I don’t watch Beasts of War too often, it’s more or less an advertising channel for the wargames industry. Maybe out of remorse they decided to pay attention to the Lardies and Chain of Command. Or maybe because Wargames Illustrated awarded CoC the ‘best game 2017 award’.

Richard Clarke, gentleman-gamer, was interviewed. Nothing new for me. Fun, however, were the questions. The interviewer looked bewildered. A game designer who likes … gaming? Not making profit? Beasts of War’s first question:

 This is a ruleset. You don’t produce miniatures. Why?

Because Clarke doesn’t name a miniature range himself, the interviewer drops the names of a few of his advertisers and asks Clarke what he thinks about their ranges

 ..just to name a few, you got Perry, you got Warlord of course, you got Battlefront..

Yes. “Just to name a few”, mr Beast of War? The website promo for the interview, added afterwards, specifically links to these advertisers. How….surprising! 

Clarke slips in the names of the much smaller Empress, Crusader and Artizan miniatures (definitely not advertising on Beasts of War)

And then the interviewer wonders about Clarke who sees no problem in mixing models from different manufacturers

 that’s a very ecletic way of collecting for Chain of Command, it’s a very ecletic way for anyone who collects something like that

he says, looking at the viewers.

NO IT’S NOT, BEAST!! Collecting miniatures from different ranges is very usual for any historical gamer. It’s very UNusual for gamers who play GW or Privateer Press games. GW in particular forbids miniatures from other brands, changes basing and sizing to prevent mixed armies.

It’s fun to see how the interviewer struggles with the idea that Clarke is not the regular miniature company guy who wants to sell miniatures, but a genuine game designer who doesn’t bother too much about the ‘right’ scale, the ‘best’ miniature, ‘the only official miniature allowed for this unit’. Clarke wants a good game. Not double digit profits.

I don’t blame BoW. It’s good that, within their commercial format, they give airplay to something different, outside the bigger companies and kickstarter campaigns. But when they do it, you see from where they come, what their home turf is.