First European HA Gathering:
From 17 until 20 October 2003 the first European HA get together was held in my village Bovenkarspel in the Netherlands (of all places)
Although the setting was rather small I think we can really call it a European HA Gathering since I welcomed Axel from Germany, Darren (Kskyhappy) from
England and Henrie from the Netherlands.
There was quite some excitement since we all know each other from the message board and from chat so now we finally could meet in person.
Axel arrived by bus (a 10 hrs long drive all thru the night with no sleep) and Darren by plane. After picking them up and visiting some scenic places in the
capital Amsterdam we went home to officially start our first European HA session.
After meeting the rest of the Gebooms family and the ritual handout of gifts the gentlemen finally could look with their eyes and hands since I placed my
gaming table in the living room with all my projects on it. I transformed a part of the garage as a casting area where we could freely mess about without
getting the lady of the house upset.
After showing my guests the casting area, Darren run away and returned 2 minutes later dressed in his casting outfit. In the meantime Axel had already
prepared his first casting session. He also showed us his technique of using a pipette that proved to be very successful for casting in extreme detail.
Although casting blocks was one of the most preformed activities there was also plenty of time to do all sorts of other things. There was some spray paint
action going on in the garden and later in the evening the first try outs on resin cast were made. My kids also had a great time helping us out with all
kinds of things. Big fun with all those strange speaking folks!
The European HA connection (from left to right) Axel, Geboom and Kskyhappy).
On Saturday we welcomed Henrie61. He also lives in the Netherlands and came by to say hello and joined in the fun for the day. This day we focussed on making
molds and sculpting / modelling stones. We did do lots of work outside since the weather was fine.
Saturday evening Darren (Ksky) hosted a Mage Knight game. Once Darren explained us the basic rules we started playing and had a great time. I seem to be
very rare that a thief runs towards a big bully monster, hits him in the nose, takes his treasure and runs off with it. Lots of laughter lots of fun.
A great surprise was the “Fire” tile Darren brought to show us. We could see right away how much more fun it is to play this game on a real 3D surface.
From this first MK game on Axel and I decided to start making a MK dungeon as well starting first thing in the morning.
Playing MK while having this HA gathering was kind of funny, while playing we cast some blocks and even had a brief chat with Bruce Hirst that fitted
nicely in to this HA gathering.
A building session wit the kids.
Bas Boom (Baboom) proudly presents his sci-fi radio control tower.
Some results of this gathering:
During this weekend we built some things, sculpted some blocks and made some molds. Here is a series of pictures that gives you an impression of some of
the things we did.
The molds we made, we made them of freshly carved blocks and also from some series of blocks that I did not mold yet. Besides that we molded some metal
pieces with extreme high detail in them. I thought this was not possible to cast well in plaster but with the new technique I learned it is possible.
(see the shields and heads we have done) I demonstrated my way to make molds using silicone strips. We decided to make a connection block for the ruined
arches that I made for my "Amon Sul" project. The top of the arch had to be flat so there is a possibility to stack at least a
floor on it that is 1.5” wide.
Daren sculpted some nice basic building blocks with different structures in it. Since we molded them I expect to see these stones back in some projects.
Another fun thing is the large floor tiles with flat cut squares of 1”in them. We now can put different types of pieces in them and create tiles that
suggest hidden spaces, openings to other levels or traps.
Well to be honest it wasn’t all fun. After our meeting we had to clean up the place again. (bummer) But since we did this without any form of protest we
can gather again at my house next year.
Thank you Yvonne for being so flexible during this weekend and for your great cooking.
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