Category Archives: Whatever
GrogHeads Central Command Origins Events 2018
What’s coming up in Columbus this summer? ~
GrogHeads Staff, 24 April 2017
Per GAMA, event registration goes live on 2 May.
This year, we’ve got a variety of things for you to check out –
- Kids! The Junior General kids’ table is back! We’ve got 3 games that we’ll be running all weekend, in shorter 1-hour sessions. And for any kid who plays all 3 games at least once each, and completes 1 extra mission, we’ve got a special Junior General prize. These games are for kids age 7-14, and they must have an adult come to the table with them.
- Team / Group events! Command Post Wargaming is back, and this year, we’ve got an old-school Kriegspiel to go with it! We also have big team games of Sergeants! and Lock’n Load Tactical, and a play-with-the-designer for Quartermaster General.
- Tournaments! We’ve got tournaments for Table Battles, Manouevre, and Nations At War.
- Origins War College! GrogHeads will be sponsoring/leading 4 talks at the Origins War College, and we’ve included those in our events below (note that these will be in the OWC rooms, not in our gaming area).
- Wait… what’s that? A Kids event that’s also a Group event?! Yep! We’ve got a big multi-board game of Commands & Colors Napoleonics specifically for the kids to play a mega-big game.
- Oh yeah, and an open gaming table (see details at the bottom of the page)
Which companies are here with us?
- Tiny Battle Publishing! New this year, showing off their series In The Trenches
- Hollandspiele! Another new one this year, presenting several games: BitsKrieg for the kids, Supply Lines of the American Revolution for the adults, and Table Battles for the tournament-inclined.
- Lock’n’Load Publishing! Nations at War (and a tournament), LNLT, and tanks for the kids
- Enterprise Games! With their support for our GMT events again this year, we’ve Time of Crisis, Talon, C&C Napoleonics for the kids, and the Maneouvre tournament
- Griggling Games! Quartermaster General, and some expansions
- Lost Battalion Games! The always-awesome Sergeants! games are back, and look for their award-winning tiles, too
Over 50 events across 4 days, for all your wargaming goodness.
Plus, the Sunday morning raffle, and a bonus this year – an absolutely FREE event on Wednesday night, as we hold a Kriegspiel for anyone who wants to join us, starting at 4pm. If there’s enough demand (and enough pizza) we might even run it twice! This is a chance to kick off your gaming weekend in style, with a come-check-it-out-with-nothing-to-lose event from your favorite wargaming miscreants – us!
When you’re looking for our events in the Origins master event grid, they all start with “GrogHeads Presents”. We did that to make it easier to find when sorting through a giant spreadsheet with over 6000 events, however we stripped it out of the names on our event grid here just to simplify the listings.
Don’t forget that everyone who plays in our events gets a discount with our vendor partners, and gets entered for some great Sunday-morning raffle prizes. There’s also at least one prize for one of the players at every one of our events.
Note that the kids’ events – as noted above – have a special prize for kids who check out all of the different kids games, and do not have prizes for each individual event.
Click through for the sortable table of events
2017 Readers Choice Award Voting
Have your say about your favorite 2017 games ~
GrogHeads Staff, 17 March 2018
It’s time to get your votes in for the Readers’ Choice Awards for game-year 2017. Yes, we know we’re running about 2 months late on this. But hey, we’re not nearly as far behind as the Charlies!
The only required items are the overall digital / tabletop games, at the end of each of those categories, and there is an “opt-out” option available for those of you that don’t play that type of game.
Chat about it below, or in our forums, or hit our FaceBook page >>
Winterfest: Wargaming’s Mini-Mecca
Pull out of the winter doldrums with a heavy dose of hex-and-counter happiness ~
Gary Mengle, 28 February 2018
A small gathering of wargamers has met in Sandusky, Ohio for the last 21 years. While the Cedar Point amusment park sits frozen just up the road and Sandusky sleeps through its winters, the February weather is ideal for wargaming. The centerpiece is a small handful of monster wargames, with smaller titles played on the side and a variety of pickup games in the evenings, or throughout the day as folks shake loose from their bigger games.
This year the featured monsters were a playtest of OCS Third Winter and a combined La Battaille game of Ligny and Quatre Bras. The venerable Stonewall Jackson’s Way was also played throughout the event, as well as twin games of Axis Empires: Totaler Krieg. Smaller but nevertheless multi-day games included TCS Omaha, OCS Sicily: Triumph & Tragedy, OCS Tunisia II and a double-blind game of Flat Top. Short-format actions included Amateurs to Arms, The Napoleonic Wars, Close Action and Star Fleet Battles. It would be impossible to categorize the sole miniatures game of Teutoburger Wald as “small” but it only took a few hours in each of two playthroughs.
As you can see from the above list, titles from The Gamers and Multi-Man Publishing were very well-represented, but stuff from GMT, Avalon Hill, Clash of Arms and even ADB got busted out and played. Plans for next year’s games are already afoot. This was my first year in attendance – it won’t be the last. As one of the new guys I was made to feel very welcome, and there was always something available that I wanted to play. Even with an event-long attendance of less than 30, Winterfest is a great little event that you should take a look at if you’re in or near the Midwest or can’t make the annual pilgrimage to Tempe.
More Info:
Winterfest Wargaming
Ardwulf’s Lair
Chat about it below, or in our forums, or hit our FaceBook page >>
2018 Convention Calendar
Your local convention… and plenty of national ones! ~
GrogHeads Staff, 23 January 2018
Obviously, we pimp Origins pretty hard because that’s the one where we have our “official” presence. But there’s plenty of gaming all over the country (and Europe!) that you can check out if Origins isn’t in your schedule or budget.
If we missed your local one let us know (links / feedback at the bottom) and we’ll try to remember for next year.
Game On!
8-11 Feb, Seattle, WA
An ASL tournament, along with the Hank Award and all sorts of hex-and-counter goodness.
Williamsburg Muster
16-18 Feb, Williamsburg, VA
A new date this year, but the same wargaming fun. There’s also an additional boardgame area run by TAGS that includes all sorts of non-wargames. This annual wargaming convention is hosted by the Hampton Roads Wargamers.
Playthrough
17-18 Feb, Raleigh, NC
A newer convention, but growing like crazy. A mixture of digital and tabletop games, with previous exhibitors including folks like Epic Games. A big free-to-play area of classic consoles complements another large area of open tabletop gaming.
Modern-Day Napoleonic Battles & Travels, Part the Fifth
The continuing chronicles of last summer’s wanderings ~
Jim Owczarski, 2 December 2017
On the evening of October 13, 1806, Napoleon I, emperor of the French, made his headquarters here at the site of what is now the Jena Battlefield Museum.
If the displays are to be believed, a recent proprietor was given to dressing up as Napoleon annually and playing at Jena. I admire this.
