American Civil War “the Last Waltz”

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I haven’t done a battle report in ages, frankly for a couple of reasons, they are a lot of work and unless you were there can be a bit boring. I’m putting this one up because the occasion was a special one, a gathering of the “clan” so to speak to “honor” one of our long-time gamers and a gentleman of the first order Steve Gausche!

Joe N and Steve G back when we played WWII 20mm at the “Dogs of War” clubhouse in Burbank, California. Great times! Circa 1998?

Steve has been around the Southern California historical gaming scene for as long as I have or longer, from the early 1980’s, so 40+ years! I met Steve at the last Grenadier in Burbank California and discovering that not only did we have a love of playing with toy soldiers and history we both worked in the movie business and had the same job on different “sets”!  This led to a friendship and work relationship of over thirty years! We worked on many of the TV shows and Movies familiar to you all, Startrek, Profiler, Charmed, Magnum PI, Arliss, and more for long hours made bearable by talking history, miniatures, games and even doing a little painting on set waiting for makeup, hair, or special effects to do their thing.

Steve Gausche life long gaming pal! We had just re-based his ACW troops on magnets! We did this at a time when most others still hauls their mini’s around in old pizza boxes! Circa 1992!

These days Steve’s gaming has become limited because of health issues, yes none of us will last forever. I resolved to give Steve something to remember, a showing of the love and respect he had earned over the years in our gaming community. Steve and I had been talking and lamenting the fact that we hadn’t been able to game much over the last year with Covid, and other commitments and I said “well let’s do something now, no more waiting” when I asked him what he would like to do it was “American Civil War” his favorite period.

The shear number of troops on the table made for a great looking game!

Really at first it was just going to be me, Steve, and a couple of others on a Friday night at my place, nothing to complicated or special, however I thought I might just send out an email blast to others who might want to join. I figured that since I live up north of Los Angeles and it was a Friday evening game the traffic and logistics would have few people joining us, boy was I wrong! I ended up with an outpouring of support that touched me and made the night very special for Steve! Over a dozen gamer’s committed to coming up with many more sending messages of love and support for Steve! Friends in other states wishing they could be there, some of the players drove 4+ hours, all through the LA traffic, some even taking the day off to get there early for dinner!

Truly a gathering of the “Old Guard”

Thanks to all who attended and to my lovely wife who gave us a great after dinner spread of munchies! On to the game!

A good game always starts with good preparation. Terrain laid out, troops assembled, and rules, reference sheets, and all needed gaming aides at the ready!

With large groups, impromptu games, and limited time, fairly balanced forces and a meeting engagement is often a better choice than a historical battle. We went with a Corps per side, each player having command of a division and its artillery batteries. Mike Estey and I umpired as many had not played the Fire and Fury rules before, I helped on one end of the battle and Mike the players on the other end.

A little side note; ALL the figures on the table are Steve’s and all painted by him, they are beautiful as well! All the terrain was built, painted, and provided by me and it’s OK I think….

Thanks to Mike for spending much of his time helping to explain or answer questions from players, this made the game the success it was!

The original “Brigade” Fire and Fury is a great, classic, innovative rule-set, easy to learn and quick to play, perfect for this evening! Just enough detail and feel to be fun but not cumbersome.

The Battle opened with players rolling their entry positions. The table was basically divided diagonally following the main road stretching the length of the table. Each player rolled for entry at one of 4 points, 3 on their long table edge, and one on their short side. Rolling ended up with each side having one division coming on in the center and 2 on the southern edge. Classic example of two army’s who while searching for each other unexpectedly bump into each other resulting in a “battle”

As troops poured onto the battlefield both sides rushed to deploy into position while commanders struggled to come up with a battle plan! As happened in the Civil War the “eye’s” of both army’s, their Calvary was out gallivanting somewhere else!

Both side rushed units North to avoid being flanked, the Confederates had the advantage of controlling the road but were a bit slugish in issuing orders getting the troops moving down it. Union General Clark Dandridge commanding the Union right flank (on the northern flank) pushed his units hard and got into good defensive positions before Confederate General T. Daun could get his attack organized. The opening shots came from this flank with General C. Dandridges forces artillery battery pounding the assembling “rebels”.Unfortunately for the battle report I was to busy to pay much attention to what was happening on the Southern section of the battle field or even in the middle where the largest concentration of troops were located on both sides. I have to rely on the bits and pieces learned after the battle from those who survived….

