Lead Adventure Forum
Other Stuff => General Wargames and Hobby Discussion => Topic started by: tinfoilknight on May 25, 2017, 09:55:52 AM
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I was wondering if you guys might have some advice to offer on setting up a gaming club while living in the countryside. I'm surrounded by about 10 villages, some almost towns they're so large but there's no gaming club here, just 40+ minute drives away. I thought of taking the initiative and seeing if I can get one off the ground but have no idea how I would best get in contact with others interested in the hobby.
We have a local news letter and many village notice boards but I don't know how well read either is. Where would be my best chance of contacting others locally to get stuff off the ground?
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Do the local supermarkets have notice boards.
I can remember that when I lived in England, Asda had a noticeboard dedicated to the local community.
What about asking to have a notice hobby shops in a 20 mile radius? Maybe they have a mailing list too.
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The local shops and libraries have notice boards and I plan to put notices up on them.
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We contacted the local newspaper and asked if they would be interested in doing a "personal interest" article. They were very keen and sent a reporter and photographer to interview my wife and I and took some photos of the wargames table. The resulting article was along the lines of "local married couple settle domestic disagreements by fighting Waterloo as Wellington and Napoleon". But it did get us a lot of interest and eight members to start our club.
We repeated the process some years later, but with less success.
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Surely Facebook?
...says a non Facebook user but everyone I know is on there apparently.
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Facebook would be a good one and also as many forums and such as you can get onto.Sometimes games shops let you put up flyers for games clubs too.Some even give your member discount.
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We started a wargames club in Amsterdam, a couple of years ago.
We did all of the above. but also spent money on a good website, first a free one, now a domain that we bought.
Don't be too ambitious, start with a monthly frequency.
Be clear about your target group. 14y old teenage boys who play warhammer don't neccesarily mix with middle aged men who play Hail Caesar or Black Powder.
Think about combining club evenings with board gaming or mixed gaming like XWing or D&D.
Keep a friendly atmosphere, maybe not competition or points focused but more on good fun and trying different systems and periods.
Invest in good scenery. We started with paper scenery. After some months we charged a small entrance fee and bought battle mats. Since then we have slowly upgraded our scenery. A club will attract members because they offer the option to play regularly on goodlooking tables with a band of brothers.
Expect to invest a lot of time.
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In my experience there are two sorts of club. One where lots of groups of friends turn up and play their particular games which is fine but can end up rather cliquey and so not all that welcoming to newcomers.
The other is usually a smaller club where everyone takes part in the one game usually decided by one or two members. Again which is fine as this is a lot more welcoming but not so great if the game being played isn't your particular interest and you just want to game with your figures that you have painted.
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You could start advertising here, my experience is that there are more historical gamers not in a club, even when there are several nearby, than are in them.