Yesterday was the annual trip to Newbury Racecourse for the Colours wargames show.

I must confess that I almost didn’t go: my memories of previous Colours were of a very packed, very hot, and very sweaty show…and the weather forecast was for the day to be the hottest day of the year so far.

Well, it did prove to be the hottest day of the year so far, but when I arrived at about 10.30am, the venue was actually pleasantly cool: all the doors on all the floors were open and there was actually a breeze blowing through the stand. It did get a bit more crowded and a bit hotter during the day, but well done to the organisers for making sure that despite the blazing sunshine, I shall remember this year’s show as one of the coolest on record.

That and the free parking and low entrance fee (£5), and the fact that one of the catering points was actually a Costa (or at least had Costa coffee), made me very glad that I had made the effort to attend, and I shall certainly diarise next year’s show as soon as I can.

I wasn’t shopping for anything in particular this year, but there were the usual plethora of tempting trade stands, and I did actually end up buying some very nice “clumps” to use on my big element bases.

Magister Militum were conspicuous by their absence (being in the process of being sold) and as I wandered past where they usually were, I remembered that I bought something from them at their first show ever. Can’t remember what it was, but I’ve been a regular customer since, and they have always given excellent service. Let’s hope the enterprise goes to an equally good new home.

I thought that the display games were better than usual this year (there’s a gallery of some of them below) and I even played in one of them: the soon-to-be-published mini-skirmish game set in the Edo period of Japan currently known as Bonzai Bonkers or, perhaps more properly, To The Last Sword or similar. Incidentally, Sid, if you’re reading this, my 16-year old thinks the latter is too generic and that Bonzai Bonkers is the way to go! Kids, eh?

The game is excellent fun whilst, as with all Lardy games, really engendering the feel of the period/theme it’s designed to replicate: here, all the jidaigeki/chambara films that I love. The rules are very easy to pick up (my opponent, Gary, and I were working out our own combats etc within ten minutes) but involve a suitably fiendish amount of decision-making.

In this scenario, my band of four ronin and two retainers (I’m sure that means we were missing one!) were out to reclaim a legendary blade from the evil wrongdoers who had killed our daimyo and stolen the sword in the first place.

As with all good films games, it all came down to one last fight, where the hero Juko, supported by his retainer Mushin, was up against the Boss of the opposition: a far better fighter and dressed in armour. Juko fought bravely but was cut down and all looked lost, but Mushin hurled himself forward and, throwing caution to the wind (no parrying dice for Mushin!), finished the Boss off with a lunging thrust: my clan had avenged the insult, reclaimed the sword, won the battle and won more honour as well. My thanks to Sid and Gary for an excellent game.

So a very good Colours indeed, and my commiserations to anyone who decided not to go because of the heat: it was, as they say, a good’un.