 

Seeing the lines of blue clad Union troops already advancing on them the Southern commanders dressed their lines of battle and pushed in to meet the “yanks” It seemed the southern Generals had finally aroused themselves!

Right wing Southern Commanders (pun intended) Chris S, Stevie G, and Joe N.

Pictures of the battle are a bit lacking because of the photographer (me) having little time and not wanting to slow the game down. Everyone was having a ball and with the limited time for the evening I chose to pay more attention to moving things along than taking pictures and gathering information.

Around this point the various artillery duels settled down, a general push began, and firing erupted along the entire line of battle.

The far southern table edge looking out into the middle of the battle centered around the church where some of the heaviest fight would take place.

This gallery is from fighting in the center around the church. It was here that the legendary miracle of “Stones Church” happened! When called upon to roll the dice for the resulting firing and melee’s Confederate General S. Gausche rolled like never before with 4-5 consecutive 10’s, a few 8-and nines, but never less than a 5! This feat of die rolling just couldn’t be matched by  the Union Generals Clark Dandridge, his father General Dave Dandridge, or General Estey. Union Brigades were pushed back with several colors captured and battery’s silenced or forced to retreat.

Matt Denny and Mike Estey of the “Bengal Club”

About 2/3rds the way into the evening Matt Denny of the Bengal Club group made it (late nite doing peoples taxes) and being another experienced Fire and Fury player grabbed a beverage and offered his services to the Union!On the Confederate left flank the Union had been holding it own and in fact General Clark’s artillery was causing concern with Confederate General T. Duan’s infantry, disordering them and causing light casualties. General Daun was heard to tell his brigade commanders “let us push forward bravely and clear out this nest of vipers!”

I failed to get many pictures of this action but you can see the initial deployment in the picture I used at the top of this post with the pictures of the resulting action here.

Union forces sent to guard the flank under the young “give them the steel” Union commander General Clark fix bayonets and surge forward. Rebel General Daun struggles to get his men in position.

The Union brigade managed to reach the stone wall but a withering blast from the Reb gun batteries and the muskets of their infantry disorders and causes much loss of life to the Union brigade.On cue, sensing the moment and following General T. Dauns order to give them “the steel” two rebel brigades crash into the remnants of the Union brigade, killing or capturing what was left!

Going down fighting this union Brigade is attacked by two full rebel brigades, on of which is in brigade mass and hitting them in the flank! I think the difference in final numbers was negative 14 for Clark’s troops! Resulting in “Swept from the field”

With little opposition the Northern wing of the Confederate Corps looks to roll onto the Unions flank and finish folding the Union center.

A Union brigade suddenly finds its self alone, out of command, and facing more than 3 to one odds including a rebel battery to its front.

Meanwhile the Southern flank was like a pot beginning to boil over. An early push by Confederate General Christian Adolphus Snell (his father fought with the Prussians at Waterloo) was checked by large Union forces under the commands of General Dandridge and Estey. Dense woods and hilly terrain made maneuvering on that flank difficult but it was about to explode as night fell, this combined with the bad news from the Northern section surly would have caused the Union commanders to retreat, regroup, and not risk destruction of their forces in a less than advantageous engagement. Besides think of all that fine Tennessee Whisky we captured yesterday, certainly wouldn’t want that to fall back into Rebel hands!

General C.A. Snell pushes his brigades into the attack helping to give the northern C.S.A. brigades more time.

Fierce fighting was breaking out in the dim shadows of the wooded hills. The outcome was never a sure thing for either side.

Muddy “Catfish Creek” divided the forces of the Southern edge and the center. However it was fordable along its entire length, it being the end of summer. The Unions superior artillery and their Generals ability to keep it close in supporting the Brigades had a telling effect on Rebels ability to close in.

Another view of the left end and the center from the Union position (we captured Matthew Brady and all his equipment) showing again the perfect positioning of Union battery’s to support the Brigades.

With the Northern flank of the Union army turned as well as the Union center cracking and under pressure by having to redeploy forces to meet the Northern attack soon to come it’s the opinion of this reporter (known Southern sympathizer) that had darkness not begun to fall (it was 10:30 and many had long drives) the South would have carried the day! Not a resounding victory but certainly barring a lot of great die rolls would have forced the Union off the map. At the end every one was smiles and Steve with the biggest smile of all, being the “Hero” of the game!

