Things of Beauty

Ah.. we've had a sparkling day weather-wise this week..
And as usual it gets me thinking about things and places of beauty.


View Larger MapTop of the list comes SWMBO (she who must be obeyed - my smarter cuter half, the perfect compact package of Ordnüng, Sweetness and Sudden Death with Frozen Fish) she's  valiantly enduring Frankfurt weather and we would spend a day such as we had here this last Thursday  with a newspaper, thermos of coffee a blanket and possibly an ipod and speaker, soaking in the sunshine under a tree somewhere here in the Darling Gardens in Clifton Hill opposite my place.

The park's big enough to largely deaden traffic noise and while browner than usual these days due to the drought that's hit Oz for the last few years, it's still a lovely place to go to get away from the Keyboard.

"..the  world is an arch."   "ssh, that is a secret"

Objets also of note are possibly the only RPG is achieve Clarke-like levels of what J.R.R. Tolkien ("On Fairy Stories, 1938) called "sub-creation", presenting fantasy with "an inner consistency of reality", "as if it were true"

That RPG is Chaosium's Ringworld, based on Larry Niven's  Known Space novels, novellas and short stories.


This RPG is the Silmarilion to Larry's vision and John Hewitt,  is the collato, preserver and dare I say weaver bringing the worlds of Man, Kzin, Pak Puppeteer and Dolphin together in an unparalled whole.

Admittedly, the vastness of the subject, when you consider only the Ringworld, its size and the deep contemplation and purpose of the Pak project underlying it, shows a panache, elan and arrogance that you simply don't see in SF these days. It is a tour de force.

Hewitt's done an amazing job creating a Billions of years long Tapestry from Niven's threads and the Cover Painting by Ralph Mc Quarrie, who brought you the Sky mines of Bespin, matte work for almost every significant genre film youve ever seen, conveys the majesty of the artefact that, Wu, Speaker, Nessus and Teela explore and that they only explore a chasteningly small portion of.

You walk away knowing reverently without doubt that in Sagan's words,  we "live on a pale blue dot".

All roads lead back to SWMBO an as far as Frankfurt goes a hot day  shoes off dangling or walking in the Fountain outside the Alte Oper   is superb and refreshing.

The Germans keep the  fountain beautifully and the fountain is clean and free of debris.

I'd have proposed to her there but for the irresistable temptation to drag her under the water curtain, in which case it would have been a combined funeral.

An Army marches on its stomach and I'm no exception.

The exquisite  and simple pie floater.

I've only ever had one a few years ago  at Pie in the Sky at Olinda on Mt Dandenong outside Melbourne and it was heavenly.


And lastly the thing of beauty is the look on SWMBO's face when she reads this (in which case its been nice knowing you all)

if you waste 5 minutes of your life today, waste it here at http://www.nothinglikeaustralia.net/.

Packed. Next Stop Melbourne.

Packed and passport in the pocket.

My baggage is borderline, so the lead I'e done up here will have to get posted back.. with a few books including the  prize of the trip: TCG James' RAF History of the Battle of Britain (Vol 1 of the air Defence of Great Britain)

I will miss the Bröt, I will miss the snow and I vill miss SWMBO. It's a long stretch this year. won't be  in her lovely clutches again til next November.

I will miss the tee und kaffee with the mixed bag of expats at CTK Episcopalian Church in Frankfurt, the glorious organ Postludes by a lovely Irish bloke named Simon.

I will miss one of the nicer quieter spots in the Gießen Seltersweg, the  Thalia Buchandlerüng..  nice spot to read and have a coffee, much quieter than your average Borders' back in Melbourne.

The Good news today is that Max the Guinea Pig is back from the vet and what was thought to be a nasty and final  tumour probably is now, something enlarged and onc he's over his infection a further X-Ray will find something far less fatal.

Speaking of Kafee, I am bringing back a 500g bag of "Orange Liquer" flavoured beans..  well I have my strange wargaming habit and SWMBO has her bizarre tastes in Coffee (OK, what else is bizarre about an Anglophile German anyway?), some undrinkable (to my taste) and some fabulous! (though I'm positive my Friends Nino and Rosa at Pellegrini's would scoff).

SWMBO is off picking up Küchen from her Granny in the next village and then we are off to stay overnght with the Parents closer to Frankfurt Flughafen, we haven't had much snow but the little we did hav yesterdaý caused chaos on the A5 south to Frankfurt.

This is supposed to be a wargaming blog so I'll pass on a link from one of my clubmates at the Knights of the Square Table a glance into the past at a year in the life of one of the Founding Fathers of our hobby, Don Featherstone from the very early 1960s.

Dave from Museum Miniatures just email to say they've posted my Defiants and .Dornier 17s. Yay!

I've put some stuff on the Ipod for the trip back as the movies coming ove were absolutely dire. Peter Ustinov recounting  his Biography, Dear Me,  a few of the old UK radio crime serials and Choral Music the lovely  SWMBO loves and the radio Series of  Absolute Power with Stephen Fry and John Bird by Mark Taverner.

