Sunday Sermon: Now with added FREE!!!

  
   

Well I guess now the Blog is a year old I should be reminiscing about the good old times shouldn't I? But I guess I did that yesterday. Speaking of which, do spread the word about those prizes, they're well worth winning. This isn't going to be a long drawn out Sunday Sermon either today, mainly because I'm a little bit busy right now doing other less interesting things, and well, I guess I'd rather people read my  Birthday article. There is a point to me directing you towards that post though, even if it is a tenuous link. You see in that post I am offering my readers an awful lot of 'free' as it were. Products kindly donated by companies to help celebrate my Blogs Birthday, but companies obviously don't do such things out of the goodness of their hearts alone. They'll have weighed up the pro's and con's of doing so, and decided that there was something in it for them.


Maybe it's just that they really like me and think I'm splendid! You know and having me for a friend seems worth it. But I doubt it, far more likely is the fact that they see this Blog as a good place to promote their products. That my readership are the sorts of people they want to be targeting their products at... which isn't a surprise to me because I've been pimping those guys products myself because I love them, so it's a good thing. Marketing types call this a 'synergy'. So here's the thing, I got to thinking the other day what a terrible influence I am on my friends, and now all you lot who read my Blog. I mean I've always chucked the odd free mini from this range or that to my friends that I've purchased myself, to get them interested in a game. You know, "here, have this spare Anima Tactic's mini I've got kicking around" or "here, you want this Prussian fleet for Dystopian Wars? I'm not using it"... it's normally worked too.

Meh pimp paw iz way strong

I then did even more thinking, it's kind of difficult to stop my brain once it is in motion. In reality I got into wargaming myself when my dad gifted me my first ever miniature, a small car for Battlecars, which yeah OK I painted shocking pink and lurid yellow, I was young, impressionable and had terrible taste in colour schemes. Some might say not much has changed. So I asked a few friends what got them into the hobby, you know as you do. They obviously started regailing me with tales of the game they played first, Hero Quest, 40k, but I pressed them further. What exactly was it about the game or the experience that worked? Most couldn't actually tell you anything about the game... but they did remember somebody gave them a mini for free, almost 9 times out of 10. Frustratingly its actually 8.73 times out of 10, rounding up to 2 decimal places, plus I'm not so sure it's a representative sample! You get the point though, whether it was a free plastic Marine from Games Workshop, or a friend giving them the Orks and Gretchin from the second edition 40k starter set, an awful lot of people it seems were introduced to the hobby via a gift of some sort. A promo if you will.

Toy soldiers just as addictive... just not as lucrative!

There is another industry that is famous for such similar, free sample, try before you buy tactics... the drugs trade! Yep the old joke about Games Workshop miniatures being plastic crack might not be too far from the truth. Because once the hobby has its claws in you, and if you accept a free sample it will get its claws into you, it is like an addiction for some of us. Hopefully not it's not quite as life destroying as an addiction to narcotics is... but seeing some of my friends faces and how their lives have gone I do wander! So here's the thing, think back to when you first got into the hobby, did someone give you a free miniature? Was it really the game that hooked you? Or was it that first illicit hit of the free good stuff? Be honest with yourself, there's no shame in admitting you like the pretty shinies. I make no secret of my sordid tactics of enticing people into the hobby, I'm a pimp and a pusher of toy soldiers, I'm the Stringer Bell of wargames... I just have to hope the Omar of wargames doesn't shoot me in the head now, for some perceived injustice!

some of your projects are NEVER going to happen!!!

So where the hell am I going with all this? I normally have a point somewhere don't I? Even if it takes me far too bloody long to get to it! How many of you have unwanted and unloved miniatures kicking around your attic, or at the bottom of the painting pile, or under the painting desk, so forth and so on? How many times do you look at that unpainted Ork horde or the unfinished Space Marine army you were going to do, maybe the second Infinity faction you were going to do but you then brought Aleph and think... well after I've finished my Grey Knights? Look you're an addict and I know it's difficult for some of you to admit that, and to think about giving up some of the "good stuff", but here's the truth of it... you're never finishing that project! However, IF you give the gift of an unwanted and unused mini to somebody you know who might be interested in the hobby, you are likely to created a new wargamer to play against. Now look at all those mini's you'll NEVER use... yeah that's right, you could be a one gamer mega recruiting phenomenon all on your lonesome couldn't you? So why not become a games pimp yourself? Peace out!