Conventions and Events

By Kreighton Long

I recently had the pleasure of attending a 1000 point Bolt Action tournament at Your Hobby Place in Fredericksburg, VA.  The tournament was hosted by Josiah Nehrke and we began the day with six players.  The participants played through three rounds: Key Positions, Seek and Destroy, and Breakthrough. The lower than expected turnout was likely due to the tournament falling on Mothers Day weekend and that the previous weekend was another local tournament at the Richmond Open.  The event progressed smoothly with all parties respecting the prescribed schedule and the whole event had a friendly atmosphere with players joking and helping each other with rules throughout the day.

Josiah’s highlight of the tournament was the high standard for how the players’ armies were painted.  He considers it rare to have such effort and care put into every players’ armies at events and the paint jobs, paired with the tables, made the event a special one.  Special shout out to Wayne W. for his excellent terrain.  Wayne provided nearly 100% of everything on the tables and multiple players took the time to praise the tables we had the opportunity to play on.

After finishing the day with two wins and a loss, I took home first place.  My Italians pleasantly surprised me with how well they played following a disappointing few months before replacing three L6/40s with two M15/41s.  The M15/41s worked well as they put out up to four pins per turn, if they divided their fire and had targets to engage, and even succeeded in knocking out three vehicles during the day.  Fingers crossed that I can replicate this success at my next tournament at the end of May.  The highlight of the tournament for me was having the opportunity to see so many well-painted armies on great looking tables.  I’m a sucker for the aesthetics of this hobby and when players put effort and pride into armies that go on tables similarly decorated, I can’t help but have a great day. 

The second place finisher was Tom Slook, who also finished with two wins and a loss.  Tom’s highlight from the tournament was his Hellcat advancing out of cover, hitting and knocking out his opponents Centaur with the first order die of the first turn of the first game.  That gave Tom a notable morale boost early which carried him through the remainder of the tournament.  His most valuable unit was the M5 Stuart with hedgerow cutters.  The 5+ upgrade allowed the Stuart to open holes in the bocage in his second game which gave him a distinct advantage over his opponent.  Tom also took home the award for Best Sportsman.  Congrats Tom!

Joe Dent took home third place with a record of 1-1-1.  Joe’s highlights from the tournament featured the paint jobs of the armies present.  The tables themselves were also a treat for the players.  The tables were well designed and decorated and each presented a unique challenge for players.  Joe remarked how when seeing the tables he didn’t think, “oh god I hope I’m not on that one.”  Joe’s most valuable units were his Regular German Grenadiers and his Veteran Panzer IV G with Panzer Ace.  Joe brought five identical Grenadier squads and used the one LMG per squad to reach out and put pins on units to force his opponents to take Order Checks.  Working together, the squads stacked pins on units even pinning out an enemy squad in the third round.   Joe’s Panzer Ace Panzer IV was a real menace.  As a Veteran tank, it ignored pins that could not penetrate it’s armor which kept it active throughout the game and it’s murderous Pen 6+1+D6 make quick work of any target it landed it hit on.  It knocked out enemy armor in and survived all three rounds. After eliminating the enemy’s armor, the Panzer IV became a mobile machine gun bunker reliably putting pins on two enemy units per round of firing.  Congrats Joe!

The Best Painted Army award went to my North African Italians.  Josiah emphasized how the judge had to make several laps around the armies during the lunch break due to the caliber of submissions.  This was my first foray into desert themed armies and I ended up enjoying the change of color schemes.  The tan and ochre colors help my units stand out compared to the more common European themed armies which I believe will help them stand out during future painting competitions.

Your Hobby Place, Fredericksburg, is planning on hosting another tournament in July.  Keep an eye out for advertising for that tournament.  Josiah is taking a break and will not run that tournament but plans on being back in his TO chair in November.

Thank you to the sponsors — Warlord Games and Your Hobby Place.  Warlord Games provided a prize support package and Your Hobby Place the entry costs into store credit for the first and second place finishers.

See you next time!

By Kreighton Long

On Saturday, 12 October 2024, Kalissa Skibicki organized a Bolt Action tournament at the Call to Arms convention in Williamsburg, Virginia.  Sixteen players brought their armies and positive attitudes for one last Bolt Action Second Edition tournament. Due to the travel involved for me to get down to Williamsburg, this tournament feels like a Bolt Action geek reunion where I have the pleasure of catching up with like minded people on an annual basis. I caught up with familiar faces and made some new friends throughout the weekend. Overall, the tournament appeared to have been a success with plenty of laughs and jokes to compliment the friendly competition of the day.

Kalissa’s highlight from the tournament was the influx of new players.  She commented that around six of the sixteen players had recently started playing Bolt Action and that this was their first tournament.  Moving forward, Kalissa, as well as her players, will need to become familiar with the revised rules of Third Edition which will require a not-too-small investment in revamping the tournament packs for Kalissa’s future tournaments.

After three rounds of games including Double Envelopment, Demolition, and No Man’s Land, the players gathered around Kalissa to hear the final results of their efforts.  Due to all sixteen players tying in the second round, the final push to secure a place on the podium came down to secondary points.  In this tournament, the secondary points resulted from order dice claimed minus order dice lost. After all the scores were tabulated, the winners were announced with one order dice separating first place from second.