 

The Secret is out, an Un-Dead Warband

Places like Paul Freilers (Torrance, California) were magic and I could spend hours there just dreaming among the oh so cool treasures!

Back in the beginning (early 1980’s) when I first started to collect and paint miniatures it was only a hobby to relieve stress from work, an outlet for my creative/collecting desires. I didn’t play games with them, I simply bought figures I liked, painted them and stuck them in a small cabinet I had. Most of the first figures were from the Dungeons & Dragons world since that was the rage at the time, for me Historical’s would come later but it was fantasy first.

Like most folks I painted the “good guys” to start with, some Wizards, Elves, a few Human hero’s, my collection grew. One day while in a shop looking at figures, I noticed a rack of books with small rule books allowing you to play games with these miniatures, sort of a way to bringing them to life. I now became interested in playing with these miniatures, found a group in Santa Monica’s Aero hobbies (sadly closed) that played and I signed up for a Saturday session. I was hooked, my minis now had a purpose in life!

Back in the day painted mini’s were not always that common in games, well painted was rare, and basing…whats basing?

I painted, I played, but after only a few sessions the Game master of our little group failed to show up for our Saturday adventure. In his place I was nominated to run an adventure (perhaps because in of all the group my minis were actually painted in more than two colors!) so letting my imagination go I winged the group through a made up on the spot adventure. Afterwards I figured I had done so poorly that they would never have me as a GM again but to my surprise the players said it was one of the best sessions yet and could I do it next week! I agreed but without telling them that I had no idea what I was doing, that most of my die rolls had nothing to do with actual rules, I just rolled dice and then interpreted results, balanced with what I thought should have happened for FUN! Most players back then had little knowledge of the rules anyway…thank God for those GM screens!

Sure I read the “Hobbit” and had to have three trolls for under the bridge!

I realized that as a GM, players relied on me to bring the “bad guys”, the monsters, NPC’s, the things in the game they had to fight, out think, and overcome. I started painting Goblins, Orcs, and the various things one finds in D&D dungeons. Remember Kobolds? Lots of those! I would go down each week to the hobby shop to see what new treasures had come in, yes, remember when you had to “go to the shop” to see figures!

Fast forward to 2018, D & D is long behind me, I’ve been playing “historical games” for many years and with many different groups. One of the groups I have played with the longest is the “Dogs of War” in Los Angeles, they had gotten deep into a game called SAGA by Studio Tomahawk, dark age battles involving warbands instead of full armies. I was never a big fan of Ancients, Dark Ages, or the Medieval period although I had painted several large “Tactica” armies, Romans, Huns, and played that for a while. Still this new SAGA “Dark Ages” period interested me, especially since it had “Vikings”. Several of the movies from my youth involved Vikings and had left strong impressions on my young mind, adventure, gold, sex, and hacking apart your fellow man to get them! What’s not to like?

Who better than Kirk Douglas to play a Viking!

Yes, my dad and his buddies had a habit of taking me to all those movies their wives were not interested in, Goldfinger, Fantastic Voyage, The Longest Day, etc.… (thanks dad!). I’m sure my mom was not thrilled about me going either but go I did (thanks Mom!). Movies like “The Vikings” staring Kirk Douglas. Tony Curtis, and Ernst Borgnine as well as “The Long Ships” with Richard Widmark and Sydney Poitier were what SAGA was about! I got roped into a few SAGA games with a “lender” Viking warband and was hooked! Soon boxes of “all the Vikings in the world” were headed to my house (I bought almost the entire line of Foundry Vikings). Warbands of Vikings, Saxons, Normans, Teutonic Knights, and Moorish hordes poured off my workbench! I painted, played and enjoyed SAGA for several years but then like many other popular games it grew and produced an updated version SAGA II

It was the move from SAGA into SAGA II that worried me. Now SAGA II changed a few things around (for the good) but it introduced “Fantasy” warbands and “magic” as an option, yet another peroid, and one I was not interested in starting, my lead pile is big enough! . As we moved into SAGA II some of the group leaned towards creating some “fantasy” warbands, in fact they fairly quickly built them! Ha! “Not me” I said “NEVER, not going to happen” I told them, over and over, right up to the point while watching one of their silly Saga Magic games I picked up the “Age of Magic” supplement book to help look up a rule. While looking through the heavily illustrated book I saw a skeleton warband in 28mm and felt faint….my head started to spin…..I spun straight back to my youth once again, I’m sitting in a darkened movie palace, gobbling down popcorn, and watching “Jason and the Argonauts”.

