tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-65803841221128637492024-03-06T01:33:28.635+00:00Life in MiniatureI joined the world of metal miniatures in 1983, little realising it was a boom time, and I`d missed it...
30 years later, and still no wiser, this is my story.pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.comBlogger31125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-14339751486491277382015-05-16T09:56:00.000+01:002015-05-19T10:35:06.479+01:00Challenger and IT Terrain.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Odd how things coalesced, and one day can define years to come...<br />
<br />
Occasionally in this Life in Miniature, I 'be been around successful
protects, at GW late in the 80's they came thick and fast, in the 90's it was
amazing to watch Magic: the Gathering grow from nothing to a world beater, but
TTG's little (micro) success, stems from the summer 1983 launch of Challenger,
the 1/300 scale micro-tank game set in the 'Ultra Modern' period.<br />
<br />
Challenger, written by Bruce Rea-Taylor, and published through Table Top
Games, is a simulation wargame based on the supposed escalation of the
NATO/WarPact Cold War to a point where hoards of Soviet Armoured Divisions roamed
into Western Wargamerland.<br />
<br />
Quiet if this was simulation, dystopian fiction or wish fulfilment, I can't
really say, At what point would a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, have not
provoked a nuclear response, and made all these tiny tanks piles of
radioactive dust? Or maybe this was after 'the bomb' and the elephant in the
room was that all these little model towns, hills and road junctions were
already a radio active wastelands, but still strategically important... in
either case, a certain type of British gamer started to lap it up, and
Ultra Modern was a big success, in TTG terms, for the remainder of the 80's.<br />
Within a year or so it was adopted for Nation Championship play, making it
the game of choice for both Marxist teachers and Civil servants, looking to
advance the cause of Communism, and camo-jacketed maths junkies, holding out
for Freedom.<br />
<br />
Over the next 10 years Challenger and all it's updates, digests, and army
lists would keep TTG in a steady stream of sales that drove the tiny company
forwards, and I think this period was the happiest I ever saw Bob, he liked the
rules, he loved the period, and he was great chums with Bruce, a larger than
life figure, who quiet clearly loved his hobby, and the (niche-sized) recognition
it brought him.<br />
<br />
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Bruce's Rules (published through TTG)</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">No pictures of Challenger I on t'interweb, unless you know better...</td></tr>
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Challenger</div>
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Challenger Revised Edition</div>
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Challenger II</div>
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Challenger 2000</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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Battlezones - Scenarios for the Ultra Modern Period<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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Corps Commander OMG (Div Scale)<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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Firefight (Modern Skirmish)</div>
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Ultra Modern Army Lists and Organisation Volume 1 Challenger</div>
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Ultra Modern Army Lists & Organisation Volume 2
Challenger</div>
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Digest No. 3 - Challenger / Corps Commander</div>
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Digest 4 Ultra Modern Army Lists for Challenger II Rules</div>
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Digest 5 Ultra Modern Army Lists for Challenger II Rules<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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Modern Aircraft Handbook - Aircraft Details & Weapons
for Challenger II<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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Revised Modern Aircraft Handbook - Aircraft Details &
Weapons for Challenger II</div>
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And...<br />
Bob used to clean up on the miniature sales for the games too, buying in
Skytrex, and Heroics and Ross, tanks and vehicles, the only brands available
freely in the UK, and stripping them from their packaging and reselling them at
just below original price... Those camo-jacketed gamers could be seen in droves
at any show TTG attended, heads down perusing lists and scraps of paper for
micro armour at 33pence a pop...<br />
<br />
On a couple of occasions both Skytrex and H&R both put a stop on selling
to Bob, he just bought around through other people, before getting back into
good-books with both companies, and at least once trying to buy Skytrex's range
to tie our rules to their models.<br />
<br />
Bruce died suddenly in the late 80's, from what I suspect would be described
as a life-style related condition, smoking or weight related, and Bob would
never be the same person after, the wind gone from his sails...<br />
<br />
Ok then, and now for the odd coincidence, on the very same day the TTG took
delivery of the first batch of Challenger rules (mid-summer '83?) Bob had a
visit from a chap, whose name I never knew, who bought samples of his new
companies product to 'pitch', polystyrene terrain and tiles.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA36NeOqYg8yCc96AA4hwZnrvMcroSCdRx-xqSa5BcnUhyCxGBZ_TKlbMXDuxvQaGqtniBnHhlZPb2BlFvEjfqRDvQORanhGuo3wSAApql4zUaTzwobnmtx_gNacSrk1SCRX52_9yk1_C2/s1600/IT+Terrain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA36NeOqYg8yCc96AA4hwZnrvMcroSCdRx-xqSa5BcnUhyCxGBZ_TKlbMXDuxvQaGqtniBnHhlZPb2BlFvEjfqRDvQORanhGuo3wSAApql4zUaTzwobnmtx_gNacSrk1SCRX52_9yk1_C2/s320/IT+Terrain.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">2 of the first poly tiles in the world...</td></tr>
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These things would over the next few years become almost standard items for
large numbers of wargames, but as yet were an untested idea. People used to
bring ideas to Bob quiet a lot, I suppose his opinion must have been valued by
those wanting to get into the hobby, as the chap from Integral Terrain had
done, most were given short shrift, but Bob spotted this as a winner straight
away and bought whatever samples the guy had, a few packs of small, medium and
large hills, and 3 or 4, two feet square, terrain boards...<br />
<br />
I remember Kate saying, "what fools are going to pay £6 for 2
feet of polystyrene covered in green flock?" with complete disdain...
seconds before Mark and I tore into the stock to buy up whatever stock Bob had
acquired minutes earlier...<br />
<br />
And that's the way it went, gamers knew a great idea when they saw it, and TTG
would sell out of Integral Terrain whenever we got new stock in, what gamers
had used previously; green baize or cloth, was cheap and easy, but looked
bad, plywood tiles with Tetrion 'hard modeled' on looked good, but needed a
village hall to store it in, and a team of volunteers to lift into place,
sand-trays were versatile but heavy and attracted cats (!!!)... polystyrene
solved a load of these problems, light, adaptable and uniform they gave a
gamers a handy battlefield that could be changed to suit many games and was
easy to break down and store in a small (ish) area.<br />
<br />
So on that evening, Mark bought half a dozen T72's and M60's, which he
quickly daubed with green and olive paint, and the pair of us tried, almost in
vain, to get some kind of enjoyment out of the maths equation that was
Challenger...<br />
<br />
I can't say ever I did get a great deal of mirth from the game, then, or on
any of the two or three occasions I've played since, but on that night, with
some brand new Ultra Modern rules in hand, and some state of the art
polystyrene terrain to play on, we could definitely say, the 80's started here...<br />
<br />
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pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-87168129471590737492015-05-12T09:16:00.000+01:002015-05-16T08:47:36.989+01:00Still clearing up '83Ok, this blog update is dedicated to Kevin Davies (no not that one), Shaun Watson, Steve Clark and the two or three Frothers that commented, without whom I might not have continued blogging...<br />
<div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG7ry9el0xco4jDCuoj6JG8ko-Y_aElkW2bGda_L8qbAxZerVPNPl76t-_7HU6wrEe-aEI6Il_2acx7EorUhFlZyB5zjy7hBqm0WcXBRbzC_xh1gq6o1dNivghUY2yEkhRQt3nNSls5nwB/s1600/Kevin+Davies.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG7ry9el0xco4jDCuoj6JG8ko-Y_aElkW2bGda_L8qbAxZerVPNPl76t-_7HU6wrEe-aEI6Il_2acx7EorUhFlZyB5zjy7hBqm0WcXBRbzC_xh1gq6o1dNivghUY2yEkhRQt3nNSls5nwB/s320/Kevin+Davies.jpg" width="216" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not this Kevin Davies</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div>
I had hoped to deal with things in a roughly chronological order, but this has gone wholly out of the window over the last year or so, the best laid plans, and all that... So what I'm gonna do is catch-up as quickly as I can with one big post about events in '84, which should bring us to the early spring of '85 and another fairly traumatic full stop point... </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
But before that there are s couple of thinks to clear up from '83 that really need doing, one that has personal impact on me, and one that was of a more general interest for the wargames world...</div>
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So, with a much waffle as always, I'll blog on... </div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-18251805447078132532014-09-06T12:18:00.000+01:002014-09-08T10:17:32.609+01:00Series 2 games - Micro WarfareOk, gone off the boil recently, work gets in the way of writing... so some '83 stuff to catch up on, there really was a lot going off including; Wargames Illustrated, Challenger, Tercio and mould making, and then I'll get onto whatever was going on in '84, but first I'll finish off the TTG history lessons for awhile, before moving onto more time related stuff...<br />
<div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9WbY3pKHgKleleLzmkybX6ldHAReyoac2VfU9B3ThTq2-9agn2R8Xrzr0gHk-N6Cq5BKZjAFgJEt1OoOE7LqC8zDiaA41xVw92wuduwuShdvnwBpYMCTmr4twkfw5pd5TW6jF3RWKaSNG/s1600/Micro_Nap_frontpage.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9WbY3pKHgKleleLzmkybX6ldHAReyoac2VfU9B3ThTq2-9agn2R8Xrzr0gHk-N6Cq5BKZjAFgJEt1OoOE7LqC8zDiaA41xVw92wuduwuShdvnwBpYMCTmr4twkfw5pd5TW6jF3RWKaSNG/s1600/Micro_Nap_frontpage.jpg" height="320" width="195" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">page one, slightly damaged/aged</td></tr>
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<div>
The next step for TTG back then in the mid-70's was the Micro Warfare Series, known as the Series 2 games, and if what Bob had done with the Series 1 games was strip the flab from American board games of the period, what he tried to do with the Micro Series games, was in a way even more radical.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamefamily/9153/micro-warfare-series">Mirco Warfare Series games</a>, Ancient Mediaeval, Napoleonic, Colonial, three Naval games (Napoleonic, WW1 and WW2) as well as a Sci-fi ground warfare game, reduced everything from the traditional wargame, the rules, the playing pieces, the terrain, everything, to the barest minimum necessary for play, turning expensive and difficult to find miniatures and terrain into card counters, and giving you everything necessary to play in an 16 page A5 booklet, with record sheets, and cut-out and keep counters, in a sleeve in the dust jacket.<br />
<br />
Once again the rules were all Bob's, although I bet the Nottingham club had helped with the play testing, and Roger Heaton supplied the art work, and both still stand up to closer inspection. Bob had a knack for writing just enough detail into the rules to enable fun, flowing play, and Roger does wonders with 70's-printed black and white line drawings, character and action in such a small production can't have been easy...<br />
<br />
I don't know whether Bob would thank me for saying this, or even acknowledge the existence of the word, but what he was doing, and continued to do all his working life, was democratize gaming. He was a great believer in trying to get everyone playing games, and this is what the Series 2 games did best. The rules were pocket money prices, £1 each, and extra armies even less... you could have bought all 5 extra Napoleonic armies for less than a couple of quid... and the games themselves were pocket sized... micro even... no need for huge table, or massive amounts of toy soldiers. Everyone could play.<br />
<br />
Which brings me to a point of contention, whilst I was looking at the Wikipedia page for Micro Games I read that... <br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microgame">"While small scale wargames and board games had existed before they began publishing, Metagaming Concepts first used the term "MicroGame" when they released <i>Ogre</i>, MicroGame #1 in 1977."</a></blockquote>
</div>
</div>
...but TTG's Mirco Series pre-dates this release by a couple of years, and it is possible that they would have been on sale, and known to American gamers before 1977 and the Metagaming release, making TableTop Games the first to introduce the word Micro into gaming...<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">French and British Napoleonic ready for play</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
So I'm off to edit the Wikipedia, and when I get back, I'll finish off with the 1983 stuff that I mentioned above, and then onto 1984...<br />
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<br />pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-16107325888705976992014-06-09T09:32:00.000+01:002014-09-06T13:41:52.166+01:00Series 1 gamesI think Bob's first love was for board games, even into the 80's he would argue that Avalon Hill's Stalingrad was the best game ever made,and I'm sure that at some point in the period between '73 and '81, TTG did in fact produce a board game, called Wild West, but on the whole I think that full-sized, boxed games, were beyond the scope of a small company like TTG at that time.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cover by Rodger Heaton</td></tr>
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So what Bob, and Rodger, did for their first game release was strip away all the flabby excess of the American tactical Board game, the board (!!!), the die-cut counters (players cut-out their own printed ones), and the box, and instead, produced a game in a zip-seal bag, that could be played on any flat-ish surface and packed away into a (duffel) coat pocket.<br />
<br />
In what order, Galactic War, MTB, U Boat,and Ballistic Missile were designed and released, I don't know, something makes me want to say that they were all done at the same time in '73/4, which would have been quite an organisational achievement for a small company, but regardless, these four Series 1 games were TTG's first pop at the gaming market.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Series 1 game</td></tr>
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MTB (Motor Torpedo Boat) and U-Boat show Bob's Naval fascinations coming to the fore, I suppose its not surprising that as a child of the 40's and 50's, World War II, and the Navy with all it history and traditions played, such a part in his life. MTB is set in the English Channel in the mid-war period and U-boat under it, but both are very (too) similar games in out look, groups of small craft against each other in encounter battles with weapons and damage recorded on record sheets.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Swoosh-blam!<br />
Fun with nukes '70's style</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The only one of these games that I had played before
working with Bob was Galactic war, a sci-fi ship combat to ship combat,
which I suppose again owed a lot to Bob's interest in Naval gaming. I can't say
it particularly grabbed me, the ships on both sides were too same-y and
looked like ELO's space ship from the Out of the Blue LP cover, a bit dated in the
80's, but it was a reasonably good game and played out in 45 minutes to an hour...<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQVgd5nwV6_OzPKhgR01_y7L7hkjJVkFwFzyKiGOdJvFg9O98eWb09R1iHFcZFVe2ZQ-9i-K1czHTtz-fIG0wSpOJ7ZZOL-rgJHl6UgYU9DgqYoa-HbvN-KPvZIPR7Mf6-YKA-xY4cMt9n/s1600/$_12.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQVgd5nwV6_OzPKhgR01_y7L7hkjJVkFwFzyKiGOdJvFg9O98eWb09R1iHFcZFVe2ZQ-9i-K1czHTtz-fIG0wSpOJ7ZZOL-rgJHl6UgYU9DgqYoa-HbvN-KPvZIPR7Mf6-YKA-xY4cMt9n/s1600/$_12.JPG" height="320" width="225" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Image nicked from Noble Knight Games</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Ballistic Missile is only one of the four basic games that was a based on Naval warfare, it being a Cold War gone hot, shoot out, with counters, rules and record sheets all yours for the princely sum of 75p.<br />
