CanCon 2013

I went to CanCon over the Australia Day long weekend, and had a blast. I only had an old phone camera, and didn't get enough pictures to scratch the surface of all that was there, but still hope I make the non-attenders jealous.

Part of one of the halls

I took part in the Blood Bowl tournament, giving my Lizardmen team a run.

Montezuma's Revenge- 'We go right through you!'

Day One I played against all greenskins. I blew off some rust in the first game to draw 1-1 against Lelrythus' orcs. In my second game against Oozeboss's Goblins I suffered under his chainsaw, but won 2-1. (Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of his team which won the 'Best Conversion' award with a troll chucking a gobbo). Finally, I played Thomsy's orcs- I had him utterly over a barrel but he got insanely lucky and pulled out a 1-1 draw in the final turn.

Lelrythus's Orcs- Brutomax Broots

Thomsy's Orcs- Blue Mountain Crushers

Day Two started against Sledge's Dark Elves with a convincing 4-2 win (I got lucky and caused two casualties with my first two actions, then things got worse for Sledge). My next game was a real struggle against Devil's Reject's beautifully converted and painted undead (he deservedly won best painted team, and also came third overall). I couldn't overpower his mummies or outpace his ghouls, and lost 2-1. I played Sun Tsu's High Elves in the last game, and won 3-2. I had to work hard to keep him from scoring as he had some excellent players.

Sledge's Dark Elves

Devil's Reject's Undead- Dead Evil

Sun Tsu's High Elves- Praetorian Predators (Heresy sculpts)

The seventh and final game was against Senexis' Orcs, and I had a satisfying 3-0 win, including a Kroxigor touchdown!

Senexis' Orcs- The Fabulous Zarsoff Brothers

Overall, I won 4, drew 2, and lost 1, coming 5th overall out of 54 coaches. I'm very chuffed about that.

In the evenings, I managed to get a few new games under my belt: I played a game of Nexus Ops, which was undeniably colourful! I'd do better if I played it again, now that I know what I'm doing...

Nexus Ops under blacklight (Picture from BoardGameGeek)

I also got a game in of DungeonQuest, which I hadn't encountered before. Here's a picture of my first turn:

Decisions, decisions...

Left turn: dead end. Right turn: Bottomless Pit- roll 3 or less on 2D6 or die. I died...

But the other players let me reset, and I got a few laughs out of the rest of the game. I was expecting some sort of HeroQuest dungeon hack, but it was more of a push-your-luck game- how far do you go into the dungeon before you turn around and decide it's better to live poor than die underground?

At CanCon itself some superb demonstration games were going on including Isandhlwana, Boxer Rebellion, Franco-Prussian war, WW2 Pacific tanks, ACW, a Cold War hypothetical, a WW1 aerial game with a huge zeppelin, and a retro old school HG Wells Little Wars game with massive shiny soldiers and buildings out of wooden blocks. I was too busy in the tourney to really get to explore these games or get decent pics, unfortunately.

650 Zulus!

Thin red line before Isandhlwana- unfortunately I didn't get the mountain in the picture!

Massive 1:214 scale zeppelin

With planes for scale

Distant RAAF Spitfires protect Australia from Betties

Boxer Rebellion

HG Wells Little Wars

I took a few pictures of some very nice tables for 'Infinity':

The Canberra Gaming Society were also giving away a lovely Mike Broadbent Australian Light Horse figure as a memento (to celebrate 100 years since the publication of HG Wells' 'Little Wars', I heard), which will eventually find a way to my painting table.

I picked up a load of Saga stuff, some Flashpoint moderns, rubber roads from Fernvale Specialty Scenics, and a few other bits and pieces. I don't know whether to feel faintly nauseated at the cash I spent, or self-congratulatory at the bargains I got, or smug at the self-restraint I exhibited in not getting much much more!

Here's a kitten photo, because the RSPCA were there for some reason:

Cute!

Last but not least, I also got to exchange a few words with Paul of the Man Cave, who had a nicely painted Ogre team. Good to meet fellow bloggers!