trading card games as well and quite a lot, as every week is quite busy and offers a lot for the about 180 (!) members of the club. But more on that below.
Where is Würzburg and what do I need to about this city? Würzburg is a German city in the region of Franconia in the northern part of Bavaria. It is roughly in the middle between Frankfurt and Nuremberg (about an hour from each city). As a Franconian city you may choose your poison from hearty dishes, various beers and wine, everything not that far from eachother in the city with a population of 120,000.
Hamburg Tactica 2023 Loot
After the event coverage, here's my loot post from Hamburg Tactica 2023.
I got myself some reinforcements for World War 2, adding the Bofors gun by Rubicon for my 8th Army and got the new Sd.Kfz. 250 plastic kit for review purposes. The large Start Collecting! Box for Age of Sigmar covering the new mortal Chaos, was something I got from Fritz the Brushzerker, I've been tempted by that box for a long time and the updated range really speaks to me. Maybe we will see more of them as I got my hands on the army box, including the new Daemon Prince as well.
Hamburg Tactica 2023
After 4 years, we're back at TACTICA in Hamburg! Our last visit was back in 2019.
TACTICA is Germanys largest wargaming convention and usually held in february (this varied in the last years a bit) in the Wilhelmsburg Community Center. I'll talk about how to plan a trip and combine the show with other things in Hamburg in a separate post. The show is open two days, Saturday and Sundays and usually the first is the more crowded one.
TACTICA covers trade stands and participation / demo rounds of various games, in different scales and settings. You'll find historical as well as ficitional setups, with detailed tables and many wargaming clubs work all year to prepare their demos for the show.
Adeptus Titanicus – Battle for Uulda III Titan Walk
As a sum up of the Battle for Uulda weekend, we did a brief photoshoot of the miniatures we brought to Uulda. A good mix, three traitors and three loyalists.
Legio Tempestus (Stormlords)
by Marius / Poom / Herr.Poom