Salute in Steve's Words

After what must be 18 months of work, it was good to get the actual game on the road. Although we had the two warm up games last year, Blore Heath at Triples and Northampton at Derby, the full game is on a totally different scale to either of these. So on Friday afternoon I set off towards the capital with the car packed to the gunwales. Even then I had to leave one of the terrain boards behind, so the game was only 16 feet long rather than 18.

After a restful night on the outskirts of London, I arrived at Excel in the morning and, after meeting up with Graham and Leigh at the stand, soon had the game set up. Although for a short while, we did have Fauconberg appearing on both sides of the battle, but with this being The War of the Roses, nobles did like to hedge their bets.

As with anything you’ve worked on there is always the worry of will anyone else like this. We needn’t have worried, the game definitely had the wow factor. The table seemed to permanently have people round it and comments being universally positive. There was the occasional questioning of our sanity, but there have been moments where we have as well. I was amazed at how many people have been following the blog and then came to see the game itself. I can’t think of any negative comments, even the ‘I couldn’t paint anything that small’ brigade seemed to be tongue in cheek. After seeing the game many people were seen heading towards the Baccus stand to check out the figures.

Overall Salute was a very enjoyable event. The game was very well received and, despite Peter’s doom-mongering, we won an award, The Most Impressive Troops.



With our enthusiasm rekindled we shall return at Triples bigger and better, just a few more stands to paint.