HUZZAH 2024 CONVENTION

 

The main room in full swing on Saturday afternoon during the Huzzah! 2024 Convention.

Well, it has been convention season here in these parts, with the Huzzah! convention held in Portland, Maine, this last weekend coming on the heels of the Mayhem Convention held on the New Hampshire and Vermont border in late April. I was not sure whether I would attend Huzzah! this year, but events unfolded so that I was able to make a spur of the moment decision (living about an hour's drive from the event certainly does facilitate such open-ended decision making).  Given circumstances, I was not registered to run any games (unlike Mayhem), so I made the trip up just to get out and about.  I decided to do a bit more than just attend, though. I got there early so that I could sit in and lend my friend AJ a hand running his Saturday morning game.

AJ (seated at the end of the table) facilitating his Battle of Newport AWI game. This was a 28mm Electronic Brigadier game. AJ has been running these games at regional conventions (and once or twice in other venues), and there is a dedicated following for them, including several of the players at the table. AJ didn't need much help, truth in lending, but I did do some facilitating and prompting to keep things moving along at my end of the table. Thus, I wound up sticking around for the entire game and then helping to clear the table, as AJ has done for me unbidden on many occasions. We then headed out for lunch and I returned to the convention for a walk through and visit with friends before heading out. Therefore, this report is going to be rather slight and spotty as far as coverage of the event--yet there might be a few things worth seeing, dear reader, if you stick around.  Here is a sampling of just a few of the games and people (as usual, you may clix pix for BIG PIX in this post).

On the next table over from AJ's computer moderated Electronic Brigadier Game in the morning there was a computer moderated Carnage and Glory game (not pictured). And at that same table in the afternoon slot there was another Carnage and Glory Game (pictured), Freeman's Farm, run by Rich Wallace (for a report, please see the excellent Corlears Hook Fencibles blog).  So by chance or design, this seemed to be the room for computer moderated miniatures.

As far as spectacle, this magnificent Khartoum game took pride of place. It ran through Saturday, so several shifts of gamers got to participate and take over from where the previous group had left off. Simply stunning!

This whimsical Moby Dick game was in full swing. I had seen this before at several HMGS conventions, and it was good to see it on the table again. Rumor has it that the rules will be coming soon to the Wargame Vault (something to watch for). 

A very well presented winter WWII game and a quite busy Wings of Glory WWI game were on hand. 

There were several tournaments ongoing, Art De La Guarre Ancients and Lord of the Rings among them (and I must say, the winner of the tattoo award goes to the LOTR player in the lower picture!). 

Speaking of things Tolkien, there was this cracking Battle of Five Armies game.  As I was taking these shots, the game master had just announced that Beorn had arrived on the battlefield, much to the excitement of the players!

I took these two shots, both of WWII historical games, because I was struck by the players. Looking at these images (and my general impressions from attendance at Mayhem), the graying of the hobby may be real for those of us who are "gray" (literally), but the evidence suggests that the hobby, specifically historical miniatures, isn't going to go "poof" when we are gone. 

Best, of all, attending conventions brings people together...

...BLOGGERS THREE

Although not on the scale of the Salute Blogger's Meet Up, three of we happy bloggers did arrange to get together and visit: Right: Vincent, of the Corlears Hook Fencibles blog; Center: Mark, of the My Brave Fusiliers blog; and myself, of the inexplicable squint (not a bad name for a blog, come to think of it...).  It was a high point of the day, and we are looking forward to finding a time when we might get in a game together when Vincent is in the area again. 

Exelsior!