<br />
The thing that strikes me now and has really struck me before about these games is Rodger's art work. His covers, especially MTB and Ballistic Missile have a good deal of 'dash' about them, which can't have been easy to achieve in the two colours that they were printed in.<br />
<br />
I am unsure of the current availability of these TTG products, if anyone has pdf copies of them I'd be delighted to see them.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-64485367312419199382014-05-28T10:18:00.001+01:002014-05-31T13:14:47.623+01:00Tabletop GamesOk, well the previous posts clears the Old School games out of the way, and I can get into the meat of the next stage of this blog.<br />
<div>
<br />
Tabletop Games, had been a new comer to the wargames scene in the early 70's, Kate told us (new boys) that the company had grown out of Bob's dissatisfaction with the currently available wargames rules for the Napoleonic period that he playing at competitive level at that time.<br />
Quite what his beef was with the sets they were using I never got to the bottom of, ask him and you get a mumbled responses about "riflemen lying down" and the only way you could "kill them, was with Lancers..." quiet why this got at him I have no idea... but it did, so when in 1973 Bob won the National Napoleonic title, and I assume, as part of team, was invited to host the following years tournament, he threw away the old rule set and wrote his own.<br />
<br />
Bob's rules for Napoleonic warfare were used at the 1974 National Championship.At first they were just given away to competitors, but reaction must have been favourable, because shortly after they were being published by the infant Tabletop Games.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdBQFeRWH2K4vGuBFHzoGWvelG88c0DgI_foleaaQcDqKdENkczCmrqLhFqsFHxZ12HX2cY_oRdO5tj6pgTj6OgVB4zyVFo3C17ezvTlDBSFtoKGAIbkxj1iQwGqshZfTwIjJRobWT1Jj0/s1600/Nap_rule_cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdBQFeRWH2K4vGuBFHzoGWvelG88c0DgI_foleaaQcDqKdENkczCmrqLhFqsFHxZ12HX2cY_oRdO5tj6pgTj6OgVB4zyVFo3C17ezvTlDBSFtoKGAIbkxj1iQwGqshZfTwIjJRobWT1Jj0/s1600/Nap_rule_cover.jpg" height="320" width="216" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cover by Rodger Heaton</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Tabletop in seems was a partnership at its inception, Bob of course wrote the rules, and the other Partner, Rodger Heaton did all the illustrations.<br />
Kate also told a tale about Richard Butler being there at the start of the company, but not becoming a partner in the business at the last moment because of the finance necessary.<br />
Richard would later go on to write his own set of Napoleonic wargames rules used for National Championship games, To the Sound of the Guns, which TTG published, and Bob and He would remain firm friends.<br />
Richard was one of the few people who wouldn't stop when arriving at the shop, he'd hustle on through to the back rooms without stopping, not even noticing the bemused wooden-top shop assistant sitting on the stool, with his speechless mouth open...<br />
<br />
When or how the split with Rodger occurred I don't know; all the early games (series 1 & series 2) had an address given as Ruddington, which is a couple of miles outside central Nottingham, which I'm assuming is his, and all these early games, and many of the early rule sets published, used his illustrations as covers, or scattered though-out the text. By the late 70's Rodger seems to have dropped out of TTG leaving Bob and Kate as the sole proprietors, to run the business from the home on Acton Road in Arnold.<br />
<br />
OK then, back after a short break, with the early TTG micro-games, and all the other products of the late 70's and early 80's<br />
<br />
Interested in reading Bob's Napoleonic rules?<br />
<a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/106898294/TTG-Rules-for-the-Napoleonic-Period-1975">Check them out here on Scribd.</a><br />
<br />
<br /></div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-51254242055556588852014-04-10T10:23:00.000+01:002014-09-06T13:44:04.736+01:00Combat 3000<span style="font-size: small;">As much as I was fighting shy the previous post then this one is a much more cherished task.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Of all the games that I played before leaving school, this, a sci-fi skirmish set in the distant future, was the one that really fired me up...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Written by Halliwell and Priestly in 1979, it flung gamers into a universe of possibilities some of which were trailed on the inside as including...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">"Command a squad of Star troopers, blast your way into the Galaxies richest banks and out of the strongest and most infamous jails. Boldly go where no man had probably gone before, swap insults with exotic aliens, then swap blows with insulted aliens..."</span><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXQXqHEW7sLpweXtit7U5k3L3yY1waOE_7GzKkuPXEiSQl6OKaP8isuxUvbuj0L381GbSx2pV1NYnfAG_1A3-QdhyphenhyphenAWEAAUx_BrzfE11CqG1UCU6CcyLok12hraBKp9p6NHh6lsgpXsuVL/s1600/C3000Cover1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXQXqHEW7sLpweXtit7U5k3L3yY1waOE_7GzKkuPXEiSQl6OKaP8isuxUvbuj0L381GbSx2pV1NYnfAG_1A3-QdhyphenhyphenAWEAAUx_BrzfE11CqG1UCU6CcyLok12hraBKp9p6NHh6lsgpXsuVL/s1600/C3000Cover1.jpg" height="320" width="244" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Front cover by Tony Yates</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Which all sound great to me as a kid raised on Dr Who, UFO, Space 1999 and just discovering The Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy, Combat 3000 seemed like an ideal jumping off point for the whole universe...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Not that there was a whole universe inside the rule book, this was a TTG product and the whole thing ran to 32 pages long, with just three alien races (plus humans) for the players to get there teeth into; Trimotes, three armed apes, lifted shamelessly from Larry Niven's 'A Mote in God's eye', Maniblax, bipedal insectoids, and Zarquins, which had a more alien hive-mind thing going on, but this was enough, along with what seemed like an endless list (50+) of lasers and blasters to arm your soldiers, and loads of armour and secondary weaponry to add, the game lent itself to highly personal squads.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Once again, looking back, the rules themselves were quite complex, a percentile system with everything; (range, movement, target size and situations, types of weapon, types of fire; aimed indirect, covering, conditions etc) adding or subtracting from the chance to hit, and then all that armour and variable weapon effects to take into account for damage, once a hit had been achieved... which lead to quite small intense games, 6 - 10 each minis a side on a 4 feet square area would take a few hours for us to get through, with each -5% for being hotly (childishly) contested, each move/shot/throw or melee vital...</span><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidbdcVqQZypgCHaiBCnr-Z-wEXplQydfRGr0SX1CRbJu7O5ZS1dVIiSbwAb89IXjnrm2gVrmDutBc89I1JQE9g1KOVneRrctCbU_8w7zde5U4BvHnAdzNtrGeloThVsIuQtCSEcHfeVbUC/s1600/Marine3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidbdcVqQZypgCHaiBCnr-Z-wEXplQydfRGr0SX1CRbJu7O5ZS1dVIiSbwAb89IXjnrm2gVrmDutBc89I1JQE9g1KOVneRrctCbU_8w7zde5U4BvHnAdzNtrGeloThVsIuQtCSEcHfeVbUC/s1600/Marine3.jpg" height="320" width="235" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Space Marine by Nick Bibby</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: small;">I
suppose that I shouldn't be surprised that this game played so sweetly,
and that I became so enamoured with it, Halliwell went on to become THE
greatest British game designer of his generation, with a list of
credits that include; Warhammer Fantasy Battle, and it's highly regarded
but less well supported sister game, Warhammer Fantasy Role-play,
Battlecars, the most entertaining car-wars game ever, and of course the
classic Space Hulk.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">This was also the first game I played outside school, the time needed play meant we (Simon, Mark, a lad called Richard Purseglove and I) had to meet up on Saturdays to play at each other's houses. In fact the only time Andy Chambers ever came to my house, was to play was a game of Combat 3000, he arrived an hour or so late, mocked my rudimentary modelling skills on a future-tank I'd made, and then nuked the playing field from some cool looking space-fighter he'd scratch built.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Which cuts to the heart of what I loved about Combat 3000, and the problem with Sci-fi gaming in general. This is summed up in a quote from Ripley in the Aliens movie... present with an insumountable number of menacing monster aliens she says..."I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit?", in that, in the far-future whole planets can be whipped-out at the press of a button, or alien cities reduced to dust by half a dozen power-armoured Space Marines with imploding mini-nukes, so that minor conflicts can't/shouldn't exist, without some kind of narrative to drive the game forward, scifi gaming becomes a power gamers dream.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_lWNAY9zlkzhtuJDcyLKXZCzmGBMMcZnXhgmevZiMNUE0BRfsiv9ZYqxv7JzadBFvObgGI4tFu2mGaRnjcrQcdP7CAahvZJkDeUglbWGfFcD2GUDUIh9ja0m-azgVhdsFuyhAR6Xd8rC/s1600/Trimote2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_lWNAY9zlkzhtuJDcyLKXZCzmGBMMcZnXhgmevZiMNUE0BRfsiv9ZYqxv7JzadBFvObgGI4tFu2mGaRnjcrQcdP7CAahvZJkDeUglbWGfFcD2GUDUIh9ja0m-azgVhdsFuyhAR6Xd8rC/s1600/Trimote2.jpg" height="265" width="320" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Trimote, by Nick Bibby</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">How much better then, not to use all those high-end future weapons (Imperial Arsenals, the standard weapon of Imperial troops, +18% to hit, +5 damage effect!) "check your blasters at the door", and duke it out with pistols and laser sabres, rather than to fight armoured combats, with roughly man-shaped future tanks... Battletech anyone?</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">Combat 3001 was released in 1981, this time authored by Halliwell alone, and although it did add more depth to our imaginary future worlds; gravities, vehicles, more weapon types, more Aliens, it didn't really add anything much to the gaming experience, and apart from Laserburn, British Sci-fi gaming was heading to the doldrums for half a decade or so...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJPhDHOcKVY7qwkE59ljSR_ngtUjD_E9A6k4kCC1xYG3b-D0aTVCzq1oi8kW6d-p9_Nk9NFBRFTI-aYpdcFhiJ-xFPW22WBQYkDtwz9UYh3VHIar9w4r8OsP1JX09EN6FadhwQ5V7wVBhA/s1600/Combat3001Cafe2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJPhDHOcKVY7qwkE59ljSR_ngtUjD_E9A6k4kCC1xYG3b-D0aTVCzq1oi8kW6d-p9_Nk9NFBRFTI-aYpdcFhiJ-xFPW22WBQYkDtwz9UYh3VHIar9w4r8OsP1JX09EN6FadhwQ5V7wVBhA/s1600/Combat3001Cafe2.jpg" height="468" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Future-Cafe from the inside cover of Combat3001, reportedly showing the Asgard crowd responsible for the game</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;">Interested in reading these veteran rule-sets?</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Check them out here on my Scribd page. <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/80261502/TTG-Combat-3000-1979">Combat 3000</a>, <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/80142995/TTG-Combat-3001-1981">Combat 3001</a></span>pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-17688962113664785312014-03-04T09:54:00.001+00:002015-06-18T10:34:43.790+01:00Middle EarthOk, so then you look up and a month has flown by and I've not updated the blog... and...<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Well to tell the truth I've been fighting shy of this one, coz the rule set that I found next in my lil'life in miniatures is Middle Earth, written by the South London Warlords and published by Skytrex in 1976, a wargame in the style that WRG were producing in the same period, and obviously based on Tolkien's world in Lord or the Ring et al. <br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCGf3BixqoCY4f2ciYLxzdXMDgA9TZ4GMu3qxBnfPBkc0Qu8NVHFhtoqB_6WG7uKq3ocDGToZht-M7OY4WNc55i25m-fE4hyrRHdq71EjMGOyOZ5xHGmrRqWQcLC0UCHAETnJtipmU3-yS/s1600/MIDDLE+EARTH+WARGAMES+RULES.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCGf3BixqoCY4f2ciYLxzdXMDgA9TZ4GMu3qxBnfPBkc0Qu8NVHFhtoqB_6WG7uKq3ocDGToZht-M7OY4WNc55i25m-fE4hyrRHdq71EjMGOyOZ5xHGmrRqWQcLC0UCHAETnJtipmU3-yS/s1600/MIDDLE+EARTH+WARGAMES+RULES.jpg" width="278" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">the only picture from this 1976 publication</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now I had no trouble with the rules, slightly less involved than D&D but by no means simple, or the wargames aspect, it made a change to line up the few dozen minis we had in little warbands and advance them at each other, rather than 'roleplay' with them.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Where the issue lay was with the whole Tolkien background, implied but not exactly explained in the rules, a world similar to the one of my D&D experience, Orcs, Elves, Dwarves, even Dragons are allowed for in the rules, but there seemed to be so much more...</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
And this off is course the problem...<br />
Of there is "so much more", because Tokien's world is huge, vast, a history and a mythology of a continent, over 1000's of years, and I hadn't read a single word of it...</div>
<div>
I wanted to play, I loved the idea of battling armies of dwarves and elves but I was a complete wooden-top where Tolkien was concerned. </div>
<div>
"No..." Simon Maze would cry "...Nazgul do <b>not</b> have wings..." as I tried to rope in my Ral Patha demons as the Dark Lords servants...<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRdBExjNO1YiEh_naMaDPBItMPY2pfyjVNyRAHgQ_rfUTHGeQKx_QYSiKcF64fnkqSirOu3Horar-Lk4CkZ9trUXVDtDog-EohxxPWTXFQG6tE4Fd2maNu2oFc0oFvzw5ad5tyKqxWXGZ3/s1600/The-Fellowship-Of-The-Ring-Book-Cover-by-JRR-Tolkien_1-480.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRdBExjNO1YiEh_naMaDPBItMPY2pfyjVNyRAHgQ_rfUTHGeQKx_QYSiKcF64fnkqSirOu3Horar-Lk4CkZ9trUXVDtDog-EohxxPWTXFQG6tE4Fd2maNu2oFc0oFvzw5ad5tyKqxWXGZ3/s1600/The-Fellowship-Of-The-Ring-Book-Cover-by-JRR-Tolkien_1-480.jpg" width="258" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">a better draughtsman than writer?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: right;">
</div>
</div>
<div>
It wouldn't be another three or four years (after I left school) before I even attempted to read LotR, even then it took me a couple if attempts to get through it, and as anyone who has known me at all in the last 30 years will probably be able to tell you, I am not a fan of JRR.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
I find there is just 'too much' LotR; the prose is leaden, the plot drawn out, and the dialogue stilted, I admire the scope of the book, and his work in general, bringing together all the tradition elements of the myths of Northern Europe into one whole as he does, you can't doubt he knew his stuff but, but, but...</div>
<div>
<br />
Like a huge Christmas dinner, where with the need to accommodate everyone's favourite tradition goes into the meal, it gets larger and denser with every element added, until the whole thing is fit to burst... Now everyone likes a blow-out meal now and then, but Tolkien servers his spicy stodge all the time, page after page for 100's of pages...</div>
<div>
</div>
<div>
Ok, ok, ok, I know it's not a popular opinion, and in the Geek World in which I live, it is almost considered heresy to say you aren't a fan, but there ya'go, I can't lie to you folks can I?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So, my introduction to The Master comes not from his great work, or his kids intro book, or the film (the Bakshi version kids, go ask your Mum) or some other kind of tie-in product (like there were any), but this little fan made rule set.</div>
<div>
<br />
Check out my copy of <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/79079294/middle-earth-wargames-rules-1976">Middle Earth here on Scribd</a><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcwE4oYAa1adNgeHvi-Tn4T3OdkkKp29KcSom6qBoxA3o8k5-YwWSDtPPu69cKHxDkMxhr_x3-hAF6PEd9uTfftk5zVreUYJu6afFlN8TrdwHoi1knjke8rd75tO7u3V8H0gvUnFbnSMRu/s1600/rp01028agremlins2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="207" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcwE4oYAa1adNgeHvi-Tn4T3OdkkKp29KcSom6qBoxA3o8k5-YwWSDtPPu69cKHxDkMxhr_x3-hAF6PEd9uTfftk5zVreUYJu6afFlN8TrdwHoi1knjke8rd75tO7u3V8H0gvUnFbnSMRu/s1600/rp01028agremlins2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ral Partha Demons, not Nazgul.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
Next Combat 3000, where stealing ballpoint pens on far away worlds, is a distinct possibility.</div>
