When Dick Bryant asked me to cover Pacificon I accepted immediately. I should have been more cautious since I was already committed to playing in the Ancients championships and putting on a demonstration game of 15mm Colonials -- number thirtyfive on the miniatures program. The problem was how to give the other thirtythree events scheduled equal time. Saturday Morning Ned Zuparko, Vive L'Empereur's designer and Miniature Events coordinator for the convention expediated the inevitable name-tag for me (what a pain to have to stand in an endless line behind kids, wizards etc. why not just sell little tags and let a person write in their own name?) and I was off to the first event of the miniature schedule, the Third Annual West Coast Ancients Championship. Mike Jentoff, host and Chief referee, assisted by Carlos Deluz paired off ten players in the 25mm Section and two players in the 15mm Section. I was the only entry in the 15mm Section with an army of Early Byzantines until Bill Butler got me to agree to using 2000 point armies so that he could field his deadly Greco-Bactrians. I'm afraid my right flank was getting badly punished by his armored dromedaries and phalanx of pike, when the first period ended. Although my Byzantines were by no means defeated, I was not interested in continuing and so conceded the victory. I had a chance for revenge later in the Convention. With the 15mm championship decided, the second round of the 25mm Section continued with some interesting pairings: Bill Voorhees, Mongols vs. Scott Henderson, Pontic; Craig Henderson Harbridge, Myceanean vs. Bill Anderson, Sassanid; J ames Mathis, Achaenenid Persian, bye. Saturday Afternoon This was a playtest of KILLING GROUND, a new 25mm Ancients Miniature rules set that seemed the perfect antidote to a defeat with WRG. Gordon Monson and Terry Jackson, two of the codesigners, led us through the soon-to-be-published rules. After one round the game had to be discontinued and moved to another room, so I was able to get a peek at a few of the other games being played and have lunch (it was 6 pm) before the next event in which I desperately wanted to participate. There were three large rooms devoted to miniature play throughout the three days of Pacificon. I was still in RM#1! On the table next to KILLING GROUND was an "N" gauge ACW game or demonstration hosted by Ray Jackson of the Miniature Warfare Institute. The scenario was Stone's River (Mufreesboro) and it looked like the Union had the upper hand. The MWI all appeared in nifty summer weight uniforms, short sleeve blue for the Union generals and more formal long sleeves for the Southern gentlemen, all with proper insignia of rank and etc. A great boon for spectators wondering, "who's in charge?" So far I had missed Ned Zuparko's first session of VIVE L'EMPEREUR playtesting which Ned was to continue through the Convention and hold a tournament with on Monday. Somehow he managed to coordinate the multitude of miniature events simultaneously. I'd already played the game and enjoyed it. Meanwhile, it was time for "Trajan's expedition to Dacia," miniature event #15. Hosted by Jim Vidlak and using his wellpainted Trajanic Romans and Dacians with Sarmatian cavalry, it was a playtest of his soon-to-be-published 15mm ANCIENTS. This set of rules has captured the attention of every 15mm Ancients player who has been fortunate enough to use it. They are revolutionary for most players who have only used WRG rules since they are Grand tactical in scale (40:1 men:figure) yet incorporating all the subtleties of Vidlak's historical research and basic gamesmanship. Movement and charge distances are generous, with a random bonus die roll for all charges and pursuit/evade moves that makes such events a little less predictable, and a lot more fun. Combat, both missile and close, is accomplished with a percentile system that has the smallest unit of organization -- six castings -- as the "basic combat multiple" two BCMs may inflict twice as much possible damage to an opponent as one. This simplifies play and eliminates the need for laborious records keeping. It is the scale of 15mm ancients that is so attractive. With the smaller castings, much larger actions can be fought than with the 20:1 scale on any playing area. Tactical scale is fine for 25mms, and the traditions of WRG and its new challengers like KILLING GOUND are made for it. 15mm ANCIENTS allows the 15mm user to come into his own. Weary, but elated after six hours of bashing Dacians and Sarmatians with Romans and Auxillia, "Trajan's Dacian Wars" was declared a Roman Victory. I embarrased Mr. Vidlak by applauding him and his creation, but I'm sure more Lauds will follow on this remarkable addition to miniature wargaming. Sunday I didn't do too much. I wandered around the dealers' rooms hoping to see the new Minifigs Napoleonics, but no luck. The only new figures were from Mike's Models -- Colonials, Renaissance, Medieval, Napoleonic and Ancient, of which only the Napoleonic and Renaissance lines haven't been fully