Leaving Frankfurt.. reflections #4 New unpainted Lead and Bag the Hun (verdammt!)

"My name is Bob and I'm a Wargamer ..
..Hi, Bob"

It's Tuesday, I leave Sunday noon. and SWMBO (my smarter cuter half, the fiancee, AKA She Who Must Be Obeyed - say it in stentorian terms aka Albert Finney in the Dresser and you get the idea, she's German and wouldn't have it any other way) and I have gone for the comfort dinner: proper German Bröt with Brötherring.. fried herring marinated ..  on bread as only the Germans can do.. delicious!

Anyway.. what does a wargamer do? seek comfort in buying more lead of course!

The times being as they are a few disposal recession bargains are floating about and Greg (fellow clubmate and he of the blog The Ammunition Box) has acted as postmaster for my purchases which I will savour next week.

These New build New Anglian Confederation  and Federal Stats Europa ships (stats for both fleets both NAC and FSE new fleets here) for Full Thrust by Ground Zero Games I picked up these off  the trading post forums on Starship Combat News

I also got a bargain on some Kravak and UN space command fleets, stats at the link above from a local guy in Melbourne.

But the splash of the Trip here probably goes toa newly adopted game, Bag the Hun (BGG entry, TMP Review from 2005, Timbo's Advance Review(the lucky swine!) of BTH2)by those collective Lager or is it Ale-inspired Geniuses at Toofatlardies Games.

I must mention the fabulous guys at Theminiaturespage.com's WW2 Aviation Discussion Forum - I've never had a warmer welcome and more assistance when startng a new period/game witness these ramblings I'm a bag the Hun Sprog ad I have a few questions

Timbo (he of the blog  Tim's Wargaming Stuff a "local" BTH player who's in Bendigo) haven't met him yet, but have to say he's been (if you're reading this, my dear SWMBO) half responsible for the new lead I've bought.. plus he's a top bloke and genius if you need proof here's a map he made for Bag The Hun

"Where's the lead?" I hear you ask?

Well I ordered 1/600 Tumbling Dice Luftwaffe  and RAF Hurricane, Spitfire, Defiant and Blenheim Me109e  Me Bf110c Ju88 Ju87  Do17 and He111 forces plus decals all from Dom's Decals (good service and generous suport on the TMP and Toofatlardies forums, good vith order related email, I'll shop there again)

I caved in and also got Dom to send me some Gorgeous 1/285 Fighters from Raiden Miniatures look at them and DROOL. They are the best castings I've seen since Nic Robson at Eureka Miniatures cast the AB Miniatures 15mm Early Imperial Romans (I've long lusted after AB 15mm Ancients for DBA.. I will cave in one day)

Leaving Frankfurt.. reflections #3 Frankfurt Spieltrieb and the gaming scene here

[originally posted  to my Melbourne Club (Knights of the Square Table) Knights of the Square table yahoo group 13 December 2009]

"..i had my first taste of FoW yesterday too.
cossacks v germans/italians in the snow.

looks like fun, but ive always pushed ships around in preference to panzers.

the frankfurt scene is entusuastic , but dispersed.. people dont have space to play at home and  larger clubs as we see in melbourne dont seem to get started so there is no crossfertilization between the GW mob and the historicals..
where the next generation of historical amers/opponents is coming from Im not sure, they dont pay uder the same roof so they cant catch new players when they catch onto the GW scam.

boardgaming eurogaming is strong here and they hold regular meetings in cafes.. historical wargames called "cosim" here fights for a place and where it normally plays under the same roof as the rest in melbourne, cosim players  seem to struggle to find one another and play at home.

the mob I played/observed FoW with  Frankfurt Spieltreib meet in a  room  about twice the size of the FBC kitchen with 2 very nice tables  about 5x3.5ft it has the feel of a poolroom. its their rented room exclusively  members get a key for 250 euro annually.. they store and build terrain for shows (hamburg "tactika" is the german cancon mid feb)
their terrain is insulation foam modules 1x2ft.. theyre doing
the room is alas small and  no room for growth in members or a boargame  but they manage to keep a slab of beer around and a airbrush in the corner

not sure about the availability of public halls meeting spaces like we have in oz.. guess I'll sus that out when I move over here in a few years..."

Leaving Frankfurt reflections #2 Demoing Full Thrust to 2 newbies

As noted below, I'm leaving Frankfurt this Sunday.. I did some gaming while I was here..
[originally posted on boardgamegeek.com.. Scenario here.]


"..Gidday all.

I winter in Frankfurt and begaN meeting some of the smal number of wargamers (miniature and board) who are scattered about the place.

Matt is a pom who works locally and he and Oliver are members of http://www.spieltrieb-frankfurt.de/ a small club ina room about 15 foot by 8 foot. with 2 5x 3 tables.

anyway, when people ask me what I play I say Full Thrust and most gamers have "heard" of it.. and wanted to get into it.. so I evangelize a little and got a demo arranged and that was it.. I sent them links to FT light and Fleet books 1 and 2.

