South West Model Show 2026 Tank Museum Bovington 12th/13th Sept.

[Ian61]

Unable to get to Colours this year Rob and I are likely going to Bovington for a day on the next weekend. I suspect an emphasis on more recent conflicts and SciFi/ fantasy.

 Has anyone been to these in the past? I get impression this is a relaunch, Warlord Games seem to be big backers.

 (I took Rob and one of his friends to the tank museum when they were about eight and virtually had to lever them out, I think it is still one of his favourite places😁.)

[Imperial Dave]

 

[Nick Harbud]

Well as it happened, I found out about this event from the Warlord guys who had the stand next to ours at the Attack show in Devizes.  We thought it might be a great place for the Society to put on a participation game, but we could not rustle one up in the limited time available.

If anyone fancies helping us with a stand or game at next year's event, please get in touch.

[Ian61]

Well as it happened, I found out about this event from the Warlord guys who had the stand next to ours at the Attack show in Devizes.  We thought it might be a great place for the Society to put on a participation game, but we could not rustle one up in the limited time available.

If anyone fancies helping us with a stand or game at next year's event, please get in touch.

Let me see what the set up looks like this year, I may be persuaded. Its the same distance for me or a little shorter than Newbury or Devizes.

[Ian61]

Just a bump on this. Rob and I will be rocking up to the Tank Museum on Saturday. I will be sporting my SoA polo shirt so if anyone is going and spots us do say Hi!

[Ian61]

Well, we had a really enjoyable few hours. The tank museum Plus wargames stuff - two for one. The tank museum is unusual amongst its fellows in that it has a lot of space around the very large exhibits. Lots of spaces to put a stall or a demo game. As a concept I thought it worked. Well done to both the Tank Museum and Warlord games for getting this set up.

Whilst it was clearly being used by Warlord to showcase their different games (at least 6 demo games) the very fact that they were so split up prevented this from seeming to be overpowerful. There were other vendors (I succumbed to a box of Perry's WotR Archers / Halberdiers). And there were a few other demo games -some of these were by the Tank Museum or groups with links to it it clearly has good outreach into the local community.

There was a Bolt Action competition on the Mezzanine with 15 very well appointed tables inhabited by intensely involved players that seemed to be very well organised.

Although the car parks were full-ish (there was still space) I did not get the feeling that there was that many actual wargamers at the event and the chaps running the demos were not getting many players compared to what you would see at other shows. Despite the earlier history demo games being run (HC, P&S and BP) the rest was very much Tanks onward (to Konflict '47 but also 30K and 40k plus a lot of titans (40K?), So, whilst well worth the visit I don't think this would be very fertile ground for an SoA stand/demo game we would definitely jar with the vibe.

I do hope the organisers feel the show has been a success and will go on to repeat this again. It was certainly and inspiring setting and I am sure Bolt Action at least will will have gained  a few converts.