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2012/08/08 16:36:42
Subject: Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland (with pics and Massive Voodoo Video)
I enjoyed it much more than the last Games Day that I attended in Chicago in 2003. Perhaps things have changed in nine years but Chicago had too noisy a venue and seemed like nine hundred screaming kids were attempting to drive me out of the building in less than ten seconds flat (they succeeded after a little over an hour.
The German Games Day in Cologne (Köln) is a lovely old building called the Gürzenich. It is a pretty good event hall (as you can see in the Wikipedia pictures), but may be a bit small for the crowds. This was the 14th year of the German Games Day and it draws a crowd!
The venue is in the old city (Altstadt) and is within very short walking distance of the historic cathedral (Kölner Dom), the main train station (Hauptbahnhof), bus stops, streetcar stops, and more eating, drinking, and lodging than I can name (including several Irish style pubs).
The city's old city festival (Altstadtfest) was also taking place on Saturday and Sunday so I enjoyed that as well.
Cost comparison: Mega Ticket was 45 Euros. Normal Ticket was 20 Euros.
General Information and Activities:
Spoiler:
The venue has three floors. All floors and rooms are used during Games Day.
Basement (Keller): Auditorium, Forge World sales area - the hardest thing to get to in the entire Games Day. I gave up three times and finally made it in on my fourth try after a twenty minute sojurn in the queue. I wanted the show only Enforcer mini. Otherwise, I would have skipped this line, - Bring and Battle table area, and the board game and card game table area .
1st Floor (Erdgeschoss): Entry doors, displayed Ultramarine Chapter (lots of minis), Golden Demon, Armies on Parade, Hobbyclub displays, painting workshops (Massive Voodoo, Team Deutschland, and Platoon Britannica), retailer info stand, Inquisition Troop 23 (40K reenactment group) display (this was huge and very, very cool - ganz geil!), various displays of minis, and the ubiqitous giant space marine figs (Ultra and DA) for photo shots. Lots of display cases in the lobby with interesting armies. There was also space set aside to hand out the Mega Ticket goody bag (t-shirt and Games Day mini) and a coat check (Garderobe).
2nd Floor (Obergeschoss): Conversion and terrain workshops (bashes?), Studio and Black Library special visitor room (the hottest room in the building...whew!), GW sales area, hobby clinics and some available space to build your own stuff, GW mail order stand, refreshment area with coffee (Kaffee), sodas, apple juice, mineral water, and either sausages (Bockwurst) or meat croquettes (Frikadelle) with a roll (Semmel). There were also more army displays in cases, game tables (guided game play with green shirt staff), an information booth, a GW job information booth, one display of fan art, and the speed painting tables.
I'm not sure what a typical Games Day schedule looks like. German Games Day is held on a Sunday.
Schedule:
Spoiler:
0900 Entry for Golden Demon and Armies on Parade entrants and Mega Ticket holders
1000 Doors open for everyone else (normal ticket)
1200 Entries close for the Golden Demon
1500 Judging completed for the Golden Demon. Entrants can collect their entries.
1600 Closing Ceremony begins for Golden Demon
1700 Games Day ends
Golden Demon: GW Germany has not announced the winners on their website yet and I do not have that information. I will post it once I get it. I am very curious to see which participants/models won. I do not have pics of the entries. Getting close to the cases was maddeningly difficult and when I did sidle up to the 40K cases, I didn't snap pics. I was studying minis. I will link to photos later as they get posted by GW and the Unofficial Golden Demon site.
Spoiler:
I am no expert but the level of competition seemed consistent with Chicago. I have no idea about the quality of the judging. For those who don't know how the system works, the minis are pulled from the cases and taken back into a secluded viewing area where three to five judges review each mini. Perhaps a frequent participant can explain the details. I'm not sure if there are one or two reviews, but the entries are screened to determine the finalists in each category. Each finalist gets a special Golden Demon finalist pin. You can see them in the cases along with the minis.
It appears that the overall number of entries in a category determines the number of finalists in that category since the amount of finalists seems proportional.
At German Games Day you can see the judges reviewing minis because the second level (club display tables) of the first floor area overlooks the Golden Demon display cases and walled in secluded area. Fortunately, they are too far away for spectators to hear their conversations.
I do not know the current trend in model painting for Golden Demon competition. The Germans like very realistic muted palettes, which are darker than GW 'Eavy Metal palettes. I did not see a heavy emphasis this time on OSL or NMM but there were lots of models with wonderful shading and highlighting. Gimmicks like LEDs and really ornate plinths didn't seem to help a model make the cut.
