BRITCON 2023 12/13th August 2023 (Nottingham University)

[Hedeby]

Following on from the successful relaunch of BRITCON at Nottingham University last year we have been asked if we would like to take part in the 2023 event scheduled for the 12th and 13th August. It’s a great venue (if a little quiet at times, well it was last year) Hopefully the Mercury won’t be nudging 40 degrees this year as it did get a little bit warm.

The organisers are confident of having many more gamers and traders this year. So, anyone fancy coming along?

Let me know in the thread below....

[mikeemagnus]

Sorry Chris - I'm likely to be out of the country on those dates, but enjoy

[Flying Officer Kyte]

If I can get a lift in with my ships, coastal strips and mat etc. I'm up for it again Chris.

Rob.

[Strangely Brown]

I’m available for WGS

[Flying Helmut]

I'll probably be OK for this one - can't be certain just yet, though.

[Boney10]

I should be ok this year, so Rob you got a lift.

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Thanks Chris and you have a bunk.

Rob.

[tonyc206]

I'm pretty sure I'll be OK for this one, just need to consult with my CO

[johnbiggles]

We should be ok for this one again

[Hedeby]

I will continue to work on pulling this together, however it looks like I won’t be able to make it as my extended family have organised a big get together that weekend. Looks like we will have a good turnout though.

[Strangely Brown]

Put me down for WGS “Op Chastise”

[Flying Helmut]

Put me down for WGS “Op Chastise”

Oooooh!!!

[Hedeby]

Sorted Simon thank you. That game is going to be awesome.

[tikkifriend]

Sorry Chris - I'm likely to be out of the country on those dates, but enjoy

Same goes for me too but would surely love to visit my old stomping ground one day

[Hedeby]

So two weeks to go before BRITCON. Can I have a list of definite attendees please?
Although I can’t make it I will continue to liaise with the event and get all the loading/parking details etc.
I have asked for two large tables (6x4) ...

[Hedeby]

Hopefully we can do the operation chastise that was mentioned... Dambusting will look awesome

[Strangely Brown]

Hopefully we can do the operation chastise that was mentioned... Dambusting will look awesome

Op Chastise still on for 12/13 Aug…

Does anyone know what the moon state will be?

[Hedeby]

Has anyone told you what a star you are Simon?
Don’t know about the moon state but I do know it’s not going to be 38 degrees outside and a veritable oven inside this year.
Dear god it was hot under that glass roof last year....

[Strangely Brown]

Has anyone told you what a star you are Simon?
Don’t know about the moon state but I do know it’s not going to be 38 degrees outside and a veritable oven inside this year.
Dear god it was hot under that glass roof last year....

…it will be ok, we’re going at night

[Hedeby]

Lol

[Flying Officer Kyte]

I will be there for the Saturday with a seafaring game Chris.

Rob.

[johnbiggles]

The Biggles seniors will be there, looking forward to it

[Flying Officer Kyte]

See you all next week then John.
Rob.

[johnbiggles]

Just checking, what time do we need to turn up? Just checking so we can work out which tram to get

[Hedeby]

I have sent details through to Rob Chris and Tim who will coordinate.
My guess would be any time after 09:00

[Boney10]

I have received an email ref the show with instructions for loading and off loading, I need an email address to those concerned so I can forward to you.

[Flying Helmut]

Sorry, I can't make it to Nottingham.

Something's come up, so I'll have to pass.

Hope those who can go have a splendid time.

[Boney10]

All, due to family issues I am unable to attend as intended. My apologies.
I shall inform the organisers we will not be upto normal strength this year.

Can I ask John (Biggles) can you take over the Wings section please as Tim also cannot make the show, Rob will look after the sails.

[Hedeby]

From the organisers...

We're now getting very close to Britcon 2023, our second outing in Nottingham, and whilst being in a great venue right in the city centre of Nottingham has already proved its' worth last year by helping us deliver a great audience to you all, we are aware that this is not the best venue for load-in and load-out, and the arrangements may take a little getting used to, especially if you haven't exhibited with us before.
Please be assured that we (and the venue team) all know how important this aspect of the show is for you all, and we'll again be doing all we can to make things run as smoothly as possible during buildup and breakdown.
This year, with the benefit of experience we have tweaked things to make it easier, so whilst we can't guarantee it'll be as easy as driving into ExCeL for Salute!, we do have much cheaper (ie "free") parking and much cheaper beer too (including our first ever "Britcon Ale"!) - and we're all here on hand to help fix anything that catches us, or you, by surprise too.
Please read the following instructions carefully - they are intended to help make your load-in and breakdown at Britcon 2023 run as smoothly as possible.

