[Brother Armiger]

So after starting back into the hobby- my friends and I went out 'into the wild' to find some games. Most of the time, the community was fine (there were a couple of weirdos and Great Unclean Ones, but not nearly as bad as when I played M:tG). For the most part, our decision to go private had less to do with community and more to do with locations.

So we started our club with some simple tenets and rules (I'm excluding most of my 'house rules', like "only one sixer per player" and "no drinking and driving").

I'm curious as to what has worked for you, what hasn't worked, and what you'd add. Now, rules of etiquette on a personal level are not what I'm looking for- I don't police behavior unless it's outright a problem for a bunch of grown-ass men. But this is the first group I've ever started, and it's the one thing I've never had guidance for in this hobby.

1- Must be 21 or older. This is mostly because in my experience, 18-year-olds may still be under parental guardianship and people under 21 might not have the time to dedicate to the game without it affecting their studies and such.

2- Must provide at least one piece of scenery. Since we went all out and started ordering GW and other companies' scenery, this isn't a huge issue but we at least ask that you find a cool looking rock or something.

3- Must conduct one game out in the wild (At GW or a FLGS). This is kind of loosely enforced, because sometimes there's no game to be had. I at least ask that they go and show their faces and talk to people who are playing. I also encourage them to go to painting classes or host them if they're good enough.

4- No Politics. Because I think most politicians belong in prison, the rest need a kick in the ass. And some folks can't handle themselves when they politically disagree. Being a veteran, I simply don't care because I think it's all BS and we're here to game and not worry about boring stuff like the future of our country.

5- Your guests are held to the same rules as you are, and their actions are your own. Basically we all know that one guy that's fun to drink with or go out to a movie with, but you wouldn't bring him to something like this. A lot of people are shaky about this rule, because it makes them fully responsible for another human being- but it makes you really take a look at who you bring in and think about it (And if the person that brings a guest is the first one to correct the issue, then I let it slide).

6- No children. I don't demand people abandon their kids for the game, quite the opposite. I just think children are a bad distraction from the game and are part of the reason I formed a private club in the first place. I know it sounds dickish, especially since I have no children- but I also live in a home that is not made safe for children nor is it equipped to entertain children.

7- Dues are a 'monthly sum'. Basically, our goal is to collect $70.00 a month total from all members, but it's more on the system where you pay what you can. All the money goes into a safe and is set aside for supplies, food, and potential trips to tournaments and the like. This is also used to help replace a model or item if it gets broken on accident.

8- All rules for your army must be present, but scanned 'reference copies' are allowed. As a matter of fact, my dirty secret is I want to get scanned copies of all important rules and put them into a binder. I know it's awful, but so is paying $60.00 for something that's 70% fluff.

9- No models that are completely third-party, recasts, or 3d Prints. I let things like a female commissar slide as long as there's at least a Games Workshop/Forge World weapon and some modifications but I'm not keen on someone getting a bootleg version of something that other members worked hard and paid money for.

10- No dice cast on the table. Call me weird but I've always had this little cart for garage work, and I just put a shallow clear Rubbermaid box with a rubber mat in there- it's so no models can get knocked over and all rolls are easily visible to both people.

 

[ArkInRev]

1- Must be 21 or older. Club preference, but personally, I'm not a fan of exclusionary policies. Feels bad to tell a kid that picks up Battle of Vedros that they can't play. Keeping it adult is fine if it works for the club.

2- Must provide at least one piece of scenery. This is the method that the club chose to have scenery, but personally, and especially if I am paying into it, I want the club to provide. I make terrain, and there are a number of others out there who do as well for money or fun. Really not much of a reason to have nothing out there. Either spend the time or spend the money as a club. Now, I would encourage people to bring terrain to share, it certainly can keep the games fresh. Just try to be wary of terrain built for obvious advantage. (free defense lines or bastions kind of a thing)

3- Must conduct one game out in the wild (At GW or a FLGS). Helps recruit. Fine rule, but not easy to enforce.

4- No Politics. Better to rephrase to something that encourages conversation to be about gaming. Religion, sex, movie spoilers, etc. can also be great points of contention. Keep the focus on the game. That's more of a 'host' problem.

5- Your guests are held to the same rules as you are, and their actions are your own. Bad guests are bad guests and there should be rules like this, but... grown-ass men.

6- No children. Personal taste ruling, but most of the people that I play with have children. Excluding them doesn't encourage the hobby (non-infant) so I don't agree with the general direction here.

7- Dues are a 'monthly sum'. Personal taste. I'd rather each player brought $70 of new painted minis a month rather than turn it in. Amount may vary, but fundamentally, the cost of gaming should be addressed somehow. Reference the terrain comments above.