Burned into my memory was one of the last scenes where after Jason kills the Hydra and steals the fleece the local king cuts out the Hydras teeth and scatters them on the ground to release long dead victims, “Children of the Hydra”, only skeletons now to catch and kill Jason and his band. The Ray Harryhausen’s master piece of animation that brought the “children of the Hydra” to life was when I fell in love with skeleton figures.

What young boy was not inspired to create his own adventures after seeing this!

The “Master” of stop motion Ray Harryhausen works with one of his skeletons on the set!

Now this photo in the SAGA II  Age of Magic book was not the first time I felt that pull from my past as far as skeletons are concerned, it was years ago on one of those trips to the hobby shop for some new D&D figures that I first saw skeleton mini’s! They were quite possibly the first skeleton minis ever made in 25mm, and knocked me over, I had to have them!  They were modeled in the style of Hans Holbein’s Dance of Death, or “Totentanz” renaissance wood block prints from the 1500’s. As I recall the sets were produced by Minifigs in 25mm and the range was called “Valley of the Four Winds” or “VFW” for short. I bought perhaps 30-40 figures in the range and had them on display in my miniature’s cabinet for years, even after becoming mostly “historical only gamer”. Yes I did some Victorian Science Fiction, Battle Tech, even Starship Troopers. As the years passed, I started to sell off most of my unused fantasy figures to create space and cash for the historical figures. The cherished VFW skeletons went to greener pastures, but I never forgot them….

Pretty impressive for the early 80’s….many of the GW crowd who might think they came up with this stuff were still learning to walk.

Original packaging from the still popular among collectors line. (out of production)

It was after returning home from that game at the “Dogs” clubhouse that I felt the urge to see those old skeleton figures and what was produced in 28mm Skeletons nowadays, heck just “looking” wouldn’t hurt… Little did I know that like a fish below the boat looking at the bait, I was in dangerous water.

 

Wow! found an old picture of my painted VFW skely’s! Painted Circa 1981

Wow, there are tons of skeletons out there nowadays!!! A dozen or more manufacture’s, different period’s, styles, historical and total fantasy to choose from. Now being a very “traditional” type I was not impressed with the many times overblown sculpts popular with some gaming systems and manufactures, I yearned for the style I remembered from my younger days. I wanted Skeletons from “Jason and the Argonauts”! Well it was not long using the power of the internet that I found what I was looking for. The bait was looking good!

I couldn’t believe how close these figures looked to the figures in “Jason and the Argonauts” and then I read the box that proclaimed “Children of the Hydra” doh!

There it was, a box of 24 Skeletons looking as if they came right off the silver screen! They were pretty bare “bones” (pun intended) and had only options for spear, sword, or bow, and a few Greek style shields. I figured I’d just take a look at prices and availability but  before I knew it my shaking finger hit the “buy it now” button… the hook was set, and I was into the net called “Age of Magic”

The figures arrived and while unboxing them I remembered they were plastic, I had to assemble them and oh boy what a lot of parts, small parts, fiddly parts! This was going to take time. The good news was that there was little flash, and mold lines were not bad at all. Yes, there are a lot of parts but with some proper glue and a bit of patience I built the first one and he (?) looked great! I soon got the hang of assembly and could churn out 5-6 of them in about an hour. You get plenty of options for body parts, and since they are plastic the posing possibilities are nearly endless! They even have options for a few coming out of the earth which is really cool and something I definitely wanted. I actually really enjoyed building these! The box says you get 24 figures but if you want you can use extra pieces to make partial skeletons emerging out of the ground, or as casualties, and increase that number. I think I got 28 figures all told with a few casualty markers (pile of bones) to boot!

Now normally I have a habit of not revealing my new projects until they hit the table, it’s fun that way, the big reveal. Now with the Corona Virus, Sheltering at Home, and social distancing get togethers are done for a bit so I have decided to just share my build of this warband here.

Ok, enough! Let’s see the figures!

REMEMBER “clicking” on the picture will give you a larger version.

