Barrage 2016

Buck

The Barrage Main Gaming Room in Full Swing

The Barrage main gaming room in full swing

The Harford Area Weekly Kriegspielers (HAWKs) hosted our 20th incarnation of our Barrage gaming event.  This year was the first year that we tried to run Barrage as a two-day event.  We also expanded our tournament offerings to TWO Flames of War tournaments, an X-wing tournament, and an Art de la Guerre tournament.  We had a number of excellent vendors with many great products on order as well as several flea market tables.  We also had record attendance.

A view of some of the excellent flea market tables

A view of some of the excellent flea market tables

Another view of the dealers

Another view of the dealers

Tournaments at Barrage

Below are some views of the Flames of War Tournaments run by Kurt Reese:

If you are a Flames of War tournament player and weren’t at Barrage, you missed a chance for two official tournaments in one weekend — well worth the trip to Barrage.

Below are some pictures of the Saturday Flames of War tournament run by Bob Everson of the I-95 Gamers:

Walt Leach ran a 36-player Art de la Guerre tournament:

 Andrew P. ran the X-Wing tournament:

 Games at Barrage

Views of Brian Cantwell‘s very popular ancient naval game:

Brians ships are made of paper and look excellent on the table.  They are crewed by 15mm figures.

Views of Matt Kirkhart‘s inspiring “Craftee Dungeon Crawl:”

The figures used in Matt’s games are made from wooden bits from the craft store and other odds and ends.  The figures are extremely creative and are made extremely attractive through very excellent painting.

Richard Hefner ran his every popular Aerodrome game:

The two people in the picture below had never seen a wargaming convention before.  They spent much of the afternoon in Richard’s game and had a terrific time.  We always have several games for younger gamers at Barrage. In this way the HAWKs try to encourage younger games to come to Barrage.

Here are some other games at Barrage that were aimed at younger gamers:

Chris Johnson, a huge supporter of our Armies for Kids giveaway project, ran this WWI airplane game on the floor.  We didn’t have as many younger gamers on Friday as we had hoped, but a host of non-so-young gamers had a great time nonetheless.

Chris also ran this very enjoyable American Civil War game on Saturday.  This time he got a host of younger and new gamers.

Peter Schweighofer ran two kids games.  One was Valley of the Ape.  The other was Panzer Kids from Peter’s book of the same title.

Note the mix of adults and kids in this game.  We had several gamers at Barrage who were new to gaming.  I tried to push many of them into kid-friendly games as a great introduction to gaming.

Lee Sowers ran two games using his to-be-released Skirmish Action rules.  I was able to play in one of them, and I enjoyed the game.

I ran a Combat Patrol™ game set in Normandy in WWII:

A funny moment came when the Americans targeted a mortar shell at some Germans behind a hedge.  The round landed short and into the middle of an American unit.

The Americans made good use of smoke to screen their advance.  Despite a very good defense by the Germans and some really poor American morale results, the Americans managed to work their way around the flank of the Germans and force the Germans off the first line of hedges.

Philip Gardocki ran an attractive game based on the Battle of the Pelennor Fields from The Lord of the Rings:

Mike and Patrick Byrne ran a lively Force on Force game in which the Russians employ a new weapon against the Chechens.  The game was going so well that it ran an hour longer than planned because the players weren’t ready to stop.

Chris Palmer ran two eight-player Frostgrave games, both of which were completely full:

Cliff Brunken ran this French and Indian War game:

Ed Watts ran a 7TV game, called the Yellow Submarine Caper that involved James Bond, The Avengers, The Beatles, and other factions.

Scott Perry ran a very cool looking naval boarding action game using the Age of Sigmar rules.

Eric Schlegel ran a cowboy game, Schlegel’s Gulch, using slightly modified Combat Patrol™.  It seemed to be a wild and wooly affair.

Jim McWee ran this game based on the Aliens movie, called “They Come Mostly at Night, Mostly,” using Aliens Miniatures Rules.  This seemed to be a very enjoyable game for those involved.

Zeb Cook ran a 1939 Winter War game using Combat Patrol™.

Greg Priebe ran a Star Wars themed game using Combat Patrol™ in which the Rebels had secured an important droid from a crashed ship and were trying to get it past the Stormtroopers.

By all accounts this was a very popular and fun game.

