Part 6 - The proof of the pudding...
The morning of Saturday 4th October was an important one in the brief existence of Leipzig-Lite. Firstly I got to see what the board looked like with all the armies deployed on it, while Derek got to see what sort of a spectacle all his carefully painted little men made on the battlefield. And I must say, that neither of use were disappointed as this series of photos shows:
The nice thing that we found was that although the board was only four foot square it actually gave the impression of being much bigger because of the sheer number of figures used in the game. We were also very pleased with the way that the marked squares proved to be easy to see when you were looking directly down at them from close up, but faded out of sight when viewed from a steeper angle and at a distance.
Derek, (the chap in the natty black Baccus polo shirt in the piccy below), had decided that the standard 'Old Trousers' rules used in the earlier, simpler form of the game were not up to handling the larger unit count
demanded by the Leipzig scenario. As a result a new 'Big Battle Old Trousers' version of the rules was produced. This proved a great hit over the weekend and due to public demand, I'll be making this available for download shortly.
The game that was placed next to use was a monster 28mm spectacular put on by the Stonewall group featuring yard after yard of densely packed, pretty painted soldiers. My first thought was that our little game was going to be swamped by comparison. As it happened I need not have worried. Once the games started going we had a constant crowd around the table which at time was buzzing with feverish activity. At certain times it was completely surrounded by players, umpires and onlookers and you literally could not see the game for the gamers.
The games themselves were run by Derek and another friend ours, Paul Cramer. Together they supervised and guided several would be Napoleons to glory or defeat. The first victim of the game play proved to be the time scale. Derek had hoped to play the game through in 30 minutes. In practice the games all took twice this long, but no-one complained and we had several repeat players. Highlights of the weekend were the occasions when the French army was reduced to just two bases of the Old Guard and Napoleon facing off the entire allied army who were taking it in turns to assault them, and the successful holding of the line of retreat for the by Marshal Ney, only for the entire French army to be destroyed before it actually got a chance to take advantage of it!
A typical game in progress. Derek is pointing out exactly where he expects the Grande Armee to make its last stand. The chap with the pony tail on the right of the show is Paul, the other valiant umpire. Wearing the white shirt in the centre of the picture is Chris Grice, the author of the Polemos Napoleonic rules.
Every game proved to be very different and involved the players to the end, so we were all highly delighted with the end result.
Leipzig-Lite will be attending various shows in the North of England over the next couple of years and I'll let people know which ones in the News section.
I'd like to thank my son, Chris, for his help in making the terrain boards, Mark and Barrie at Timecast for the superb buildings and Derek and Paul for working their socks off to make sure that all the players had a great time.
The really worrying thing is that as the show was winding down, a familar glint was appearing in Derek's eyes as he started thinking about all the other impossible great battles of history he could miniaturise on to a a four foot square board. I can see that I've got some more battlefield building to come...
So there you have it. The game will get its first outing over the weekend of 4th and 5th October 2008 at the World Championships held at Derby University. If we don't all get put away for doing this, I'll round off this report with some pictures of the game in progress.