Historicon 2016

Well another Historicon has come and gone.  I hosted four games and played in two.  The drive down from Aberdeen, MD was pleasant without any real traffic problems.  I arrived around 1130 and the parking lot looked to be mostly full.

I made a pass through the main gaming hall and took a few pictures before heading to the dealer's hall and stimulating the gaming economy.  There were some great games in progress.

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Another great looking game

A good looking Bolt Action board

After the dealer's hall, I headed to the HAWKs room to set-up the rubbled city table.  We would run seven games on this table throughout the convention with five different game masters. 

The HAWKs rubbled city table

Tanker's Challenge aka World of Tanks - Tabletop Edition

 My first game was at 7 pm Thursday evening - Tankers Challenge using Battleground WWII.  I had 12 players broken out into four teams.  Everyone started with an early war tank.  As they got destroyed, they got an upgrade to something better.

Panzer 38t takes a hit.

British Cruiser and Italian M13/40 slug it out at point blank range.

 

Churchill VII rolls through the wreck cluttered street

Panzer III attacks Italian 13/40 from the rear

British Cruiser gets a flank shot on an Italian Semovente

Sherman engaging a STuGIIIb

More tank action

An more.....

 My next game was Friday morning at 9 am:  Trouble in the Rubble.  Another Battleground WWII game pitting elements of the 29th Inf Div trying to take a portion of St Lo from elements of the 352d Inf Div.

A panzerschreck pops up in ambush...but misses the M8 Armored Car.

US recon teams fan out in the rubble hunting the Germans.

A view of one rubble filled street

An "88" covers the main street and has a Sherman in it's sights

Next I played a game of Look Kaiser, No Charts;  the 1914 Battle of Maissin.  I played the German right flank.  My mission was to protect the town of Maissin and slow the German advance.  It was a great game with lots of friendly smack talk on both sides.

Next I played a game of Look Kaiser, No Charts

German artillery on a ridge

A view of the artillery position from an observation balloon

A view of the town from an observation balloon

  After thrashing the French, it was time to set-up my evening scenario, River Crossing at Arnaville; another Battleground WWII game.

US troops have crossed the river; engineers are working on a pontoon bridge

A view of the US lines

German view

German troops advance to reduce the bridgehead

US smokescreen drifts across to cover the bridging site

 The evening game went well - for the Germans.  They managed to delay the bridging operation long enough for reinforcements to arrive.

I managed to get a couple pictures of some other game board set-ups.

Almost looks real

Nice little town

Another view

A PAK-40 on the same table

 A Force on Force game being run on the Rubbled City table:  Chechnya War scenario.

The Battle of Grozny

Russian tanks cautiously move forward

Russian tanker's vi

 The final game I hosted was a Muskets and Tomahawks scenario.  The French and their allies were raiding a British outpost.
 

The French close in on the British outpost

A unit of Rangers fall to a party of Hurons

 Sunday morning I managed to get into a tabletop version of the Source of the Nile.  The game was fun but by then I was ready to go eat lunch and head back north home.  So I meet several of the HAWKs at Wegmans for lunch.  The drive back home was slower but the traffic never stopped moving.

Had a great time as usual.  Didn't take as many pictures as I should have, and didn't record the names of the games I did capture digitally.  Will have to do better next time.

 After a short rest, it'll be time to start planning for Fall In.