Trader& Demo Game access for Britcon 2023 is via two goods entrances at the back of the venue, located on South Sherwood Street, Nottingham, NG1 4BY

When you arrive you'll be greeted by either me, or one of the Uni venue team and directed to one of the two goods entrances to unload.
We will then ask you to unload in one of two ways
• If the loading bay area is relatively clear of other vehicles when you arrive you can unload and take your kit directly to your stand using either of the two goods lifts. After you have dumped everything at your stand, move your vehicle to the Gill St Car Park (on Gill Street NG1 4FY), park for free for the rest of the weekend, and then walk back down to the venue to finish unpacking and setting up your stand.
• If the loading bay is congested when you arrive we will ask you to unload your kit into a designated "holding area" just inside the loading bay doors. Then you can take your vehicle to the Gill Street Staff Car Park (on Gill Street NG1 4FY), park up, walk back down to the venue and moving your stuff up to your stand/demo table and finish setting up.
Either way you will need to use one of the venue's two goods lifts to get from the loading bay to the show floor - the only difference will be whether you take your kit direct to your stand/demo table before parking, or whether you will be asked unload into the loading bay, go and park up, and then come back to finish moving your stuff to your stand or demo table.

Goods Lifts:
The Uni venue team will be around to help you use these lifts, and are also going to be providing a number of wheeled cages for you to use (if you don't have you own trolleys etc)

Loading bay lift : Width: 1000 mm Depth: 1470 mm Max Capacity : 1000 kg (pictured)
Glass Lift Doors: Height: 2050 mm Width: 900 mm
Glass Lift (inside) Height: 2100 mm Width : 1530 mm Depth: 1520 mm Max Capacity: 1000 kg

You can park at Gill Street all weekend for free, and go in and out as often as you wish.
The Gill Street car park has a barrier with a keypad for entry and exit - the code is 3012.. On arrival the Gill Street car park will show as full, but just enter the barrier code 3012 which will lift the barrier. You will need to enter this code also on exit
(Please don't share this with non-Trader / Demo Game attendees - we have arranged discounted parking for them in a separate car park)
Britcon Traders/Demo Game Organisers officially have exclusive use of this car park from 5pm on Friday, so before 5pm there will be Uni staff parking in there too - but it’s a decent sized car park, and it is a Friday afternoon in August outside of term time so unless something has changed radically then there should be no issues with finding yourself a space no matter what time you arrive.
Once you've parked up in Gill Street, you should walk back down to the venue (5 minutes via Gill Street and Dryden Street) when you can then start to move your stuff up onto the show floor using one of the two goods lifts.
What happens if there's no space for me to unload when I arrive?
The loading bay area has room for either 6 vans or up to about a dozen cars at any one time so based on last year and the staggered arrival times we're aware of so far we hope that almost everyone will be able to unload either directly onto their stands, or into the holding area and them complete setup after parking.
If we have run out of parking spaces in the loading bay when you arrive we'll take your mobile number and ask you to go to Gill Street, where you can park up and wait for us to call you to drive back down once a space frees up for your vehicle.
Breakdown / Leaving the Show
For breakdown on Sunday (and, for some of the TFL games and a handful of Traders, Saturday evening and Sunday morning) we will be following the two-stage plan in reverse - first move all of your stuff down to the ground floor and into your own "holding area" using the 2 goods lifts, then go and collect your car/van and bring it down to the loading bays to load up ready to leave site.
If any of your cars/vans do arrive straight to the loading bay on Sunday before all of your gear has been moved down to your "holding area" we may/will need to ask you to go back up to Gill Street until all of your stuff has been moved off the show floor. This is so we can make sure the loading bay area runs as smoothly as possible during breakdown, and is only used for loading up directly from the "holding areas".
This is the best route back from Gill Street to the loading bay on South Sherwood Street.
Please ensure that you do not drive down Goldsmith Street – this is a tram route and automatic fines will be issued if you drive down here.