There was very good participation in the Golden Demon competition in nearly every category. Only one category, large scale model, seemed a bit thin. I liked the display cases used to show and protect the entries but I had a tough time getting close enough to see them. I gave up on the fantasy models entirely and finally cracked into the 40K viewing mob by around 1400.
Special Visitors:
Spoiler:
Forge World (miniature designers/sculptors): Will Hayes (nice chap) & Edgar Skomorowksi (an Austrian). Will sculpts 40K and Edgar works for Warhammer Forge. Will said that the studio has three designers/sculptors for 40K and three for fantasy.
Game Design: Adam Troke. He also spoke twice in the auditorium. No real earth breaking news.
Illustrator: Alex Boyd. He showed a bit of his portfolio and answered a lot of my questions about inks and color mediums. Nice fellow.
GW miniature designers/sculptors: Mike Anderson (capital fellow) & Dave Thomas (didn't get to talk to him). Mike was sculpting using super sculpey while folks were talking with him. He was very helpful. I learned that he uses super sculpey quite a bit, which surprised me. He said to put the sculpts in the oven when it is cold and turn it on to heat it up to the recommended temperature. Once it reaches that temperature, turn it off and let the oven and sculpt cool down completely. Then pull it out. This method is different from the directions and avoids the warping/distortion that occurs with super sculpey when you heat the oven up first and then pop the sculpt directly into the full heat.
Black Library: Christian Dunn (sorry, I didn't even try to get near him).
Painting Workshops: These were put on by Team Deutschland (Deutsch), Massive Voodoo (English), and Platoon Britannica (English). These looked fantastic but only four to six people could get close enough to talk and see the painting at each of the three or four tables. I wish they would have had video cameras capturing the painting and sending the images overhead to a large flat screen. This activity was just frustrating.
Auditorium:
Spoiler:
I sat through three presentations, each lasted about 30 minutes. The same presentations, according to the schedule were repeated again later in the day. This was nice since the basement room is very cool and visually interesting but has limited seating (80?).
Inquisition Troop 23 presentation (in Deutsch): This troop is a 40K reenactment group with lots of cool costumes, weapons (including crew served imperial weapons, communications gear, and more. Imagine getting a group of people like Finnlock together and letting them run riot. Most of their costumes are Cadian looking but there was also a nice Sister of Battle (not as nice as Finnlock's work) and several Adeptus Mechanicus. The presentation was basically a slide show of their work which you could see in person on the first floor so why bother with the slides?
Warhammer Online presentation (in Deutsch): Basically just a reminder that they are still working on this and that the beta is free online. The German developer was very nice and gave out business cards with free unlocks at the end of his presentation. The game is basically just six on six battles/capture the objectives for two to three teams so I was not very interested.
Adam Troke's presentation (in English): Adam described his interest in the GW hobby and showed his body of work on a slide. No earth shattering news in game development and no confirmation of anything interesting. The questions and answers were very tame. You could also ask him questions upstairs in the Studio and Black Library special visitor room so that was probably a better way for German language speakers to corner him. He had a nice man named Ullrich with him. Ullrich translates GW's English language products into Deutsch, and was there at Game Day following Adam everywhere. Both gentlemen were roasting in the heat furnace that was the special visitors room.
Overall, the auditorium presentations were not great for me because I was not very interested in the subject matter but they did provide a nice cool spot to sit down and rest my feet.
Next time, I would probably just get a normal ticket, eat a leisurely breakfast and show up at 1030 to avoid the line at the doors. There seems little point to the Mega Ticket - unless you want the t-shirt and Games Day mini - because the press of people around the Golden Demon display cases and the line for Forge World are just insanse. I may buy the Mega Ticket anyway for the goodies but just walk in at 1100 once the masses have sorted themselves out a bit. I wouldn't bother with the Forge World line until around 1500 when it is very short.
The secret to painting a really big army is to keep at it. You can't reach your destination if you never take any steps.
I enjoyed it much more than the last Games Day that I attended in Chicago in 2003. Perhaps things have changed in nine years but Chicago had too noisy a venue and seemed like nine hundred screaming kids were attempting to drive me out of the building in less than ten seconds flat (they succeeded after a little over an hour.
The German Games Day in Cologne (Köln) is a lovely old building called the Gürzenich. It is a pretty good event hall (as you can see in the Wikipedia pictures), but may be a bit small for the crowds. This was the 14th year of the German Games Day and it draws a crowd!
The venue is in the old city (Altstadt) and is within very short walking distance of the historic cathedral (Kölner Dom), the main train station (Hauptbahnhof), bus stops, streetcar stops, and more eating, drinking, and lodging than I can name (including several Irish style pubs).
