Editor in Chief Bill | 28 Jan 2015 7:46 p.m. PST |
What age were you when you first knew you were a miniatures wargamer? |
gamertom | 28 Jan 2015 8:00 p.m. PST |
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Jakse375 | 28 Jan 2015 8:01 p.m. PST |
8, the first time I put paint onto lead. |
morrigan | 28 Jan 2015 8:02 p.m. PST |
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Stan Johansen | 28 Jan 2015 8:05 p.m. PST |
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taskforce58 | 28 Jan 2015 8:07 p.m. PST |
About 14 I think, when I checked out a copy of Don Featherstone's "War Games" from the school library. |
Dave Crowell | 28 Jan 2015 8:08 p.m. PST |
I'm still in denial. I can stop any time I want to. I just don't want to. I've always been into miniatures. Playing with actual rules came later, but toy soldiers and elaborate forts etc, since I was very young. |
Only Warlock | 28 Jan 2015 8:11 p.m. PST |
13. Avalon Hill Bismarck while stationed in Puerto Rico. Played the engagement with the Hood and Prince of Wales. |
cfielitz | 28 Jan 2015 8:15 p.m. PST |
15 or what age one is when they start high school. |
Ed Mohrmann | 28 Jan 2015 8:17 p.m. PST |
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Mserafin | 28 Jan 2015 8:19 p.m. PST |
Six. My brothers gave me some Airfix figures for Christmas, and my life was ruined. |
Sundance | 28 Jan 2015 8:29 p.m. PST |
Used to play games with 1/72 plastics and Airfix HO. |
79thPA | 28 Jan 2015 8:30 p.m. PST |
Wargaming with real rules? About ten years old. |
x42brown | 28 Jan 2015 8:32 p.m. PST |
7 when father brought back a lot of flats at the end of the war (probably looted) x42 |
Charlie 12 | 28 Jan 2015 8:36 p.m. PST |
16. Started with Minitanks and Airfix figures. |
vagamer63 | 28 Jan 2015 8:47 p.m. PST |
9 After I spent my summer's worth of allowance and news paper route money buying and painting enough airfix U.S. Cavalry and American Indian boxes to recreate Custer's Last Stand. Even built my own Fort Lincoln out of twigs gathered from the local patch of woods. Drove my parents nuts in the evenings listening to me yell "Charge!" every few minutes up in my bedroom!! Ah, those were the days!!!! |
Mad Guru | 28 Jan 2015 8:48 p.m. PST |
About 10. Got my parents to buy me John Tunstill's little book, "Discovering Wargames," during a visit to Polk's Hobby Shop in Manhattan. I never used the rules inside but the book's very existence confirmed that the hobby existed and there was something for me to do with my Britain's and Airfix soldiers in addition to lining them up on the floor and admiring them! That tiny book probably cost less than a dollar at the time but has had a pretty big impact on my life ever since. |
cfuzwuz | 28 Jan 2015 9:03 p.m. PST |
About 9. Got the Marx civil war set for Christmas. Played it for years. Best present ever. |
skippy0001 | 28 Jan 2015 9:07 p.m. PST |
Tractics and Chainmail-whenever they first came out. Earlier-Fletcher Pratt with home made balsa ships on a ping pong table, around 1971. |
Battle Phlox | 28 Jan 2015 9:12 p.m. PST |
15, when I picked up Battle Tech. |
Cyrus the Great | 28 Jan 2015 9:14 p.m. PST |
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53Punisher | 28 Jan 2015 9:32 p.m. PST |
7 and then started "writing" my own "rules" when I was 8. |
Winston Smith | 28 Jan 2015 9:35 p.m. PST |
25. I had of course played with soldiers when I was a kid. But I never considered it a "hobby" (obsession) until I went to a gathering of boardgamers in Joisey. We stopped in Altoona to play the excruciatingly rare Trafalgar. Then after playing a monster hand made Great Patriotic War game on multi maps we played some Nappie minis. When we got home to Penn State I started in on WRG Ancients. |
Perris0707 | 28 Jan 2015 9:38 p.m. PST |
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Winston Smith | 28 Jan 2015 9:40 p.m. PST |
Funny story. I was reading a review of a uniform book in Strategy and Tactics which went into great detail on facings etcetera. The reviewer sniffed that this had of course nothing to do with proper wargaming. Even as a devoted Avalon Hill and S&Ter, I thought that was an odd comment. I had heard of those oddball loonies who played with toy soldiers seriously. I had just never met them. |
Saber6 | 28 Jan 2015 9:49 p.m. PST |
12, "Fast Rules" with whatever models and Airfix figures we had |
Henry Martini | 28 Jan 2015 9:49 p.m. PST |
So it could be a congenital defect, Perris? Neither of my parents is a wargamer, so now I suppose I'll have to go through the family tree to find out how far back the gene was first expressed. |
