Warrior Ancient and Medieval Rules

[scott holder]

Most of you know the background about the Historicon "Management Team" trying to move all tourneys into the Darkroom at the Host last year. When that initial plan failed to work and Tournaments were promised not be be moved involuntarily, the "Management Team" then adopted a set of rules that are a complete misreading of the American with Disabilities Act whose net effect is to strangle all tournaments that remain in Lampeter by not allowing enough tables there to meet expected needs.

I developed a floor plan which you can download from this posting as well as the unacceptable floor plan provided by Duncan Adams, the Hcon Events Coordinator. Note how he's cut 20% of tables (which comes out to 25% of the square footage needed) from the original and not provided enough 8x5s nor laid them out in a way that works for ALL tournaments. The floor plan I submitted has been run by FOUR seperate people, the Host, an ADA engineer working for former East Board member Fred Haub, Bob Nedwich who worked facilities issues at a Northern VA college for 8 years AND finally I ran it by the Northeast ADA Center at Cornell Univerisity, a place with a nationwise reputation in ADA issues.

No surprise, the floor plan met all requirements, no problems. And yet Mr. Adams, rejected it since the Hcon "Management Team" has clearly misread the ADA requirements, which isn't surprising either since nobody on said "Management Team" has any credible experience working ADA issues.

What follows is my response to Mr Adams. You'll need to read down to see his "nice" initial response to my floor plan submission.

Again, none of this should come as any surprise to any of us. Unless an honest mistake has been made, and that is probably not the case, the only conclusion one can draw from all of this is that the Hcon "Management Team" doesn't welcome all historical miniature wargamers to the convention. I'd strongly urge everybody here to email the East Board of Directors and the Hcon Convention Director politely expressing your concern over seemingly reneging on promises to not voluntarily move Tournaments out of Lampeter and how the policies of the Hcon "Management Team" are in effect making an involuntary move highly likely.

Okay, begin email:
Please note who has been CC'd on this response, all the Tournament POCs, the other two Convention Directors and the East Board of Directors.

I applied due diligence as Tournament Coordinator, an appointed BoD position, when submitting floor plans and program material and have on every correspondence, treated you with courtesy. In response, much of your tone and comments have been obnoxious. I would hope that as a member of the Hcon "Management Team", you would have chosen to treat one of the core group of the East conventions with at least courtesy if not respect.

Since you refused to provide any meaningful guidance on how to do a floor plan in Excel, I did the best job I could. I fail to see how what you sent back differed in any formatting detail as to what I've submitted, hence your comments about format are mystifying. Note I've attached both the floor plan submitted by me, the Tournament Coordinator, and the one you returned to highlight that point.

I made sure that the floor plan I submitted met all local, state and federal requirements before submission, hence why it took longer than usual to get to you. Since nobody on the Hcon "Management Team" has any professional, or even volunteer experience with the ADA, I made sure that the floor plan first passed muster with the Lancaster Host. Secondly, I had the floor plan submitted to Richard Vargas of the Northeast ADA and IT Center at Cornell University. He has no vested interest in this, in fact, doesn't even know about miniature wargaming. And to quote him: " I think that in your spec there would be more than enough room for someone using a wheelchair or scooter to get down a row to a space for eating purposes. When I say this, I am also assuming that persons are already seated & are eating as well." It was submitted to him as if it were dining, which for all intent and purposes, this floor plan represents. Hence, any "rules" adopted by the Hcon "Management Team" are not based on a competent reading of the ADA. We have pointed this out before but this is the first time that we've had a group with a nationwide reputation in ADA issues and no vested interest in Hcon comment on the floor plan.

Your floor plan doesn't even come close to meeting anticipated Tournament requirements in terms of needed tables and layout of said tables but since no one on the Hcon "Management Team" ever asked any questions about what was needed, this shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone. As such, for the first time, let me repeat that, for the first time, in the history of HMGS, an East convention will be forced to TURN AWAY attendees. I seriously doubt that Mr Giglio wants his innaugural run at Hcon to be best remembered as being the show in which policies were adopted that were designed to DAMPEN attendance. This is particularly ironic considering that Hcon attendance over the last few years has been flat, with the exception of Tournament gaming which has shown solid growth. Since we can be expected to be under our historical high overall but as of this date, have historically high pre-reg for several tournaments, people will understandably question the rationale behind turning away attendees from a facility that hithertoo has easily handled the numbers we pull in.

Your floor plan also reneges on a promise, repeat promise, made by the Board in that no Tournament would be forced to go elsewhere unless they volunteer. To date, only Armati has done that and none of the other Tournaments want to move. Your floor plan restricts Tournaments to the extent that if they want to host the expected turnout, they would have to move elsewhere, which again, violates a Board promise. In fact, one Board member up for reelection has in his campaign platform statements about that promise so now it appears you'll make him look like a liar.

