Thanks very much Far-seeker! As it turns out we had a little trouble powering the shield but I left a post on Adafruit with the hopes of a fix.

Hey, I'm looking to turn a rotary dial using a stepper motor. I'm hoping to take out some of the stress by using a couple of cogs so that we don't have the stepper turning the dial directly. My question is, what kind of kit will I need for this? I've got this shield picked out, http://proto-pic.co.uk/adafruit-motor-stepper-servo-shield-for-arduino-kit-v1-0/ and we have a generic stepper to play with but will I need quite a beefy stepper? I'm also curious as to how hard it is to use a stepper with a shield; is it as simple as a servo?

Thanks
-Struan