Club vs Country

WARNING: Sports related post!

Well, it has been quite sometime and there's a toys twist a few paras in at least ;)

This is Joe Simpson, live-wire scrum half for my beloved London Wasps, one of the club's star players. On the fringe of the full England squad for a while now, the foot injury to Danny Care has seen him included in the World Cup squad.

Good for him, well deserved BUT this means that Wasps will be without him for the new season's start and with a lot of new faces and many other big names already injured pre-season. As effectively 3rd choice how much meaningful game time will he get? What will be the knock on when he returns to the club?

This is nothing new amongst any team sport, all standard stuff, but it did set my mind wandering to nerdy wargames comparisons and the best inter-dynamic I could come up with was Game vs Company i.e. games, figures, genre that you like / dislike versus their manufacturer that you may like / dislike...... bear with me?

GW has to be the obvious first "hit". I love the figures, the settings and artwork. Once upon a time I played (and worked) it all. Now it's Blood Bowl, Necromunda and Mordheim. As much as it would be cool to dive into a new Ogre army the horrific cost and ropey ruleset just stops me dead.

I've previously got in on the ground floor of a number of big hitters in the form of Flames of War (Battlefield) and Warmachine (Privateer Press) back when artwork was black and white the books fell apart and their forums were almost just one big FAQ but the game, the community and the company were bending over backwards to be fun and accessible.

I suppose that with success comes inevitable change to what is labelled as a GW-centric business model. Having recycled sometime ago I'd now be looking at a £200 / £300 layout to get back in bed with either of them! Maybe I'm just whinging again??

Two Hour Wargames churn out great PDF rules that are just that, you sort out the rest. No problem with that as me and my lot are long enough in the tooth to do so but many aren't. Love them but hate that they're so limited.

Finally Spartan Games. Still got my Uncharted Seas, resisted Firestorm Armada, sorely tempted by Dystopian Wars. Wasn't bothered by non-digitally mastered figures a version 1.5 reprint or a relatively slow release schedule. Loved the fast, fun, simple skirmish level games that they are. WIN - WIN.

My ramble has become a rant, I'll stop :)

P.S: just for the record for me this is never about expenditure of time / money / effort only ever about RETURN!