<div>
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<div>
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pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-45527264682695401882014-01-22T10:25:00.001+00:002014-09-06T13:38:14.000+01:00D&D the game that changed the world<div style="text-align: left;">
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Well if this blog is going to be about Games and Gaming then we might as
well start with the biggy, the daddy of all modern fantasy games, the system
which launched a thousand imitators and made stars of its creators, writers and
artists...</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOHpeCUxp7PtEyshhLuRJgGY6WsMc0yJ2JfXPxQYhtV-xnX5IQaXc4-2H8l7sOrRYl7agwqLB5zb2fnY6BYUegHkdr2q8RXfc0IrXEMjNpIikmi2bEkZhHfba8PFH32d9m3Xr4hovLjeUh/s1600/Dave_Arneson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOHpeCUxp7PtEyshhLuRJgGY6WsMc0yJ2JfXPxQYhtV-xnX5IQaXc4-2H8l7sOrRYl7agwqLB5zb2fnY6BYUegHkdr2q8RXfc0IrXEMjNpIikmi2bEkZhHfba8PFH32d9m3Xr4hovLjeUh/s1600/Dave_Arneson.jpg" height="213" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dave Arneson</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Dungeons & Dragons is, this year in its fortieth year, and fifth or
sixth incarnations . It's creators, Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, both of whom
are now dead had the genius idea of marrying, role-playing, a previously
little known psychology and management tool, with escapist fantasy story
telling, and traditional tabletop miniature and board games, to create a game
like no other of its time...</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
The earliest versions of the game, simply called Dungeons & Dragons, or
Chainmail, seem to have had an effect not unlike the Velvet Underground's early
LP's, or the Sex Pistol's gig in Manchester 1976, not many people bought
records or heard them play live, but everyone who did went away and started their
own bands, or in this case their own game systems... The game was that inspirational.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdScq5m3pD-7KxmjIglUwS5HPvSZKcXAm4lRpBkyJMseHSIbqsPJZCzKz-sGfONRNnM6wQZY2eODkQ3KcHjVlfwAvlpypMYj8SxFWoJiEOfo5bDn1i_1CyHqFtMZj7J4COq9IZNP8GvAkj/s1600/Gary_Gygax_Gen_Con_2007.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdScq5m3pD-7KxmjIglUwS5HPvSZKcXAm4lRpBkyJMseHSIbqsPJZCzKz-sGfONRNnM6wQZY2eODkQ3KcHjVlfwAvlpypMYj8SxFWoJiEOfo5bDn1i_1CyHqFtMZj7J4COq9IZNP8GvAkj/s1600/Gary_Gygax_Gen_Con_2007.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gygax, great dress sense too...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: left;">
But what was it that inspired so many people? There was little in the way of
story, background or plot for a modern role-player to get their teeth into, the
rule system although quite complex for its time, and becoming increasing dense
with each new edition, were really little more than a combat system and list of
spells and their effects, it's surprising to look back at those rules now and
read "the DM's word is final" and accept we live/gamed in worlds with
no fixed rules.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
When I got to Advanced Dungeons & Dragons as it was called, in the late
70's TSR monstrous baby was seeming huge, they had a whole world, Grayhawk, for
gamers to explore, but wafer thin, huge areas were pencilled in with mountains
or dessert, cities and kingdoms but very little detail was given, not even
'Here be Dragons' to aid the Characters or DM in their quests to adventure into
this new world... and even where D&D did give you a grand plot or over
arching scenario to discover and work through, such as in the now legendary
G1/2/3,D1/2/3,Q1 campaign, the action takes place outside of the Greyhawk
continuum, and outside the rest of TSR's output (other modules) completely.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZA1iS2hAHfJKgVL5aucg-K-kDWV1cxB7Z7bC5B-hk5BGOVWV9A_RvvbMpYVdCR9TyqrCfBjIz9unk49Q2126QCjVgkKtP0QlJlUTCqvSEXKZFSNj1Eds3SJRs4QAvrc8F_WR-knuPzgwP/s1600/Charactor+scan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZA1iS2hAHfJKgVL5aucg-K-kDWV1cxB7Z7bC5B-hk5BGOVWV9A_RvvbMpYVdCR9TyqrCfBjIz9unk49Q2126QCjVgkKtP0QlJlUTCqvSEXKZFSNj1Eds3SJRs4QAvrc8F_WR-knuPzgwP/s1600/Charactor+scan.jpg" height="320" width="227" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">my first D&D character,<br />
in Andy Chambers's hand writing</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Later as the system and the Company behind it grew, TSR became more
prescriptive about its worlds and the mythos within them, they spoon fed gamers
with Dragonlance, or Ravenloft, or Shadowrun or... but somehow giving us more detail,
they restricted the imagination of the gamer, they corralled
everybody, 1000's of us, all locked into the same 10' wide corridors
fighting the same Liche Lords or Tentacle walls.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
And although this gave people of a certain age, a shared experience, it also
reduced creativity at the base level of the game, the stand alone role-play
group and it's DM.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Today Dungeons & Dragons is huge, more people play now than ever have
before, the conventions are better attended, gaming groups are growing and
TSR's parent company knows that if it continues to nurture its brand with new
product and continued support, the game will run and run...<br />
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR1gXwD4-Z5YFjao3nWLTnnIXHFPtDY3fhndCRUuDbUvuer2xnaNfvg2kiPM2WtvXVGtu4BFTDf6OS-6ox7NOOLcMy9vovFGPKIqWPMEZ_EaV3_o5_gubB2YlJR4UuPgPLN6piDVlJOD4s/s1600/G1_Steading+of+the+Hill+Giant+Chief.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR1gXwD4-Z5YFjao3nWLTnnIXHFPtDY3fhndCRUuDbUvuer2xnaNfvg2kiPM2WtvXVGtu4BFTDf6OS-6ox7NOOLcMy9vovFGPKIqWPMEZ_EaV3_o5_gubB2YlJR4UuPgPLN6piDVlJOD4s/s1600/G1_Steading+of+the+Hill+Giant+Chief.jpg" height="320" width="246" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">12 pages of black & white print, and few drawings</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br />
So if you're a gamer, or modeller, or even a collector of fantasy and
sci-fi metal models, and you've not already contributed to the <a href="http://www.gygaxmemorialfund.org/">Gygax memorial</a>,
or raised a toast to Dave Arneson and those ground breaking early guys, can I
suggest you do so, salute D&D; the game that changed the world.</div>
<br />
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<![endif]-->pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-36196536915892187462013-12-24T09:57:00.000+00:002013-12-24T11:19:49.609+00:00TTG Christmas Party!<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Yer yer, I know promised you more Old School ramblings about the Fantasy and
Sci-fi games I played in school, but the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christmas rush here at work kicked-in, and I've
had little or no time for writing, so all that stuff about D&D, Combat 3000
etc will have to wait until the New Year...<br />
<br />
30 years ago today...
I know exactly what I was doing....<br />
<br />
Christmas Eve that year fell on the Saturday, so although the shop was open
and we did get a few customers though the door, we spend most of the day
playing Shock of Impact on Bob's old dinning room table in the shop...<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA3ByM1ErHlUVrVoj_WwPuv8nT5cW2YFhBcauDMPme-cFBDDJLmAYhr4EPjnYnfSFz8-DfGD8fw6r5xxQFs2eO_Hb_C3zucEumvHe3FcYDe15_JkV2lubyRfT-wPZrYa2uEQtf-ww-rHdv/s1600/SoI.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA3ByM1ErHlUVrVoj_WwPuv8nT5cW2YFhBcauDMPme-cFBDDJLmAYhr4EPjnYnfSFz8-DfGD8fw6r5xxQFs2eO_Hb_C3zucEumvHe3FcYDe15_JkV2lubyRfT-wPZrYa2uEQtf-ww-rHdv/s320/SoI.jpg" width="235" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">not WRG 6th</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Shock of Impact were TTG's Ancient Wargames rules, covering warfare from the
dawn of recorded time until the end of the 11thC, written by Ian S. Beck, who
wrote a lot of what was good about TTG in the late 70's, they had one or two
new ideas contained with-in the rule system...<br />
Firstly they used D10 instead of D6, which in Wargames rules was a bit of a
leap, and secondly they had a whole figure causality removal system, again
based on D10, which stopped too much record keeping.<br />
<br />
I'd been playing SoI over the summer and autumn of '83, it gave good
games for smallish units and I'd been enthused enough to buy a second
hand (half finished) Late Roman army from a painter called Ted Pool who would
come into the shop, it was mostly Minifigs infantry and TTG cavalry, but it
gave me enough smartly painted minis to use at the club on Monday's, and start
learning to play.<br />
<br />
<br />
But on Christmas Eve we didn't use our own armies...<br />
Oh no, too easy...<br />
<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnG5U4b1_lbpbLtRETUOC0epJZI_EgOMqNELNfNpo9Gx-HRdJeTgn-P81qYZZIJ0-MXMfJNclIyEBgqxjytq2dPp3t0GQ4fvCGx1pF1AKcoRu326lloKzv9hNGUrpEhNyYpKG51QnCRAqR/s1600/SoIAL.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnG5U4b1_lbpbLtRETUOC0epJZI_EgOMqNELNfNpo9Gx-HRdJeTgn-P81qYZZIJ0-MXMfJNclIyEBgqxjytq2dPp3t0GQ4fvCGx1pF1AKcoRu326lloKzv9hNGUrpEhNyYpKG51QnCRAqR/s1600/SoIAL.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">it does what it says on the tin...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In the week or two previously we'd rolled randomly to see not only, which
army we would be using from the 60 or 70 given in the Army List, but also the
number and type of troops that each army contained... SoI had a randomisation
factor built into the army list which was supposed to stop players fielding
only super armies with no dross, in actual fact all the players I played liked
to pick their armies rather than take what came on the randomiser, all super
troops and no dross was how we rolled, but for Christmas we had proper random
armies... and we had to find the minis out of TTG's range, with proxies
standing in, where we didn't have the exact minis needed...<br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
<br /></div>
I don't really remember which army I rolled, something with lots of Medium
Calvary in it, or how the game went (which means I probably lost), but the day
stays with me... Kate bringing food and drink in between serving customers, and
us four boys, head down over the green baize for the best part of the day...<br />
<br />
<br />
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<![endif]-->pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-53995117100506195482013-12-03T09:06:00.000+00:002014-01-21T10:58:34.066+00:00Airfix<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Well I was going to blog about a couple of my favourite games today, but I shall fly in the face for the current vogue for <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/121390094630920/">Old School Gaming</a> by going back, way back, before Old School, to Pre-School... And like almost my entire generation, pre-school soldiers meant plastic, and plastic meant Airfix. </span></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjyFy5zU7qCtj24DAy4VN5dLHioIT10FO6jrK8XBl-LU9wJqtnEmNYo9qWUVKKVyPaRpVHlwMAlRzVaYV9Ppb7-S_Uy5B-RTyduRbizOZHglSteNDPvS1IiuiKobtZAET8JYW7pgmFJI3H/s1600/Airfix+Robin+Hood.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjyFy5zU7qCtj24DAy4VN5dLHioIT10FO6jrK8XBl-LU9wJqtnEmNYo9qWUVKKVyPaRpVHlwMAlRzVaYV9Ppb7-S_Uy5B-RTyduRbizOZHglSteNDPvS1IiuiKobtZAET8JYW7pgmFJI3H/s320/Airfix+Robin+Hood.jpg" height="271" width="320" /></a></span></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Airfix Nottingham connection</span></span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Airfix were huge in the UK, and had been a staple of British boyhood for over 20 years when I got to them in them in the early 70's.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Little did I know it at the time but the had 100's of kits, and were Britain's biggest toy company producing models as diverse at 1/144th scale airliners and 1/8th motor bikes... But all these kits were for older boys, and I, like so many others my age, started out with a box of their 1/72 scale 'little men'.</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Saturday afternoons would mean a walk to my paternal Grandma's house, to be left there in front of the wrestling on ITV or a Cowboy 'picture', whilst my Dad went into Arnold to watch the local non-league side play football... Walking to Gran's, we had to pass Berry's paper shop and as often as not, we stopped in the shop for a treat... </span></span><br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I can't remember why Dad bought me the first box, Astronauts, but after a couple of boxes, Robin Hood & Sheriff's men, I was hooked. </span></span><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJAjO6bjIVMY2-9XrMAWs2v8el2g2VkIdySvWbX9pN6i71qdfB0lK_Ny9oC34xv9snYrrTc8blUkWiKim_KKt4uV_Xylw6_IsLG6u4KSHgdmMEXdChhnM2siH7TU_TIauKnbQCXSFhUjb3/s1600/Airfix+Astronauts.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJAjO6bjIVMY2-9XrMAWs2v8el2g2VkIdySvWbX9pN6i71qdfB0lK_Ny9oC34xv9snYrrTc8blUkWiKim_KKt4uV_Xylw6_IsLG6u4KSHgdmMEXdChhnM2siH7TU_TIauKnbQCXSFhUjb3/s320/Airfix+Astronauts.jpg" height="263" width="320" /></a></span></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Astronauts first, well it was 1970</span></span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Maybe it was the boxes, all the boxes had full colour art and Airfix were very good at showing you what you were going to get inside... Or maybe it was the models, 10 or 12 different little men with a few doubles, and little diorama, or a two or three part snap-fit kit... But whatever it was, there was everything in the box to create a tiny world, right there on the carpet in front of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mick_McManus_%28wrestler%29">Mick Mcmanus</a> or John Wayne.</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Soon it was a regular feature of my weekend, a box of soldiers on a Saturday keep me in a world of my own until Doctor Who at 6ish, and time to go home... After a while I had quite a lot, bags full in fact, and I would acquire loads more too, including tanks and diorama sets, as other boys grew out-off theirs and handed them down... </span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">And everybody (well every boy) had loads. You'd go to peoples house's; cousins, children of family friends, school mates, and they'd all have loads too... so we'd tip them out onto the bedroom floor, line them up, and knock them down...</span></span><br />
</div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">It was in a bag of Soldiers that I inherited from somewhere that I first learned a salutary lesson about scale... In the bag, much like the others ,there were the usual British Commandos and WW2 Germans, as well as the odd stray knight or WW1 Frenchman, but there were also some American Paras or Airborne... AND THEY WERE A DIFFERENT SIZE!</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Airfix advertise their minis as 1/72 HO sized, and these were BIGGER! </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Now I wasn't daft I knew that Airfix, and say Action Man, weren't going to be compilable together, but what on earth was this all about? Why make Soldiers like Airfix, and not make them the same size as Airfix. It was my first inkling that all was not right with the world of tiny troopers... and I didn't like it...</span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></div>
<div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5LSnODSmeKxVtLRfodfHPV-OPrAsBfi6rBFppn6wHB_OMjVeyfgSMCxZRkziRI3yeRQAyQB6QhfZNxI_WiC8_7xAPZG1VyCkxG-XYgGu9WvCDoGvYR9jiJ1WjMMEBgQmCLsTCuSNidGCG/s1600/airfix+book.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5LSnODSmeKxVtLRfodfHPV-OPrAsBfi6rBFppn6wHB_OMjVeyfgSMCxZRkziRI3yeRQAyQB6QhfZNxI_WiC8_7xAPZG1VyCkxG-XYgGu9WvCDoGvYR9jiJ1WjMMEBgQmCLsTCuSNidGCG/s320/airfix+book.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></a></span></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Bruce Quarrie's rules for WW2</span></span></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Much later, at about 11 or 12, just before I got into D&D actually, I had come across Bruce Quarrie's rules for WW2 games, published by Airfix. These were the first rules I'd ever seen and I was on the verge of getting a few mates together to play, when the D&D bug bit, and I (we all) moved over from plastic WW2, to metal Fantasy minis and gaming.</span></span></div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-63138561352143534532013-11-27T09:29:00.000+00:002013-11-27T09:32:41.807+00:00A bit of a catch up...<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Ok Folks, sorry if the last three or four posts have been a bit of a
hatchet-job, I didn't really intent for it to be read that way. I had hoped to
start the blog in June with leaving school and starting at TTG, but one thing
drove out another (<a href="http://www.theassaultgroup.co.uk/store/home.php?cat=130">TAG Tudors</a>)
and I didn't get started until September... which made getting to Nov 8th a bit
of a rush.... and consequently the posts do come across as a bit of a...
