…“So where do we go from here?” five club New Year’s resolutions.

This time of year, it is very customary for all hobbyists to decide on resolutions, many of you will have declared that this is finally the year in which that Greek army will get finished. More figures will be painted than brought and perhaps that finally that old naval project will be finished or sold off. This is all fairly sensible and might make you dear reader wonder why on earth you need to read another list style article on the plans of other war gamers, short of working work who’s selling what and if you can get a good bargain for when another army goes off cheap.

Based on the feedback from my previous article, the wider concept of why a wargaming club needs to have resolutions is best addressed.  While we all as individuals might require more painting and less buying, a club requires a whole different stance to the coming year. Again, this all sounds fairly obvious but some of the resolutions will not be as obvious as you might think.

1. Recruitment

   

   This doesn’t need explaining… Or does it? When we talk of recruitment are we happy enough with the stereotypes or do we wish to push ourselves towards the wider gaming world. If your club does not have any board gamers ask yourselves why. Given some of the recent wargaming surveys, consider how welcoming your club is to all groups and players. Can clubs do more? Is it enough to get people to walk through the door once? We all want more members, but how can we do this, and once they are in the building how do you keep them?

2. Displays to the outer world

   

   We have been proud of what we can do at shows. To be proud for a moment the awards we have won have been impressive. Out of the last twelve years, our local show has been running we have won six times, short of the back to back win we possibly deserved. But to an audience that expects what we can do has a slight feeling of so what. We have taken from the last two years of local county events more than the last twelve years. To engage with those with no interest before they enter the site to leave with a figure painted by themselves and a real hooked interest is something to build on. To do more must be a resolution for us all.

3. Growing the club’s abilities internally

   

   Again this shouldn’t be too hard to think about. A few extra trees perhaps, a new mat? But perhaps the idea of keeping a tidy clubhouse, cleaning up that dumping ground corner, repainting tables can all go a long way. I feel of all the points this could be the most plainest and yet it is the things we forget that can make a club feel that extra ten percent. Commit to putting up some new posters, adding some new terrain, write a new campaign system for that rule set that everyone loves. The more of the smaller things that clubs can do internally can make the biggest difference.

4. Online presence

   

    

5. For this it is not needed for the Instagram photos, the tweets or even the Snapchat accounts, but the use of a Facebook account will go far. The amount of clubs without this is an issue when you can consider how best to recruit. Where once forums were the best way the use of the using of Facebook posting of photos, updates and future events all in one easy place with we all have access to without all the signing up is a strong plus. The resolution for this club this year will be to host more events and put them as events on Facebook to all to register interest.

5. Play more games

   

This final point might be seen as obvious. All of the other points have lead up to this. A club has but one point and need, to get people to wargame. From the use of new members, putting on displays all around the country and county, bringing in new terrain, running more events for the wider world to join in. All of these points have been linked to one resolution. Make use of those dice, as much as we quote the lead mountains, they have a use, and for some of us, the kitchen tables are not the answer. Be brave, get out there, roll those dice.

I hope in these you can start to take away ideas for your own clubs, or even the three of you meeting in an upstairs pub’s spare room. All of these are brilliant resolutions by themselves but it is the real challenge to link these all together and make them work for the benefit of all in the hobby. Modern wargaming is a changing world, and when for us in the United Kingdom the only public face we can rely on is the ever present Games Workshop store and the hope of the feeder system we have all gone through in some stage.

It is up to the wargaming club to help that gateway into the next wider stage of gaming from a store meet up with friends into the future. In that displays in castles, on battlefields and in any setting that promotes history and as a side achievement welcomes more people to our hobby is a bonus. We have an ability to be educational as well as play our games. All of this adds to what a club can do, not just as mentioned by buying terrain or extra gaming mats but by seeking out those local companies and using those links to grow the communities around us. Furthermore to continue the concept of linking around ourselves is more important than ever before with the online world in which we live. To have feedback on the last piece from people around the world was a real reminder of this and what we can achieve when we link together. It has been said that at least one of the fringe periods that has become now mainstream would not have even started if not for the free forums we all used five years ago, where Facebook can take us for selling, buying and booking/meeting for games is the real focus of the future for clubs. We need the real space in which to play but the amount of times you will have heard… “Oh I didn’t know so-so place had a club…” now replaced by, “I found you on Facebook.

All of this is for nothing if we do not play games. I realise this will feel like a rehashing for the sake of it but as I’m not being paid per word I’ll repeat myself. All of the resolutions we set ourselves will be for nothing if we do not at the next meeting ask the person you’ve not played against for a while for a game next week. If you take nothing but this away from the article, please make it a resolution to play more games. I am as guilty as most with this, we all take what we want from our hobby and some may never play a game more than once a month preferring to paint or model, but for this next year, I implore you to pick up the dice with a gamer who’s never played science fiction, never played historicals or even never played a board game. Make an event page for your local area and get in contact with the club in the next town over. See what local shows are in need of a display game table. Resolve to get our hobby out into the world, and roll those dice.