"On Disagreeing. In Wargaming. And Why it is Difficult" Topic

… for Some.

" I wrote this post on a whim the other day as part of dealing with some negative feedback. As you know, sometimes writing out or talking through things can be very therapeutic and cathartic (I love that word!). So take this with a grain of salt as it was really just thoughts in my head flowing out onto the page.

Over the past few years, as we have been writing for the blog and doing our videos, I have encountered slight resistance to our work. I say "work" but this is a hobby and what we do is far from professional level. We are gamers at heart who simply like playing and talking about wargames. All kinds of wargames mind you and not just a certain type of niche wargames. We play hex and counter, Card Driven Games, Eurotrash, block wargames, card wargames and lots of others. In fact, we really have tried to build our experience pool with games and will generally try anything at least once. I am 51 and was born in 1973. In my family setting, we played games but mostly I was brought up on RPG's like Dungeons & Dragons and other games but also with games like Axis & Allies. I feel cheated somehow because I didn't have a father who loved wargames. My dad, God rest his soul, is a veteran and was enlisted in the Air Force for 7 years during the Korean War era where he worked as a machinist in an aircraft maintenance crew making and repairing parts for those planes. He never saw action nor was he ever stationed overseas. In fact, he hated to fly! He didn't come home after work and play wargames with me like the classics from Avalon Hill. I wish that he had but sometimes you don't miss what you don't really know and I grew up just fine on the games that I was playing.

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Armand

Is a wargaming father common? I didn't have one know no-one who did, although that's possibly because I never asked. What I have had conversations about with fellow wargamers is whether or not they've managed to get their children into gaming, and ‘not' is my experience and certainly seems more common.

For me what you were doing was ranting abbout life, what you descibe is typical in a hobby, not particularly about any one hobby. Your "lack of history" is not one I relate to, most of the games seem to be board games, and so for me unrelated to minature gaming so perhaps I have never felt the loss.

To me the greats were Phill Barker, in infamy Donald Featherstone so your historic games are not mine, but hey that is not an issue. But your "History" seems far to specific. H G Well Little Wars now that is true history whether you relate to the game or not.

Many, Many years after the fact my mum noted Dad only played with me onee he was worried. However at the end he decided there was so much maths in it that the "playing with toys" bit was not an issue as other skills were involved. So my dad only played with me once.

My own son I did try early, on but he very quickly went onto RPG's and SI-Fi and so we almost never play, no common ground. Does it matter, no, I still ended up Publishing rules with a friend. Inevitablely you get the "it should be done like this" folk but that is life and you take it all with a pinch of salt.

I hardly ever saw my father. He was working constantly providing for a family of five children and a wife. There is a myth about only having to work an 8 hour day back in the 60's and 70's and being financially well off.

On vacations my father started off with me in the back yard with fire crackers and tennis balls with 54mm plastics or living room carpet (no fire crackers).

Started my kids off the same way – 1 now does D&D the other likes historical games on occasion. Both love games in general.

Thanks

Armand