frenzied...<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3zeVcl0bfNzrZDXo2mR7lqatOkHIwFcS1HnlnUc0bE31leibaNBYcygor6ZIA8bo0ghyveiNE7DEejU1shqh1ejxFk8lqrBgTYFX_gDQbCUyHr0PGHJVWx959fZRDf4cmcpytmTXH_rQI/s1600/Shoot-out_Chop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3zeVcl0bfNzrZDXo2mR7lqatOkHIwFcS1HnlnUc0bE31leibaNBYcygor6ZIA8bo0ghyveiNE7DEejU1shqh1ejxFk8lqrBgTYFX_gDQbCUyHr0PGHJVWx959fZRDf4cmcpytmTXH_rQI/s320/Shoot-out_Chop.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tony Yates Illo</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
But this Blog is not necessarily about Citadel Miniatures, its about my life
with in the minis world, and as I said in previous posts, a break with Citadel
occurred in the late '83 so at that point I stopped following there mini
releases as closely as I had been doing. And although TTG did keep up a
relationship with Game Workshop for awhile, which I will blog about when the
time comes, for the next few years most of these posts will be about TTG, their
miniature range and rules, as well as the games that we stocked in the shop and
some of the people who bought them.<br />
<br />
Before that though, I would like to blog about one or two of the games that
we played back at school, that were very important to me in a couple of ways,
for the worlds they created, and the way that they did so... <br />
<br />
So next time, back in full flow, with Combat 3000 and Middle Earth.<br />
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<![endif]-->pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-21999886878768760082013-11-19T10:47:00.000+00:002013-12-03T09:22:30.164+00:00A gamble?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Right-o,<br />
<br />
I didn't mean this to turn into a micro analysis of Citadel miniatures, but
what Bryan did with the production of the miniatures in the period ('82-84) after he
took charge bares noting, so if this gets a little technical please stick with
me, and I get back to the rampant nostalgia in the next update or two...<br />
<br />
Traditionally, making white-metal minis involves a two stage moulding
process; firstly an original sculpture is made using an epoxy putty (or even
earlier carved from solder) and then moulded into what is called a Master-mould. This Master-mould might contain a few different models but of course it
could only have one copy of each original in it, this is ok for small scale
production, but as moulds ware, and quite often the original would be destroyed
in the stressful vulcanisation process, it is only really a temporary mould.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcJ7LzeQ2mF07gP6npX-RHCxsriDiae_DDDP4r9qk4LB_LkjrYLRSMMcg7RRAoT77uo2NQ_0VEt7z4OmKiBr_btHgdBwyeklP7ijqaG4VYbV_FoCRq47JKnckroWUmVwIrMNf6IZW33Tao/s1600/Mastermould.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcJ7LzeQ2mF07gP6npX-RHCxsriDiae_DDDP4r9qk4LB_LkjrYLRSMMcg7RRAoT77uo2NQ_0VEt7z4OmKiBr_btHgdBwyeklP7ijqaG4VYbV_FoCRq47JKnckroWUmVwIrMNf6IZW33Tao/s320/Mastermould.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">a silicon rubber Master-mould.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
So once a mini had been Master-moulded a number of Master-castings would be taken
from it, cleaned of blemishes and then these would in-turn be moulded into a
Production mould, which would have a large number of each mini type on it. <br />
It
would have been incredibly difficult to provide large numbers of castings from a
mould with one cavity on it, but considerably easier if the mould had 10 - 20
minis of the same type on in... simples...<br />
<br />
In this a 'belt and braces' type of mini production, the expensive to produce
original is protected by having firstly a Master-mould taken, and secondly by having the master-castings cast, and saved, to
return to when the Production-mould inevitably wore out.<br />
<br />
So what Bryan
did in 82 - 84 to this traditional process was not only radical for the time,
but also quite risky.<br />
<br />
What he
did was get the sculptors, and at this time there was only a handful of them,
to make-up only the basic bodies of the miniatures before master-moulding, and
then to add the final detailing onto the Master-castings just before the
production moulds were made. This allowed a great degree of variation to each
mini that went into production, for
example one fighter would get one type of helmet and a bag, and the next in
line might get a different helmet and a cloak, the next, a third helmet and a
sword instead of a axe etc... One well known sculptor told me that his job when
he first went to Citadel in this period was to do a good deal of this type of
conversion work, sitting between the moulding processes, sculpting bags and
pouches, cloaks and hats that all added a huge amount of character and colour to
the minis that were being released.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-TR4hEGs_duRR9gqKGLACNdLDlmXKu6G8Tu2tR4deIeevEKibHq685W8seMK58G0cQWK-Vhw6tfU5L0VYtlbYVPQgrbbkAB0MypKAVxFP5nXEI6E_USt4YCsBl24sbVVNJXP8QnkNDyGR/s1600/C02-47.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-TR4hEGs_duRR9gqKGLACNdLDlmXKu6G8Tu2tR4deIeevEKibHq685W8seMK58G0cQWK-Vhw6tfU5L0VYtlbYVPQgrbbkAB0MypKAVxFP5nXEI6E_USt4YCsBl24sbVVNJXP8QnkNDyGR/s320/C02-47.jpg" width="187" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">C02 Wizard</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1lNWQlRu0PXRcEdrmQniMMxkKXxp_s4-aG3HWuiZUr7qU1aLbEtgnKMQplebKCbjP3cQkSMjxqTztPFY-VzCmKygl-_MSzaeWXcerJ7b-6ALVmp1a-nd9x5A1Kik4Sjb8afQKL_Ut56kR/s1600/C02-48.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1lNWQlRu0PXRcEdrmQniMMxkKXxp_s4-aG3HWuiZUr7qU1aLbEtgnKMQplebKCbjP3cQkSMjxqTztPFY-VzCmKygl-_MSzaeWXcerJ7b-6ALVmp1a-nd9x5A1Kik4Sjb8afQKL_Ut56kR/s320/C02-48.jpg" width="182" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">a converted C02 Wizard</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
But there is a problem with this method, moulds ware-out. The moulds once spun
a few time start to degrade, areas that are undercut will rip, larger items
will start to flash and constant use will cause them to burn-out (lose the
oils in the organic rubber compounds) and break up. In the traditional process
this is not an issue, in that it is possible to return to the master-castings,
which survive the vulcanisation process, to make more moulds... But where the
design team had added extra detailing to the basic body types in Bryan's new method, the
putty would be lucky to survive, and the sculptors would need to make a number
of new variants to fill the new production mould every time they were remade.<br />
As an aside, it might have been possible to take more 'master-castings' from
a fresh production moulds and put these aside to make more production-moulds
from, but these would have been third, (forth, fifth) generation copies of the original
bodies and would be of lower quality that the first and second generation
copies...<br />
<br />
From gamers this method of making minis produced a boom in the numbers of
different models that were available and kick started the 'Collector-gene' in a
lot of people, but it had an inherent problem, it required an almost ever
increasing number of sculptors to service the constant remaking of the range...
and although Citadel did increase the design capacity over this period,
doubling the number of sculptors they employed, I suppose the decision was
taken to move back to a more traditional method of working, and by the release of
the Second Compendium ('85?) the range had settled down to less varied 'codes'
with regular numbers of set minis in each...<br />
<br />
Which all begs a couple of big question; 1) did Bryan
know what he was doing with the moulds?<br />
I suspect that he did, he knew that his new moulds would ware-out, he is an
accomplish mould maker himself and Citadel must have already been remaking
loads of moulds on a regular basis, given the numbers they were selling of the old
range... And 2), did he realise the medium term problems he would create? And again my guess is that he did, taking a gamble on pumping the highly profitable
miniatures side of his business as quickly as possible to grow the whole
organisation.<br />
An entrepreneurial risk.<br />
<br />
Regardless it worked, Citadel miniatures were now driving Games Workshop
forward but at a cost... most of those great minis from this period are now
lost forever, torn, ripped or burnt-out long ago, never to return.<br />
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Next time, a pause for breath...pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-29128090078602082272013-11-15T10:48:00.001+00:002014-01-28T10:39:24.850+00:00...and rise...Citadel miniatures in 1983, must have been a fabulous place to be.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
After the changes in personal at the top of Citadel/GW in the previous year left Bryan wholly in command, the year that followed would be one which shaped the miniature gaming hobby for the next two decades.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Bryan changed the way that miniatures were produced, marketed and consumed for a generation of gamers. These changes weren't instantaneous, and some like the production methods, had been developments of what was already going on across the previous couple of years, and of course some developments were only temporary themselves and would be superseded in a the fullness of time, but it clear to see Bryan's direction and imagination coming to the fore, in his first full year in charge.<br />
<br />
The first noticeable move away from the sales model of the previous 4 years came in late '82, Citadel started to put out new miniatures in boxed sets. Now I don't think this was a original idea, I had seen some American companies selling in boxes (but I can for the life of me remember who? Dave?) in the early '80's, but these new Citadel boxes were the first to contain minis that were any good.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmhksTe-VN2DG6Zbt8-kXdWDBRNfp52y1TxygInhc3GmBwj78IKp64rLLOJ4Xdqob2eWfWjasZg0utrFxEMENDmm2LWe2nlur0vBuvd9crnDxci69NK5gOvE1nDksyfaSCm4BOoDGCUjxy/s1600/s2dwfkingcourtc2-01.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmhksTe-VN2DG6Zbt8-kXdWDBRNfp52y1TxygInhc3GmBwj78IKp64rLLOJ4Xdqob2eWfWjasZg0utrFxEMENDmm2LWe2nlur0vBuvd9crnDxci69NK5gOvE1nDksyfaSCm4BOoDGCUjxy/s320/s2dwfkingcourtc2-01.jpg" height="320" width="222" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Dwarf Kings Court</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCwdKiFRXsalD_bIFMLtoaY46TRiyRSTvf-fX072vBOCLmLYbfyD4p1Tt0CPiruTGpUYRQye2af7tP5Kij_fFPJEkoqgVhJ7yhGE3rfMFc3ab9mj2o1bQXVzORQWWY_2HTtZ6baGFgoBGj/s1600/citsslogo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCwdKiFRXsalD_bIFMLtoaY46TRiyRSTvf-fX072vBOCLmLYbfyD4p1Tt0CPiruTGpUYRQye2af7tP5Kij_fFPJEkoqgVhJ7yhGE3rfMFc3ab9mj2o1bQXVzORQWWY_2HTtZ6baGFgoBGj/s1600/citsslogo.jpg" /></a><br />
<br />
Previously minis had only been sold in singles, in plastic bags with folded cardboard headers, and if you wanted one mini, you paid for and got, one mini.<br />
Boxing was the first attempt to drive gamers/collectors into buying more miniatures than they necessarily wanted. A box would contain 8 to 10 minis that you couldn't get in the main range, so if you wanted a specific mini the only option was to spend £3.95 on the box to get it...<br />
<br />
Fortunately, for gamers, most of the these early boxes contained great minis, so people were only too willing to to put up with the marketing to get the best Citadel had to offer, and most of these box sets are still very fondly remembered. <br />
<br />
<br />
The second change, visible form the outside, was the move away for a catalogs of miniatures you could buy to what came to be known as the 'C' codes.<br />
In the early years Citadel had it range divided into <a href="http://www.solegends.com/citf/citfa/index.htm">Adventures</a>, <a href="http://www.solegends.com/citf/citff/index.htm">Monster and specials</a>, with each mini having its own specific code, with-in these broad groups, which you could order separately.<br />
The 'C' codes stopped this, minis were grouped into 40 codes which contained many different minis.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK33IRPmVTtUa2MhZsH50esifM0E9JEpj5z7ObQi1WEBeRjJvRV21ovKBXD9vkR7AdA4eZuHF0V1jFPv3MC9mpcX8xcbM5RkTjXHanu-Yg6AoM4tW5d5Mb5ZTmRgY04WTP3AKE0l-2-8oq/s1600/Citadel.Compend-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK33IRPmVTtUa2MhZsH50esifM0E9JEpj5z7ObQi1WEBeRjJvRV21ovKBXD9vkR7AdA4eZuHF0V1jFPv3MC9mpcX8xcbM5RkTjXHanu-Yg6AoM4tW5d5Mb5ZTmRgY04WTP3AKE0l-2-8oq/s1600/Citadel.Compend-1.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John Blanche art from the first Compendium</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I don't quite know when this change took place, <a href="http://www.solegends.com/">The Stuff of Legend</a> gives a date as early '83, and when I got to TTG in that summer, Bob had me had me change over the figure-racks from the old codes over to the new system, the change was defiantly complete by the release of the fist Citadel Compendium in October...<br />
<br />
In October '82, if you wanted <a href="http://www.solegends.com/citf/citfa/citfa82cat.htm">FA-1 Fighter in Plate</a>, you got it and noting else, in October '83 if you ordered from <a href="http://www.solegends.com/citc/c01fighters.htm">C01 Fighters</a>, you got one of sixty plus variants.<br />
<br />
Finally, the biggest thing at Citadel in 1983, was the release of Warhammer.<br />
The first edition of the mass battle system was launched in the summer, and was an attempt to put a game behind the miniature range to guide players into buying more miniatures. The problem with D&D was a vehicle for a miniatures range was that the miniatures themselves were an unnecessary luxury. With role-playing most players wanted one or two miniatures, preferably ones that represented their Character as closely as possible, and no more... DM's would be expected to have a few more, half a dozen goblins and Orcs, an Ogre or troll, or a scenario specific monster or two, but not huge numbers.<br />
Warhammer changed all that. <br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVPZrwozyb0q-KagUhUM_9f4CLlotY4f8M87R2d-qDq9j9YprGlGpwcSa9DxW8froPvQu9xVYZJ2lvWeCTBcX30mD6H_9Qq-WSL4bbImHvYG_CKLUJ0xPhwEo8qMO4M2xxGKj7YW0F1DkR/s1600/warhammer_fantasy_battle_edition_1_book_cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVPZrwozyb0q-KagUhUM_9f4CLlotY4f8M87R2d-qDq9j9YprGlGpwcSa9DxW8froPvQu9xVYZJ2lvWeCTBcX30mD6H_9Qq-WSL4bbImHvYG_CKLUJ0xPhwEo8qMO4M2xxGKj7YW0F1DkR/s320/warhammer_fantasy_battle_edition_1_book_cover.jpg" height="320" width="233" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mr Blanche again</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