8- All rules for your army must be present, but scanned 'reference copies' are allowed. I agree with this - Fair use copies in whatever format are good with me. Most players don't really need to reference the literal rules, but as long as they can be accessed for reference, I don't even care if they are physically there. Internets FTW.

9- No models that are completely third-party, recasts, or 3d Prints. I'd be concerned about excluding scratch build, or 3-d prints that the player modeled. I still consider that scratch. (Forget IP infringement discussion.) I encourage scratch build in my group. Some people like to sculpt and model, more than just a bitz conversions. Rules curbing artistic endeavor are problematic for me.

10- No dice cast on the table. Scatter Dice - Not a fan of this rule. Maybe better for me would be "Control your dice, you're grown-ass men!" Be responsible players. Treat the hard work that others have put into models and the terrain with a little bit of respect.

 

[Brother Armiger]

ArkInRev, thank you for taking the time to address these things. I'll give my responses to each, if there is need of it- just so you can understand my frame of mind and that of my club members.

1- Must be 21 or older. Club preference, but personally, I'm not a fan of exclusionary policies. Feels bad to tell a kid that picks up Battle of Vedros that they can't play. Keeping it adult is fine if it works for the club.

Well, it is intended to be exclusive. I don't feel comfortable opening my home and investing this much money into stuff to just anyone. I've had things stolen in the past, I've had my home cased, etc. But, as for the age requirement- I have a house full of booze, and a Kegerator. Back in 2003 a young 19-year-old stole a bottle of booze from me, went and did something incredibly stupid and dangerous and then told the military police (I was in the Marines at the time) that I 'gave it to him'. NCIS shows up- because what he did was that stupid.

So the age thing is to legally protect everyone in the house, and we all kind of agree on it.

2- Must provide at least one piece of scenery. This is the method that the club chose to have scenery, but personally, and especially if I am paying into it, I want the club to provide....

Well, this is kind of where I'd point to the GW scenery on my table and the table itself and say it was provided, but we're wanting everyone to contribute -something- to the gaming experience to keep things interesting. It's just my way of asking for help.

3- Must conduct one game out in the wild (At GW or a FLGS). Helps recruit. Fine rule, but not easy to enforce.

Usually we go as a group to a few places after lunch on a Saturday to see what's kicking.

4- No Politics. Better to rephrase to something that encourages conversation to be about gaming. Religion, sex, movie spoilers, etc. can also be great points of contention. Keep the focus on the game. That's more of a 'host' problem.

Well, the idea is that also this group- we want people to be able to voice any issues they have or personal problems. Part of the reason for the dues is just in case something bad happens we can always pool it together, take the money, and help someone. We're not just in it for the games, we're in it for the spirit of gaming.

6- No children. Personal taste ruling, but most of the people that I play with have children. Excluding them doesn't encourage the hobby (non-infant) so I don't agree with the general direction here.

Like I said, my home isn't equipped for the safety and entertainment of children. Plus, they're a distraction to most players in my experience. Nearly every single player in our now 7-man club has agreed that the unruly children in our FLGS's are the main reason that a private gaming club is needed. I don't hate kids, many of the guys have kids- being a parent comes first in my book, but I can't let it affect other players.

7- Dues are a 'monthly sum'. Personal taste. I'd rather each player brought $70 of new painted minis a month rather than turn it in. Amount may vary, but fundamentally, the cost of gaming should be addressed somehow. Reference the terrain comments above.

No, we all combine our money to reach a $70.00 goal. It covers food, soda, the electricity from running a heater/fan and the lights in the garage.

9- No models that are completely third-party, recasts, or 3d Prints. I'd be concerned about excluding scratch build, or 3-d prints that the player modeled. I still consider that scratch. (Forget IP infringement discussion.) I encourage scratch build in my group. Some people like to sculpt and model, more than just a bitz conversions. Rules curbing artistic endeavor are problematic for me.

I specified this rule to basically be 'no bullshit on the table'. If someone's laid down a piss-poor imitation Baneblade or something similar, that's a hell of a lot different than a customized Warboss or IG Commander.

10- No dice cast on the table. Scatter Dice - Not a fan of this rule. Maybe better for me would be "Control your dice, you're grown-ass men!" Be responsible players. Treat the hard work that others have put into models and the terrain with a little bit of respect.

I should have refined this to state that scatters were legit on the table. One of my secret concerns here is losing dice- the dog thinks that anything colorful on the floor is a Skittle so he tries to eat it. All our house dice are bright colors and differently colored (for different weapons, etc).

But we use a lot of scenery, so it's just easier to do my room service cart tray.

 

[Iraqiel]

Interesting thread, thanks for sharing.

I've been a part of a few clubs, but the transience of members and difficulty in raising funds to play somewhere (none of us had houses until recently) killed them in the three states I've been in.

