Wij Amsterdam6shooters zijn een vriendelijke club van volwassen wargamers die twee keer per maand wargames (en soms boardgames) met miniaturen organiseren in Amsterdam-Oost. Met passie, met lol, met plezier en met stijl. En heel breed: Alexander de Grote, Napoleon, WOII, 40K, Age of Sigmar, X-Wing: het komt allemaal op tafel. Met ons meedoen kan door gratis te registreren en daarna via de agenda op de site een tafel te boeken. Een eigen leger hebben is niet eens nodig: we hebben alles. Dus wat let je? Angst voor miniatuurtjes?
…but I can’t remember what it is now. (FX: more Lemsip)
So, yesterday. I pre-ordered Bad Squiddo’s fabulous Bofors gun because, well, it’s fabulous, and also see not-so-Secret Project S!
Also composed several relatively carefully worded tweet replies and – on a related tack – considered editing the podcast before realising that (probably fortunately) it had been superseded by events, and I was going to have to think very carefully and rerecord one section. Still have a decidedly croaky voice and no brain, so that’s not one for now.Trouble T’Mill
I have got the first big update for Mathhammer! Yeah! I’ve added MathHammer Weapon Profiles so that each saved Attacker Profile can have one or more weapons associated with it. MathHammer Weapon Profiles This is less useful for a Guardsman. But really useful for a Leman Russ, a Baneblade or a Knight. You can add as many weapons as you wish to a profile, giving you the true damage output of the unit. You can overwrite the BS too. This is particularly useful if you have a unit with an Assault weapon or Pistol that has a BS of maybe […]
Not really connected, except that I wouldn’t have discovered the latter without a dose of the former rendering me incapable of stringing many coherent thoughts together.
But hey, I vanished down a YouTube rabbit hole yesterday (as this requires very little brain) and came up with something that’s both about ancient history and boardgames. Good enough for here, no?
The Royal Game of Ur, for those not aware, is generally held to be the oldest playable board game in existence. The latter appeared on a cuneiform tablet in the British Museum, and were the subject of some serious research by Irving Finkel, who’s one of the museum curators. The video in question is from blogger/YouTuber Tom Scott (of whom I’m a fan), who actually took on Finkel at the game.
What actually makes it interesting is that, despite (in the form they were playing it) being a very simple game (you can explain the rules in under two minutes) it has a fascinating combination of luck and strategy, has dice that are basically ancient D4’s (well, technically D2’s!) and is a game with an interesting self-balancing property where the further ahead you are, the easier it is for your opponent to catch up (given a bit of luck and optimal play).
A fun game: I shall have to grab a copy to add it to our copy of Hnefatafl.Trouble T’Mill