I remember taking the first box home, and playing a scenario given in the back of one of the books.<br />
The adventures had to cross one of three bridges, whilst a random assortment of 'baddies' tried to stop them... the heroes I think were given in the rules and the baddies were generated by an encounter table... Now, Mark and I had a fair number of minis each... I must have had 50 or 60, Mark a similar amount but within a few rounds we'd exhausted our supply, even reusing dead'uns and throwing in proxies where we didn't have an exact match for what the the random table generated, we ran out of minis...<br />
Plus the rule system seamed retrogressive even then... saving throws! What was all that about? Mark was throwing buckets of random monsters at my five heroes, with whatever damage done 'saved' on a roll of 3-6!<br />
Would you believe I played Warhammer on the first day it was released, and didn't play again for 5 years, I just didn't like it... but I assume lots of people did, or were looking for something new after the D&D boom waned, as it went on to be the biggest game in the UK Fantasy market in the 80's and 90's, but you needed LOTS of miniatures...<br />
<br />
How Citadel provided all these new and different miniatures is in perhaps the most interesting thing about the growth of the company in the period, and I'll write about the radical production methods next time, but for now I hope that I've shown you how Citadel Miniatures started to dominate, firstly Games Workshop Britain's biggest game manufacturer and retailer, and secondly the UK market itself.</div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-22949341425367933042013-11-12T09:26:00.000+00:002014-01-28T10:34:46.851+00:00The Rise...It's hard to look back now at Citadel Miniatures and not see them as the all conquering behemoth of the miniature gaming world they were to become, but in the early 80's that one particular outcome was not certain by any means, other companies could have come to the fore or the company might not have developed in the way that it did.<br />
<div>
So what happened between the formation of the company in early '79 and my formative year of '83 to turn the casting arm of a small games company into a dominant market leader?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Citadel's early miniatures show their roots, all those early minis are designed almost exclusively for use alongside Dungeons & Dragons. </div>
<div>
Character types are copied slavishly from the AD&D books, creatures from the Monster Manual, very little is original, and where it was, as was the case of the few monsters that travelled from the range over into new D&D books, we all knew what we were being sold, and for what we were supposed to be using them... D&D.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcZ_JS-R-bOVUnZbXffEe4esIF97rXAgK1CWG_u9-TykDXICzl7ecGzhKplrZQZoQJKsMH2A8iJkVtN8pW4-ofX07uG474pDwgw217GdqEV_vG_6bBLJz1cBi_Ab-4WJMNEpOvqIvWHg2G/s1600/Citadel+Blue+Catalogue.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcZ_JS-R-bOVUnZbXffEe4esIF97rXAgK1CWG_u9-TykDXICzl7ecGzhKplrZQZoQJKsMH2A8iJkVtN8pW4-ofX07uG474pDwgw217GdqEV_vG_6bBLJz1cBi_Ab-4WJMNEpOvqIvWHg2G/s1600/Citadel+Blue+Catalogue.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">'82 catalogue </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div>
Which is a bit odd really, because it wasn't until much later that Citadel had a full AD&D license... </div>
<div>
Grenadier Models had that license in the in the late 70's and early 80's in the US, but made little impact in the UK in spite of the tie-in.</div>
<div>
Even the range that Citadel were set up to produce over here, Ral Partha, could (should) have gone on to become the dominant player here, as it was in the US, but again, even with a long standing history of being associated with D&D, it slipped into the position of also-ran.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It's possible to go a look at what Citadel produced in the first couple of years and pick out virtually every monster and character from the D&D pantheon or it's rough equivalent, but after making everything that the D&Der needed there was a natural break on what the company might possible make next.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Obviously they looked for other markets, historical miniatures were (are) a short step away, as are minis for other game systems, and Citadel go away and try to expand all these other revenue streams as the 80's dawn... Gangsters, sci-fi, larger scale models and movie tie-ins (Star Trek) are all explored, but with little success... </div>
<div>
The only thing that does start to sell more miniatures, and I mean sell more than the one of each or the few that you needed for the D&D campaigns, were the Fantasy Tribes.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRMQdyLtWcyqI0Aq9IreImygRWj1132S_3e1cwfrlL6CZvkE9OFK2CxosBvrKib39H4kMVzzhsCTGrkDPjXragsGnJ4ZrnmuHXScZJ1M0CsHUyEVlPRhgds65tO4CLf8yK_CuQ3NkIzq6r/s1600/FTD9.Show.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRMQdyLtWcyqI0Aq9IreImygRWj1132S_3e1cwfrlL6CZvkE9OFK2CxosBvrKib39H4kMVzzhsCTGrkDPjXragsGnJ4ZrnmuHXScZJ1M0CsHUyEVlPRhgds65tO4CLf8yK_CuQ3NkIzq6r/s320/FTD9.Show.jpg" height="320" width="230" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of 20 variants of FTD9 Dwarf in plate-mail with sword</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div>
Fantasy Tribes, I feel, have all the hallmarks of what made Citadel great in the 80's, and would show the pattern which Bryan would try to repeat whenever he started a new project.</div>
<div>
Firstly they were wholly original, other manufacturers may have had a dwarf or two in their range, only Citadel had 60 different models in a Tribe, secondly they were collectible, where other ranges had fixed models to buy, Tribes were, it seamed, constantly changing so that just when you thought you had them all, new variants would turn up to keep you buying, thirdly, and this was true of all the models that Bryan commissioned, they were full of character, no bland Orc with Sword in this range, these Orcs are attacking, swinging, charging, and finally, they were great models, in a way that lots of early Citadel or American imported minis weren't.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But even these stand out collections weren't for very much more than extra variety on the D&D table and I doubt that the company could have gone on from strength to strength in the way it did with just these...</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Which is where a little bit of luck comes in handy...</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Steve Jackson and Ian Livingston, Bryan's partners in Citadel and owners of the parent company, Game Workshop, had hit on the smart idea of copying the unique feature of also ran fantasy role play game Tunnels & Trolls, it's solo play option, and repackaging it for a younger market as Fighting Fantasy game books... They were hugely successful creating a publishing phenomena and launching a whole line of best selling books which made their authors at least properly famous, if not quite house-hold names.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYqDxqAYcfxp5r9ESArzup4v7J0PwdqidodxlqQvrxveTF0aSTB81x14Zc-DsT607MiDp1lltj1fq4JUyjlb_RP89prK8_WS-r4kr3usPGkVgLu69W8IXl6W08iFsZP0qj2N5JQCS72n5q/s1600/figfan03o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYqDxqAYcfxp5r9ESArzup4v7J0PwdqidodxlqQvrxveTF0aSTB81x14Zc-DsT607MiDp1lltj1fq4JUyjlb_RP89prK8_WS-r4kr3usPGkVgLu69W8IXl6W08iFsZP0qj2N5JQCS72n5q/s320/figfan03o.jpg" height="320" width="195" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The first Fighting Fantasy book I bought</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<div>
Which must have taken the pressure off Citadel/GW to perform financially, Bryan had made another halfhearted effort to start again with his Bryan Ansell Miniatures, but by late '82 with Steve and Ian moving into new spheres and Bryan looking for new directions, a deal is struck that gives Bryan control of Citadel AND Games Workshop and allows him to take both companies forward with his direction and control.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Now, the deal that I heard that was struck was that Bryan would take immediate control and pay Steve and Ian £1,000,000 in 12 months. Bryan told me at a much later date, that he didn't have the money when he took control, and had to make £1M in that first year to for-fill his part of the agreement, but fore-fill it he did, so we can assume that 1983 was a very good year for miniatures...<br />
<br />
Next time, Lets make a million! All aboard for Boxed sets, the first Compendium and Warhammer Fantasy Battles </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-32796037374221164952013-11-08T23:40:00.000+00:002014-04-10T10:45:35.250+01:00The Severed Alliance<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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(80's joke in the title...)<br />
So it came as a bit of a shock to get to work on the 8th of November 1983,
and find Bob in a terrible mood, Kate warned us (Mark and I), just to stay out
of his way when he was in a foul mood, so we kept our heads down and got on
with whatever we had to do...<br />
<br />
Shame really coz I'd had a terrific weekend, for the first time I'd travelled
away to help out at a wargames show... and not just any wargames show, oh no...
this was the BIG one.<br />
<br />
Northern Militaire was held on the 5th and 6th of November in Oldham, at the Queen Elizebeth Hall. Bob had travelled
up on the Friday evening but I went on the Saturday morning with Rees (if
memory serves we went up in an escort-type hire-van rented from the place where
his wife worked... it's was foggy on the M1 and I remember Siouxsie
and the Banshees version of Dear Prudence on the radio...)<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisuryKdAffbGBZ4McfXYutGMXz8sGZIXpOwogU7T0C4jNvfuRgsoXCm8607cVyqB4Laihu1HKdZSXO-pyGRZmSpdrRcKNluFwbX2uhNX5Hfz5NfWPa576DjrFZpvvk53lf5tawvNWIqenX/s1600/QEH.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisuryKdAffbGBZ4McfXYutGMXz8sGZIXpOwogU7T0C4jNvfuRgsoXCm8607cVyqB4Laihu1HKdZSXO-pyGRZmSpdrRcKNluFwbX2uhNX5Hfz5NfWPa576DjrFZpvvk53lf5tawvNWIqenX/s320/QEH.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Queen Elizabeth Hall, Oldham</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
TTG had a huge stand at the event by Bob's standards, which is why Rees and
I travelled up, and Bob roped in the willing hands of Bruce Rea-Taylor to make
four of us to cover the 24 feet.<br />
My section of the stand was made up of the extra stock that Bob had arranged
to bring from Citadel.<br />
That same weekend was Games Day in London,
and of course Citadel/GW were directing all their efforts toward that.<br />
<br />
A deal was struck to exchange stock between Citadel and Bob, so that we
could both have a presence in, and a profit from, both events.<br />
Rik Priestley and Richard Halliwell had come to the shop in Daybrook square
to bring stock for us to take to Oldham, and also to take away TTG rules and
minis for sale in London.<br />
<br />
Northern Mil. was amazing for a young'un like me, it was so BIG, a couple or
three floors and although there were only a few games on, it was primarily a modelling
event, there was a much greater variety in displays, traders and public than a
normal wargames event...<br />
And boy were we busy... now in my time I've stood trade shows like Salute or
Games Day where the public have been three or four deep at the stand, but
nothing came close to the two days of Northern Mil.<br />
<br />
"Used to be better in the old place..." grumbled my Boss,
"... Never recovered from the change of venue..." But if shows did
get bigger and better than this, I would have been amazed.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIsn_Ua2P1WVTPrB6mhDpD-uwbO-VvjLrlKf9qSWA8uIZ0Sl09yQ_Qfm9rLFEYOLf8ufabCe6fi9TcATOEWYI6UGXwNZkNqessbljSbT2fJEPziIvBlArAAHOjaETV2MKeas1CSa_j5PYC/s1600/Games+Day+1983.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIsn_Ua2P1WVTPrB6mhDpD-uwbO-VvjLrlKf9qSWA8uIZ0Sl09yQ_Qfm9rLFEYOLf8ufabCe6fi9TcATOEWYI6UGXwNZkNqessbljSbT2fJEPziIvBlArAAHOjaETV2MKeas1CSa_j5PYC/s320/Games+Day+1983.jpg" height="225" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Games Day '83, note the date.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I remember being driven through Oldham in
the dark, heading for the hotel, and the road ran through all the old back to
back houses, which were lit with fires and fireworks... Punch drunk and tired I
sat drinking cola listening to the old Chaps joke in the bar... perfect.<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
Sunday, more of the same... Non stop customers... and non stop music too...
They used to play Top 20 War Film Themes over and over, all day long on the public
address system... Even Bob who liked a movie film theme, would be tiring for 636 Squadron by 11am on Sunday morning...</div>
<br />
I bought some minis, a second hand Japanese Samurai army from the Bring& Buy. (more stuff for Tercio)<br />
<br />
No club on Monday, a night off after a two day event, and then into work
again on Tuesday as normal.<br />
<br />
Or not...<br />
It transpired that Bob was fuming because all the stock, minis, rules,
displays, that we had sent to Citadel had not been taken to Games Day, they had
been left behind and TTG would get no presence, or profit, from the event
despite having to work double-hard to do two major events in one weekend, and
working hard and taking extra staff/space to sell the Citadel stuff at Northern
Mil.<br />
<br />
I don't know if Bob even spoke to Bryan
on the normal Monday 'Run' or not, but as far as Bob was concerned, that was
it, The End.<br />
Over that week, Bob had me take down all the Citadel miniatures stock from<br />
the rack in the shop, other things would take its place, and we would have
no more contact with Citadel.<br />
<br />
So, people often say to me, "oh the golden age of Game Workshop was such and such...
85-87, or 88-91, or mid 90's". Well for me the golden age of Citadel miniatures ran from the time that they
started on the Fantasy Tribes (81?), until the 8th of November 1983, the day that I found out that you
couldn't trust them, and they were only looking out for No.1.<br />
<br />
And what next dear reader?
