(Cold Wars) More Gnome Shenanigans!

Outside of the impromptu Friday game to fill in the cancelled one, there were three separate events: the mega-game, the joust, and the super secret race game.

Our 3rd annual Gnome Wars mega-game covered three tables, had over thirty players, and somewhere around a thousand figures.  This year's theme was the Battle of Saragarhi.  The two tables with forts bookended the signal station table, manned by a mere 21 Sikhs.  

The most "amusing" mechanic was the use of the signal tower.  The other two boards could attempt to contact Fort Gullistan via signal giving statuses, requesting reinforcements and calling in artillery barrages. Unfortunately each communication required a roll to determine if the message got through completely.  If it didn't, the GM would rip a third (or more) off of the standardized message form and let the commander of the fort decipher it.  Artillery requests for 20 inches to the right of the last shot and 25 inches forward turned into 20 inches right and 2 inches forward.    One of these miscommunications resulted in the near destruction of the signal tower on Fort Lockart

I only have one half decent picture of one of the boards.  A long and exciting Friday ground my Saturday to a halt and I had to excuse myself for a nap.    As always, there were ridiculous levels of bravery on both sides, but reports had every Sikh on all three boards slaughtered to the man.

After an awesome dinner break, we had the Gnome Joust.  Over 30 players grabbed a mounted gnome and attempted to knock the opponent off their bunny, kangaroo, pony, Komodo dragon, wiener dog, or wild goose.  The kids reigned supreme, knocking out most of the veteran players, until, through the mud and the blood, Elias reigned supreme! 

The last event was the semi-invitation only Gnome Racing, where the Gnome mounts race around a track while the their riders pummel each other with lances, swords, guns, rockets, and clubs.    As I missed the first few races at Historicon and Fall-in, I got a bit confused and fell to the rear of the pack.  Some bad die rolling by others on the backstretch let me finish intact and in 6th place.  Congrats to Canadian Kevin, whose Irish Goose  passed Mike Lung's fading weiner dog late in the race and never looked back.

The pack rounds the turn while chasing a tired weiner

Anything in base-to-base contact is beating the crap out of each other

There were a few new Gnome releases at the con.  The only one that I managed to snap was the Gnoman Archer.