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Traditionalists vs. The New BreedIf this was a national magazine we might be able to get a raging debate going here. Unfortunately our club members appear to be broadminded about this sort of thing. Although there does normally seem to be a split on what people play based largely on age, lately club games have been all over the place. Older members have recently been seen playing a version of "Awful Green Things From Outer Space (Doctor Who Style)". The proposal for a forthcoming club day has been a kind of fantasy Battle of Britain, with words such as Orc Balloons, Flying Dinosaurs, Ratmen on Gliders and Dragons being bandied around with no sense of shame and definitely no dignity, (You know who you are). At shows across the country populated with impressively painted ranks upon ranks of ancients, medievals and muskets, our contribution has been dinosaurs, fronted by an inflatable Godzilla with (gasp in horror) sweets as prizes. I believe that it is now time to say enough is enough, we must try to restore the stifling atmosphere that should be prevalent in our dearly cherished hobby. It is time that we returned to the days of toy soldiers, when people could barely distinguish between a zulu and a redcoat except for the colours that they were painted. We need to return to a time when to achieve variety each model had to be individually converted with bits of streched plastic sprue. A time when each model had its coat size painted on the inside of its collar, and animated poses were unheard of. The problem with today's hobby is that it is too accessible to the masses, who have been weaned into the game by that source of all misery, the Evil Empire That Shall Not Be Named (mainly for fear of legal action). These youngsters, many with no grounding in real toy soldiering have been accustomed to being spoon fed a diet of easy to understand games, with attractive, well modelled figures. They should be learning as we learned, when you had to travel 50 miles to the nearest supplier and mail order used to take 6 months (if you were lucky!). In closing, I feel that we can all take steps to make this a better hobby. We need to act as mature adults, with responsibilities rather than rights. Our responsibility should be to put of anyone under the age of 60 from even thinking of joining our hallowed ranks, and return this hobby to its golden era. I thank you. |