Game Session #2:


Pregame Setup:

Sorry for the darkness of these next couple of pics.

This pic shows the table taken apart into its two pieces. Each half is about 6' long. The legs are standard furniture legs bought at Lowes:

Next pic is the table stood up and put together without the projector, mirrors and screen. The two halves clamp together with standard furniture clamps, like on the insert leaves of dining room table. The table halves are made from 3/4 inch birch furniture plywood. 

Here is a pic of the projector rig and first mirror. The wood for the rig is left over from cutting out the table tops. The mirror is mounted above the projector. You can see one of the knobs(on the left) that adjusts the angle of the first(upper) mirror;

Next is the main mirror while in use. This mirror is also adjustable. Also shown is the network switch and cabling that we used to connect the computers for the table to my home network router.

Next is another shot of us in mid-game. My chair is on the far right(I'm taking the picture). We really don't need all four computers to run the table. It only takes the two on the left at the GM station. One for the GM map/Maptool server and the other one(Far left) feeds the projector showing what the Party sees. The one at the far end is just for that player, he has his Character Sheets and notes on it. The fourth one, the one in the far right with the screen facing the camera, is running skype (you can see the speakers on the very far right of the screen on the small table) so that our remote player can talk to us. There's a table mic but it is behind my laptop out of sight(Note: if you ever use an audio program like Skype to help a remote player game with you, make sure that you have the mic separated from the speakers, feedback is a pain). My wife wasn't playing tonight so the position on the GM's right is empty.

The size of this table has enough space around it so that six adults can sit at it and have space around the screen for books, papers, laptops, or whatever. Our group used to have eight people(1 GM, 1 Remote and 6 Players at the table), we're down one player right now.


Here's another picture showing it in mid game from another angle. You can see how much room is all the way around the mapboard. The GM station is shaped so that part of the table that sticks out for the two laptops and that leaves a spot in the middle for GM books, notes and a clear sight of the mapboard.

We took some other pictures with Brian's camera so as soon as he sends me those I'll post them. Those pics show some more closeups of the mapboard.

We have one more playtest of the table(next Sunday) before its public debut at GameCon Memphis. If you are going to GameCon Memphis, my HackMaster Basic and Aces&Eights games along with Brian's HM4(2  sessions) and Traveller(2 sessions) games will all be played on this table. That's a bunch of hours of gaming at this table, so if you are going to be there check it out!