Ray and Fran's 20 Questions

I didn't have much time to give my answers much thought, but I really liked the questions posed by 'Don't Roll a One' Ray and Angry Lurker Fran. So here are my responses. 1. Favourite Wargaming period and why?

I go through cycles. This year has definitely belonged to the ‘dark ages’, partly because I’ve always loved the literature and history of the period, and partly because of how much I’ve enjoyed Saga. Napoleonic remains my Holy Grail because of the tactical challenges of using different arms in cooperation.

2. Next period, money no object?

If money, space AND time was no object, then Napoleonics, playing a massive game of Quatre Bras with 28mm figures.

3. Favourite 5 films?

As me tomorrow and you’ll get a different list, but today? In no particular order, M, Blade Runner, The Seventh Seal, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and Last of the Mohicans.

4. Favourite 5 TV series?

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Spaced, The Wire (especially season 4), Friday Night Lights, The Walking Dead, Band of Brothers (damn, that’s six)

5. Favourite book and author? So many… but I will go with Patrick O’Brian for his Aubrey/Maturin novels, with the standout book being Desolation Island.

6. Greatest General? Can’t count yourself!!

Yes, well I certainly wouldn’t be counting myself…. Think I'll go with Alexander.

7. Favourite Wargames rules?

SAGA. I’ve played more fun games of Saga in the last year and used it to introduce more people to the hobby than any game in the last ten years.

8. Favourite Sport and team?

The Dillon Panthers. Clear eyes, full hearts: Can’t lose!

9. If you had a only use once time machine, when and where would you go?

Rome, c. AD 350 to see if my thesis was right.

10. Last meal on Death Row?

Slow roasted shoulder of lamb with roasted root vegetables, washed down with a really great pinot noir. And a cyanide pill, just to piss them off.

11. Fantasy relationship and why?

Since the key word here is ‘relationship’, I really have to say the Duchess. The fantasy part is just having the time to actually enjoy being with each other, and being able to finish a sentence without someone under the age of six screaming at one of us. A different question might elicit answers along the lines of Monica Belluci.

12. If your life were a movie, who would play you?

Probably an amalgam of the two blokes from Mythbusters. I’ve been told I look and sound like a non-American fusion of the two.

13. Favourite Comic Superhero? Stupendous Man (from Calvin and Hobbes)

14. Favourite Military quote? ‘They couldn’t hit an elephant at this dist – ‘ General Sedgwick, being proven wrong at the Battle of Spotsylvania.

15. Historical destination to visit? Dura Europos.

16. Biggest Wargaming regret? Not trying harder to find like-minded gamers when I had the time to play more games. And basing hundreds of Napoleonic figures for a rule system that nobody uses because it’s rubbish.

17. Favourite Fantasy job? Pretty much the one I’m doing, but without writing reports and having more time to do my own research.

18. Favourite Song Top 5? Again, ask me tomorrow for a different list. Today: Isis (Dylan), I Was Wrong/You Were Right (Badly Drawn Boy), Sukie in the Graveyard (Belle and Sebastian), Ceremony (New Order), Casimir Pulaski Day (Sufjan Stevens)

19. Favourite Wargaming Moment? Winning a Saga tournament at The Hall of Heroes.

20. The miserable Git question, what upsets you?
People being unkind to children and animals
The increasing lack of courtesy people show each other in public
Littering
The relentless stupidity of the media
Those awful stories that always crop up when you log out of hotmail, that demonstrates that somebody has the job of flicking through the world’s media to find the most upsetting stories about the grotesque things people do to each other to be presented as titillating entertainment.
Wargamers who go on about metal figures having ‘heft’. Doesn’t upset me – I just wish they wouldn’t.