The Show
The Britcon Trade Show is officially open to the public from 10am-4pm on Saturday and 10am-2pm on Sunday, although "playing" gamers will be in the building on Friday afternoon/evening until around 8pm, and from 730am - 8pm on Saturday and 730am-5ish on Sunday when we close, and so you are welcome to sell to players outside the "public" show times.
The venue will be locked overnight once our team leaves the building (around 1030pm on Friday, 830pm on Saturday).
As of today we have over 300 registered players, 200 pre-ordered day tickets (even though access is free!) and some really strong engagement with our social media activities too, all of which suggests we are set for a material increase on last years attendance - so fingers crossed we all have a good one this year !
Any questions please email me or call me on 07795 396549
Best Regards

Tim

[Hedeby]

Good luck folks tomorrow, genuinely gutted I cant be there... Hope the above gives you the info you need. If you have any questions give Tim (NOT our Tim) a ring on the number shown above and he will help you out.

HAVE A GREAT SHOW

[Boney10]

Thanks for the info Chris you beat me to it.

[Hedeby]

Send us some pictures folks

[Strangely Brown]

Day One of Play Testing:

Target for today -



Lancaster starts at peg 4, makes a turn to port and has to be at level 2 (with lights on), with 2 straights before release and 1 straight after…. Easy peasy



Bugger, I forgot about the searchlights…


Like the Mastermind theme tune, their closing in is not a good thing…


Lit up like a Christmas Tree, the FLAK gunners zero in and let rip


Under fire, the Lanc lets loose Barnes’ wonder weapon…


And then it’s a hop, skip and a jump to the dam


Damage taken from the Barnes’ Blue Bag of Death, 2xD for Bang On, 1xD for “Ooh that’s close!”, trying to reach the magic figure of 30 before you run out of planes….

[Flying Officer Kyte]

And a great game it was Simon.
Magnificent Dam.
Will post my shots of the unfortunate later run asap.

Rob.

[mikeemagnus]

What a great idea backed up by superb scenery. I'm now looking forward to the photographs and report on the game. Thanks for posting.

[Hedeby]

Looks brilliant...

[Stumptonian]

The water alone looks terrific in those shots, nevermind the dam itself.

Looking forward to more.

[johnbiggles]

As the pilot for several attempts on the damn dam, it was brutal trying to get the right distance for the release while dodging searchlights and flak. Brilliant fun!
Simon has, once again, come up with a simple seeming but deceptively complicated game.
First rate.

[flash]

The water alone looks terrific in those shots, nevermind the dam itself...

A vinyl table protector by the looks of it, I have one in green I've used in OTT in the past.
First rate bit of modelling for the game too, well done Simon.

[Strangely Brown]

A vinyl table protector by the looks of it, I have one in green I've used in OTT in the past.
First rate bit of modelling for the game too, well done Simon.

The ripple effect is a by-product of the roll being bent in transit, which does add to the feel, thankfully.

TBH, I laid the dam foundations and sub-conctracted the dam building out to my better half (F.a.D.), who secretly enjoyed building it amid the protests. NB: IKEA packing is very handy! A spray with textured (stone) paint and allow to set overnight. Then an hour of pva, flock, clump and paint before the show opened, et voila! (If you’re not still doing something five minutes before the show, you’re not really trying…. Or just better organised!

[Strangely Brown]

And the there’s the re-painting/decalling/de-propping overnight to create the first wave (George, Mother and Popsie (aligned)):


Ah, you can almost hear a dozen Merlin’s…

[Flying Helmut]

A vinyl table protector by the looks of it, I have one in green I've used in OTT in the past.
First rate bit of modelling for the game too, well done Simon.

Yes, excellent terrain!

I've got two of those table protector rolls, from Dunelm - they cut-to-specified-length straight from the roll in store, so I asked for two 8 foot pieces!
Mine came "ready-rippled"!

[Teaticket]

Beautiful layout Simon. The eye candy effect must have drawn a lot of attention.

[Flying Officer Kyte]

As the pilot for several attempts on the damn dam, it was brutal trying to get the right distance for the release while dodging searchlights and flak. Brilliant fun!
Simon has, once again, come up with a simple seeming but deceptively complicated game.
First rate.

And here is the proof John.
"P" for Pig's ear.



Rob.