The city's old city festival (Altstadtfest) was also taking place on Saturday and Sunday so I enjoyed that as well.
Cost comparison: Mega Ticket was 45 Euros. Normal Ticket was 20 Euros.
It was better than last years I think. I do agree about the venue. It gets really crowded and seeing how theres something like ... 500? ... megatickets around, even the hour of "early" access isnt really that helpful. Queueing is a b**** there as well. Apart from Forgeworld theres no queueing lines anywhere. This gets really annoying at the Golden Demon displays, direct order stands or anywhere else.
Black Library didnt shaft us like they did last year so several limited edition books where available. Including the first actual Black Library Germany Book, which is german only and wont be published in english for quite a while. Its a Heresy Era story, but I havent looked into it yet. Gav Thorpe was suppose to be there, but he got replaced by Christian Dunn on short notice. This was not announced anywhere ... except to the GW stores - hence the reason why I knew this. Hundreds of people waiting to get to the BL stand didnt though, so it was quite a disapointment for them. I have no idea why GD Germany, in general, is usually visited by one author only. Most events get two or more if Im not mistaken ... oh well.
Concerning the judging of the Golden Demon miniatures: Im not exactly sure how it works, but I believe that some of the guys from Massive Voodoo are actually judging as well. Im not sure about the exact system though. There were some beautiful minis in there though, thats for sure.
Overall I have to say that Im not quite sure why I actually go every year ... No new minis, no teasers or info about future releases of any kind. Mr Troke even said in his presentation that he wont be talking about any future stuff whatsoever. Sure, its nice to chat to a game designer, and even more so Alex Boyd and the miniature designers (both were very polite and very helpful!!!! - both mentioned that they are very unhappy with the results of finecast at the moment and that theyre trying to improve on it, since they want the hard work they have put into the minis to be translated 100% to the customers ...) but thats it. The only upside is that you may get your hands on some limited stuff (BL books, Direct Order stuff, or FW event miniatures) or that you can actually look at FW things before you buy them. Obviously, theres no discounts ...
This year, I went because my army was on display in the main hall and to catch up and hang out with some friends.
If you get to all the displays and stands in time though, you should be trough the entire thing within two hours or so. Is that worth 20/45 bucks?!
2012/08/14 17:24:34
Subject: Re:Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)
It was better than last years I think. I do agree about the venue. It gets really crowded and seeing how theres something like ... 500? ... megatickets around, even the hour of "early" access isnt really that helpful. Queueing is a b**** there as well. Apart from Forgeworld theres no queueing lines anywhere. This gets really annoying at the Golden Demon displays, direct order stands or anywhere else.
Black Library didnt shaft us like they did last year so several limited edition books where available. Including the first actual Black Library Germany Book, which is german only and wont be published in english for quite a while. Its a Heresy Era story, but I havent looked into it yet. Gav Thorpe was suppose to be there, but he got replaced by Christian Dunn on short notice. This was not announced anywhere ... except to the GW stores - hence the reason why I knew this. Hundreds of people waiting to get to the BL stand didnt though, so it was quite a disapointment for them. I have no idea why GD Germany, in general, is usually visited by one author only. Most events get two or more if Im not mistaken ... oh well.
That solves that mystery for me then. I was wondering why there was such a huge line for the Black Library table. I didn't mind though because I wanted to talk to the artist and all of the sculptors. There was no waiting for them.
Flachzange wrote:
Concerning the judging of the Golden Demon miniatures: I'm not exactly sure how it works, but I believe that some of the guys from Massive Voodoo are actually judging as well. Im not sure about the exact system though. There were some beautiful minis in there though, that's for sure.
That makes sense. They have some talented painters...who like bunches of mini bananas piled around their painting workshops. Now that I have seen their website, I understand why they had all of the bananas.
Flachzange wrote:
Overall I have to say that I'm not quite sure why I actually go every year ... No new minis, no teasers or info about future releases of any kind. Mr Troke even said in his presentation that he won't be talking about any future stuff whatsoever. Sure, it's nice to chat to a game designer, and even more so Alex Boyd and the miniature designers (both were very polite and very helpful!!!! - both mentioned that they are very unhappy with the results of Finecast at the moment and that they're trying to improve on it, since they want the hard work they have put into the minis to be translated 100% to the customers ...) but that's it. The only upside is that you may get your hands on some limited stuff (BL books, Direct Order stuff, or FW event miniatures) or that you can actually look at FW things before you buy them. Obviously, there's no discounts ...
It was my first trip and I wanted to see how it stacked up against the Chicago Games Day. It compared quite favorably in spite of the flaws that you and I have related in this thread. Your note about Finecast is interesting. I didn't think to ask that question of them. The Games Day mini is my first Finecast purchase and I have yet to take a good look at it.
