As it says on the tin! I remember it well as I was working in the Manchester shop at the time. Can't remember if this was the one where they had Archive Miniatures blistered up and I didn't get any as I'd not get staff discount at the show... they never appeared and everyone swore they didn't have them at the show. Hmmm. Talked to Nevile Stocken about it a few years back and he never knew they had actually cast them as no agreement had been made. One of my holy grails is to pick up some of these! The other one it could have been (or maybe this was both!) is where Bryan turned up with a box of newly cast blisters which were in an awful alloy. Shade of future problems to come for us collectors. Do miss the man, my weekends at BOYL were great fun helping out and chatting to them all. Anyway, I found my old programme so though I'd add it to the rest. Please leave a comment as I'm starting to worry no one reads me any more!
The Little Soldier Company
Sunday, 5 October 2025
Thursday, 11 September 2025
Games Day 1983
A jolly pile of goodies popped through my letterbox a little while back (thanks Rob!) including this old prog. 1983 marked the 7th or 8th Games Day - there was a Northern Games Day up here in Manchester as well (see prog pic at the bottom) so there may have been more? Anyway, they started in December 1975 at the Seymour Hall in London and went from strength to strength!
Enjoy!
There are more Games Day posts if you hits the tag listing on the right.
As always do leave a comment or shoot me an email enquiries@deartonyblair.co.uk
Saturday, 4 March 2023
FANTASY BATTLES by Gary Gygax
Today (March 4th, 2023) marks the sad 15th anniversary since Gary went to DM somewhere in the beyond... pretty sure he's still outfoxing everyone he meets.
As he appeared in Futurama...
FANTASY BATTLES
by
Gary Gygax
I offer the following details of our fantasy battles:
The rules used are those designed by Jeff Perren and I - CHAINMAIL, Guidon Games, P.O. Box
1123, Evansville, IN 47713, U.S.A., at $2 plus postage. The revised and expanded version should be
available by the time this is read. The booklet contains brief information about the scales used for the
different figure-types, and the expanded edition has things like how fast goblins, ores and dwarves can
tunnel under the walls of a besieged stronghold.
Tolkien purists will not find these rules entirely satisfactory, I believe, for many of the fantastic
creatures do not follow his "specifications", mainly because I believe that other writers were as
"authoritative" as he.
Because I have a large force of 40mm Elastolin figures, we use a base 40mm as man-size, but 30mm
will do as well.. Regular troops have only a few added touches of paint, but hero-types have such things
as gilded or enamelled armour, jewels, and carefully painted devices on their shields.
Orcs and elves are 30mm - that is what it says in the book. However, because we have not got around
to preparing them, Orcs are 40mm Turks and Elves are bowmen of the same scale.
Trolls and ogres are 54mm. I located some inexpensive plastic Indians in this scale, and a bit of
conversion produced sufficient numbers of block, grey, green and purple creatures of this ilk.
Metal mediaeval figures in 25mm scale can easily be painted up to make goblins and dwarves, while
converted Airfix "Robin Hood" men serve as Hobbits.
Giants are made from the 70mm Elastolin figures. At the moment we have only a pale blue fellow
with a head of bushy hair (snipped from one of my daughter's dolls when they weren't looking), who is
brandishing a huge club. He was originally a Viking with sword and shield, but this shield was stripped
off, the sword removed and a puttied matchstick became the bludgeon.
The Balrog has caused considerable problems, and right now we are using a giant sloth from an
assortment of plastic prehistoric animals, which (converted) makes a fearsome looking beast, albeit not
quite as Tolkien described it.
Nazgul, like the Balrog, are also difficult. Presently we are employing unconverted 40mm Huns on
black horses, but we would like to put wings on these steeds and cloak the figures riding them.
There are two dragons in our force of fantasy figures. One I made stegosaurus: First, the head was
enlarged with auto body putty, a wire was inserted into the tail and puttied to make it longer - and
barbed, the spines on its back cut to small points, the spikes on the tail were clipped off and added as
horns at the head end, cardboard bat wings were puttied in place, and finally the entire affair was given
many coats of paint, gilding, and glitter (as sparkling gems on its belly). The other was made by Don
Kaye using a brontosaurus, with two smaller heads added to the long neck, spikes along the back,
wings, and so on.
A large stock of plastic wolves, bears, vultures, and the like are used for lycanthropes or whatever
other fairly normal looking creatures are called for. Soft plastic "horrors" and insects from the dime
store serve as elementals and giant insects.
Perhaps the best part of fantasy wargaming is being able to allow your imagination full rein.
Whatever the players desire can be used or done in games. For example, for one match I built a chest of
jewels as the object to be obtained to win. However, I did not mention to either team that I had added a
pair of "basilisk eyes" (large pin heads dotted appropriately) which immediately turned- the first ogre
who opened it to stone. The possibilities are boundless.
The way the rules are selling here, it seems a good bat for some model figure firm to start producing a
line of properly scaled fantasy figures!
Mr. Bortham's observations about the possibilities of the Airfix "Astronauts" as Heinlein's "Starship
Troopers" (or other future warriors) has also crossed my mind as a fair possibility. In fact, if Mr.
Bortham eventually puts his ideas into a set of rules I can state, as Rules Editor for Guidon Games, that
I would like to see them with eventual publication in mind.
Some of the Futurama episode...
Thursday, 28 April 2022
Games Day 1981 Programme Guide
With many thanks to a great hobby friend, I thought this might be of interest... great to see many of the old companies that are now long gone listed as being present. It was held at the Royal Horticultural Society's New Hall on Greycoat Street... possible pic below. I know I went to at least two of the Games Days back in the day down in London, but I cannot for the life of me remember which ones. One trip was organised by the GW Manchester shop and another I drove down to. No programmes kept unfortunately... not sure why as I normally keep everything.