Poll: Time spent on ASL versus other Wargames

[M.Koch]

90% ASL and 10% orhers, in this case WH40K Kill Team.

 

[Thunderchief]

90% ASL and 10% others:
Others being S&T magazine games, MBT, GMT WW2 "XX" and EFront games, SCS, BCS, OCS, a few VG Fleet games and my game to be started on day 1 of retirement (still a few years away): GDWs Fire in the East.

 

[pensatl1962]

Wargames: ASL 100%
Other games that are not wargames: Mahjong
Other hobby (50% of my liberty card time): model railroading.

 

[BattleSchool]

model railroading.

Sadly a fading pursuit. Still have a box of HO scale parts sitting idle on a closet shelf. One day, he says...

 

[BattleSchool]

When I actually get around to playing a game (rather than reading about it, sorting counters, etc.), 99% of the time it's ASL.

 

[pensatl1962]

Sadly a fading pursuit. Still have a box of HO scale parts sitting idle on a closet shelf. One day, he says...

I was reading the monthly newsletter of my local division of the Natl Model Railroaders Association this morning and the Division Superintendent was bemoaning the fact that the hobby is aging out. Few newcomers are entering the hobby. Barriers to entry are remarkably similar to ASL. As are the pleasures one can derive from them.

 

[Robin Reeve]

I was reading the monthly newsletter of my local division of the Natl Model Railroaders Association this morning and the Division Superintendent was bemoaning the fact that the hobby is aging out. Few newcomers are entering the hobby. Barriers to entry are remarkably similar to ASL. As are the pleasures one can derive from them.

Same fate for both hobbies...
I said a word of it in the "MMP and 25+ years of stewardship of ASL" thread:

ASL will fade away, as will stamp collecting and model railways...
Nothing good or bad.
The wheel of time is simply turning.

 

[Carln0130]

What other games?

The correct answer, of course.

 

[wrongway149]

I've been burnt out on ASL for a while now, so in order to recharge my batteries and also justify to myself all the other games I buy, I've been playing some other games the past two years. For most of the period 2001-2023, ASL was about 90% of my wargaming.

When I first started ASL ('91?), it soon became the 'everlasting gobstopper' of wargames for me.

 

[aiabx]

Wargaming: 100% ASL, nothing else scratches that itch.
Boardgames, 10% ASL, the rest Ticket to Ride, Wingspan, Power Grid, that sort of thing with the wife and our friends.

 

[Houlie]

Aging out... One of the gearheads at my Friday morning coffee said the same thing about classic cars/hotrods. He read the average age of an owner is 70(!). I was shocked for a moment until I thought about it, and yes, most of the classic cars guys I see are old(er). He predicted that the market for these cars will suffer as folks inheriting them will be uninterested in keeping them. Today's young people have little interest in many of the things we used to do when we were younger: wargaming, model building, coin/stamp collecting, telescopes, model railroading, reading a book, etc.

 

[Houlie]

90% ASL / 10% other

I took a breather from ASL ~2015 to ~2018 as I was getting a bit burned out. So, for that period I played maybe 25% ASL / 75% other. The 75% consisted of mostly GMT-produced games (Mark Simonitch WW2 series, COIN, Virgin Queen, Sekigahara, etc.), plus some euros. These were all played at the First Minnesota Wargaming Group at the local game store almost every Friday night. It was a blast and I met some great people and played some great games. However, attending Friday nights after a long work week became difficult for me. Then the pandemic pretty much broke the back of what was arguably one of the most vibrant gaming groups in the nation. Around that time, ASL's Lorelei was singing her siren song wooing me back to near full time ASL commitment with a few non-ASL game every so often. A key part of that was the amzing blessing I/we have with availability of VASL to play any time we want. Glad to be back at 90%/10%.

 

[BattleSchool]

Today's young people have little interest in many of the things we used to do when we were younger: wargaming, model building, coin/stamp collecting, telescopes, model railroading, reading a book, etc.

It sadden means that I've no family members to leave my scale models and tools, RR paraphenalia, stamp collection, war-games, maps, and thousands of books, most, but not all, military related. As a history buff, it pains me to see the stuff of an era binned, never to be enjoyed again. Perhaps that's on us for not trying hard enough to get younger people interested, but I've got a nagging feeling that your assessment is spot on.

 

[Actionjick]

It sadden means that I've no family members to leave my scale models and tools, RR paraphenalia, stamp collection, war-games, maps, and thousands of books, most, but not all, military related. As a history buff, it pains me to see the stuff of an era binned, never to be enjoyed again. Perhaps that's on us for not trying hard enough to get younger people interested, but I've got a nagging feeling that your assessment is spot on.

You can't hold back the tide with a fork and it seems the tide of " progress " will wash away much that us old geezers found entertaining.

 

[Robin Reeve]

Just to shed a small glimpse of hope on this globally sad picture, boardgaming as a whole is a growing hobby.
Our niche game within the niche historical wargame category is dying, but playing around a table with family or friends is still a thing.

 

[ozradio]

My wargaming is 100% ASL but probably only 10% or so of all my total boardgaming (primarily euros such as Castles of Burgundy and Ark Nova).

 

[dlazov]

Building plastic models and dioramas, collecting and building RR dioramas, board wargames, and collecting baseball and football cards are hobbies that are all fading, you can even begin to add collecting and reading history books is fading.

 

[aiabx]

The demographics of ASL players leans very heavily towards people too young for WWII but grew up among people who were veterans with artifacts and stories. Our media was loaded with war movies and comics and history books that resonated because we had that close connection. The younger generations have a very different experience of the war stories they were exposed to, so a game like ASL or a comic like Sgt Rock just doesn’t appeal to them in the same way.

 

[Vic Provost]

You can't hold back the tide with a fork and it seems the tide of " progress " will wash away much that us old geezers found entertaining.

We lived at the right time, no doubt about it. Just listen to todays 'music' compared to what we grew up with, case closed. RIP Ozzy Osborne...

 

[Grumblejones]

I was reading the monthly newsletter of my local division of the Natl Model Railroaders Association this morning and the Division Superintendent was bemoaning the fact that the hobby is aging out. Few newcomers are entering the hobby. Barriers to entry are remarkably similar to ASL. As are the pleasures one can derive from them.

A great many hobbies and associations are going by the wayside. Civil War reenacting has been hard hit in the past decade and again, young people are not signing up to participate. Professional Business Associations - Rotary, Kiwanis, Jaycees, and even my supply chain association (ISM) are all struggling to maintain membership. Young people prefer Linkedin to face to face dinner meetings with area colleagues. Society is changing. I spent thirteen years on the board of ISM-Tulsa promoting the mission of education and professional ethics for our supply chain profession - only to shut it down and disband it in 2017 just shy of the association's 100th Birthday. A professional association that had existed in Tulsa since 1919 and at its zenith had over 600 members had been reduced to a gaggle of boomers and Gen X'rs attending the monthly supper club. It's disheartening on so many levels. Wargaming as a hobby faces much the same dilemma. Call of Duty, Hell Let Loose, etc. are not wargames in the classic sense. They are immersive experiences and altogether separate from board gaming and table top miniatures. Those things lived in our imagination.