Some might question the basing choice since I went with a “fairly” simple flocked base instead of a more intricate “undead looking” base that many people use. Well several reasons,

  1. I didn’t want the base distracting from the mini, sometimes “skeletons” are  a bit plain.
  2. We play mostly on “grass” covered mats (and see above)
  3. Skeletons, even with their armor, weapons, and dressing, can be a bit monotone so the green color really helps off set this.
  4. There was going to be a lot of skeletons and simple is faster!
  5. I had a plan to “tie” in the basing with the figure! (see further down)

While there are a few bases designed for “clawing out of the earth” poses its very easy to take spare parts and create your own. I actually found creating varied poses was a lot of fun and pretty easy given the thin plastic. In part two of this series on the “Undead Warband”  I’ll talk more about the nuts & bolts of building and modifying.

My crazy brain like to analyze figures before I paint them, what are they doing, why are they doing it, what are they thinking, etc. I find it helps me in selecting how to paint and pose them. With the “skeletons” I started thinking, “well their frekkin dead so what keeps them going?” and thought “ok, dead equals no “life force” so to reanimate them the Necromancer gives them a magical shot of “life force” but how can he keep this up for a whole army?” well he doesn’t! Once they are brought to life and sent off they have the ability to steal “life force” from any living organism they contact.

So if you look at my bases you see that the grass where the skeletons walk is black or brown, wilted and destroyed as the “life force” is pulled away. Yea, I sometimes go down the “Rabbit Hole”……

These are just the first five of 30 that I’ve done already, they are fairly simple as I was using them to develop a style and paint selection for the rest of the army. I will post picks of the others soon. There are also quite a few other components to this army to be revealed in future post!

Blast from the Past, Wargame Memories!

Since most of us have not been gaming much the discussion of games gone by has come up more often. I have been going through boxes of old pictures and came across some I thought many of you might find interesting in fact some of you might find yourself in!

I’m going to start putting them up randomly in post and then on a page of their own. If you have any better info on some of the pictures please let me know in a comment on the site or an email reply. I you have pictures you might want to share of gaming in our area, with us, or are relevant please let me know or send them.

 

Static Grass gone Wrong

Several years ago I decided to learn to make my own “Static Grass Tufts” and as part of that I built myself a negative ion grass applicator. Now those who know me are well aware that when I go, I go big most of the time, and this was no exception. Not content with buying one, or a simple small conversion using a cheap 9 volt battery powered electric bug zapper, I went full tilt and made a 120 volt powered applicator that Darth Vader would be proud of!

Fun to learn about, build, and have it work but its not that practical for most “wargaming” applications.

It works great, full coverage over big areas!I guess if you were do some large battlefield or convention terrain it would be great but as the wise Tim D said “Tufts? Why?, I buy all I want online”

Me being sorta stubborn I was determined to justify making it and having just finished  some 15mm French Cavalry I decided to use it to static grass the bases!

Just used it on the Cavalry, what do you all think? Perhaps a tad too much?

I might give them a permanent “in cover” bonus the next game! “Dam! is that French Cavalry on our flank?” “No sir! just some oddly shaped bushes”

Seriously the applicator works great, but for basing where you also have a “metal” figures the electric “charge” causes the grass to gather on it as well! For terrain and other projects its great but really more of a model railroaders item or even static “plastic” modelers tool. For basing a plastic squeeze bottle like the ones used in restaurants for ketchup or mustard works fine for basing.

HMGS/PSW Spring Convention 2011

Still going through boxes of pictures, wait no that was old school, now I’m going through a 750gig hard drive of pictures, sorting, filing, laughing, and just remembering all the good time we have all had. I’m just going to quickly toss up a few to keep content flowing and for us all to enjoy. These pictures are from the HMGS/PSW “Spring Con” held back when HMGS/PSW had them at the boy scout hall. I sure do miss them, good times! Eventually I will have all the con pictures sorted, labeled, and under their own convention “tab” some are currently under the “bits and Pieces” tab but that will change. For now, just enjoy the trip down memory lane! Please if you have anything to add let me know in the comments so I may update info and photos!

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The “Boy Scouts” hall was sometimes crowded, hot, noisy, and occasionally smelled of old Pizza, but it always felt like home! I truly miss it!

I think we held conventions in the BS hall for around nearly ten years but others can correct me on that. It was a great spot we should never have let go. We nearly always made money at those cons, not always, but it was such a good deal that it allowed us to make money one time and lose some another time, but never go into the red!

Doug Kendricks, Robert Boyens (picture right of Doug), and Jesse Boyens (back to camera) and I play in a game of 15mm Samurai battles using the “Battles in the Age of War” by Peter Pig.