By Kreighton Long

On 21 September, twenty-six players gathered at Titan Games and Hobbies in Timonium, Maryland for another Bolt Action tournament (2nd Edition) organized by Michael Kehs.  Mike was pleased to see his tournament crowd grow since the last tournament back in April to include recurring players from as far away as Ohio and a new player who ventured down from Connecticut.  Mike credits a level of his growing popularity to his success in reaching out to vendors for prize support.  In addition to healthy rewards for the top finishers, Best Painted Army, and FUBAR, players also can look forward to raffle drawings between rounds.  Well-earned credit needs to go to the Assistant TOs, Rob and Chris, for providing invaluable support with setup, break-down, raffles, and pictures.

The three scenarios chosen for this tournament were Meeting Engagement, Key Positions, and Sectors.  This tournament included a new gimmick from the previous one.  While last time players could find their turn ending prematurely if two odd colored Order Dice were pulled from the bag, this time players needed to keep an eye on Secret Objectives distributed prior to each game.  The Secret Objectives forced players to adjust strategies and to think more tactically to score up to an extra ten points, five per objective, each round.  From what I was able to overhear, the feedback from the Secret Objectives was mostly positive, and Mike confirmed that he will look into incorporating them at future events.  One improvement he plans on making is to specifically assign certain objectives to pair with certain scenarios and to balance them with each player receiving one hard and one easy objective.  In my three games, the Secret Objectives did present opportunities for me to play the game differently than I normally would, and added an extra level of intrigue to the game.  For example, in my final game, I had an opportunity to finish off one of my opponents units but instead moved my unit into my opponents half of the table to accomplish my Secret Objective of finishing the game with all my surviving units on my opponents half of the table.  While that choice had no true impact on the outcome of the game, the choice I faced did make it a little more interesting for me and bagged me an additional five points to my overall score.

By Mitch Reed

Another Connections Wargaming Conference is in the books and this last event was yet another benchmark performance. Held in Carlisle PA, the host Army War College Conflict Studies Laboratory exceeded what they did when they last hosted the event in 2019. We have covered this event over the last few years, and it is the premier event where wargamers from defense, industry, academia and the hobby community gather to talk about how to make wargaming better and what the next generation of wargaming looks like.

By Michael Rafferty

Recently, AdeptiCon announced that it was moving to the Baird Center in Milwaukee. While Schaumburg and the Greater Chicago area has been great to us, we’ve epically outgrown the Schaumburg convention center. Three years ago, we expanded to the facilities at the Hyatt Regency, moving historicals and a few other events there. By the last convention, even this extra space was full and then some. This doesn’t even factor in all the hassle of being at two hotels. While I’m a big advocate for the Hyatt and our historical space, it was packed this year. AdeptiCon has been pushing at the limits of Schaumburg, and it was time to look at bigger spaces.

The Baird Center at night

By Kreighton Long

A few weekends back I had the opportunity to compete in a Bolt Action tournament.  Twenty-four players converged on Titan Games and Hobbies in Timonium, Maryland for a day of competitive play.  Operation Roundup was Tournament Organizer Mike Kehs’ third tournament and largest so far.  Mike began organizing tournaments in Maryland to support events for players in his area.  Learning from other TOs, Mike advertised early and often for his event which helped to pull in players from multiple states around Maryland.

Mike’s tournaments aim to provide enjoyable experiences for competitive players, hobbyists, and new players alike.  Mike was supported by two assistants who doubled as judges for the painting competition.  The assistants helped to ensure a smooth event considering it’s size with one stepping in as a ringer to even out the numbers.

by Mike Rafferty

I feel like I say this every year, but this was the biggest AdeptiCon ever. Early estimates are over 8000 badged attendees with the numbers still being calculated. That means likely 10,000-12,000 through the door since AdeptiCon does not charge for a shopper’s badge and there are a lot of people that come to walk around and check things out. Early reports from the vendor hall is that the majority of vendors had their best year ever and the hall was packed when I walked through. Despite all these record-breaking notes, there is one important question: did I have fun?

Team NDNG was in full force at Adepticon 2024. Mike, Tom, Paolo and Mitch wound up in Schaumberg Illinois to attend what turned out to be an amazing event. We rally back at the studio to talk about the next event in Milwaukee WI in 2025.

By Paolo Paglianti

Imagine an airport hangar packed with tin soldiers: tin soldier shops, tin soldiers demo tables, tin soldiers tournaments. Well, that’s literally what happens at Warfare 2023, one of the biggest and most significant wargaming and modeling shows in the Old World, located south of London. Warfare is a heaven for every wargamer: there are lots of shops selling essentially anything you can imagine: books, miniatures from 6mm to 54mm, and terrain for any wargame from ancient to sci-fi.

It is organized by the Wargames Association of Reading and it’s simply excellent – I know how difficult is to organize an event so huge and complex, and David, Steve, and the Reading Team always do a fantastic job. I really recommend you pay a visit, if you’re in the UK next November.

By Erich Goebel

List building in Blood & Plunder (and any wargame) can be one of the most intimidating facets of learning a new game and delving into competitive and focused, serious play. Blood & Plunder also features over 100 different factions to play under seven umbrella nationalities with fantastic nuance and differences that give each a unique flavor to play and test. These numbers can be overwhelming, as one flips through the one core book and three expansion books available to compare list options.

Luckily, the online force builder tool is utterly amazing and is actually fun and convenient to use.