Typically, we've moved to having facebook groups where people propose games and if you get a bad rep, you get booted. Solves the theft problem too somewhat, since you have access to a facebook profile.

 

[Brother Armiger]

Thanks for your input. Our local gaming scenes are hurting a bit, and a lot of older gamers are just looking for a comfortable place to game. Our biggest problems in my area are kind of... weird. I'll try to be as rational and reasonable as I can while I explain them.

1- Kids. People just don't watch their kids in the gaming store. Fortunately, most stores are now working toward a 'no unsupervised children, no one under 16 after 7pm without an adult' rule but we don't know if it's going to work. I know one particular store owner said he's had four minors shoplifting in his store in less than a month.

2- Tables are getting harder to book. And it doesn't help that one of these stores will take down tables to make room for the card gamers. Nothing against card games or the people who play them, but I've been repeatedly disappointed to find that the tables have been cleared for more children to play Paradox Billiards Vostroyan Roulette Fourth-Dimensional Hypercube Chess Strip Poker.

3- Uh... this one's hard, but let's just say 'No Politics' kind of also means 'no pushing ideologies'. We have a um... group of very pushy people in the area that have noticed a certain 'blog', one that references some pretty horrible things happening to someone. So there's a bit of a witch hunt for someone exercising 'wrongthink' in the gaming community, and some of these folks are taking it upon themselves to police the community. I'd love to say 'they will find nothing wrong at my table', but if they can't find something wrong- they find something and make it wrong. You can't reason with them, you can't ask them to leave you in peace- they'll just smear you.

 

[ArkInRev]

The smear blog is certainly awkward for it to be a reasonably expected threat, but a determined group could still leverage the veil of secrecy as proof of their agenda, and avoid accusation, slander, or libel with proper phrasing.

Alcohol being provided or consumed is a good reason for an age limit. There is overhead to avoid the liability of underage drinking which can impact the club experience.

Game shops or clubs are not daycare. However, rule number 5 actually fully addresses children without the age restriction. Your child is your guest, and you must both mind them and contribute to your game.

This next part might be a little bit long winded, but I sort of want to explain where I am comping from on the proxy/scratch build/3rd party thing:

Having a fully painted WYSIWYG army on the table is exciting to see and play against. In practice, that's been true for a few games. After the initial shine wears off, you realize you're playing the same army, because in practice, a lot of players that I've encountered only have so many points fully modeled, which limits to an extent, their list building capability. Often times, when players have variation, you're greeted with the endless gray tide of resin. For my personal enjoyment of the game, I'd rather proxy a painted plasma gun as a grav gun, rather than see an unpainted gray WYSIWYG model.

From what I've encountered in the wild, and this is anecdotal of course, is that veterans of the game are often more guilty of this than new players. I've seen a lot of new players with one army just continually progress on their army, because they sort of cherish that first thing, and have some paint on everything. Veterans, however, often grow tired of an army, start several armies, have several projects at once, etc, which leaves incomplete headless models on the table or large amounts of unpainted troops. This isn't to disparage their ambition, but in the quest for WYSIWYG, you sacrifice an aesthetic enjoyment. Often, these WYSIWYG armies are very static. They were built with purpose, and since this isn't a studio army, it's limited in scope. After some number of games, it gets boring to encounter basically the same thing over and over.

As for the ugly Baneblade, I have a somewhat differing opinion. I buy most of my models used. Many of them have been absolutely butchered. I strip and repaint them with varying degrees of success. If you've seen, which no doubt you have, some of the tragic efforts that I've seen, you'll know that just because it started off as a GW model, doesn't mean that it looks good, or anything like, what you expected to see on the table. Because of the spirit of the game, and not the spirit of modeling, I would absolutely allow a model on the board, because I want to play that dynamic game rather than penalize someone for their participation award modeling skills.

Of course, aesthetically, I'd rather see WYSIWYG models that are painted reasonably well on the table. Reflecting on the past... probably dozen or so games I've played, some with 10 year veterans, I can't think of a single game that had fully painted models on my opponent's side. I'd rather see a painted scratch built/3rd party model than an unpainted GW one.

As for exclusion: If I were too exclude my opponents models from play that were either incomplete or poorly executed, my list of available opponents would just be demolished. And even basing it solely on aesthetic, I'd rather include a well executed 3rd party model than a poorly executed GW one. I'm sure my models would be excluded from games just because others don't like my style. Fortunately, this hobby is both modeling and gaming, so I get to be included, even if my models are not all pretty.

At the end of the day, however, I want to play the game. I want the lists to be dynamic and fresh, and my desire for the game to take place in new and interesting ways overshadows the aesthetic appeal to me. Most players just don't have their entire codex available to them in model form, and if a proxy can get me a game that is something other than a tournament netlist, I will be the first person on board to allow it.

