Pitching Guild Ball

Today I was meant to post about the great painting progress made last night on my Butchers models, but little Finn's continued distress-filled time with his teeth completely scuppered the evening… and the night's sleep.

Instead I thought I'd post a word or two regarding my excitement about the Guild Ball classic mat (that I ordered yesterday, cough).

I already own a couple of well printed vinyl mats (a space mat for X-Wing and a Woodland mat for Hood) and so when I saw the Guild Ball pitch being touted I thought "why bother?". However, after some internet trawling yesterday I discovered that the Guild Ball mat is actually printed on neoprene – boom!

Now, those of you who have been following Aetherium's progress over the last two years will know that the boxed game comes with a beautifully printed neoprene mat. I have two of them (a mis-sized prototype and the final shiny version) and I cannot express how truly awesome and versatile they are. Whilst I don't play Aetherium myself (yet) I use the mats all the time. I have one permanently on my desk as an enormous mouse mat. The other I use on the dining room table when playing Zombicide, cards, Subbuteo, whatever. It's a beautiful thing to behold. It doesn't crease, it retains its shape, it doesn't smell like plastic. It's the perfect gaming surface. Beautiful I tell you.

And discovering the GB mat was neoprene too, well my resolve cracked… nay, crumbled… and the order went in immediately. It should arrive today as Element Games are super fast at dispatching in-stock items and send everything via 24hr post. I will have a good close look and post my final thoughts next week (it also comes with a carry case!).

Hopefully we'll see the missing painted miniatures soon!