Flachzange wrote:
This year, I went because my army was on display in the main hall and to catch up and hang out with some friends.
If you get to all the displays and stands in time though, you should be through the entire thing within two hours or so. Is that worth 20/45 bucks?!
Was the Tzeentch demon army in the Erdgeschoss lobby your army? If so, I loved the Soul Grinder and the wonderful coloration. My wife enjoyed it too and she took four or five photos. The glare on the glass display case caused difficulties but the pics were not too bad. Who did the Necron army that was in the same case?
The secret to painting a really big army is to keep at it. You can't reach your destination if you never take any steps.
JB wrote:
That makes sense. They have some talented painters...who like bunches of mini bananas piled around their painting workshops. Now that I have seen their website, I understand why they had all of the bananas.
yeah, theyre a bit obsessed with the whole ape-/jungle-theme!
JB wrote:
It was my first trip and I wanted to see how it stacked up against the Chicago Games Day. It compared quite favorably in spite of the flaws that you and I have related in this thread. Your note about Finecast is interesting. I didn't think to ask that question of them. The Games Day mini is my first Finecast purchase and I have yet to take a good look at it.
You really missed out then! Those guys were very talkative, honest and it was great to get an insight into their work. Especially seeing them doodle around with clay and producing pretty awesome looking mini-busts. Absolutely crazy! I also got the mini by the way, and the cast is pretty good. Hopefully yours will be too!
JB wrote:
Was the Tzeentch demon army in the Erdgeschoss lobby your army? If so, I loved the Soul Grinder and the wonderful coloration. My wife enjoyed it too and she took four or five photos. The glare on the glass display case caused difficulties but the pics were not too bad. Who did the Necron army that was in the same case?
Yes, that was mine. Im glad you liked it! I got some awesome feedback from people (good and bad), especially after the event when I took the minis out of the case.
I wish I had known that you were there, but I missed your original post. It wouldve been great to chat!! Also, Im going to send you a pm, because I would love get my hands on those pictures of yours
The necron army was done by my friend Bruno Bitz (yeah, thats actually his last name). We're actually building a necron army in the exact same theme, since we attend local tournaments together. All the models you saw belonged to him and despite what a lot of people thought, there was no drybrushing involved
2012/08/15 07:08:46
Subject: Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)
The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all
We love our superheroes because they refuse to give up on us. We can analyze them out of existence, kill them, ban them, mock them, and still they return, patiently reminding us of who we are and what we wish we could be.
"the play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king,
2012/08/15 18:40:04
Subject: Re:Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)
Sadly wasn't worth to travel that far for me, so until they improve their show I can live with the experience of a single GD visit....
So anyone except Flachzange and JB going there?
PS:
maybe if they learned to bring a few guests ( its not so hard to get across that channel ) and allow them to speak, plus a few new shinys to look on and something fresh to buy, I'd give it a try again.
PPS:
and please, don't have your staff standing there selling almost nothing whilst FW isn't doing well because they don't seem to have any retail training and aren't used to anything than english. Sorry FW, your small heap could be sold in 3 hours ( so next time bring more...).
PPS: if anyone doesn't need his GD exclusive HH short story....PM me...
Target locked,ready to fire
In dedicatio imperatum ultra articulo mortis.
H.B.M.C :
We were wrong. It's not the 40k End Times. It's the Trademarkening.
2012/08/17 04:37:35
Subject: Re:Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)(now with pics)
Sadly wasn't worth to travel that far for me, so until they improve their show I can live with the experience of a single GD visit....
...
PS:
maybe if they learned to bring a few guests ( its not so hard to get across that channel ) and allow them to speak, plus a few new shinys to look on and something fresh to buy, I'd give it a try again.
PPS:
and please, don't have your staff standing there selling almost nothing whilst FW isn't doing well because they don't seem to have any retail training and aren't used to anything than english. Sorry FW, your small heap could be sold in 3 hours ( so next time bring more...).
PPS: if anyone doesn't need his GD exclusive HH short story....PM me...
Sorry, I didn't get the short story. I didn't even know that it was available until Flachzange mentioned it.
The GD only FW Enforcer is a nice mini. However, it was only barely worth standing in that long FW queue.
