Having arrived in England and somewhat settled into the Post Office and shop it was time to look around for some wargaming, as well as a choice of clubs I was expecting myriad wargame shows on my doorstep, most things that happen in the UK normally happen south of the border, little did I realise that that 'border' went as far south as the outskirts of London. The only club within shooting distance was nearby Lancaster and that was held on a Tuesday night in an old house on the edge of a nice park but next to what you and I would term 'bandit country', the kind of estate that you enter with your car and exit with nothing but a steering wheel. Anyway I went along for a few weeks before, guess what, the council shut it down, the club was then moved to Lancaster Grammar School as one of the founders was a teacher there and used his influence. I only managed a couple of nights as the strain of earning a crust running my own business and getting up at 0500 hrs in the morning to get newspapers ready was not conducive to happy wargaming. I was also used to having up to eight hours gaming at a leisurely pace complete with wine/beer/sandwiches and then a trip to the pub, not get there at seven, start at eight, finish for ten, I therefore left to concentrate on building my financial empire.
After a few years I felt confident enough to advertise for locals who might be interested in wargames, I put up some beautiful posters in the shop and waited, and waited, and waited. I eventually managed to get two people to try wargaming, it just didn't suit them and quickly I was on my own again. At this time I found Wings of War a WWI aerial combat game and something completely new to me, a card driven game which was immense fun and for which you could buy little airplanes, I bought 50+ (and re-painted every one of them) when the most you could handle in a game was about four, I was falling into a dangerous habit.
I did manage to get my hands on a load of Wars of the Roses figures cheaply and decided to build up an army for the period, my son got interested and said he would do the Lancastrians, I of course am a Richard III fan and took the Yorkists. Real life intervened and Stewart had to give up, but he had painted about six contingents which I added to my troops to give a very large army or two smaller ones. The only gaming I was getting at this time depended on a visit from Billy in Scotland or my son coming over from Darlington once in a blue moon.
I went on all sorts of forums and wargaming sites to see if I could entice someone to come and play and generally had no success at all, there must have been wargamers in the surrounding area and I began to wonder if I should be less needy in my posts and maybe I should not put a picture in them. I eventually found Glynn from Southport who was asking for a game of Wars of the Roses and I offered to put on a trial game for him, he duly made the almost two hour journey and thankfully he was not a wierdo, enjoyed the game and after that we tried to meet at least once a month.
On one occasion he brought along some Dark Age troops and they looked so good I thought I need some of them. Wargaming had come a long way since I started and painting styles along with the figures and games available had dragged the hobby into the 20th C and we were spoiled for choice. I wanted to get up to date, and right at that moment along came Dux Britanniarum a Dark Age skirmish game, I jumped in with two feet, I was beginning to do this with frighting regularity. I changed my painting style, I tarted up my bases bought terrain and got a new table. I was still almost managing a game a month as Glynn had rebased some of his Saga Saxons for Dux B, then in a passing conversation I mentioned the new Old West skirmish game Dead Man's Hand. I was off again, figures, terrain, mats and a full Wild West town with around twenty buildings when in actual fact you only need about six, I called it Carefree, Arizona, where the only thing that flies is bullets! Come on, that's pretty good. I think Glynn and I only ever had one game.
Sometime later while at my sons we went to a show in Middlesborough, he decided to buy X-Wing and again I saw the cute little starships and despite being the worst pilot in the galaxy bought a shed full of stuff for the game, I have at last managed to go cold turkey with this game, although I still feel the need for a fix every time a new 'wave' appears.
So, almost no opponents and I start four new periods, I had sold all my medieval armies but still hankered after my first love of big games so I decided to expand my Dux B forces into armies, I looked at several new rules and settled on War & Conquest and began to once again buy hundreds of new troops as I needed two armies. My games were now down to one every three months or so if I was lucky.
Things were now getting desperate, I bought Zombicide as you could play the game solo and was surprised at how good it was and duly impressed with the quality of the playing pieces. I decided to try once more to get someone local interested, with Glynn I arranged that we would put on a display of the battle of Bosworth as Richard III was flavour of the month due to the finding of his body in a car park. I put up posters saying we were re-fighting the battle in the Post Office on Saturday the whatever at 1400 hrs. I duly set up the terrain and put as many figures as I had out only to get a text that Glynn could not make it, in an emergency I phoned Stewart but he couldn't come through at short notice, I couldn't cancel as I was expecting crowds at the door. I opened up at two and no crowd, not even a passer by, I thought of playing the game solo but gave up on that so I settled down and waited, no one would want to be first I thought, two hours later I shut the door having seen not one living soul, my wife comforted me with her kind words "I told you no one would come and to close hours ago."
I teetered on the brink of putting the white flag up and finishing with the hobby which had been a huge part of my life as I slumped alone in my favourite chair in the dark, empty wine bottles rattling at my feet.
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