Dave Wood ran several Napoleonic games using Fate of Battle and 28mm figures.  There is something very appealing about a table full of 28mm figures.

Mark Fastoso ran a very pretty Dragon Rampant game using Flintloque figures.

Brian Lipscomb ran The Gates of Damascus using Lion Rampant.

Emril Gletscher ran a table of short games designed to give folks something to do between other games.  I played a game of Forbidden Island, and she ran Forbidden Desert, Gloom, and others. Next year I plan to give her a dedicated table and advertise this more.  I also “forced” Emril to try some other games, like Chris Johnson’s airplane game and Brendan Watts’ Eat Hitler game.

Joe Richards ran this Rapid Fire game of Russians versus Germans.  I haven’t seen Rapid Fire at a convention since the release of 3.0, and it was good to see this oldie but goodie on the table again.

Phil Jones ran this Volley and Bayonet game, The Golden Sun of Kolin.

Duncan Adams ran his WWI game using a mashup of Look, Sarge, No Charts rules for WWII and the American Civil War.

Kevin Lepley ran a cowboy game with the odd title, Cowboy Daze or Don’t Fall Asleep on the Wagon.

Eric Schlegel ran this Lord of the Rings game based on the late 1970′s version of the rules, “Ringbearer.”

Mike Pierce ran a modern game using Battlegroup rules.  The game seemed to be VERY will received.

Tim Tilson of NOVAG ran two games for us at Barrage, including this one.

Robert Franklin ran two modern games at Barrage in 1/285 scale.  He has these really clever terrain boards built into boxes for each store and transport.

 Phil Jones ran the battle of Liebertkolkwitz using Volley and Bayonet.

Some other excellent games at Barrage 2016.

This was our first year of trying to expand Barrage from one day to two.  We think it was very successful.  We had a full slate of games on Friday and every gamer had something good to play.  We hope to have even more games and gamers for both days of Barrage 2017.  We will be posting the dates soon, so mark you calendar and plan to be there.

Post Barrage LARP

Having done it twice, the HAWKs now have a time honored tradition of conducting a pirate tavern brawl based on Blood and Swash.  After all our guests have left, we rearrange some of the tables into a replica of the taverns that Chris, Jennifer, and I have used in many convention games.  Attributes are assigned based on the quality of the costume, sides are chosen, and the game begins.  As with our barroom brawl games, the objective is to get the treasure chest out of the tavern.  The winner fro the previous year acts as GM for the game.   This year Jennifer Palmer won the game.

These are many (but not all) of the people who made Barrage a success

These are many (but not all) of the people who made Barrage a success

Queen of the Pirates for 2016 and GM for 2017!

I want to provide a personal and special thanks to the folks who made barrage a success:

  • The game master who schlepped their gear to Barrage, set up their games, and ran them.
  • The various volunteers, especially the HAWKs spouses who did a tremendous job preparing and serving meals, drinks, and snacks throughout the two days of Barrage.

 

 

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Author: hawksgameclub

2 thoughts on “Barrage 2016

  1. WOW! This was truly awesome and I am glad that you extended to a day and a half this year. My thanks to all the HAWKS. In summary:

    Dave Wood’s Fate of Battle game was fun and well-balanced. He ran it very smoothly. Nice job classmate!

    Chris Palmer’s Frostgrave game (I played in the second one) was action-packed. My apologies to Greg Priebe for dissolving his weapons and for murdering Santa, Yukon Cornelius, and others – though Yukon did go postal. I can’t wait to play again. Great job Chris.

    Buck Surdu’s Combat Patrol Normandy scenario was non-stop action – and the funny moment cited above was mine -BUT the next mortar hit the MG and my daughter Ellen’s infantry was able to rally and advance – well – what was left of it. I am even more impresses with Combat Patrol – truly a unique system. Well done Buck!

    Matt Kirkhart’s Craftee Dungeon game was fun. I was blown away by the figures themselves – truly beautiful work. Thanks Matt for running the game – it was a blast!

    Lastly, kudos to Greg Priebe for running the Star Wars Combat Patrol game so well. It was a near-run thing for the rebels, but everyone had fun, and all were totally engaged the whole game.

    Ellen and I really enjoyed Barrage. Thanks to all behind the scenes as well who made this work.

    1. Thanks for the kind words regarding my game! No need to apologize, you played the game just the way you’re supposed to! 🙂

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