The Last Supper Posted on 21 Oct 21:47 , 2 comments

 Day 10 - Dateline: Hofgeismar

So at last, Euro WiFcon 2016 is over.  After hours upon hours of dice rolling, strategising, plotting and cursing the enemy, it is time for The Last Supper.

I must admit to being relieved to find all the gamers still alive and relatively healthy. WiFcons in Hofgeismar have a habit of casting strange spells on the players to ensure they never leave, doomed for eternity to rolling dice in hope of that elusive 20.

 

So as we file into the last supper, the Creator takes his place at the head of the table.  Looking at him, it's hard to ascertain whether he is a benevolent Creator, or an Old Testament wrath and fury type.  What do you all think? Comments please.

Benevolent?

Or maybe not?

What I do know for sure about him though, is that he speaks in a peculiar war gamers dialect.  We had visited Prague together before arriving at Hofgeismar, and when I asked him how far to the German border, he replied "One and a half hexes". Ok, glad we sorted that out...

Now it's time for a shout out to the guys who've been at WiFcon from the beginning, which is now 20 years ago. Let's start with Harold.

Harold is responsible for starting the original EuroWiFcon 19 years ago this week (this being the 20th convention). Initially it was only because he was being bugged by a bunch of Vikings who wanted to play this (sort of) new game World in Flames. So he hired a scout hall where they ate, played, drank and  and slept WiF for a week. Harold thought that was it.How wrong he was, 20 years later and he's been to every convention since.

Harold is a big wig at Daimler/Mercedes, and as he reminded us at the Last Supper, these days drives a beautiful big Mercedes Benz. He is also now married to Vera and they have a 1 year old son Henry.

 

Vera is another long suffering wargame widow who along with Harold and Henry visited us in Australia. She has won the Eurowifcon award for the woman who came back 3 years running! That shows true grit.

Some years ago Harold passed the baton to Marcus S who is now the convention's main man.  As well as doing a prodigious amount of work bringing the convention together each year, Marcus is one of those laid back guys who never lets a bad roll faze him, well for no more than half an hour anyway. And no matter how bad things get he will ensure that no counters are ever harmed needlessly (hurling them at the enemy of course excepting). He too has come to every convention since its inception.

Another Marcus, Marcus G has come to (almost) every WiFcon since the beginning as well.

He had to miss two when on holidays with his wife Anthea, and one when on a police training exercise (I spose that's a good enough excuse Marcus).  He loves the social aspect and reckons WiF is the most interesting and best game in the world.  He grew up close to Hofgeismar, is a cop with a big laugh and a laid back attitude. He helps Marcus S in the organising and was instrumental in the printing of the very limited edition (11 copies total worldwide) convention only collector's edition maps.

All 3 of you deserve our thanks for doing so much over the years for the game and the community. 

The last supper is going well by the way.  

All this focussing on people has taken me away from my food, and if I'm to even make a dent in it, I'd better get eating.  I ordered fish, which comes with vegetables and potatoes.  Like - a whole bowl of potatoes.  Ten potatoes in fact.  What the hell?  TEN POTATOES. I promise I'm not making it up - here's a photo to prove it.

So I share a few round with the guys who are hungry from all their fighting at the front, while they wait for their Schnitzels.  For at the last supper, let me tell you, Schnitzels abound.  Of all different varieties - Schnitzel with onion, Schnitzel with Mushroom, Schnitzel with Schinken, Schnitzel with Cheese, and finally, Schnitzel with Schnitzel.  The order for our table of 30, was in fact, 29 Schnitzels and one fish (with ten potatoes).  My fish was such an oddity of an order amongst all these Schnitzels, that they wrapped it up like a bon-bon for me.  Sweet of them don't you reckon?

Now I know I touched upon fashion in the last blog, specifically footwear, so I won't go into it again here.  But I will mention that everyone looked very smart for their Last Supper, and there were a few impressive t-shirts on display.

Cool huh?

Now even though he didn't actually play at this WiFcon, he was there as the mascot, and no conference would be complete without the lovely Rudiger.

Ruediger taking a short break from his Schnitzel.

Ruediger is the last of the quartet who has been to every eurowifcon since the first and is also the only player who has been to every day to every convention, except for a couple of days when he sacrificed his perfect record to drive Harry to Spiel 2010.

Ruediger has been a wonderful supporter of WiF over the years, distributing the game throughout Europe, running German Design Group and producing German language versions of the rules. He designs his own games these days including the Master edition of World in Flames and Caribbean Colonial Conquest.

This convention he was playing some strange game with his mate Marc in the smoking hall all week. I'm not sure how Marc survived it but he seemed to take it all in good spirits or at least his laryngitis meant he gave no complaints.

Finally, there were some awards handed out and we will append them to the blog when we manage to collate them all. Furthermore the images of the past week have been so memorable that I will also sync them into a slide show and pop it up when its finished. Stay tuned...

Well after 10 days of fun, frolic and war for the whole family, I must reluctantly bring my blog to an end. But like all wars, this is merely an armistace and not peace and I am already in training for next year's extravaganza.

Bye for now

Cat <3