Several games, accessories, and related products caught the eyes of the Skirmisher Online Gaming Magazine staff at Gen Con 2006 in Indianapolis in August. Following are Skirmisher’s “Top Picks” of especially good, fun, or useful products from this most recent Gen Con (along with the companies that produced them). We recommend all of these items and reviews of several are in the works now. So, check back here often to read more about them!

Medieval Building Set (Dwarven Forge)
HorrorClix “Great Cthulhu” (Whiz Kids)
Hollywood Shuffle non-collectible card game
Counting Zzz’s non-collectible card game
Villainy non-collectible card game
Dead Hand Chaos Poker non-collectible card game
Qin role-playing game
Pit Fighter: Fantasy Arena board game
EuroVillage Series “Town Wall” components (The Miniature Building Authority)
“Qauctica” miniatures (Lance & Laser)
Warriors of the Gods role-playing game

A Skirmisher “Top Pick” from Gen Con 2006!

One of the most versatile and useful gaming accessories released at the most recent Gen Con, in August, had to be Dwarven Forge’s Medieval Building Set. Not only has the company lived up to its usual high standards with this set, it has made available something markedly different from its existing product line.

According to Dwarven Forge, the Medieval Building Set “is meant to be the first of many aboveground sets that will finally allow our collectors to take their adventures into villages, towns, and cities.” This set certainly does that, and its Tudor-style components are ideal for creating three-dimensional floorplans for essential urban adventuring areas like taverns, inns, shops, guildhouses, and any number of other buildings. They are also fully compatible with the stonework and cavernous pieces of the other sets, allowing creation of multimedia subterranean and aboveground structures alike.

Like the company’s other Master Maze components, the modular pieces in this set are scaled for use with 25mm miniatures and marked with a 1-inch grid pattern that makes them ideal for creating floorplans that accurately correspond to graph paper maps. Likewise, they are made of handpainted cast resin, with felt-covered bottoms to keep them from scratching any surfaces on which they are placed.

This is a nice, fat set, and well worth the $99 price. Its 40 pieces are adequate to configure any number of small, medium, or even relatively large floorplans; without too much effort, we were able to create a three-room structure that was a scale 40 by 90 feet (with one piece left over). Components in this set include four Doors, 10 Straight Walls (three different versions), four Window Walls, eight Corner Walls (two different versions), 12 plain 2-inch by 2-inch Floor pieces, one 2-inch by 2-inch Floor piece with a bearskin rug, and one Secret Door.

As with many Dwarven Forge products, it is the little details that make one realize just how much care and imagination goes into developing the company’s various sets. With that idea in mind, my favorite pieces in the Medieval Building Set are a secret door disguised to look like a bookshelf and the wooden floor segment with a bearskin rug on it, both of which are very cute and elegant.

Other nice details of the pieces in this set include wood grain on the edges and little brackets on the corners of the 2-inch floor pieces, which can help make them all the more suitable for use in platforms, boardwalks, wharfs, or other applications where their sides might be seen.

Addition of accessories like Dwarven Forge’s Medieval Furniture Set or Dungeon Accessories Set (elements from which are shown in the pictures accompanying this review) -- or similar accessories from other companies -- can help to further customize areas created with these components.

Among game manufacturers, Skirmisher Publishing LLC is a big fan of Dwarven Forge products, and you can look for floorplans based on the Medieval Building Set and other Master Maze components in the upcoming Nuisances-inspired d20/OGL sourcebooks The Great Con and Antipaladin’s Quest.

Dwarven Forge’s Medieval Building Set can be purchased directly from the company.

Joe Hauck, Executive Vice President of Sales, Marketing, and Product Development at WizKids, has announced that his company has sold out of the first production run of HorrorClix.

"The good news is that HorrorClix is experiencing a wonderful release, and we appreciate and recognize all of your help in creating this success," Hauck said in an e-mail to retailers, distributors, and WizKids volunteers. "The bad news is that despite our efforts to create what we thought were sufficient quantities of inventory to stock the product for three to six months after the release date, our inventory is currently out in the U.S. After the promotional window for the Cthulhu figure was closed, we continued to receive re-orders from all of our distribution partners as more and more fans became excited about our new line of Clix-based minis."

Now that the product has launched to consumers around the world, WizKids said it is receiving re-orders even earlier than it had expected.

"The good news is that anticipating this upswing in interest and activity, we have a reprint already in the works and on the way," Hauck said. "The reprint is expected to arrive in early October. So although in the short term we may have a lack of product to satisfy everyone's needs, we will be able to catch up fairly quickly."

Skirmisher Online Gaming Magazine acquired one of the Cthulhu figures last month at Gen Con and can vouch for why demand has been so high, as it is a striking, incredible piece that would be a great prop for almost any horror-oriented game and beautiful collector's item as well.

HorrorClix is still available to retailers through most adventure game distributors. For more information on HorrorClix, go to www.wizkidsgames.com.