seen at the local dealers before the convention. MM has marvelous figures, unusually animated and paintable if not of the "realistic" school of Heritage (Hinchcliffe) and Minifigs' "Super-detail" line. I bought a few dozen packs. The West Coast Ancients Championship is in its third year. Sunday saw the semifinal playoff between Jim Mathis' Achaenenid Persians and Bill Anderson's Sassanids. This one was argued, debated, disputed and closely refereed at the request of both players in good WRG tradition. Jim Mathis triumphed but then lost the championship game to Bill Voorhees in an extremely close match. After the championships and a look around at all the i/300th scale tank wars and rooms full of grown men crawling around on hands and knees playing with WW1 and WW2 battleships I headed for the Painting competition and a scheduled seminar on painting techniques scheduled by THE COURIER's own Joe Micelli. The Painting Awards were over and the winners put away -- a frustrating situation held over from last year. I always think there should be more time to view. Mr. Micelli was a no-show and then it dawned on me why I'd only been asked at the last minute to cover the Pacificon '80. [ED NOTE: A son's burst appendix kept Joe away.] I got a six-pack and headed off to watch Charlie Tarbox's Chariot races. Actually, at the chariot races I watch the crowd, which is thick at every race. The chariot races are the most popular events at Pacificons as they attract the Fantasy and D&D crowd as well as the faithful Miniature Wargamer, a minority. The crowd makes it easy to understand the ancient Romans delight in blood sports they cheer when a charioteer is hurt, maimed or killed preferably all three in close succession. That they can understand. The game abounds in pitfalls, or rather, accidents for the foolhardy or just unlucky charioteer. I also had a look in on Steve Payne's "Talavera," 25mm Napoleonics using EMPIRE. The cases of beer being consumed was belied by the neatness of the well-laidout gametable. I also looked in on a scenario of ENGAGE AND DESTROY, hosted by its creator, Chris Kurzadkowski. Chris is also proprietor of Light Brigade Hobbies, the only one of the Bay Area's dealers that is oriented to the miniature wargamer instead of the D&D or boardgames. I've never seen a D&D game there, three cheers for Chris. ENGAGE AND DESTROY is a newly published set of rules simulating modern combined arms with 1/300th scale tanks and men. Not my cup of tea right now as my devotion to miniature wargaming tapers off with the introduction of the Maxim gun during the Colonial wars; too unsporting. In my opinion, atomic weapons in wargames are uncivilized, barbaric and . . . but I digress. I was still "high" from playing 15mm Ancients the night before and smoking tanks wasn't on my schedule. I decided to skip the all-night Battle of First Bull Run -- shocking as I am the official COURIER ACW Editor, but itwasagoodthingformetogetanight's sleep. Monday Monday dawned and with it I set up a table with 15mm Colonial British and Zulu armies. As I predicted there was some interest in this since the 15mm Colonial scale is as yet unsaturated with figures; the convention's perennial favorite movie is "Zulu," and there is something delightful about a British square being surrounded, assaulted and in this case broken by a horde of Zulus. The square was too thin and the Gatling jammed on the first Boxer cartridge, alas. I cancelled a scheduled second game. My original players had all gone off leaving the defeated British to their fate. I have to admit that once I'd got the game going (using W3's IMPERIALISM with modifiers for 15mm), I turned it over to the players while I sold some extra figures to the people at an adjoining table. Also Jim Vidlak was giving another playtest of 15mm Ancients, and I wouldn't have missed that for a colonial game I could get any time. I commanded one Roman flank. Our opponent was Bill Butler's Greco-Bactrian conglomerate-phalangites Elephants, armored dromedaries and so forth. I was able to destroy enough armored dromedaries with two cohortes of SHI swordsmen to repair Roman honor, and mine, following my fumbling in the WRG tournament. 15mm Ancients was head and shoulders above any other event at Pacifican '80, for me anyway, and I'm now building two and maybe three new ancient armies for it specifically, although WRG basing is nearly the same. For Origins '81, a vast two-day battle is being planned by a now forming 15mm ANCIENTS club -- a double siege with two forts for the Romans and the Gauls. It'll be worth going to Origins '81 for that alone. Now if I can only find the time to get going with the ACW too! Three days is just too short a time to do it all -- how about a two weekend convention? SUPERORIGINS! Back to Table of Contents -- Courier Vol. 2 #3 To Courier List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1980 by The Courier Publishing Company. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. 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