The Enfilade committee met on April 6th in Lynwood. We discussed a lot of issues weighing on Enfilade preparation. One of the most important issues is the shortage of games so far. We need more, and we need your help to put them on. There are several other issues that we want to bring to your attention, and this article will review those for you.

The Painting Competition

Each year we have a painting competition, and this year will be no different. This competition is an opportunity for you, the miniature gamer, to display your art. While we rarely jump up and down and celebrate this important event as much as we should, we hope to interest even more entries than we have in the past. We have added some categories, they include:

Best 15mm
Best 25mm
Best Equipment: Air
Best Equipment: Land
Best Equipment: Naval
Youth
Open category

15mm and 25mm awards are limited to units of at least twelve figures. The Youth award is limited to participants under age 18. The open category recognizes unique or particularly interesting entries. This could be a vignette or single figure from any genre. Every convention participant will receive a ballot for the competition on Saturday. The prizes will be awarded at 5:00 sharp.

Best of Show.

Each year we have given a Best of Show Award for the weekend. Unfortunately, as all conventions have discovered that give such an award, it is hard to determine what is best, and figure out how to give it. Was it pretty? How did it play? Did the participants have a good time? This year rather than try to give one such award we are going to give seven. First, we will give a Best of Show award after each game period. Winners will receive some badge of recognition, as well as a gift certificate to one of the dealers in the convention hall. We will also give a grand/uber Best of Show award. It will cover only the games Friday and Saturday through the end of the day. If you want to put on a special game to contend for the grand recognition, make sure that you have scheduled it for game periods I-IV and are on hand to collect your prize. We know that there is a certain lack of fairness to those whose games are set for Sunday, but many people don’t stay for Sunday games-so schedule the good ones for Friday and Saturday.

Swap Tables.

Last year, and every year, swap tables are a source of irritation for those who buy them, and we who rent them. The entrepreneurs want to be in with the gamers, and the dealers don’t want to compete with them in the convention space. In the past they have been outside the ballroom in a break-out space, but this year we’re bringing them inside. However, there is a catch. The tables for the painting competition will be vacated by 5:30. These tables will be swap tables. Swap tables will be open from 5:30-7:30 at which time the swap tables must be closed. Cost of a swap table is $5.00 for half an 8 foot table. There will only be six halves and two of them are already spoken for so don’t wait. This is the best compromise we could work to meet the needs of the dealers as well as the complaints of the swapsters.

Buffet.

You may recall that in the early days of Enfilade we had a free buffet. This is nothing like that so don’t get any ideas. One of the things we wanted to do to keep the convention a bit more gamer-friendly is to bring some relatively inexpensive food into the convention hall during the hours between games (1-2:00, 5:30-7:30) so you wouldn’t feel like you had to run out to buy fast-food. This wastes time and is a pain. We are working with the hotel to bring some game friendly food into the convention space at a cost of five to six dollars per meal. We hope that will address some cost issues for gamers, and provide some additional convenience as well.

Registration Desk.

We are trying hard to be organized in staffing the registration desk. We presently have the desk fully staffed during the first few game periods. But we still need volunteers for the registration area Saturday night and Sunday morning.

Dave Schueler and I have our names all over the advertising for this convention, but there are a bunch of other folks who always work hard to make this work. They include Norris Hazleton, Mark Serafin, Bill Stewart, David Sullivan, Greg Maggard, Tim McNulty, Bryan Shein, Phil Bardsley Steve Allen, and the inimitable Dick Larsen. The organizing committee thanks all of you in advance for your support and the gorgeous games we know you will schedule-eventually.