Historicon Meetings

Although it seems a long time ago, around the end of July, I was in Fredericksburg, Virginia, running demos of my new fantasy game Frostgrave at Historicon. At the time, the game was getting a little interest on the forums and such, but I had no idea how the game would actually be received. I ran a lot of demos that weekend, met a lot of nice people, and even sold a few books. However, there were two people in particular that I met that really made it a stand out show for me. The first was Howard Whitehouse. Howard is the writer of many wargames, probably the most famous are Astounding Tales and Science vs. Pluck. Howard came up, introduced himself, chatted for a bit, and then bought a copy of Frostgrave. After only a few minutes of conversation, it was easy to see why he is such a popular guy in the wargaming world. The next day, I ran into him again. He held up his copy of Frostgrave, and said 'There's some good stuff in here'. He then gave me a little piece of terrain he had made to sell at show. It is in the photograph above. It's just a couple of pieces of wood, with, I think, a bit of old jewelry glued to it, but it such a perfect piece of Frostgrave terrain that I could believe it had been made for the game. Thanks Howard!

Later that day, a guy came up to the stand carrying a box of plastic Frostgrave soldiers that he'd bought from another dealer. He introduced himself as Bobby Jackson. It took me only a second to realize he was 'the' Bobby Jackson, who had sculpted so many of my favourite figures for Reaper Miniatures! In fact, I was using a wizard that he had sculpted to lead one of the warbands in my demo. His enthusiasm is completely infectious. He too went away with a copy of Frostgrave. It was only when I got home that I realized that Bobby Jackson also sculpted the last miniature I had painted before I left for the show, the Elf Ranger (seen in a previous blog).

So, while most of Historicon has been pushed out of my memory by jet lag and everything that has happened since, those two meetings have stuck in my memory and made it one of the best wargaming shows I have attended.