DON'T FORGET, PLEASE, IF THE NUMBER ON YOUR MAILING LABEL IS 126 IT IS TIME TO REENLIST IN THE HELIOGRAPH FOR ANOTHER YEAR.

PLEASE NOTE THAT MY ADDRESS HAS CHANGED.

I said last issue that the photograph of Ron Lizorty’s game table gave me ideas and it did. I went to Lowe’s and bought a sheet of 1/4 inch masonite, two eight foot 1 x 8s and some trim. I cut the two boards to exactly 8’ and attached the trim to it so the boards and the trim would fit snugly under the chipboard tabletop I have now. There was a three-inch overhang on my table so I screwed the 1 x 8s to the underside of the over hang. So now I have a ledge on the two long sides of the table for pens, drinks and dice to keep them off the tabletop.

I both screwed from the top down and bottom up for added strength. I then added the full sheet of masonite to the top of my chipboard tabletop and nailed it down. I smoothed the edges with sand paper (wear a mask as this makes a mess and if you don’t think you need to sand, don’t) and wiped the tabletop and down with a lightly damp-cloth.

I then took a quart of water based acrylic finish and gave the new stuff four coats, sanding between each coat. It looks great, I love the ledge, and the table is much better than the rough chipboard top. Thanks for the idea Ron!

I went north to see my (96 year old) father in late July (amazing he still drives, but not far and lives on his own, and probably in better health than me) and we stopped in at Historicon on the way home for an afternoon of mad buying. I mean mad buying because where ever I saw colonial figures a bought a small pack for comparative purposes for figure reviews. Historicon was pretty enjoyable.

Even more so was the chance to meet Nic Robison of Eureka Miniatures and Gerry Webb (and Wife) of Castaway Arts all three from Australia. Quite amazing to me, well not really since I’ve gone to England just to buy figures and books, that there was a crowd of Aussies in attendance and they were then on to England. They all seemed to be having a great time and these two sales tables were very busy. I would venture to say they had nothing left to sell by Sunday afternoon. I bought some of Nic’s Anubis warriors and Gerry gave me a figure every good general needs when crossing water features is a problem--who else but Moses from his Ancient Hebrew line (heh, heh, heh my own secret weapon, oops! well I guess not any more). These two guys (and Gerry’s wife) are really nice people, if you go to Oz on vacation or for work stop in and see them!!

I did see four new figures from Gerry’s soon to be available Franco Prussian War line. The Germans looked good, but the French (and I’m a francophobe) were really great, the detail was amazing, every bit as good as the best of the Foundry figures if not better. I am truly impressed by these new figures. Oh Geez! I my have to raise another French unit for my Franco-Prussian War figs. Just what I need more unpainted lead. Hey! Yeah! I do, I’m running low on unpainted lead. Anyway, I was very impressed with both Eureka and Castaway Arts and Nic and Gerry.

I cannot say how many of the colonial games at Historicon actually took place, but, not counting colonial naval actions there were 46 colonial games listed in the program. The rules used included: TSATF 18 games, the new GASLIGHT rules 2 games and home rules 16 (ok, ok this doesn’t add up but I’ve lost my list somewhere). The break down of games was Darkest Africa 10, Old West 8, Zulu 6, India 6, VicSciFi 3, FFL 2, and other areas 11 with 10 plus naval games. This is pretty respectable considering the number of Napoleonic, Civil War and WWII games going on. The only game table I saw set up, only because I didn’t have time to spend looking around, well I did but I had the unpainted lead urge, was Duke Seigfried’s Aztec game. WOW great scenery and tons of players.

I actually did see some other games and I’m ashamed to say the scenery was generally terrible. Now I was only passing through and did not see a lot of tables only Friday Afternoon, if you had great scenery and I missed it, tell me about your game we want to know. Some of the 15mm SYW, ACW and Napoleonic games had some very nice scenery, but others were just greenish blanket with a few trees. ANYWAY, everyone seemed to be having a great time. I hope next year that the flea market is in a bigger room it was wall to wall people in there. Ben bought some Warhammer stuff in there but I really didn’t see anything I wanted there, so I bought new.

As I said I bought figures for comparative purposes for reviews so you all know what figures will go with what other figures. I’m still working on this and it is going slow. There are a whole lot more colonial figure manufacturers out there then I ever thought. So this will be an ongoing project with results each issue, especially in regards to reviews. Because of this I will eventually revamp this intelligence section and just provide new information while manufacturers addresses appear only once a year in October. Of course each review will have addresses for contacts but a directory will appear once a year with all sorts of info. Just trust me you’ll see it this October, it will be a much expanded version of the Guide to Manufacturers and Figure Lines from last issue.

I found figure lines I can’t say I remember hearing about before like Newline Design (20mm colonial) and Parroon Productions from London War Room (28mm VicSciFi-Martians, Jekyl and Hyde, and British soldiers) which will be reviewed next issue.

NEXT ISSUE

The Next issue will be devoted to figures and scales and will include information on figures I bought at Historicon in an effort to help you understand what figures go best, scale wise anyway, with what figures. The table of figures will make it’s return with loads of new information. There will be lots of new figures reviewed as well as the next edition of Ultimate Miniatures. Also a gigantic figure give away for Christmas, especially 15s, 20s, 25s and larger 25s (28-30). Well maybe not so big but I do have about 100 figures in 4 scales to give away.