So: I know that was quite a long rant from me about my personal preference, but this is sort of coming from a dissonance that I see in the community (outside of tournaments) There is often this "I paid good money" on models and "It can't look bad" etc. sort of predominant vocalization. However, when I go to a FLGS or just find a random opponent, I'm not seeing that ideal taking shape. If the issue is that "the game is meant to be played with these models" sort of thing, that's fine, but I would also argue that it means they should have heads, arms, and weapons attached, probably with a coat of paint. If, however, an incomplete model is acceptable, then really, aesthetics are not really the driving force behind the policy. The thread that remains is usually, "I spent $X on my model, and they think they get to play by spending $Y." I don't have any interest in knowing, nor frankly is it any of my business, how much another player spent on models. If one player gets theirs at 90% ebay discounts, another at full price, and a third scratch builds for an amount somewhere in between, I just don't see how the $ spent is an admitting factor. I've spent more on scratch build models than some ebay auctions. Would that mean that the ebay discount models should not be included because other players paid full price? I understand where you are coming from to an extent, but spending as a factor on a gaming club feels wrong.

To me, and I'm an old-timer when it comes to this game, the spirit of wargaming was a hybrid modeling game, where creativity and craftsmanship was included as part of the experience. Limiting to specific models or X% of a model is just not inspiring to me.

In most places, outside of GW shops and maybe tournaments, fully painted high quality armies are just in the minority. When they are present, it has been for me very static when it comes to what you're playing.


For my enjoyment of the game, I need players to proxy weapons, vehicles, and units. I need to allow those unpainted or butchered GW models. The idyllic game is just such a rarity that I would not be able to get a game in if aesthetics were a prerequisite. I don't just need these things to enjoy the hobby, i need them so that I can participate in it at all.

TLDR: Despite all that I've included here: You can set the standard that you want to set. While I've seen it claimed that clubs have these restrictions, I've never seen it in almost 3 decades of GW wargaming. In the 3rd party of non-GW spaces I've been involved in, unpainted models are a foreign concept.

Anyway, just tossing some counter points out there.

 

[Rush Darling]

Very interesting posts guys, it's always interesting to hear how other clubs are run, and I'm with Ark on the "More interested in the game" side of things. A very kind opponent of mine once let me use a coffee cup to proxy as a Tyrannocyte back when I'd just kicked off with kids. (Bit of a stretch, I know). Unfortunately I may have promptly forgotten that it WAS a Tyrannocyte (was a rather large game) and I didn't question the hill-squatting coffee cup until towards the end of the game. Lost at least four turns of movement / shooting xD

We're all for proxying at our local club, whether it's a try before you buy scenario with the closest available approximate model standing in, or as Ark mentioned, simple a guy with one weapon in his hand but another on the list. That said, we do try to keep it within reason, as as I mentioned above it can get hard to keep track of very, very quickly.

As for my local club, we're very fortunate in that my friend opens his rather sizeable garage to the group, and bwhilst initially most of the scenery I attendance was just stuff I've picked up over the years, we now have quite a good collection of contributed pieces. The group itself has pretty strong ties (we're about 11 strong at the moment) such as family, people who went to school together, people who served together etc, so we haven't had any trouble with theft yet, and that's kind of become the unofficial entry criteria. It may have stymied growth, but we pretty regularly have the maximum number of tables set up on a Friday, so I think we're happy to keep it small and neat for now. I think growing too fast could pose a lot of problems none of us would like to deal with.

We have a very loose rule in the form of the three Fs: Flyers, Formations and Forgeworld. The basic format being if that you're bringing any of the 3, it's polite to declare it. It was taken far more seriously in it's inception, and it mostly came about from someone stomping a relatively new player with the likes of a Fire Raptor and a Storm Eagle. Nobody enjoys a completely one sided game, and it was implemented just to try and inform your opponent of how hard you're cheesing without actually giving away the list. These days most folks generally know the gist, so the cheese is spread pretty evenly which makes for some cracking games.

 

[Brother Armiger]

The smear blog is certainly awkward for it to be a reasonably expected threat, but a determined group could still leverage the veil of secrecy as proof of their agenda, and avoid accusation, slander, or libel with proper phrasing.

Let me put it another way, I'm more worried about being harassed by a certain type of person that has a sort of... 'moral authoritarian' ideology. We live near a major University and these types of people are reaching out.

Anyway, as to the proxy models there's a degree to which I'll flex. If someone ordered a tank or something, and already has the books and he's just testing it out to see how it will work- I'm fine with that. It's when someone is legitimately trying to play models he doesn't own or intend to by within a reasonable time frame that I'd draw the line. So far, everyone is playing legit models with the exception of a few things here and there (usually smaller models or modifications).

 

[Starbuck]

Now I am super curious to know which University.