<br />
Why I suppose we need to judge Citadel's actions in context, so next time,
I'll muse on the changes in Citadel in the years of 82 and 83...pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-34368261684292833642013-11-07T10:40:00.001+00:002013-12-03T09:16:08.596+00:00Laserburn.I said I was happy to have spoken to Bryan Ansell at my first Wargames show, but that wasn't the first time I'd seen the him, oh, no, he'd been into TTG in the summer...<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiARz-fgph_OcdIELiIypC4op3_w1Gi6nHXohQp1DBQR3SkL9vb4sysdYQaFzZ9SnUafBzXAtwl7yqp8DxIl5GWW4sTNJkAMJSuvEZOaf5NabvrglqI75zWVKJgUD5XKXitL9cM718vzA7i/s1600/Spacelady_Chop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiARz-fgph_OcdIELiIypC4op3_w1Gi6nHXohQp1DBQR3SkL9vb4sysdYQaFzZ9SnUafBzXAtwl7yqp8DxIl5GWW4sTNJkAMJSuvEZOaf5NabvrglqI75zWVKJgUD5XKXitL9cM718vzA7i/s320/Spacelady_Chop.jpg" width="147" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tony Yates illo</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
So I suppose I need to write about why Bryan and TTG were linked in those days, and what happened to end this relationship. <br />
<br />
TTG and Bryan had history going way back into the 70's, Kate had said the Bryan had first started casting miniatures in her kitchen on Acton Road in Arnold, but I am unsure whether she meant casting for Asgard, or Citadel, or why even he wasn't using his own kitchen (?!?), but hey that was the story...<br />
<br />
Bryan had been instrumental is starting Asgard in the mid-70's, with I think at least two other people, Paul Sulley being one, and had sculpted quite a number of their early miniatures, but as always, with his eye on the main chance, he'd jumped ship in in the late 70's (78?) and started to work with Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone at Games Workshop to start Citadel miniatures.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOv3ZNnwfmtWrTzH5HLatxUIn_46Zg6wl5HeUS6z_cHUYBGkGyEGlHRSeF9jMLIQK3H0q8q1L2f8dMhqp__itWGG8rgu9GLkZ-qd-wwSeerPF3BeopK_G-CaPNSbq97SX8QfQxL9VkwK0c/s1600/Robin+Hood_chop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOv3ZNnwfmtWrTzH5HLatxUIn_46Zg6wl5HeUS6z_cHUYBGkGyEGlHRSeF9jMLIQK3H0q8q1L2f8dMhqp__itWGG8rgu9GLkZ-qd-wwSeerPF3BeopK_G-CaPNSbq97SX8QfQxL9VkwK0c/s320/Robin+Hood_chop.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bryan's Robin Hood sample piece for GW</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
GW had a license to to produce Ral Partha in the UK, and had been importing for the past few years. Bryan, I was told by Richard, had submitted 5 self-sculpted minis to Steve and Ian and they were keen to become involved, so Citadel was founded, and started to produce minis from a lock-up garage off High Street in Arnold.<br />
<br />
And it was a success.<br />
By the early 80's Citadel were operating out of Newark, Notts, and making a large range of fantasy, sci-fi and historical miniatures and growing rapidly alongside Games Workshop.<br />
<br />
In 1980 Bryan had tried to get a sci-fi game/rule-set printed through Games Workshop, and although GW (Steve and Ian) were sold on the idea, and went on to commission Sparefarers, a rule-set based around Citadel sci-fi range, they didn't use Bryan's rules. (<a href="http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/8137/spacefarers">details here on BoardGameGeek</a>)<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdq2bAS0vfEnm-2l4Ek4GbmIUrbtsyKgAupAy2P4A7YxZnLo9B72oc9-Xq2YtfD8CVj3RTvIe8iABsd__pPxpIvWfPLxUIK4iIA5__IsqZtSt7omvJpaUgaDn3FGWyqGvrd4prXq6l2pY1/s1600/SpaceFarers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdq2bAS0vfEnm-2l4Ek4GbmIUrbtsyKgAupAy2P4A7YxZnLo9B72oc9-Xq2YtfD8CVj3RTvIe8iABsd__pPxpIvWfPLxUIK4iIA5__IsqZtSt7omvJpaUgaDn3FGWyqGvrd4prXq6l2pY1/s320/SpaceFarers.jpg" width="226" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Spacefarers rule book cover by Tony Ackland</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Quite how put-out by this Bryan was I don't really know, but regardless, within months Bryan was back with Bob, to set up Tabletop Miniatures to print Laserburn and produce a range of miniatures to support it...<br />
<br />
Laserburn was 15mm based, which I think was a bit of a revolutionary step back then... All GW/Citadels miniatures were in 25mm (inc Sparefarers), and maybe Bryan switched scales as a way of mollifying his partners at GW that he wasn't competing with them... or maybe he and Bob thought 15mm was a better scale for larger sci-fi battles, or possibly the move to 15mm was a trend, economic conditions generally weren't good in the early 80's, so maybe they figured a change to a smaller scale would get people buying, and 15mms were a growing part of the fantasy/sci-fi market, Asgard also produced their own 15mm ranges.<br />
<br />
Laserburn was published in late 1980, and was quickly followed by a large miniatures range, covering all the types of troops necessary for the game. Looking back it was quite derivative, the basic game, as Bryan says on the BGG page given above, owed a lot to Western Gunfight games and the background given, to many other current 70's sci-fi staples, the Law Offices were borrowed from 2000AD's Judge Dredd, the Imperialist were classic Heinlein Starship Troopers, and the Red Redemptionists owed more that a little to the Fremen in Dune.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlVxs48Mrj4GZIa00gXffJoXZ3Vapkxx3Mj2BYUPaNkx7iHgRR5NQpLDZuPvFgDAYr32acLkgYMsU_PkaM5NqNw9WyPGAS0_FPmteeTwXXYB4mjSZTbeuYrAmMg_qBrIVTPagHFfsaRi9b/s1600/100lb_1ws.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlVxs48Mrj4GZIa00gXffJoXZ3Vapkxx3Mj2BYUPaNkx7iHgRR5NQpLDZuPvFgDAYr32acLkgYMsU_PkaM5NqNw9WyPGAS0_FPmteeTwXXYB4mjSZTbeuYrAmMg_qBrIVTPagHFfsaRi9b/s320/100lb_1ws.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Law Officer (not Judge Dredd)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Tabletop Miniatures started casting this range out of the Daybrook shop, with a machine bought from Citadel, although I think the early miniatures were both moulded and cast in Newark, with Bryan doing the sculpting duties on all the minis, including TTM's range of historical as well...<br />
<br />
By '83 when I got to TTG, the range was going cold, Bryan had stopped sculpting and writing for Laserburn, and although he did bring 5 new miniatures when he came to the shop in July or August, these were there first to have seen the light of day for a year or so, and would be the last he did with Bob. I was told after the event that Bryan had come to sign-off with TTM, handing ownership fully to Bob (& Kate) in exchange for a royalty on all his work.<br />
<br />
At this point, from my view of it in the back kitchen, it looked like an amicable split, TTM had served its purpose, Bryan was moving on to bigger things and TTM had inherited a lots of Citadel 'staff' to work on side projects, including Rick Priestly, Tony Yates and Tony Ackland on sculpting duties...<br />
<br />
But this wasn't really the end of Bob and Bryan's relationship, that comes tomorrow, 30 years ago...<br />
<br />
(Interested in reading my copy of Spacefarers, <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/81678591/Spacefarers-1981">check it out here, on my Scribd page</a>)pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-44655928239469563952013-11-06T10:49:00.002+00:002013-11-27T09:31:36.895+00:00First Show.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Wargames Conventions are, I assume, as old as Wargaming as a hobby...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">Wargaming by it's nature, and unlike say, model railways or model flight,
needs groups of people to make it worthwhile, so where two or three are gathered
together, then a 'Show' and the accompanying Trade are bound to follow.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">TTG used to have big calendar in the back room on which were displayed
all the events that Bob would be attending in the year. The Season, started in
late January or early February and ran through the whole year with a few weeks off in the summer, until the last week in November or first in December...
There would be a show almost every weekend, and Bob would attend most of them.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">At the time names like, Triples and Midland Militare were all new to me, I
didn't really know what went off at these events, all I really knew was that on
these Saturdays, Bob would be out of the shop on the weekend, taking half of the
shop with him, and Kate and the other Robert would be left alone to hold the
fort.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">Once Mark and I had started work it became obvious what a large part of
TTG's business Conventions were. We would spend the later part of most
Show-weeks, getting the stock ready, rules and games all counted and boxed,
miniature stock filled to the brim and display cabinets repaired and updated
with new items... and by Friday afternoon, there would be a large pile of
heavily taped brown card-board boxes stacked by the door waiting for the
command from His Lordship to load-up so that he could be away that evening, or
early next morning.</span><br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyY0ulQojthlIDklgPChnd91NdvBxzsUX8wLk6UJdQmx0Ejf4TosXNBKZPcGEwf_gX74uosC8XDpzh9KhTvhlqgP4jot_dpK-chZfIJOb1OzqPnON6Vh44GNIfqmnUR9JvxMXrfVrMcbSN/s640/blogger-image-235783903.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyY0ulQojthlIDklgPChnd91NdvBxzsUX8wLk6UJdQmx0Ejf4TosXNBKZPcGEwf_gX74uosC8XDpzh9KhTvhlqgP4jot_dpK-chZfIJOb1OzqPnON6Vh44GNIfqmnUR9JvxMXrfVrMcbSN/s640/blogger-image-235783903.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Balrog in constant need of fixing...</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">Tuesdays the reverse would happen, all the stock piled near the door would
have to be counted, filled or repaired again and stacked away waiting for the
same to happen over and over again... Mark whose job it had become to repair the
mini display cases, would become thoroughly sick of constantly having to
re-stick dragon wings, or hydra heads to the fantasy range display or tank
turrets that had 'taken a knock' in transit... </span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Kate had promised Mark and I that when it can to the bigger two day shows
later in the year, that Bob would take us one of us with him to help, which
would mean a weekend away from home.</span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">But...</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">The first major show, after the small summer pause, would not require us to
go very far, as the British Nationals Championship would be held on our
doorstep in Nottingham.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-size: small;">Arena, as I'm sure the event was called, was a result of the Sherwood
Foresters (off whom more later) winning the team prize at the previous years
event, and opting to host the event themselves as was the tradition at that
stage... </span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOyZqO8BHtU8ozPzEwYA32_Rkl199SilQL8-gMJhZ8kIvvuZ1xtHwdN4OQVbxvW9KB52BdTDikbb26jcs_Nvr31hWeOfdy1aVEZWwEQZ9w4jxRGOT_VhBKS_O7SbfVunQfY8MIuheVUSRW/s1600/vlc-large.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="243" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOyZqO8BHtU8ozPzEwYA32_Rkl199SilQL8-gMJhZ8kIvvuZ1xtHwdN4OQVbxvW9KB52BdTDikbb26jcs_Nvr31hWeOfdy1aVEZWwEQZ9w4jxRGOT_VhBKS_O7SbfVunQfY8MIuheVUSRW/s320/vlc-large.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Victoria Leisure Centre </span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">The event itself was held at <a href="http://www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/vlc">Victoria
Leisure Centre</a> on the outskirts of central Nottingham, less than a mile
from the city centre, over two days on I think the 17th and 18th of September
1983. The venue was split into two main halls, with games and Trade in the
sports hall and more games and the Bring & Buy in the (covered) swimming
pool hall...</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">From what I recall, Bob had set the trade stand up on the Friday evening so
that when I got there on the Saturday morning there was very little in the way
of work required of me for the first hour or so until the event opened, and I
had chance to wander around... </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">The centre of the hall was given over to the games championship, with those
grass-green 6x4's borrowed from Notts Wargames Club featuring... but around the
outside were other traders like TTG. Bob introduced me to Paul and Teresa
Bailey, who had the Minifigs stand, next to them were Jacobite miniatures, who
had travelled from Scotland for the weekend and also in the Hall were Dixon
miniatures, whose adverts I had seen in White Dwarf magazine and many others.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">Also there, taking up one side of the hall were Citadel miniatures. I was
very pleased to speak to Bryan Ansell for the first time, He said hello and was
I Bob's 'new boy', I was wearing a hand knitted jumper with the logo on, so I
guess it wasn't too big a leap for him to make, I asked about what new minis they had along
that day... and in front of the Citadel stand was a huge siege game run by The
Players Guild using the new Warhammer Fantasy rules.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">And outside, were the Treasure Trap, Live Role Play people, who were
offering a free weekend to anyone who could defeat their Champion in hand to
hand combat. Mark had about 10 goes at doing this and I think eventually they
just gave him the prize for persistence...</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">I don't really remember much about the weekend other than I spent a long
time on my feet, serving customers with minis and rules, I left Bob to serve
the people wanting the tanks, planes and ships, as these were well beyond my
knowledge... and I came away on the Sunday afternoon with a Jacobite 15mm
English Civil War royalist army (with which I hoped to start playing Tercio
when I had some painted) </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
</span><span style="font-size: small;">I think John Blanche won the painting competition, with an Asgard half-troll
stood on the most elaborate base I'd ever seen, it had resin as a water effect
at the lower levels of it and I just had to (just HAD to) touch it to prove to
myself that it wasn't real water... </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: small;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I can't really remember much about the games, Ancient
and Medieval using WRG 6th, Renaissance using the new edition of Tercio, Napoleonic
with To The Sound of the Guns, ACW using the Newbury rules and Modern and WW2
using WRG or maybe Challenger... Who won? can't remember... Not the Foresters,
or Nottingham club, I think the over all Champions were The Bun Shop a London club, so the next
years event would be theirs to organize.</span></span><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-20925712792395857882013-11-05T10:44:00.003+00:002014-03-04T10:07:53.439+00:00Casting<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Tabletop's casting operation was tiny...<br />
<br />
The whole place, shop, warehouse, casting room and Bob and Kate's living
space was situated in two three story Edwardian terrace houses with shop fronts...
When I started they didn't need all the space they had so the 'house' above the
second shop (55 Mansfield Rd
Daybrook) was rented out to a couple of Police officers, who would come and go
though the shop or back rooms at will.<br />
<br />
The shop fronts were backed by a small room with a fireplace which I assume
would have been the main living room in days gone by, but either Bob or the
previous occupants had had the living space moved up-stairs and added a kitchen
and Bathroom on the first floor... But at the back of the old main room was
what might have been the old kitchen, or scullery, a room 4 yards square that
opened on to the 'back-yard'... this was where all the casting was done.<br />
<br />
When I started they had one casting machine, an ex-Citadel, swinging weight
thing powered by a belt driven motor. White metal casting works by spinning a
circular mould at a few 100 RPM and then dropping the hot metal into the
central feed-hole and letting gravity, centrifugal and centripetal forces do
their work...<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5tAVWGqVZtuH8qSUj3m8pmL4llekcQvHUGJWcH6OxWHjjiNNWBh5mEKk211FR1DK5FElH_a2WfR15H079Cj9TaR6YwzNDXB1Fl_BGM3Z5yF3ASRymTQpXhQLZ8zJstrD35YjUceygf3lo/s1600/$T2eC16ZHJG8E9nyfoTqqBRFOSItg0g~~60_35.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5tAVWGqVZtuH8qSUj3m8pmL4llekcQvHUGJWcH6OxWHjjiNNWBh5mEKk211FR1DK5FElH_a2WfR15H079Cj9TaR6YwzNDXB1Fl_BGM3Z5yF3ASRymTQpXhQLZ8zJstrD35YjUceygf3lo/s1600/$T2eC16ZHJG8E9nyfoTqqBRFOSItg0g~~60_35.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Saunders Spinning weight machine similar to the TTG one</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The only real issue with this is that it works too well, and pressure is
needed to stop the still hot metal from shooting out the sides of the mould.
