Carronade 2025

 The first big Scottish wargames show of the year is Carronade. It is held in a high school in Falkirk, which is an excellent venue, although parking and public transport aren't great. This year, there was a noticeably better turnout - more games, traders and visitors. As usual, it tailed off in the afternoon, but until then, we only played a couple of rounds of our game. It was great to see wargame friends from across Scotland and talk about the game and wargaming generally.

There were no gaps in the trader areas, and they did steady business. I picked up some paints, basing materials and a couple of books. Thankfully, no figures tempted me as my lead mountain is high enough.

We were running a game based on the Battle of Khotin in 1769, the first significant battle of the Russo-Ottoman War 1768-74. It was obscure enough to get visitors guessing what it was and reading the handout. My Old Glory 'Vlad Castle' got another run out, and is not that far off stylistically from the actual fortress. 

Running a game doesn't give much time to see the rest of the show, but the quality of the games was very high, and these caught my eye.

Possibly my favourite, Industrial WW2 with U-Boats.

A big game of Blenheim.

Alford. An interesting battle, well put together.

Poletsk - 1812 Russian campaign

I have no idea what this is or the rules, but it's interesting terrain.

There were two Samurai games, both visually good.

A fantasy version of Billhooks on a fine table.

Obviously, The Alamo. Swapped notes on using Rebels and Patriots.

The Battle of Tewkesbury.

Nice little Napoleonic naval landing game. Works well as a participation game.

I thought this was the Tradeston club's Thirty Years War game, but it is obviously later and upscaled in 28mm.

As always, many thanks to the Falkirk club. Putting on a show of this size takes a lot of work, and Kenny and the team did a great job.