PrairieCon XXXII Report

PrairieCon XXXII was held two weeks ago at Brandon University, Brandon, Manitoba, Canada (one of my own alma maters in fact!)  The Con was a great success and I am advised that registration set a new record for attendance.

On the Saturday evening I set up a 28mm Stalingrad game on an 8x4 table, using terrain I obtained earlier this year from a fellow member of TMP.

The terrain is fantastic resin stuff from Precision Model Designs.  I obtained it in one large deal, fully assembled and ready to go, specifically with a view to using it at PrairieCon.

I designed the game for eight players and we ended up with seven in the game.  Each player controlled three maneuver units - each unit consisted of an infantry section, a command section, a section of two heavy weapons, or an armoured vehicle.  This is enough for one person to comfortably control in a setting where they're not familiar with the rules.
 

Speaking of rules, we used our "Blitzkrieg" rules developed by me and Conscript Greg.  They are fast-playing and have some unique mechanics that we like.

Each player in the game also had a special mission for his force - the Scouts had to leave play via the enemy table edge, the German Pioneers had to blow up a Goliath SP explosive vehicle, the NKVD had to wipe out an enemy unit in close combat, etc.  It's always interesting to see how convention players choose to achieve these special missions (or not ;-)

Anyway, we had a good time playing the game, and it even ended right on time, with a marginal German win due to their having achieved more of their special missions.

Later in the evening, Conscript Greg ran his very popular Robotech game.  In his game, the Zentraedi have invaded Mars and are trying to leave the table via the human's board edge, to reach the SDF-1 or something.  The humans are trying to prevent this.

The game was played on Greg's really excellent "desert" game boards (that stand in for everything from Afghanistan to the Sudan to, well, Mars) with some of my styro-tastic hangar buildings.

  

Awesome game, Greg!  I'm sure we'll be back to PrairieCon next year with more games.  I just have to plan a game that involves less than 5 large boxes of terrain.  Makes things difficult to transport in my small car... again I need to thank Greg for terrain schlepping for me in his spacious new Ford Edge...