Early machines, like TTG's, had three 'towers' place evenly on the spinning
plate from which swung levers with weights attached which when spinning, swung
outward and levered the top plate shut. <br />
Cleaver huh?<br />
<br />
Well to a certain extent it was an ideal way to work, but unfortunately it
had one big draw back... The areas in-between the swinging weight would receive
less pressure that the rest of the mould, and as a result these areas would
flash (excessively fill) the cavities and if these cavities were large or
particularly close to the edge of the mould, the still molten metal would shoot
out of the mould and spray the inside of the machine... and as the lids on
these machine were quite low to the spinning plate, and never shut
satisfactorily, the metal would spray from the machine and blast a line of
cooling lead alloy across the crotch of the operative... It didn't hurt,
fortunately, but it would leave a line of metal embedded in the trousers of
every caster in town... For years after it was possible to tell people who were
working in the same job as me for other companies, by the 'Caster's Crotch' they
all had...<br />
<br />
In the middle of the summer of '83 TTG took delivery of another new casting
machine, and this one was a bit different. The new machine, with an electric
motor driving it's spinning plate directly, and its pressure controlled by a
pneumatic ram was a huge step forward. Speed and pressure were now controlled
by the caster, allowing for minor adjustments to keep a warming mould spinning
for longer in a day. Previously a mould would have to be rested to cool once
the swing weights could no long apply enough pressure to keep it running without the flash becoming too bad...<br />
<br />
The new machine was delivered by MCP (Multi-Coupling Pneumatic), with a gentleman
called Ray Tutt doing the fitting, whist his boss Mike
chatted with Bob and Richard. Ray said that the machine that was being
delivered was the first in a run of new machines which Citadel had ordered to
replace their old spinning weight machines, and we were getting the prototype
model ahead of them.<br />
<br />
The new machine was fabbo, the pressure controller cured the flash and
spitting issued almost instantly, and the dropping of the plates well below the
the lid height meant that if you did get a mould that spat, the metal no-longer
splashed into your groin...<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy8sso_aEsKHr1LrCrztOnn79yRVulJZQTkfYqUFPU-4U8NXLp3wr75MwXzEZV4zi5qsCPDIA42m-8FlUJYeBRKNLJW5tIDOkV5K1-feSdn7TgFGsWL0MlQs7qDXU3xOSnqNKRxvNebI3R/s1600/byc7.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy8sso_aEsKHr1LrCrztOnn79yRVulJZQTkfYqUFPU-4U8NXLp3wr75MwXzEZV4zi5qsCPDIA42m-8FlUJYeBRKNLJW5tIDOkV5K1-feSdn7TgFGsWL0MlQs7qDXU3xOSnqNKRxvNebI3R/s320/byc7.jpg" height="319" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">BYC7 sculpted by Ali Morrison</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
TTG kept the old machine, so across that summer there were pretty much
always two of us working in the tiny room... As I mentioned in the last post,
Rees Taylor was one of the other casters, who I was told was just making up a
little pin-money whilst being a full-time Father, but my main work mate was Richard
Evans, a 27 year old local man, who I don't think actually spoke to me for over
a week or so once I'd started...<br />
He and I would become firm-friends over
the next four years while I worked at TTG.<br />
(more on Richard later, a very interesting character, who I was to discover
had his own history in the Wargames-world)<br />
<br />
Casting isn't a bad job, its not difficult to master, but it is hot and
heavy work, and requires long spells at the machine if the job is to be done
efficiently... and although I'd jump at a chance to do anything else at TTG if
the chance arose, I didn't mind if I had to stand casting all day... it gave
the two of us in the tiny room time to chat, and listen to music... <br />
<br />
Oh, and the first mini I ever cast... Well it was one of these... BYC7 Asisiactic light-horsemen with bow and javs.pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-18644484606368200512013-11-04T10:12:00.000+00:002013-12-03T09:16:59.111+00:00Nottingham Wargames ClubThey'll be there tonight you know...<br />
<br />
And not just tonight, as if I'd chosen to write this on the one night a month or for the first time in ages, when they would be there....<br />
<br />
They are always there... well maybe not always... Christmases, and Bank Holiday Mondays, there wouldn't be a club, but every other week, like clock-work at 6.30pm the place is open for walk in gamers and regulars alike.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://nottinghamwargames.co.uk/home/4578685829">Nottingham Wargame club</a> dates back to the late 1960's, but I first started to go when I started work at TTG in the summer of '83. Bob would offer to take me and Mark, as he was virtually driving passed where we lived, to collect Richard from his mom's, to take him to the club... so keen as mustard types that we were we hitched along to see what the crack was...<br />
<br />
The club it's self was at that time on the top floor of this building, <span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><a href="http://www.ournottinghamshire.org.uk/page_id__518_path__0p31p39p67p120p.aspx">Queens Walk Community Centre</a>, in Nottingham's less than salubrious Meadows area... up three or four flights of stairs, which didn't help those members who were carting 25mm cavalry armies in large tool boxes, to the large room at the rear of the building, where there were plenty of trestle tables on which grass-green 6' x 4' chip-board tops were placed for the games to take place... <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp6ICJIBYHnhY67pRXphCfVKcMXVq-chrW7v0v-AznJtTsQvbalN2OnHtO5tWcKaDgGfe5D7jDDFxoJfrGoZhw3b0AAGmRyvSxsOEv69jlNUZe1Eko1criqw10KrMIpk6lEDR_6fjiDTmz/s1600/Queens_Walk_Community_Centre_09091_s.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp6ICJIBYHnhY67pRXphCfVKcMXVq-chrW7v0v-AznJtTsQvbalN2OnHtO5tWcKaDgGfe5D7jDDFxoJfrGoZhw3b0AAGmRyvSxsOEv69jlNUZe1Eko1criqw10KrMIpk6lEDR_6fjiDTmz/s320/Queens_Walk_Community_Centre_09091_s.jpg" width="239" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Queen's Walk view of the Community centre</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span><br />
<br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">...and to tell you the truth, this place was probably the first place I'd seen grown men playing wargames... I think I'd seen the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Callan_%28TV_series%29">Callan movie</a> at this point and was I was kind of expecting retired Brigadiers types with tweedy jackets and pip-pip attitudes, but this was all a bit different... Blokes, normal blokes, some of whom I'd seen from the shop, sitting behind units of tiny troops, measuring with expandable tape measures and either cursing their luck or looking smugly at their dice... </span><br />
<br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">I think that Mark and I just watched the first week, I don't remember playing, but in the following weeks he and I would bring Bob's old Airfix Napoleonic (of which more later) and we'd have a game or two with those...</span><br />
<br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">In those days their could 20 to 30 people gaming on any one week, and of course this meant that there was a large variety of games to get involved in, there was of course WW2 with more Airfix plastics, and other periods that were new, Ancients, Medieval and Renaissance games, as well as others with metal Napoleonic and micro tank games of 'Ultra-Modern' and more WW2... Loads of stuff, and to add to the verity each of the major periods also had a choice of rule-sets to use, Wargames Research Group (WRG) and TTG had rules for all, and others would surface form Newbury or Skytrex or other independent Wargames groups... </span><br />
<br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">Players tended to like one rule-set for one period, which could reduce your choice of opponent, but usually if you fancied a game against a particular player you could find something compatible to play, or if you want to play a particular type of game there were plenty of players willing to play along...</span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii2jg-WJT3tN1Y-JQ3O0GWD-peP2keq1xMrMhqB4zv30mu-dg9-oyuzlTZ8464wewAFy0-iPrBzEYDPm4sWoKGIa0COVSglKOn0pdiXNaIjvu3hlqXM0hCs_ZuU01wj2RkkuJ5yjfllDYW/s1600/callanmovie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEii2jg-WJT3tN1Y-JQ3O0GWD-peP2keq1xMrMhqB4zv30mu-dg9-oyuzlTZ8464wewAFy0-iPrBzEYDPm4sWoKGIa0COVSglKOn0pdiXNaIjvu3hlqXM0hCs_ZuU01wj2RkkuJ5yjfllDYW/s1600/callanmovie.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Callan and Lonely</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">Now I suppose that every largeish town in the UK and every city, has its equivalent Club to NWG, London has at least 2, Birmingham and Manchester a couple, Liverpool, Leeds, Glasgow and many more, and by the very fact that they are open to new members, they act as a starting point for very many gamers, young and old, who might otherwise struggle to get into the hobby, but it is this very openness which is the downside of them. For every cool Callan or retired Brigadier, there has to be a Lonely, and this bottom end can be a bit off putting... </span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">But...</span></div>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">If you could stand the smell of 'ripe' wargamer on a hot summer evening then NWC was a great place to be, and I'd meet loads of folks to game with, many of whom like Steve Bruce, Keith Tate, Karl Tebbe (who was running a role-play group downstairs) and Steve Clark, will crop-up again in connection with my future working life, and others; Andy Revel, Andy 'Nick' Nicholson, Gary, Chris Thorn, who I still say hello to as I pass them at shows... </span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">And after the club... off to the pub... the Queen's Hotel near the station, which is now a carpet warehouse, for a Britvic55 (well I was only 16) and a debrief of the evenings games... before Bob ran us home in the van... perfect... </span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">Ok, so then, for the next four years of this blog, you can take it that on any given Monday evening, I'll be there... a tool box full of soldiers, expandable tape-measure in hand, either cursing or hooting with joy, at the dice rolls in front of me... I am a Wargamer.</span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">Strange coincidence time... Whist looking on t'web for details of Nott's Club I noticed that the name given for contact is Rees Taylor, who I think is now Chair of the club, but in '83 he was one of the two people I worked alongside in my first few days as a Caster at TTG... Its not a small world, its a Miniature world...</span><br />
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0"><br /></span>
<span id="page_meetings_fJVPm6pR_rTRg9ZIOrhOI_P5_C0">Next time... Casting...</span>pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-31450988810798978492013-11-01T10:39:00.000+00:002014-04-11T09:42:43.370+01:00Nottingham, and the Run.As I implied in the last post, TTG was shut on Mondays, Bob would often not arrive back from Wargame Shows until Sunday afternoon, and I suppose that it was time-off to do banking and paperwork, without the shop bell ringing, or interruptions on the telephone...<br />
<br />
Also on a Monday, Bob would get back in the van and take advantage of Nottingham's place in the Wargames world to get out to see other companies in our area.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nottingham">Nottingham</a> was not, as yet, known as the British Lead-Belt, a term which I don't think I heard first until the advent of the internet in the late '90's, but is was ideally placed, in the middle of three or four other little centres of miniature production.<br />
Asgard, as I mentioned were in the City, not quite the center but in the city never the less, as were TTG's printer, Trent Printers in the Meadows area. To the south was Loughborough, home to Skytex, manufacturer of small scale tanks, boats and planes for the wargames trade, as well as the agents for Heritage minis in this country, and of course to the north-west in Newark were Citadel miniatures the big-boys of the hobby even then...<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnsKApCaA_7MKsMmpKgjZ6m2gMCflaf1zWeJ-s9spLeyX8V8O8-TtaKrqcASPCX6Z1rZu4cncDG6naduJlRFnfNbeVGh8AlIw-5hOe1BQrBmLoi7Fp9XK2s6HLtz09or7JLVN_hPPQC01W/s1600/vw_transporter_2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnsKApCaA_7MKsMmpKgjZ6m2gMCflaf1zWeJ-s9spLeyX8V8O8-TtaKrqcASPCX6Z1rZu4cncDG6naduJlRFnfNbeVGh8AlIw-5hOe1BQrBmLoi7Fp9XK2s6HLtz09or7JLVN_hPPQC01W/s320/vw_transporter_2.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">VW T2 Transporter</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
So Bob would jump in the van, and trundle off to see these other companies on a Monday afternoon, bringing back rumours and news from them, as well as picking up new stuff and out-of-stock items to for-fill mail-orders back at HQ.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
It strikes me now just how much Bob devoted his life to the wargames industry, working all week at mail-order, spending his evenings typing rules in preparation for them being printed, driving on Friday or Saturday to a show, standing all day (sometimes two days), and then driving home, only to jump into the van again on Monday to head-out on to The Run, to see all these other people.</div>
<br />
Amazing...<br />
<br />
But there was one more thing to fit into Bob's day-off (?!?), and that was Nottingham Wargame Club... and that dear reader is where our travels will lead us, next time...pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-55872901844564778772013-10-31T10:40:00.000+00:002013-12-03T09:17:45.869+00:00Full time.So after two or three weeks of working on Saturdays, I knew I wanted a job at TTG.<br />
<br />
I wrote a letter, asking if they had any vacancies, despite the fact that it would have been easier just to ask face-to-face, but that was what I'd been told in school, so that what I did, best hand-writing and everything...<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV7JW9ScfzRgg56tIWHViMYxrp9IlSHwc2wG6gj8CCN_dN9jEdX6gFWm1XXoHXsiX9rAAV2dT1Ti05-LdRJy_XxDWyKOLI6lyolduyJLMBRNNBrNU_IE0gm06izThtFDlUDijEkGKkoiQy/s1600/Thulg2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjV7JW9ScfzRgg56tIWHViMYxrp9IlSHwc2wG6gj8CCN_dN9jEdX6gFWm1XXoHXsiX9rAAV2dT1Ti05-LdRJy_XxDWyKOLI6lyolduyJLMBRNNBrNU_IE0gm06izThtFDlUDijEkGKkoiQy/s320/Thulg2.jpg" width="249" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Thulg, illo by Tony Ackland.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: right;">
<br /></div>
The next time I was in the shop after school, Kate said...<br />
"I got your letter... its left me in a bit of a dilemer..."<br />
<br />
"Why?" I wimpered, preparing myself for a big dose of rejection...<br />
<br />
"Well" she continued, "your mate Mark asked me for the same thing yesterday as well..."<br />
<br />
My life hung on one sentence...<br />
<br />
"...but, I think there is something we can do..."<br />
<br />
TTG were planning on going though a bit of an expansion, they had started a miniatures range, which was making the 15mm Laserburn minis, a few 25mm sci-fi and a small range of Dark Age 15mm's,<br />
which they had been licensing in the USA to a company called Alliance Miniatures.<br />
<br />
Now, it had come down the grape-vine that another US company, Heritage Miniatures, were going bust, and that Alliance in the States wanted to buy up the failed company and license them back to Tabletop for production here in the UK. Bob was already selling quite large numbers of the Heritage Napoleonics through the shop and though mail-order, so picking up on an existing range would have doubled their miniature out-put in one swoop.<br />
So if the deal went through, Kate was sure that there would be work for both Mark and Myself, in the newly expanded Tabletop Miniatures.<br />
<br />
As far as I remember, the deal was still to be finalized in the US, but Kate said if I could do a few days casual work, in the casting room, to see if I was up to the task, then the job would be mine when I finished school...<br />
Casting???<br />
Well I'd seen the machine and moulds in the back-room but I'd never done it at that time, but yes, " I can do that" as Yosser Hughes would have said, "Gizza job."<br />
