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Friday, August 30, 2019

Spotlight on: 2019 QoH Foamsmith Tourney

Team Shaowdragon's Entry
Photos and write-up by Arthur "Aiden" Granger

IC:
The swamps of Shadowdragon have seen an escalation of undead from unknown origin coming from it's boarders. As they move to close to the hatchery the dragon whelps are known to practice their hunting. This excess of material for bone daggers seemed a good use of piling-up resource.

OOC:
These daggers were made with 10mm EVA foam, contact cement, modge podge, and plastidip. The blade was carved with hand and Dremel to give it a more rough appearance. Leather wrap and suits were added to add balance and style to the prop. 




Why so many: 
Over 35 daggers were made for QoH to thank many people in the creation of the team. It's not what I expected this year and became a memorable experience I have only grown and learned from everyone from.






Team Serra's Entry - Avendar's Throwing Axes 
by Tom "Avendar" Gallagher 

Wednesday night I received the dreaded call from Derek and Renee. Their team had no foamsmith entry. After a few minutes of cajoling I told them I'd come up with something. I spent that night pitching ideas to my wife Jen and finally came up with one she didn't shoot down. Knowing I was likely going up against new plasti-dipped latex creations I decided to stick to traditional methods.

I focused on safety, clean tape work, and aerodynamics. I drew up a shape that was visually appealing then reduced and tapered any pointy parts for safety. Instead of blue camp foam I use Coleman green camp foam witch is thicker in width, so I only had to cut two pieces. I like to use chrome silver duct tape in most of my pieces and matched it with wood grain duct tape to give it a woodsman's axe feel. Lastly I wrapped the grip with black leather lacing. By wrapping the optimum point for throwing you don't have to find the best place to hold it every time, your hand naturally goes to that spot. 

To be honest with you the accuracy of these weapons was pure luck, my first throw was from about 50 feet and it was a bullseye. After seeing several people try them I was shocked at how accurate they were. I'm glad I got the chance to submit them and proud of the victory. That being said I'm not sure allowing throwing weapons like these into our game is a great idea, they are just too deadly and could fundamentally change the way we fight.

Photo by View Staff


Team Shader's Entry
by Nataliya "Shader" Kostenko

Are you a renowned Feast-o-crat? Known for your culinary creations throughout the farthest corners of the Realms? Do you often have an unruly gaggle of nation members causing a ruckus in your kitchen? Do late adventurers annoy you constantly, expecting to be provided with coffee and crumpets despite being at least two hours tardy to the gathering? Well I have the foamsmith entry just for you: genuine cast iron throwing pans! They’re made out of sturdy stuff--guaranteed to help you crack the toughest recipe and the hard, hard heads of your opponents. There are three, and they all nest, so you can take your foes by surprise busting them out one by one, or just cook a really cute tiny omelet. Whatever the situation calls for.

Honestly I wasn’t going to even make a foamsmith entry, because I had no idea what to do for one and the date of the event was fast approaching. Just in the nick of time, however, Eldritch said it would be cool to have thrown frying pans; and, really, who hasn’t wanted to throw a pan at Aeston every now and then? Long story short I rushed to make that dream a reality, and that’s why the taping job was maybe a bit sloppy. On a craft note, I found out that a heat knife is a really cool tool for cutting blue foam, and that’s what allowed me to put together the design so quick. As for the fact that they pack a real punch (and are definitely not the safest “experimental weapon” on the block), if you’re that concerned with safety, you probably shouldn’t go around throwing cast iron pans at people.

Photo by View Staff