A good start I imagine would be to start by introducing myself. My name's Sean and I currently live in the wonderful village of St Agnes, Cornwall in the UK. I'm 32 and live with my beautiful fiancee and our two cats.
Just yesterday I took the decision to reacquaint myself with the Games Workshop hobby. I've had something of an on/off relationship with the hobby over the past 18 years. Last year though I took the bold move of getting rid of my substantial accumulated collections after deciding that finally, I was done with the hobby. Hindsight is great isn't it?!
My interaction with Games Workshop all started back at secondary school, Woodhouse High School in Tamworth when I was I think, fourteen. My friend Thomas was telling our group of friends about this game that he'd like us to have a go at, I think including Thomas that there were four of us who agreed to give it a go. So one day we rocked up at his parents house and sat around the dining table to find out some more about this game as until that point I hadn't really got any idea what I'd signed up for. The game that Thomas had for us was Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay.
My memory of the actual game that we played have all but passed into the fuzzy haze that is my excuse for a memory. I do have some vague memory of rolling up that stat's for my character who if memory serves me was a Halfling Alchemist. I came away from the game hooked though and couldn't wait for the next session. Sadly though, not all of our group were hooked and arranging subsequent games never really happened.
So it was that Thomas invited me on a later occasion to join him for a game called Warhammer. He started explaining the rules to me and showed me a selection of the models. Again we played on his parents dining table and I learned the rules as we went. I have a suspicion that I played High Elves, this was the version of Warhammer that came with cardboard "models" for the Wyvern & Griffon. I had great fun playing this tabletop game. Returning home it was just before Christmas and my parents saw the addition of new toys from Games Workshop added to my Christmas list that year.
After the first game of Warhammer I bought my first edition of White Dwarf and became a subscriber for 15 years. I remember the issue really quite well as it had the first battle report for the newly released Warhammer 40,000 pitting the Orks against Blood Angels. That Christmas I received Warhammer 40,000, the RTB01 boxed set and some paints. I don't think my family saw much of me that Christmas as I was busily assembling and painting models. This was a trend set to continue for quite some time.
My first games of Warhammer 40,000 were played against Thomas or my brother, Liam who I seem to remember press-ganging into playing even though it didn't interest him. It was a great game. Orks became my favourite army for Warhammer 40,000 and it wasn't long before I'd amassed 2,500 points of these rather poorly painted blighters.
It wasn't long until I had a hankering to try Warhammer Fantasy again and I decided upon an Empire army. In hindsight I don't really understand what led me to that decision but it ultimately became the starting point of the collection which in later years was to become my biggest army. By the time I cleared out my collections I had accumulated some 15,000 points of Empire all fully painted. I think the biggest game I took part in with my Empire army was a 16 hour game against Gareth who brought a Lizardmen army to the value of some 12,000 points per side at Games Workshop in Stockport. In more recent years the largest battle was playing a part of (I think) a 40,000 point per side game with some players from Games Workshop Truro.
While partaking of the Games Workshop hobby I've lived in different parts of the UK including Tamworth, Ambleside, Stockport, Truro & St Agnes so it's been difficult to keep active with a regular group of gamers. Probably the biggest affiliation I had was with the club Northwest Warriors led by Adam (Woregore) and afterwards I think I was part of Marple Marauders. I'm soon to move again but not so far, to Redruth where I hope to stay for the foreseeable!
With the Northwest Warriors came my finest hours as a Warhammer player, taking part in a number of Grand Tournaments at Warhammer World as well as regional Conflicts and other events. I even managed to win Conflict Edinburgh with an all mounted Empire army once!
In between both Warhammer systems I've played every Specialist game system released by Games Workshop back to Dark Future. I still have Space Hulk, Blood Bowl & Talisman but lack willing participants so haven't played them in years. Outside of the Games Workshop range I've only really played Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay & Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire is an amazing game and I have fond memories of the story led by Phil from Morecambe and wish that I could find a group and get back into that again.
By the time I walked away I'd collected many armies of varying points for both Warhammer systems. Today I hear that Warhammer 40,000 is the most popular system played locally so I'll be getting back into that. I just have to choose an army, can save that for another post surely as this one's long enough already!
What caused me to walk away last time was how competitive the players had become and the concept of the powergamer was prevalent. Hopefully I'm ready for it this time.
So it was that Thomas invited me on a later occasion to join him for a game called Warhammer. He started explaining the rules to me and showed me a selection of the models. Again we played on his parents dining table and I learned the rules as we went. I have a suspicion that I played High Elves, this was the version of Warhammer that came with cardboard "models" for the Wyvern & Griffon. I had great fun playing this tabletop game. Returning home it was just before Christmas and my parents saw the addition of new toys from Games Workshop added to my Christmas list that year.
After the first game of Warhammer I bought my first edition of White Dwarf and became a subscriber for 15 years. I remember the issue really quite well as it had the first battle report for the newly released Warhammer 40,000 pitting the Orks against Blood Angels. That Christmas I received Warhammer 40,000, the RTB01 boxed set and some paints. I don't think my family saw much of me that Christmas as I was busily assembling and painting models. This was a trend set to continue for quite some time.
My first games of Warhammer 40,000 were played against Thomas or my brother, Liam who I seem to remember press-ganging into playing even though it didn't interest him. It was a great game. Orks became my favourite army for Warhammer 40,000 and it wasn't long before I'd amassed 2,500 points of these rather poorly painted blighters.
It wasn't long until I had a hankering to try Warhammer Fantasy again and I decided upon an Empire army. In hindsight I don't really understand what led me to that decision but it ultimately became the starting point of the collection which in later years was to become my biggest army. By the time I cleared out my collections I had accumulated some 15,000 points of Empire all fully painted. I think the biggest game I took part in with my Empire army was a 16 hour game against Gareth who brought a Lizardmen army to the value of some 12,000 points per side at Games Workshop in Stockport. In more recent years the largest battle was playing a part of (I think) a 40,000 point per side game with some players from Games Workshop Truro.
While partaking of the Games Workshop hobby I've lived in different parts of the UK including Tamworth, Ambleside, Stockport, Truro & St Agnes so it's been difficult to keep active with a regular group of gamers. Probably the biggest affiliation I had was with the club Northwest Warriors led by Adam (Woregore) and afterwards I think I was part of Marple Marauders. I'm soon to move again but not so far, to Redruth where I hope to stay for the foreseeable!
With the Northwest Warriors came my finest hours as a Warhammer player, taking part in a number of Grand Tournaments at Warhammer World as well as regional Conflicts and other events. I even managed to win Conflict Edinburgh with an all mounted Empire army once!
In between both Warhammer systems I've played every Specialist game system released by Games Workshop back to Dark Future. I still have Space Hulk, Blood Bowl & Talisman but lack willing participants so haven't played them in years. Outside of the Games Workshop range I've only really played Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay & Vampire: The Masquerade, Vampire is an amazing game and I have fond memories of the story led by Phil from Morecambe and wish that I could find a group and get back into that again.
By the time I walked away I'd collected many armies of varying points for both Warhammer systems. Today I hear that Warhammer 40,000 is the most popular system played locally so I'll be getting back into that. I just have to choose an army, can save that for another post surely as this one's long enough already!
What caused me to walk away last time was how competitive the players had become and the concept of the powergamer was prevalent. Hopefully I'm ready for it this time.
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