Celebrating a Grand Opening

On Saturday, December 1, a few of us were invited to be part of the grand opening of a new game/figure/hobby shop in London, ON. The Games Chamber is a new business run by friends of ours, Cecil and Tim. The invitation was two-fold - run a drop-in historical game AND fire muskets for fun. Beth, Katie, Rob, Andy, and I all showed up in historical gear and hosted a "Tiger Hunt" game on one of the gaming tables at Games Chamber. The ladies wore period ladies' clothing. Andy wore his King's Royal Regiment of New York uniform and kit. (It's a Loyalist unit from the American War of Independence.) I wore my 1812 US Infantry kit. Rob decided to come as a soldier of the British Indian Department, who served with the First Nations' warriors as translators or advisers.
 
We set up a Tiger Hunt game. This was originally a training game to learn the mechanics of Iron Ivan's Disposable Heroes rule section on armour. Each player gets a Tiger I tank and "it's every man for himself" from there on out. If your tank "brews up", you get another Tiger or a Panther, if no Tigers are left. Sometimes we throw in things like a Hetzer, a Firefly, a Churchill with a 75mm gun, or things even weirder. (Rob says he wants a P-51 Mustang next time he plays.) We played twice, shifting the terrain.
 

Katie strikes a "power pose" ("Mess not with me, sirrah!") while Rob is a study in nonchalance.
I'm just wearing my forage cap.

 

Andy's in his Yorker's grenadier cap. Why Katie likes that brimmed hat I'll never know. She also seems to enjoy the Tiger Hunt games. The table was smaller than we're used to but it served well for all the drop in players.



Tiger kaputt! (not the last one either!)

 

Gollum attempts to board a burning Tiger to seek the Precious. The Heroclix figure was a grand opening gift if you bought $10 worth of merchandise that day. It wasn't a problem/

 

Some of the crowd. Some of the drop-in plalyers played until their tank was destroyed. Some played on a time limit. It didn't matter - we welcomed everybody.

 

That's what we like to see - smiles on the  players' faces. I was serving as games master so the cards on in front of me. We shuffled every turn to randomize who would go first.



This could be a world's record!!! At one point, Rob's Panther had sustained 14 penetrating hits! Each penetrating hit makes the next hit by an enemy that much more powerful. He had taken 14 before somebody brewed him up.



He's so proud.
Some of the town's buildings were Andy's, some mine. The bombed out ones are paper models I found on-line. The rest are resin or plastercraft and a few are paper - like the Tudor two-story in the center of the photo. 

 

Fourteen!

 

The downtown is crowed and dangerous at this time of year, but the malls are worse.



Late in the afternoon, we kitted up and did our demonstration. This looks like "Repel boarders!" Since Rob  had no bayonet, he carried Native warrior gear - hatchet and knife.




More of the same.

 

Tim and Cecil under arrest. If you come to London, ON., look the place up. It's worth the side trip.

 

Since Cecil had been in the Canadian Forces, he gave the commands.
"Make ready! Present! Fire!"

 

The last demonstration was a close up one.




Inside the store... in varied uniforms.

All photos are courtesy of my wife, Beth, who rarely gets to appear in such photos. Here's one more. We're all doing some "Steampunk" stuff , and Beth made me a new jacket for my persona - an American Civil War ordnance sergeant on detatched duty to an airship crew, a submersible, or a tunnelling device.
More nice work on her part.