Gaming Club

[Briggsy]

Hi All,

What is the best way of finding a Gaming club in your area, I live in Southampton and a part from GW I can't find any clubs in this area.

Thanks

[snowblizz]

Have you tried this:
http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/conte ... =community


Also on TWF there's are *loads* of UK players so look at:
http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewforum.php?f=15

Here's one on the first page taking about Southhampton
http://warhammer.org.uk/phpBB/viewtopic ... 15&t=77829

[Briggsy]

Snowblizz, that's really great, thank you.....

[Briggsy]

Just to ask is the warhammer forum a centralized forum for all WH players, as I've been looking for one like this for ages?

Thanks

[snowblizz]

Just to ask is the warhammer forum a centralized forum for all WH players, as I've been looking for one like this for ages?

Thanks

I'm not certain I'd call any forum "centralised" anymore, but it is definitely one of the biggest forums currently yes. It is one of the chief ones, I'd say, with a lot of tournament organisers and the European Team Championships using the forum as gathering place. So yeah I guess it kinda is.

Just a word of caution, TWF is a big boys place. Don't text speak, and wear an asbestos suit. While flaming and name-calling isn't allowed and mods will crack down on anyway doing so there's always something that slips under the radar. Don't be the guy with a single digit post count arguing with someone with one in the thousands, let alone argue in the face of everyone else's quoted rules. I've actually seen that happen. Discussions about unclear rules can get kind of heated, people on TWF take WH seriously mostly and threads do end up locked as a result, but usually the worst excesses are avoided. TWF is not Frothers after all.
Browse around a bit before starting to post so you'll know where you're at. Sounds worse than it is, but better forewarned than... I can't remember how that ends...

I have seen a lot of recent join ups going essentially:

New poster: hi guys this warHAmster roxxers i have this big mosnter and i wonder if it can fly around if i sputter like an airplane
Poster1: Read the rules.
New poster: waht do you mean
Poster 2: Read the rules, here's the link to them. Also read the game's rules.
New poster: why are you being so mean I'm new
Poster 3: RAED THE GODDAMN RULES ALREADY AND STOP POSTING TEXTSPEAK
Poster 4: Poster 3, why don't YOU read the gorram rules as well?
Poster 3: Poster 4, yo momma!

It's a grossly oversimplified worst case scenario I'll admit. But still, there was a mom who came to ask questions and didn't like the answers she got and complained about it which sparked something of row. It went on longer than it should have since mods didn't notice, but I have to say I think both "sides" were to blame in that.

[IBBoard]

Warhammer.org.uk is unofficial, but probably is one of the largest forums (incidentally, I don't have a clue how they get away with using GW's trademark in their domain - I'd have thought GW Legal would have been down on them like a ton of bricks). GW used to have their own forums, but it looked like it was 10 years out of date in terms of functionality and I don't think it was as popular as some other sites.

Snowblizz is right on gaming clubs - the Gaming Club Network is the best place to look. It used to be much more disorganised, but GW now keeps a "master list" of those clubs that registered with them. Most clubs will accept newbies, but some might be a bit more "pro" and be playing tournament-style games rather than being a rounded hobby experience for all-comers. If you're close enough then GW stores can be quite useful, though. I had a number of good games in Manchester's Arndale Centre on Thursday nights (and once the rest of the centre closed then we got to spread out on the floor outside the front of the shop )

[snowblizz]

Warhammer.org.uk is unofficial, but probably is one of the largest forums (incidentally, I don't have a clue how they get away with using GW's trademark in their domain - I'd have thought GW Legal would have been down on them like a ton of bricks). GW used to have their own forums, but it looked like it was 10 years out of date in terms of functionality and I don't think it was as popular as some other sites.

Actually GW's forums were extremely popular, in fact part of their problem. Almost every Warhammer player who had online access tended to end up there. They were starting to crack at the edges I think in terms of size and effort so they decided to pull the plug. And they *were* getting a bit out of hand as well. It certainly didn't help that GW categorically refused to listen to its customers or take them into consideration.

