The Kindness of Strangers

One thing I didn’t mention in my last column about keeping up with my resolution to play the games I own an awful lot more was that I have recently been attempting to organise a new local gaming club, partly in order that I can get out more and play some more games. The elephant-minded amongst you may also recall that starting a local club was in fact another item on my list of resolutions for 2009. So in fact doing so has allowed me to kill two birds with one stone. The first session was fun but I was mortified to discover that after a host of promises for attendance it actually attracted only two other people. It wasn’t until the next day that I discovered this was because the chosen venue had a small card park and we’d actually had other people turn up, fail to park and drive on up the hill and get utterly and completely lost. But I digress. It’s been quite a while since I gamed at a club with strangers, and the experience led me to reflect on how this trend may, or may not, influence the direction of the hobby.