I have been involved with ATS for many years, spent too much money, and am a proud member of the 5 people that have been permanently banned from the CH forum, and probably the only person to post images of game play. Although it would be cool to be back on their board.
I remember when movement and firing were two separate turns. Now a days, there seems to be an overarching statement that , more or less, you can pick and choose what rules you want, and that if the rules re not clear, you just have to be in your game developer/explorer mindset and not worry about it. ( my words)
I enjoy the game, but, I do not like the constant changes, the drift towards ASL rules, and the continuing jockeying of the counter sizes. I enjoy what I have, the art is cool, the counters are great, especially the big ones.
I feel I have been burned by their pricing, and re-issuing.
All in all, there seem to be no players in Austin, whereas there is a great ASL community in Ausitn, San Antonio, Houston, and Dallas.
My strategy is to buy cheap on ebay as much as possible, but in the last 18 months I have not bought because there is just to much stuff, and only a collector of stuff would be interested in it all. I'd love to get some of everything, but the pricing, for me, is not legit.
My 2 cents is that nobody is really into it all that much, to bad. I miss Uncle Ted :-(
Here is the forum view, last
60 days. Maybe I did the filter wrong, but it is an honest effort at looking at the traffic in the main forum.
I don't do face to face, as with family and work, way to busy to spend an entire saturday playing, and would not be a reliable VASL, er.. VATS player.
Take it for what it's worth, but there is only one central Texas player I know, but he is to far, and as I mentioned, no time.