15mm “Two Dragons” samurai figure I painted as “Ii” cavalry.

My 15mm samurai “Battles in the AGE of War” game.

Unfortunate the first thing you saw upon arriving was me! Back when I was President of HMGS/PSW

the “Dogs of War” convention regulars who put on many of the most spectacular “mega” games HMGS/PSW conventions ever saw pull of another one with “Shanghai” many games are considered impressive with just on or two 28mm ships…the “Dogs” bring a fleet!

 

The “Shanghai” game had an enormous waterfront area full of dastardly no goods that had to be defeated! The small shore boat has my party in it!

All Dogs of War games were geared for fun, had plenty of “eye candy”, and many encouraged the participation of new or younger players. For the Dogs the reward of the game was the satisfaction of the players. Few players ever forgot playing in a game put on by the “Dogs of War”

A young John Denny guides another younger gamer in the back streets of Shanghai! A smiling Steve Phenow can be see in the background.

Pretty sure the “Dogs of War” took home the “Best of Convention” award this time!

I had brought back the awards for excellence in gaming and found some really nice awards to be used to recognize those gamers and groups but I think they discontinued this, or at least this style of award. To bad because it was starting to become a tradition!

One of the “Dogs” Chris Snell (on right) explains a few point to players. Behind him Galen Yee and at the far end of the table Chris Vivo, both long time “Dog of War”

HMGS/PSW member Mark Deliduka move figures into position on a rooftop! The central “pagoda temple” building was scratch built by Dave Dandridge yet another “Dog”!

Speaking of Dave, here he is playing in a later game of 15mm American Civil War. Simple yet elegant terrain makes for a good looking game!

Take during one of Michael Veritys massive ancients games! Tim Kennan (4th from left, black shirt) and Harold Hillderbrand (to Tim’s right blue shirt) Sadly both these gentlemen are no longer with us. Foreground in blue shirt is David Komatz assisting Michael in running the game.

Another view of Harold’s massive game.

Conventions are some of the last places to get “your feet wet” as a new wargamer since shops are now few and far between!

Steve Phenow long time HMGS/PSW member, past HMGS/PSW President, and Game Master running one of his popular American civil War games using his “Mr Lincolns War” rules. I believe next to him is the “War Gamer Rabbit” Michael Verity.

Another of northern LA’s gaming groups that I have been a part of the “Bengal Club” another great group of guys her represented by Jerry Kegley on the left and Dan Munsion on the right. The nice lady in the middle was someones girlfriend who just came and fell in to helping at the kitchen!

Jerry and Dan played in a Full Thrust game, one of the games I ran (Bill Witthans) its a fun game not to complicated but still plenty of depth. This was an assault/defense of an asteroid mining complex. The base was built in a strange rock I had kicking around for 20 years! It was at my parents house in their garden, my mom thought it was a meteor! It then went wih me years later into my saltwater aquarium, then into my garden, and now is piece of wargaming terrain! I actually think its a piece of lava….if it could only talk!

Rick Abbo (Dog of War), Adam Hammer, and Skip Gardella in a 28mm colonial battle.

Old gamers never die the just get permanent bends in their back from leaning over to many tables!

Two more members of the Bengal Club, Doug K and Jerry K around the vendors tables. The white and clear set of drawers to the left of Doug now sits under the table at my house!

Future wargamers of America! I may be wrong but I think that is a young Clark Dandridge in the Red ball cap!

Jose Mendiola, Robert Boyens, Harmon Ward, and I, in happier times!

Good days!

Corona Virus UPDATE!!!

Well ok, it’s really just an update with more stuff I’ve found while going through all the tens of thousands of pictures and videos taken of games and gamers over the years. So I though you all my get a kick out of seeing Clark (Dave’s son) who is now 15! back in his early years once again trashing us old hands! This is at a local gaming night that was down in the San Fernando Valley around 2012-13?. When I was President of HMGS/PSW we were promoting miniatures games by going to different venues and putting on simple games like this to introduce folks to the hobby and get new members. In the game are Dogs of War members Dave D, his son Clark, and Jeff MacArthur. The gentleman in the white shirt whose name I cant remember was the game nights organizer, great guy, and part owner of the Game Ogre at the time.

I love Clark’s move where he cant find his action card spins around, down, back up, over the table, and under the arm of the other player to lay it down! Way to play Clark!