22 April 2012

My Salute 2012…


So after all the excitement, the day of Salute 2012 finally arrived. As planned I met up with Bull at Bluewater and we had a catch up over breakfast before heading out to Excel. For the first time ever we had to queue to get in, which I'm putting down to us arriving earlier than previous years – won't be doing that again!

Once inside we set off on a scout around before a coffee break, then back in for the serious business of purchases. Unfortunately I was so distracted by the bright lights and shiny things around me that I completely lost track of time and missed the arranged meeting of the bloggers in the seating area. By the time I realised and made my way there everyone had dispersed – at that point it was a needle and haystack scenario to find any individuals. Bit gutted about that, although I did spot 'Postie' later on whilst I was chatting at the Critical Mass stand.

As promised I took some pics of things that caught my eye…

Malifaux demo games on Terraclips boards


Malifaux wild west board


The Critcal Mass guys


The amazing Busido board I saw at SELWEG
A new fantastic Bushido board


Very unique terrain idea

 
Excellent 28mm Steampunk battle


Breathtaking Samurai battle board


My pick of the day:
Freebooter's Fate board



Massive battle of Warmachine


Unique 40k game with islands and flyers

For a more comprehensive set of photos, have a look at Tomsche's blog.

As for my own haul, I managed to do ok. Quite a few items I was after were out of stock, which is a pain. However I managed to pick up most of my "Must buys" apart from the items I had a change of heart about. I managed to come home with £100 so the wife was happy too!


The main thing was Bull and I picking up starter boxes for Hordes. I have a game day book in with him next weekend, so it's a race to build things ready in time for an intro game. Two things I can almost guarantee: firstly my models will be build (solidly) but not painted; secondly Bull's box set will be built and painted by about Wednesday, but none of it pinned and there will be emergency glueing to come. I'll post more about this later in the week.

8 comments:

  1. Thanks for the reference :)

    Was a great show again, but next year I`m going for at least a week and finally do some sightseeing and TokyoToys looting hehe

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great day out and I asked after about at the meeting too! Good looking haul you have, can't wait to see some of it painted up.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes it was a fab day, glad you enjoyed it.

      I have already built my Legion of Everblight starter crew – despite missing bits – so they'll be blogged about soon!

      Delete
  3. Sorry to have missed you, I looked around for you but that place was a maze and crowded, glad you had a good one!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yep was gutted I'd missed you guys and, as you say, you have little to no chance of finding anyone.

      Delete
  4. Sorry you missed us all, but glad you had a good day. It's definitely too big for the short amount of time the show is open, and far too crowded early on - there were a number of traders I wanted to check out, but skipped them as there were too many people already there.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Also, I found the layout of some of the trader stands – e.g. Ainsty Castings – did not help matters as you couldn't physically get in to look at anything… so we walked on.

      Delete
  5. Good to catch up with you and Bull again, for the limited time I had. I have still not caught up on sleep and have won a cold as the stress of it all has over come me post Salute :).

    From a traders point of view floor space is at a premium and the stands we use at ever other show in the year perfectly fine can be totally overwhelmed. We (Critical Mass Games) had our biggest stand yet and had tried to organise it for better access but we where still rammed out all day. The show certainly felt busier than last year.

    Thanks for the pics.

    Cheers

    Craig

    ReplyDelete