Triples 2013

After no posts for ages its all turned a bit bus-like! Mainly because I’ve got a gap in my painting.  I made the trip over to Sheffield for Triples 2013 in the excellent company of Michael (chauffeuring), Red and Luke, Red thankfully restrained himself from suggesting an entirely new period/project (unlike York in February and the Saga epidemic!).  We arrived before 10am, and left around 4ish, spending most of the time browsing the stalls, although I had a (very brief) go of Saga using the Normans, and to my shock found rolling ‘6’s’ for them much easier than for my Welsh!

I also spent a fair amount of time restarting my 6mm American Civil War project in that I bought a bit from Baccus, and also did a painting tutorial with an excellent coach of 6mm painting – looking forward to putting it into practice once my ECW gets out of the way!  The time spent around Baccus was also bad for Lukes wallet as he invested in a Confederate starting army, and has already bypassed me in models painted.  The show itself was well populated with traders, all the usual faces were there apart from Gripping Beast (but their stuff was available all around), it seemed notably quieter than York had been, but that could be the size of the venue and its more useful rectangular layout.  There didn't seem to be as many participation games going (Mad Max and Saga the most visible exceptions), they were mostly of the demo variety, and if I'd been playing in the tournament games in the end hall I would have been most upset to have put my nicely painted army on a plain wooden table top.

Onto the list of purchases, I went with a fair list, although not all was bought either because it was unavailable or I decided against it on the way/while there.  I also took a list for Dave, but all the things on it were unavailable!

Saga Bits:

Blister pack of 4 hearthguard.

Pack of wargames factory ancient Germanic cavalry to turn into mounted warriors.

A box of the new Gripping Beast dark age warriors to serve as Welsh warriors.

Some renedra round bases to base the lot on!

Scenery:

A few more sections of road to expand my collection to around 11 feet long.

Hobby:

Army painter black spraypaint and 5 different Vallejo paints to work on my ACW 6mm troops, turned out I was using all the wrong colours (too dark) which was why my first efforts looked terrible!

Flock, or rather flowers for my Saga troops to make sure I don’t have to change their bases before I finish them.  I am hoping to turn them into a small Hail Caesar army, and so need more flowers, and the below item.

Warbases movement trays x 2; trials for moving my Saga troops around.  Very much a positive trial, I’ll be getting more!  I also got some larger round bases for small dioramas and as a test of using MDF, and Luke kindly donated some of their 40mm by 20mm bases for my Union troops.

English Civil War:

A collection of bits from Irregular Miniatures bits trays, including fires, benches, goats and several dogs and civilians including the already infamous pregnant vampire!  Actually bought after the game of Saga because they could be used in all sorts of games.

After the event I also ordered a petard assault team (Warlords best) from Triple Helix after missing out on them  there.  I bought some pointy metal javelins at the same time for my Welsh Warriors.

Total spend, including the petrol, parking and entry fee (£5 this year) was just shy of £160, which was ironically almost exactly the amount of money I made from selling my Bretonnians on ebay the next day!  Happy, happy.