<br />
As it turned out, the deal with Heritage fell though, someone else bought the failing/failed company and their big selling Napoleonic range would remain with Skytex (the UK agent) for a while yet, but Bob, indomitable as he was, made his mind up overnight, with the aid of Alliance in the US, that TTG would start their own range of 15mm Napoleonics, using their great young sculptor Aly Morrison who was already working on a Medieval range of 15mms.<br />
<br />
If anyone reading this has any more details about Alliance or Heritage in the early 80's I would be delighted to hear from you... I owe my Life in Miniatures almost directly to these two American companies, and I'd love to find out just exactly what went off in June or July of '83, I heard that Alliance were out bid, is this the truth? Who did pick up Heritage? What happened to them? I don't think that they are still out there... all information gratefully received...<br />
<br />
So, short of doing a few trail days in the casting room I had a job... £35 a week for 5 days, 40 hours Tuesday to Saturday.pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-25847709066487128242013-10-30T09:52:00.000+00:002013-12-03T09:18:07.422+00:00Saturday, Saturday, Saturday...I did already have a Saturday job, in late February of '83, Mark had got me a job on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnold,_Nottinghamshire">Arnold</a> Market, working for a flower seller, but in truth I hated it... fetching and carrying for a couple of '80's barrow boys, in all weathers was no fun at all, so after working on the stock take, I asked Kate if they needed a new Saturday-boy to fill in for Robert (who's second name I can remember), the lad who had done the job for the last couple of years and who was finishing his A levels and heading of to Bristol for Uni...<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAqur5E51DuRw7MNwjS2Dfo1WN7kYUWs_FkkGjsGFOfK3hax-7G50HnEsVoEk84mg3CN8ZlD8hKCkyWDGoRH0QOQsxZNx8yTvTofe9UYc-_Zf7O5FVsW13mAd4t_9vjlbOGetfHoL6v6zU/s1600/GoldLabelBarleyWine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAqur5E51DuRw7MNwjS2Dfo1WN7kYUWs_FkkGjsGFOfK3hax-7G50HnEsVoEk84mg3CN8ZlD8hKCkyWDGoRH0QOQsxZNx8yTvTofe9UYc-_Zf7O5FVsW13mAd4t_9vjlbOGetfHoL6v6zU/s320/GoldLabelBarleyWine.jpg" width="188" /> </a></td><td style="text-align: center;"></td><td style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">an afternoon tipple</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Kate gave it a thought, I assume asked Bob, and said yes. The Saturday post was all about watching the shop whilst Kate got on with a day-to-day life, which from what I remember was sitting with her feet-up, drinking coffee, or after 2pm a barley-wine, and reading the paper... Bob, most weekends would be away at a Wargame Show (a what?), so Kate liked the idea of not sitting in the shop all day whilst he was gone.<br />
<br />
'Watching the shop' suited me down to the ground...<br />
Plonked on a tall stool behind the counter, I would sit and read game books, or White Dwarf, or whatever came to hand, and wait for the bell to ring to announce the entrance of a customer...<br />
Saturday Mornings wouldn't be too busy, opening at 9, Kate would fulfill whatever mail-order she could that had arrived that morning, but mostly it was only a light trip to the post office before the last collection at 11.00am, and then a day of waiting for customers...<br />
<br />
Trying to remember back to those early weekends, I don't think we ever took over £150, some weeks much less, which doesn't sound like a lot of money these days, but it could be quite hard work when we were selling 15mm minis for 7p (25's for 30p)... and even a big sale, a boxed game or D&D book, might only be £8 - £10, getting to £150 wasn't easy...<br />
<br />
The thing that made it for me was the customers, mostly they were fabulous, people wanted to be enjoying themselves when they arrived at the shop, so every-time the bell went, there would be another happy Wargamer delighted to have found a little Aladdins cave of stuff... <br />
And OK, we did have our share of 'characters' though the place, (more of whom later), but mostly customers were bright, knowledgeable and funny, and I couldn't think of a better way to spend my time on Saturdays than fishing around in the figure cabinets for missing T72 turrets, or dusting down copies of Starship Troopers, or whatever else the customers wanted...<br />
<br />
Not only was I doing something well with-in my skill range, I had started to enjoy it too.pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-85937411767379899802013-10-29T10:00:00.003+00:002013-10-29T10:45:30.595+00:00The first days work<div style="text-align: justify;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg38EfGbnnV4xJPWzs87A-04vmKsC4ioC1sECIK3Zau_Bt4sCbfGVWtZwkhK50ZWIgD0n_qLmCvW5zkjSJfwUtbp_7BhezDMvoU_tM_9WcrELuO-2G_ShkyuKL_8i_d-AZcAWEvUf9XEIGo/s1600/Stocktaker.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg38EfGbnnV4xJPWzs87A-04vmKsC4ioC1sECIK3Zau_Bt4sCbfGVWtZwkhK50ZWIgD0n_qLmCvW5zkjSJfwUtbp_7BhezDMvoU_tM_9WcrELuO-2G_ShkyuKL_8i_d-AZcAWEvUf9XEIGo/s320/Stocktaker.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr align="center"><td class="tr-caption">Pathetic Stock-taker!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Right-o then, fast forward a couple of years, '81 to 83, me and my best mate Mark Weston were in and out of TTG two or three times a week, several things happened in this two year period, expansion, Laserburn, to mention two, but I'll get to these later... </div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
In March of '83 Kate Connor asked me and Mark, if we'd like to help with the stock taking in the shop. He and I lept at the chance. I think that we did two days, Tuesday the 29th and Thursday the 31st, just before the UK Tax year-end in April..</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
We arrived at 9.00 and after coffee and a chat about why we were doing the count, we set to totaling up box games, and tiny tanks, Citadel minis and Davco ships, and everything else they had in what amounted to the warehouse space in the
back of the place. TTG did quiet a number of rule sets and micro-games
and all these had to have their components counted, books, QR, record and counter sheets...</div>
<br />
At lunch time Kate fed us all, Mark and I, and the other chap who was working full-time in the casting room, Richard Evans, something she would continue to do whilst we worked for Her/Bob.<br />
It didn't really strike me at the time, but it was this kind of small thing that made work feel like home, they didn't have to do it, but they did, and even in later years when we 'workers' stopped using Kate's kitchen and living room as a canteen, they continued to provide cash for us to buy food, to cook in the work's kitchen...<br />
<br />
I don't remember what we got paid for the two days, or why we weren't in school for that matter, maybe we were on holiday or maybe school was winding down for 5th year exams, but what I do remember is finishing on the second day and being given a little handful of folding cash.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY8ZePyqxsDUWeVeQMWvyIMAvPYfCwQeppJsh5A-9ilrw8nQgLNHSFxiDbwk6UPjXrcSW7IxZS99VCby3vnxfMeUZAhw-atNFkWoPDbyNmRu4ECJ3tpWLkKxkKCiYJOkcZ5ltqJ5XklqZM/s1600/Sewerville.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY8ZePyqxsDUWeVeQMWvyIMAvPYfCwQeppJsh5A-9ilrw8nQgLNHSFxiDbwk6UPjXrcSW7IxZS99VCby3vnxfMeUZAhw-atNFkWoPDbyNmRu4ECJ3tpWLkKxkKCiYJOkcZ5ltqJ5XklqZM/s1600/Sewerville.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">illo by Tony Yates</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
On the way-out that evening, I grabbed a couple of Laserburn scenarios that I wanted, Sewerville shootout and Tarrim Towers heist, and asked Bob<br />
"...how much?"<br />
"Oh you can have those", the great man said...<br />
<br />
Money and free games, just for standing around in the shop all day, looking at whatever they had...<br />
I think I'd found something in my skill-range...<br />
Result!<br />
<br />
Now the only thing was to turn a couple of days casual work into a Career...pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-60187456064549960172013-10-25T10:40:00.002+01:002014-03-04T10:19:57.309+00:00A new shop in town...I've always been of the opinion that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daybrook">Daybrook Square</a> was the centre of the whole wide world, a fact proved to me in early '81, when a wargames shop open there, right on my doorstep, with-in a 100yrds of where I had first played with Airfix Knights and Astronauts on my Grandma's front room carpet...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmmQvKwrPpDCGhXeByH3Y02sosqSKu6TMh6ThvuooeFrEBWhnjkpRZ8H3TcDio1O6Akbn4UpBt8Lpxj4dgyL_hgv_cXF5T9g2WlheySWsBgbJ3iGyfgaaWVRSKsjTPyCgtBAPjer6Z3Z2U/s1600/TTGlogo2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmmQvKwrPpDCGhXeByH3Y02sosqSKu6TMh6ThvuooeFrEBWhnjkpRZ8H3TcDio1O6Akbn4UpBt8Lpxj4dgyL_hgv_cXF5T9g2WlheySWsBgbJ3iGyfgaaWVRSKsjTPyCgtBAPjer6Z3Z2U/s1600/TTGlogo2.jpg" /></a></div>
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Once again I think Andy Black was the bringer of the great news, he must have had to walk past it that morning to get to school and by the time D&D club started at dinner time it was pretty much old news that we had our own shop with-in walking distance...<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWbgiXauX5R6561VAZbyhyphenhyphenJDlwdTMGt1RmoeiKfpOmHKObhPvZnLTxTM6l46we86104FpSBFvCUht00tD7H7BIDUKX_rwpAoLkMsH-UlljslL_xEVSnZpdsnauvB2rLR5H8XNz6wHDKpgt/s1600/ff02-1-slimebeast-rs%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWbgiXauX5R6561VAZbyhyphenhyphenJDlwdTMGt1RmoeiKfpOmHKObhPvZnLTxTM6l46we86104FpSBFvCUht00tD7H7BIDUKX_rwpAoLkMsH-UlljslL_xEVSnZpdsnauvB2rLR5H8XNz6wHDKpgt/s200/ff02-1-slimebeast-rs%5B1%5D.jpg" height="200" width="123" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Images stolen from Richard Scott</td></tr>
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My first memory of going though inside was one tea-time after a dentist appointment with my mother...<br />
ding-ding-ding, went the the door dell on entry and we were greeted by a friendly blonde lady, Kate Connor, behind the counter who explained that they had just opened, after working out of their house on Acton Rd, Arnold for years.<br />
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My Mum and Kate chatted for awhile whilst I shot to figure racks to see what they had...<br />
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And they had loads of stuff, everything Citadel had; Adventures, Monsters, Historicals, plus loads of Ral Partha and others...<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMGsgPhT-AmK_pz0emXmWwj8Ski4RNJ_9nT0QdoVkNEfbDF8T9Xb37BqqG050l5ymjKJU2R5k-HJOWQb-8lzpc855h73RvujXrpmo6CwcFFo0ibZrOG5gGZy0FHd5y8-bcn9G3MBmbaf9e/s1600/fa01-1-fighter-1-rs%5B1%5D.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMGsgPhT-AmK_pz0emXmWwj8Ski4RNJ_9nT0QdoVkNEfbDF8T9Xb37BqqG050l5ymjKJU2R5k-HJOWQb-8lzpc855h73RvujXrpmo6CwcFFo0ibZrOG5gGZy0FHd5y8-bcn9G3MBmbaf9e/s200/fa01-1-fighter-1-rs%5B1%5D.jpg" height="195" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NOT my painting</td></tr>
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The shop was also full of other stuff, plastic kits and modelling supplies which Kate later told me had been bought it to fill out the space, and also Dungeons and Dragons books and Modules, rules from other people, and 'Wargames Miniatures', tanks for WW2, soldiers for Napoleonics and ACW, none of which I'd ever seen before... and board games, loads of them...<br />
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But, on that first visit I only had eyes for the fantasy figures, Kate lent me a chair to stand on, so i could reach the top of the rack and from there I picked my first ever Citadel miniatures... a slime beast with sword (FF2), and a Fighter in plate-mail (FA1), amongst them... <br />
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From then on, for the next couple of years, I'd cycle through Arnold Park and down to TTG after school and spend half and hour or so, going through everything fantasy and sci-fi they had... I knew there stock as well as they did... which was handy...<br />
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Next, Stock taker!<br />
<br />pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6580384122112863749.post-31654649652843593592013-10-23T10:54:00.000+01:002013-12-03T09:18:30.185+00:00Asgard for the first time.<div style="text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7kGjdXp5dJyY5HFboaeehzaw4-Bllg2-SJeJPN9uYm0qIJUSI-3bEIpMJCDNvbahx7IlBGy313YmpzGPYr9EcFJuchpf8v7w97_s1RmosP3Xyfdz0I4-qmf6SpMVvFvmpuX65l_1RNBqX/s1600/Asgardlogo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="194" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7kGjdXp5dJyY5HFboaeehzaw4-Bllg2-SJeJPN9uYm0qIJUSI-3bEIpMJCDNvbahx7IlBGy313YmpzGPYr9EcFJuchpf8v7w97_s1RmosP3Xyfdz0I4-qmf6SpMVvFvmpuX65l_1RNBqX/s320/Asgardlogo.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Ok, so my first Visit to Asgard was a bust... <br />
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But luckily I was making better friends with the lads at the D&D club and on one Saturday Simon Maze suggested that I go with him into Nottingham to have a look at the place...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO7-9VgFuoDHc_40pGVZJNnCJj4rjVEjwWD6zpfauNuDyj8ehXEJcFzB-rveaWEaTqLDUWRlFAYBmCwpbeye2OOPtY99OMo-fnRXrtrhuf3C-I3SFmDB5e8YuuDyBTzoL2bwqo5zolrNZe/s1600/EdwardsTheGhoul.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgO7-9VgFuoDHc_40pGVZJNnCJj4rjVEjwWD6zpfauNuDyj8ehXEJcFzB-rveaWEaTqLDUWRlFAYBmCwpbeye2OOPtY99OMo-fnRXrtrhuf3C-I3SFmDB5e8YuuDyBTzoL2bwqo5zolrNZe/s400/EdwardsTheGhoul.jpg" width="254" /></a><br />
Now from what I remember this was probably my first trip into Nottingham on my own, OK I wasn't on my own, I was with Simon, but without a parent, if you see what I mean...<br />
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I went to his house in the morning, he lived a mile or so from where I did, and we caught the bus in the City Centre... Simon had said that we should save our bus fare and walk, but Nottingham seemed like a million miles away to a lad of 13 so we spent the 7 or 8p that was the cost of the ride and got into the city as quickly as the bus would carry us...<br />
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The Asgard shop I first visited was on Commerce Square, which I was lead to believe was their second shop in roughly the same area of the City, off High Pavement, in what was then, quite a run-down area called The Lace Market.<br />
The Shop, which was really nothing more than a front to a warehouse or old mill, was up a couple of big stone steps, with what I assumed was a little workshop and storage space to the rear...<br />
The walls were lined, as was the fashion in those days, with a large areas of 'peg-board' racks, on which were hung all the miniatures they had in stock... Some Citadel, mostly fantasy adventures, some Ral Partha, and loads of Asgard minis they had made on the premise... and that was about it... No painted minis that I can remember, no gaming tables, no racks of rules and modules, just minis and a few old copies of White Dwarf magazine...<br />
The chap behind the counter, I later learnt was Paul Sulley, who at this time owned Asgard...<br />
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I'd seen White Dwarf at the D&D club, someone would always have the latest copy, but a back issue took my fancy, so I came away with one mag and one mini... The front cover of the mag that had taken my interest was issue 20 something, with this excellent Les Edwards Ghoul on the Cover...<br />
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And the mini... well it was this this Ogre, <a href="http://www.miniatures-workshop.com/lostminiswiki/index.php?title=Image:Asgard-fmonsters-fm63.jpg">FM63</a>, a cracking model with tonnes of character...<br />
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So, I'd broken my duck with Asgard, it really did seem like a cool place, hidden away as it was, filled with all this stuff, and inhabited with what looked like an 'interesting' crowd of people... but little did I know that at this point, that the next time I was going to set foot in a wargames shop it wouldn't be Asgard but a new shop, almost on my doorstep... TTG was just about to come into my life..</div>
pete the mouldmakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17441528010939741890noreply@blogger.com3