[Flying Helmut]

[johnbiggles]

Britcon Table 2, Sunday
Rob, being unable to attend for a second day with Sails of Glory, Ruth and I volunteered to put on a Tripods and Triplanes game.
This was really some experimental work to try out a couple of ideas to incorporate into other games later on at our local club.
Idea No 1, A downed Fighting Machine (50% damage), with a crew member needing rescue.
The photography, as usual with me, is late and intermittent, but hopefully you will get the gist.
Picture 1 is the broken Martian machine

Picture 2, is at the end of the 2nd turn,

we have started in opposite corners, and the first of the Martian rescue team has surfaced from the sea onto land near his fallen comrade. The Snipe is signalling to the N16s that the target has been sighted ( not a senior moment at all honest gov)
Picture 3, the second Martian rescuer is about to land

Picture 4,, the crashed Martian has received the signals of his rescuers and has exited his vessel.

Due to the atmospheric differences, he has a limited time (2 turns/6 cards) in the open.

Due to the vagaries of me, the next picture is mid turn 4, card 11 of the game.

The French N16 has successfully launched a full salvo of Le Prieur rockets at the wreck and the hapless Martian, blowing them to pieces, meeting the victory conditions for the Home Team!


Ruth was a) not expecting me to blow up the target
b) we hadn’t worked out the mechanic for the actual rescue. The Martian might have been mid “beam me up Scottie” at the time the rockets landed on his location.
Either way we ended the scenario at this point and made various notes for the future.

[johnbiggles]

Britcon Sunday Part 2

Later on, we had another game, with a more standard set of victory conditions; the Martians needed to destroy 4 ground targets, the Earthlings needed to destroy the Martians before they succeeded.

As there were only two of us playing, and Ruth was operating 3 Martians to my 3 Planes, I didn’t stand a chance however….
The idea I was trying out was the deployment of a new French weapon, developed with the help of the Germans; the Air Dropped Timed Landmine.
A Breguet B14, loaded with 3 mines was escorted by the Snipe and a N16 rocket plane.
The B14 observed the movements of the Martians and eventually dropped his mines in a pattern to interdict at least one of the targets (Ruth is VERY good with the Martians).

We must be 5 or 6 turns in at this point, two of the Martian targets are already destroyed, the Snipe has been hit with a heat ray from the MkIV Cuttlefish and is on fire. The Cuttlefish has claimed one of the targets, and The MkIII Squid has another.
Each mine when dropped gets a D6, which counts down in every firing phase. If a Martian treads on it, it goes off causing C damage to the Martian, and making a crater which causes the Martian to topple. After 6 firing phases it goes off automatically, again leaving a crater.

The B14 pilot noticed his pattern was about to include a wooded area, so the first two mines were dropped on consecutive moves, but the third was dropped on the 4th turn.
The Squid, seeing the last mine fall, edged too close to the woods and fell over. Unfortunately at this point the B14 was too close for the rear gunner to be able to bring his guns to bear.
At about this time the Cuttlefish was joined by a MKII Scarab, which claimed target No 2. The Snipe and the N16 finally managed to get their act together and started to harry the Cuttlefish, knocking out it’s shields and keeping up a decent rate of fire, but ultimately the Squid reached the 4th target, and after draining it of power, destroyed it winning the game.

One event we hadn’t properly though out was blast radius for the mines. As the Squid recovered form falling in the woods, the remaining mine went off. We gave the Squid a C card for being in the blast area, but in hindsight it should probably have been blown over again. Wouldn’t have stopped Ruth winning, but might have delayed her by a turn or so.

Talking about it with Simon afterwards, he proposed a blast are about the size of a certain kind of potato snack container lid (once you pop, you can’t stop) so in the interests of furthering game development, Ruth and I will nobly sacrifice our waistlines for the cause.

Finally, I apologise for the lack of pictures, I get carried away with playing.
This game lasted nearly an hour and we had a lot of fun with it.
Like Simon, I was up most of Saturday evening painting: a figure Ruth had bought in the morning for the naked Martian and then re-modelling a damaged Scarab for the damaged fighting machine

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Nicely played the Biggles's.

Rob.

[Vagabond]

Day One of Play Testing:

Target for today -

I thought "That's clever, using a picture of a real dam as the opening shot" only when I got further down did the penny drop.

Very well done Simon, I imagine it was a really difficult mission as well as a good looking one.
Cheer

[flash]

Well done for flying the Martian flag John & Ruth