This Week in the Duchy

Busy times at the moment as the academic year for our seniors approaches the business end, and the joys of marking, report writing and such loom large. This week saw the end of our 4 week Saga tournament in the school wargames club. The Tournament was a great success, the boys competing well and learning both the joys of victory and the bitterness of defeat. Nine boys took part, with armies ranging from Bretons (the tournament winner) to some beautifully painted Skraelings via Scots, Jomsvikings, Vikings and Normans. Yesterday Ian from War and Peace Games joined us for the final and donated some very generous prizes. I took him out to dinner after and had a great chat - he is a brilliant bloke.

I have been reading the increasing hype around Bolt Action with some interest, to the point that I bought a box of Warlord British Infantry and put them together during the week. I must say I am very impressed with the figures. They take a while to put together, which I actually enjoy, but the end results look great, with realistic anatomy and weapons modelled to scale instead of the great lumpen arquebuses carried by many of their metal comrades. I was particularly impressed with the engineering of the arms and the way the hands gripped weapons. Beautiful stuff.

As you can see in the photo, I am also the proud owner of a copy of Bolt Action. A big box of these arrived for Ian at War and Peace yesterday, and he brought one down for me. I therefore may be one of the first people in the world to own a copy, which I am sure makes me the envy of men and the object of desire for women. Based on an initial flick through, the rules look great - very clearly written, beautifully produced, and based around mechanics that I personally like a lot. I'm hoping that Bolt Action might be a good additional core game for the school club. The plan is to have three or so different games that might appeal to different boys and reflect different historical periods. So at the moment it looks like these might be Saga, Canvas Eagles (which I'm introducing next week) and maybe Bolt Action, with Basic Impetus up our sleeve as well.

Right, the Duchess is home so I had better go and help tidy up the house. Don't forget the Harald Hardrada competition, and also have a look at a very generous giveaway happening over at The Blog With No Name.