Whenever the subject of putting Tournaments in the Darkroom has come up, I've also noted that the "rules" used by the Hcon "Management Team" do not seem to apply there since clearly the fallacious spacing requirements being forced on Tournaments in Lampeter, if applied with the same rigour in the Darkroom, would preclude there being enough space to host Tournament games (and the obvious issue of the Darkroom being completely unsuitable for Tournament games in the first place because of the attrocious lighting), which suggests that there is another agenda at work here which we can only speculate on and as I'm sure most people will.

I also need to point out that even by your own mistaken set of ADA spacing "rules" for Hcon, the floor plan I submitted followed the minimums set down in there since at no point do I mention chair placement.

I need to remind everybody that HMGS was founded so that miniature wargaming would have enough space to play and grow and not be subject to the whims of others with alternative agendas when it comes to hosting a convention. It seems perhaps some of us have forgotten that original aim since the Hcon "Management Team's" policies clearly send an anti-gamer message that "not all are welcome at Hcon", a message not unlike how board gamers treated miniatures back in the 1980s when HMGS was founded.

Let me reiterate that the floor plan I sent fullfils all code requirements AND will accomodate expected Tournament attendance, again with the caveat that the Armati system not be in Lampeter. As such, that is the floor plan I, as Tournament Coordinator, expect to be in place at Hcon. If not, then it will be *your* decision as to what other systems are moved to places that in your opinion can accomodate them. The fact that your floor plan doesn't even accurately reflect the types of tables needed in certain numbers, much less how they are laid out and reduces the number of tables by around 20%, effectively means we either turn people away at the door or that *you* determine where else to house those tables. And again, that would violate a promise made to the Tournament gamers by the East Board about not moving them involuntarily from Lampeter. Since I am not part of the Hcon "Management Team", nor am I on the Hcon staff (unlike for something like the last 12-15 years), I will not play the heavy in deciding who lives and who dies as it were.

But all of this is a moot point. The floor plan I submitted meets requirements across the board, doesn't make the Board seem like liars, doesn't turn away players for the first time in HMGS history and would undoubtedly earn a lot of goodwill from some of our core customers.....and members.

scott

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: DNBadams@aol.com [mailto:DNBadams@aol.com]
Sent: Thursday, June 01, 2006 3:48 PM
To: Holder, Scott
Cc: ECWCAPTAIN@aol.com
Subject: Re: Lampeter Layout


Scott,

This doesn't come close to meeting your requirements for table spacing or Excel format.

The attached file is a properly formatted layout that does comply with the spacing directed. Use this and go sharpen your pencil. This is all you will get.

As for Armati, I will put them together both days. I have the space reserved for them, I think a consistent location will serve them better, and the same arrangement won't serve Armati and single games short of a Chinese fire drill Friday evening to reset tables. And, you WILL need the space.


Duncan


In a message dated 6/1/2006 4:31:23 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, Scott.Holder@fhwa.dot.gov writes:
Family medical crap will keep me from email until next Tuesday sometime,
thus, I'm zapping this off to you earlier than anticipated. Attached is
the Excel file for Tournaments in Lampeter. It has been seen and
approved by all of the Tournament POCs and will meet our expected
attendance needs.......except:

It does *not* include Armati for Saturday. I can fit the Armati games
in Lampeter on Friday, which would free up valueable table space
elsewhere for that day. I can't fit Armati in there on Saturday.
Actually, I might be able to do it on Saturday but if we get a perfect
storm of attendance, we'd be turning away a large number of gamers and I
doubt you'd want me pigeonholing additional tables in there (as has been
done historically if needed), thus, Armati is out of Lampeter on
Saturday. Armati will need the equivalent of ten 6x5 tables elsewhere
on Saturday. If you want Armati in one place outside of Lampeter over
both days, that's your call but it might mean more empty tables and less
efficient use of space than either of us wants to see.

Each red table is 30" x 6'. Each purple table is 30" x 8'.

scott

[joncleaves]

A reminder:

We don't do 'politics' here. Scott has placed this info here for you to use as you will because it does impact directly on what is now the premier event for our flagship game system. We all have our opinions on HMGS, NASAMW, etc. Let us all use this info IN OTHER VENUES and share with other interested persons as we individually see fit.

There will be no bashing of any group or individual here on our forum.

I can also tell you this. We will keep Warrior alive and well and growing for our players. And if that means changing long-held ways of doing business, we will. Our goal is to make things work in the framework that exists.
If we find we cannot, we will make things work in whatever framework we feel best serves our players.

Jon