I think that the organizers should create one line and one or two tables that services the people that just want the GD only FW minis. That would have expedited the process a great deal. Or just have one of the many green shirts guarding the front of the line direct anyone wanting just the GD only FW minis to one or two tables that only sell those minis. What really slows the line down is the folks that want to buy and/or order a lot of stuff from FW when they are flipping through the catalogues and filling out the forms. I didn't see the forms or catalogues. Were they only in English? I thought most of the staff spoke Deutsch so perhaps they have learned from previous GDs. I have no idea whether FW brought enough stock or not since I wasn't interested in any of it other than the GD only mini. They did still have that mini in stock at five hours into the day so they must have brought a lot of them.
As for special guests, Flachzange noted that the mini designers/sculptors from GW and FW were well worth talking too. I learned a couple of nice tips. Adam Troke was a pleasant chap but I didn't learn anything from him. I did enjoy talking with the illustrator, Alex Boyd. Only Edgar Skomorowksi from FW spoke Deutsch but Adam had Ullrich to translate for him all day. I'm guessing that they don't bring more guests because they have to cover so many Games Days in Europe - England, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain.
The secret to painting a really big army is to keep at it. You can't reach your destination if you never take any steps.
PPS:
and please, don't have your staff standing there selling almost nothing whilst FW isn't doing well because they don't seem to have any retail training and aren't used to anything than english. Sorry FW, your small heap could be sold in 3 hours ( so next time bring more...).
PPS: if anyone doesn't need his GD exclusive HH short story....PM me...
Im a bit confused by your second point there ... Im not sure what the stock situation was like, but preorders seem to be getting bigger every year.
All the tills I saw were managed by a guy from GW Germany, as well as FW, so language wasnt an issue at all.
As for the HH story - sorry! I wont be able to let mine go. But I will post in the BL thread once Ive gotten through it and let you guys know what I think. Theyre als signed by Gav by the way, and limited to 1500 ... so Im guessing that ebay prices will be ridiculous!
2012/08/17 06:05:47
Subject: Re:Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)(now with pics)
Flachzange's links lead to even more links which should allow anyone who could not attend the GD to see much of the goodness of the day (while avoiding all of the queues and the heat).
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2012/08/17 06:07:30
The secret to painting a really big army is to keep at it. You can't reach your destination if you never take any steps.
JB wrote:
-I think that the organizers should create one line and one or two tables that services the people that just want the GD only FW minis.
They got a table to sell the GD mini of GW, they don't sell it at GW retail so why can't they split the GD only stuff off of the FW tables
JB wrote:
-What really slows the line down is the folks that want to buy and/or order a lot of stuff from FW when they are flipping through the catalogues and filling out the forms.
I've seen the use of cataloges as 'translation device', when they had mostly FW staff.
But then, it was a bigger issue as standing there for an hour and wasting that time instead of picturing out what you want...
JB wrote:
I didn't see the forms or catalogues. Were they only in English?
There is only 1 FW catalogue - worldwide - thus english. Still free. The forms were at a table back in the day when I was there.
But then, there was no control and they had a single queue for all ( except pre-orders ) , a 1-2 hour wait was common....
JB wrote:
I'm guessing that they don't bring more guests because they have to cover so many Games Days in Europe - England, Germany, France, Italy, and Spain.
Dunno, we had ( years ago ) Mr Kelly and he had his ( at this date a new codex ) Space Wolves to talk about. Unrestrained...except other news.
Should have had Abnett, but he couldn't come. And the FW guys were a bit lonely , but maybe too many got caught at the FW - hall, waiting to grab their pre-ordered Reaver ( a first release ), who knows?
But too many GD's, I don't think so. More like no interest. ( ?they hate us? ) FW didn't even throw a newsletter at us about that GD with the common "take pre-order till xxx" line, nor did BL have one to announce their contributions or advertise their limited release HH story. GW had the usual coverage, but failed to provide pics of GD yet...didn't promote their tickets much...
No wonder.. they pulled a stunt with Space hulk right here. Imo, everything is focused to make GDUK shine.
Flachzange wrote:
All the tills I saw were managed by a guy from GW Germany, as well as FW, so language wasnt an issue at all.
But I will post in the BL thread once Ive gotten through it and let you guys know what I think. Theyre als signed by Gav by the way, and limited to 1500 ... so Im guessing that ebay prices will be ridiculous!
At least, one of the issues of former GD's was taken care of it seems.
Yes, please let us know. most likely nothing important happens, but if it was sold quick, I'll like to know if its worth to 'invest'.
Target locked,ready to fire
In dedicatio imperatum ultra articulo mortis.
H.B.M.C :
We were wrong. It's not the 40k End Times. It's the Trademarkening.
2012/08/20 12:35:31
Subject: Re:Games Day 2012 Germany / Deutschland, August 12 (Sunday)(now with pics)
yeah, theyre a bit obsessed with the whole ape-/jungle-theme!