I'm not sure pissing of perhaps the most influential group of Warhammer players in the world is a smart choice. They used to be the WPS (Warhammer Players Society) the club based in/close to GW's HQ so they are actually almost semi-official. I can see why even GW Legal would know enough to not make a fuss. Of course what GW claims is protected and what really is are quite different things. IIRC their legal pages they are actually asking people not to use their trademark as a domain names. Admittedly a Blood Bowl forum they managed to close down. But that was sorta running commercially or something. It is entirely possible that they can't stop you from using warhammer as a name. You might after all be talking about a type of weapon popular in the medieval times.

[IBBoard]

If you've got the "War Hammer Appreciation Society" at "WarHammerSoc.org" then I can see that they can't do anything, but if you go for "Warhammer Chaos Gamers" at "WarhammerChaos.org" then you're using their trademark in the trading domain of your site, giving it a more official appearance, which is something that the law would almost certainly come down on GW's side for. There will be "fair use" exceptions, but they're generally probably correct. Trademarks don't have a commercial aspect, though - it is all "use it or lose it" (unlike copyright, which you can sit on for years and do nothing).

As for the forums, personally I a) didn't find out about them for ages (they're a company, why would they have had forums? plus they weren't high in searches when I was looking for forums) and b) didn't see as many topics as I'd have expected when I did go there, giving the impression that some of the larger unofficial ones were more popular. The format of those old forums probably didn't help the cracks at the edges either - it wasn't a "proper" forum, it was an ancient old mailing-list-style interface or something from what I remember!

[Briggsy]

Thanks Guys, some great advice there, so GW don't have there own forum now? That's crap considering that would be the best place to go to find out about stuff...

Any other "big name" forum sites you can recommend? Or is TWF just so good as any?

Do Wayland Games have a forum or sponsor one?

Thanks

[IBBoard]

IMO it was for the best - the forums were terrible, and you won't get as good an environment on an official corporate forum as you would on a community forum, even if the company is a gaming company.

I don't know of any Wayland-related forums, but there might be something. I doubt they sponsor any, although there will be a number who have affiliate links like we do.

The forum you end up at will depend on what you want. There are communities per race, so you can get tailored expertise and discussion, or there are wider communities that cover a little bit of everything. If you join a gaming club then they may have their own forum as well, or they may be a sub-community within another forum (i.e. all of their members are just registered at the same forums and know that they're there, but aren't officially recognised by the forum in any way)

[snowblizz]

There's "Warseer" pretty big, but I don't frequent myself. I'm registered but the place just isn't pleasant to browse for me. I don't know why, it could be the colour scheme.

There are a couple of others.
"Bell of Lost Souls" has a community
"Dakka Dakka"
"Bolter and Chainsword"

I can give some pointers for race specific ones which seems more lively nowadays

I'm also a member of (which is where I happened to see IBBoard ask for people for his project:
http://www.warvault.net/warhammer_realm/
but it's gone very quiet nowadays, traffic feeds traffic and the inverse is unfortunately true as well

I'm surprised you didn't frequent GW's boards, they were kind of the place to be back then. They had a very nice developer's forum eg which I always felt had a lot of value. Most companies in the market have official forums which they use to communicate with their customers, only reasonable way to do it really.

[IBBoard]

I know of Dakka Dakka, B&C and Warseer, although I always got the impression they were more 40K-centric. I may have accounts on some of them that have been unused for years as well! I agree that Warseer is a bit rough on the eyes (black and bright pastel blue). I was on Warhammer Realm as well (we have Warvault links and I helped them out with a few bits) but it did go quiet. Not that we're ever busy, but I'm always here (and have been for nearly ten years now!) It's a shame when places die, but traffic is they key and I've never worked out quite how to get it :\

I must have discovered the GW forums quite late on. I didn't know they had one, and hadn't expected them to be tech-savvy enough or willing enough to have one because of all of the effort it required. I know companies have forums for feedback, but discussion and general chatter tends to be different. I guess RelicNews was Relic's unofficially official forums, though (it wasn't run by Relic, but it was for all of their games and the official site pointed to it as the unofficial community, making it semi-official). I support Privateer Press have their own forums as well, but they're somehow more "indie" than GW