I wanted to teach them cinematic movement to start with but they insisted on Vector movement... oh well.

Oliver took the Kravak and Matt the UNSC -as these were the figures Id brought to aint on Holiday I only had a 0 brush with me so im not showing you the paint jobs until theyre done ;)

This was their first game of Ful Thrust.
I did some demonstration movement, went through the weapons systems and arcs and pointed out the arcs and kill zones and range brackets for the weapons that they each had.

matt deployed Superior geneva and eyre, the three dual graser-1/beam-2 armed lake class DDs in line abreast screening the stricken carrier and waited for the Kravak to arrive. he pushed the fighters out

Oliver proceeded slowly and almost in a sail broadside oblique approach towards the humans, despite every KV shp ever made have front arc primary weapons.. I almost wanted to yell "get in there, son!" to encourage him to swoop in. he decided when in 30 MU range to split his fire with K-guns and did soe scattering of damage.

the fighter groups spooked him a little and did the job of pushing the KV to one side of the board.

the UNSC fighters cut off and killed one of the Corvettes, the KARMA, in exchange for getting one group totally mauled (down to one fighter) on the turn the engines on the ranger came back to allow her to move off at thrust 2. the UNSC heald back until the first of the reinforcements arrived, the UNSCS BISCAY then a Kravak Reinforcement the PARMA CL arrived and sped in.
The UNSC fighters killed the other Corvette at the cost of the damaged group and the Kravak defenses left the single remaining group with one fighter.

The Kravak fnaly decided to close and did a double threshold check on the DD EYRE damaging engines knocking out the port graser and the beam-2, matt later reaired the graser.. in response the UNSC DD's now having a target inside the 18MU graser range opened up on the RISHATHRA and lets just say they umm performed rishathra on it..

The graser dice were ugly with two rerolls.. not the sort of hiding that you like to see dished out to a newbie.. I stopped counting the dice pips at 22.. the RISHATHRA is an ex ship it ceased to be.

Oliver had little luck with his reinforcements for the rest of the game he didnt get any help but snuck one DD in and scored a few points on the Range as it loped along doing 5 points in a high speed run before the DD went off table..

Matt beagn to move up table an then the AMAZON arrived, but played little part in the action by the point at which we called time or rather my fiance did, on the game.

in hindsight, beng a newbie scenario, I should have reserved the reinforcement rolls for myself to keep it balanced for as long as I could and also provided a list of orders to make plotting orders clearer and a bit easier.

Its led me to think about how FT vector movement should be explained and taught as this was the only confusing issue for the players in the game..."

Leaving Frankfurt.. reflections #1 A house divided

I'm leaving Frankfurt  to return to Melbourne this Sunday.
Leaving  may smarter, cuter half, heretofore known only as "She who Must Be Obeyed" or SWMBO for short, to battle on  against the elements alone.

in the last 3 months I've done a bit of gaming here but not much.. some episodes follow:
[originally posted on boardgamegeek.com 10 December, 2009]

"... I arrived in Frankfurt a month ago for 3 months and  as I will almost certainly be moving here in a few years and am spending all my winters here from now on (yes crazy, pass up an Australian summer, but the heat kills me and I happen to be head over heels with the Woman concerned!)

The process of slowly finding out about the gaming scene here in Frankfurt is an interesting one.

I have met and arranged my first game, it will be AHD against (tellus on bgg), who I located through a german miniatures  forum as I found the frankfurt mob here on BGG  just seem to do euro stuff, though I do plan on making trips to the Cafe Vorspiel in the future.

Tellus and I are both fair to say of a certain age and our collections, his and mine, and tastes reflect that; I suggested AHD as he seemed to have a few ACW gaes in his list (I converted him onto BGG muhahaha!) and it can be fairly short and easy to get a complete playing in a limited session, as I have no gaming material with me apart from a lot of lead to paint, I suggested one from his list. I suspect he'll be hooked into and demand a few more playings once he's tried it is addictive. I think he said its a GDW edition or a german "GDW-like" licensed edition.

Tellus has opened AHD and played a few turns out solo sometime back, so this will be a first play for him against "the living" as Han Solo said once.

He's chosen to play Confederate and so I will defend as Union.. We talked AHD and games miniature and board both over Früstück (or brekky I as I say in Melbourne); the Phalanx edition, which I have not seen except for photos on BGG, while it is truly beautiful and exquisite and the components divine, I realized I prefer the GDW map for a few reasons:

1. it is a clear, effective communication tool as any LINK or LINK design will testify to.

2. its READABLE. why is this important? Well sad to say a lot of us are getting old and in the ast 6 months I have noticed on a lot lists and boards players are beginning to ask questions and making choices with their vision in mind. Contrast, Colour, Size  and Typography for matter for communication as much as beauty in Design.

So I thought of a vote, on whatever basis you like for your preferred board.

Indications of owned and/or preferred editions and if your vision is hawk-like, codger-esque or Magoo-opic are encouraged but, of course optional.

I own GDW 2nd and vision-wise would love to say I'm a codger, but in reality, I'm a Magoo...."