We were back! Salute '07 was our big re-launch date after
some appalling workmanship by God on my body and some computer
operating monkey's in charge of our domain host we were fit
and raring to go.
Not only were we back but I was determined
to learn from previous years' mistakes which included:
Squashing everything into a Toyota Corolla and
proceeding to drive the last few hundred yards into the
Olympia with smoke pouring from the Engine and having to set
up by myself as a harassed Mrs Artemis tried to explain to
the Warlords why she had 'parked' in the middle of the queue
of people trying to drive their much more suitable vans into
the loading bay.
Leaving my wallet and money tin in the newest box of
Dark Age releases for 'safe keeping' and promptly leaving
the whole box in our store on Friday afternoon - which as
you might know is in a indoor market complex which locks
overnight. This meant no sleep as I ran around trying to
find the market manager, failing and then having to turn up
at 5am to meet the janitor who let us in and we immediately
drove down. An hour late. With no sleep.
Getting lost driving from the end of the M4 to the Excel
despite having numerous maps and printed directions!
... there are more but that's embarrassment enough for now.
So, anyway, here I am learning from my mistakes. Van booked,
hotel right next to Excel booked, everything priced (mostly),
advertising done, I was on a frikking roll!
The set-up this year was ridiculously easy. No queues, no
confusion, the aisles were wide and clear, unbelievable
organisation from the Warlords. The zones were also well
marked and signposted with maps everywhere. All of last years
quibbles had been addressed, even the floor had some weird
covering on it that didn't break your feet like last year's
plain concrete. Superb stuff.
Arrival
All of that means we were set up early, our signage was in the
air and we were clearly marked on the map. Basically I'm
saying that if you didn't buy anything from us, the normal 'I
couldn't find you' excuse won't bloody work mister!
We were here btw...
The show started as it meant to go on, within 5 minutes of the
queuebuster door open we were busy and as usual Mrs Artemis
took the brunt of the sales while my lazy ass just talked to
people all day.
(Although this year I did wear a rather fetching money belt
thingy with a bag hook that allowed me to pretend I was
serving people in between yapping)
The Day
In case you are one of the newcomers who
wonder which one in the Artemis Black's t-shirt was me then I
was this guy...
What the hell? Uhm, I have no idea that
idiot is, anyway as I was saying, I was this guy...
We pretty much didn't get a break all day,
except for a strangely dead period around the middle of the
day when most gamers internal clocks register the necessity
for food. As we had been working non stop for hours and knew
as soon as the 3000 pies had been eaten we'd be non stop again
until the end of the day we took the opportunity seriously.
It seemed a good time to restock the empty hooks, take in some
refreshments of our own, maybe even say hello to some old
friends on other stands....
So of course Mrs Artemis ran around
pretending to be a 'Rebel with a Pricing Gun' and I took
photos of her...
Seemed perfectly natural at the time. In
retrospect we have been high on the show adrenalin. Either
that or a
Frother slipped us some mickeys.
(That was the second photo we took of the Stormtroopers btw as
the one on the left "blinked during the first one". Okay, I
know he probably said the joke to every single person but it's
a good line so I'm leaving it in for him)
Dark Age
Once again we brought
Dark Age to Salute. With the able
assistance of Nembool (That was the tall one in the glasses)
we ran Dark Age Demos all day. Sorry if you couldn't get a
game but feel free to e-mail us before any future shows and
we'll try and reserve you a spot.
A couple of pre-game photos were embarrassingly all I
managed...
Curwen of the Toxic Cult vs. Saint Mary of the Forsaken for
the un-initialised
I Am a Frother and I
Like Cake!
Once again Artemis Black's brought cake to
the masses and once again they took it, ate it and threw the
rubbish on my floor. I would like to say how proud I am that
nobody took one of the bag of apples we supplied for
fruitarians. Now I know most of you only read this report to
find out who won the ubercake, that moment is almost here so
never fear. A quick note to say though that one particular
customer 'was' a Frother, 'did' like Cake but refused the ubercake
because they had "already had an amazing deal" and didn't "want
the cake to melt". I can't decide whether to be proud or
ashamed of that guy.
What is definite though is that these guys really wanted
the cake...
You might be wondering why a) the guy with the cake seems
overly pleased there's a shorter balder guy with his back to
him and b) there's a strange sticker adorning the guys
bagstrap.
Well the answer to a) was that they were after some
free advertising for their club and the answer to b) is that I
made good on my promise and forced everyone who got their
entrance fee back to wear an embarrassing badge.
Both answers
should be amply illustrated below...
The Show Turned Sour
It was brought to my attention late in the day that there was
a certain element at the show. Some people there decided to
dress up as, well, basically, genocidal murderers. I know that
in this day and age we are supposed to embrace free speech and
everything that comes with it but sometimes you just have to
take a stand against this kind of thing..
I've censored the thumbnails so that only those of you of a
strong disposition will need to see the photos. Obviously I
was disgusted at this but chose not to let it ruin my day.
Overall
Overall it was a superb show. An amazing achievement once
again by the Warlords, with some beautifully produced games
going on everywhere you looked, and an excellent array of
goodies to drain your wallet. Of particular note must be the
Gamezone stand which was pretty much 3 deep all day and
garnered a frankly ridiculous amount of compliments! It also
led to us discovering the Holy Grail of advertising - the
English translation of the Gamezone catalogue that we just
happened to bring along...
Huzzah!
We'd like to thank all of our customers and everyone who
just stopped by - whether it was to simply say hello or to say
that they were glad I was back and less crippled or even those
who stood by me because they were horribly embarrassed about
their overly tight T-shirt and hoped standing by my fat ass would
make them look better. For the record Ben, it didn't.
I'd also like to add a personal thanks to the Warlords for
their usual amount of hard work and to the particular Warlord
who let me off with a wrist slapping after we committed a
slight show faux pas (You know who you are).