Sergeant Paper | 28 Jan 2015 9:50 p.m. PST |
15-16, though I was a boardgamer long before that. |
Fergal | 28 Jan 2015 9:54 p.m. PST |
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Bunkermeister | 28 Jan 2015 10:11 p.m. PST |
I got MPC ring hand toy soldiers in 60mm in 1958 at age 3. Never stopped collecting army men. Minitanks and Airfix still make up a sizeable part of my massive collection. Mike Bunkermeister Creek Bunker Talk Blog |
Bashytubits | 28 Jan 2015 10:27 p.m. PST |
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Gungnir | 28 Jan 2015 10:29 p.m. PST |
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The Beast Rampant | 28 Jan 2015 10:30 p.m. PST |
I had been collecting miniatures since twelve. I had screwed around some pretty "informal" wargaming in that time, solo and with my cousin, but around 17 I got involved with a local group headed by a veteran gamer. I was hooked by Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd. |
Sudwind | 28 Jan 2015 10:36 p.m. PST |
I guess around 16 years old. I had been a board gamer before that….but I started gaming with micro-armor using the Engage and Destroy rules. Now I enjoy converting old board games to miniatures play. Using Panzer Leader/Blitz/Arab-Israeli Wars, War at Sea, Victory in the Pacific and newer sets as a basis for miniatures gaming really is enjoyable and makes me feel somewhat nostalgic. |
Nashville | 28 Jan 2015 10:43 p.m. PST |
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Doctor X | 28 Jan 2015 10:44 p.m. PST |
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Extra Crispy | 28 Jan 2015 10:54 p.m. PST |
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wrgmr1 | 28 Jan 2015 10:58 p.m. PST |
At age 5 or 6 toys soldiers. At age 15 in 1973 C in C and GHQ micro Armour. |
basileus66 | 28 Jan 2015 11:25 p.m. PST |
I had been playing with soldiers since I was 6, but the first time I was aware of wargaming as a hobby shared by other grown men was when I turned 20. |
377CSG | 28 Jan 2015 11:32 p.m. PST |
Age 5 and 6 – 1957 and 1958 toy soldiers – 54mm American Infantry, ringhand, the helmets and gear came off in silver and Cowboys. Age 10 -1962 – Marx American Civil War Set. |
piper909 | 28 Jan 2015 11:48 p.m. PST |
Hmmm. I suppose I was 15, and it would have been "Little Wars" from HG Wells, adapted for those Revolutionary War soldiers you used to be able to buy from comic book ads. Shortly therafter I discovered the world of real toy soldiers and rules (thank you, Wargamer's Digest). But if you count those Helen of Toy boardgames/toy soldier games (also bought via comic books), I could push this back to age 13 or so. And long before that, I took it upon myself to PAINT those Revolutionary War soldiers, and other toys from Marx Brothers playsets (Fort Apache; Knights and Vikings) to spruce up the games my friends and I would play with them. I was a larval-stage wargamer then! |
Dark Knights And Bloody Dawns | 29 Jan 2015 12:09 a.m. PST |
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GarrisonMiniatures | 29 Jan 2015 12:29 a.m. PST |
About 12 or 13, which was strange because that was still a few years before I knew there was such a thing. |
snurl1 | 29 Jan 2015 12:44 a.m. PST |
About 4. Toy soldiers were always the best toys. With rules? About 10, Avalon Hill's Gettysburg. (old version) |
Tacitus | 29 Jan 2015 12:48 a.m. PST |
14. Set up dozens of green army men in the backyard, played against my friend. Won that game and not much since… |
goragrad | 29 Jan 2015 1:04 a.m. PST |
I played with 'toy soldiers' from grade school through high school. Although my brother and I had each gotten (floating) aircraft carriers and other 'military' toys even earlier. Went to college and discovered Seapower and 1/1200. Then came 1/76 tanks with various rulesets culminating in Tractics. Boardgames – Blitzkrieg and Gettysburg in junior high. Chess in seventh. |
IUsedToBeSomeone | 29 Jan 2015 3:07 a.m. PST |
11 (1974) when I got Little Wars out of the library and bought 4 boxes of Airfix 1/32 Napoleonics and 2 firing guns. Mike |
PzGeneral | 29 Jan 2015 3:41 a.m. PST |
18 or 19. I'd been playing Avalon Hill games since 12, but I fell in love with minis at a MichiCon. After playing a Medieval game I bought my first set of rules "Strike Team Alpha" and loads of 'grab bags' of minis for it. I still have everything……. Dave |
Yesthatphil | 29 Jan 2015 3:56 a.m. PST |
Proper wargaming: 10 – although I guess I 'became' a wargamer progressively over the years that followed. Phil |
David Manley | 29 Jan 2015 4:11 a.m. PST |
6, thanks to my big brother :) |