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I know we have had these before, but I saw a thread here from a young Dakkite about his age and the age of other members of the boards. Besides making me realize that I have gotten more than a few miles on the tires since I first started in the hobby, it made me curious about the games that got us into this weird little pass time of ours.

Mostly this is a masochistic exercise to show myself how out of touch I have become. But hey, I am curious.

I started with Battletech when I was about 7 or 8 years old. I had the black boxed set that came with the colored map and all the cardboard Mechs which you folded and stuck into the black plastic holders.

Man I loved that game. I had hours of fun with my buddies. They we bought the plastic and metal mechs, which were my first real miniatures.

After that, I discovered 40K on a trip to England to visit family and it was love at first sight. I came home with the second edition boxed set and my buddies and I were hooked. Now, all these years later, I still love my toy soldiers.

So what about everyone else? How did you fall into this hobby?

I clicked battletech, but it was really the Mechwarrior: Age of Destruction that got me started.

Ogre by Metagaming circa 1978. I was eleven and it changed my life. Some would say for the worst.

Risk was the original war gaming that I have played when I was in my early teens......good times

I participated in several thumb wars in my early years. Risk came next, followed by computer RTSs, (occasionally) various other combat/conquest boardgames, and finally WH40K - my first foray into "real" (here, defined as "more in-depth than Risk" and/or "encompassing an entire hobby, as opposed to a single, insulated game-in-a-box") tabletop wargaming.

Yes, Thumb Wars I think was the true beginning for us all!

Ogre? Damn, that is old school. And yes, for the better or worse I couldn't say. All I know is that despite the hours and hours of my life spent on the hobby and the thousands of dollars, it has brought lots of great friends and good memories which makes it all worth it, IMO.

1776 by Avalon Hill. Back when dirt was new.

MageKnight I believe was my first minatures boardgame (unless you count Chess/Checkers/Battleships etc - I don't)

Before that I guess there was Age of Empires and Starcraft, but they didn't really draw me to wargames per se

EDIT: Latin fail

My first wargame was Risk, my first actual miniatures wargame was Star Wars Miniatures.

The first "wargame" I played was Blitzkrieg by Avalon Hill. My older brother had bought it sometime in the late 1970's; not sure exactly when.

The first miniature based wargame I played was "Chainmail." I think we got it in 1980 when we visited family in Washington DC. I still have the book. It was written by Gary Gygax and Jeff (?) Perren. The book I have is "3rd edition" dated 1975.

Even though it wasen't an actual game I think what got me interested in playing games like Fantasy and 40k was from playing with Toy Soldiers/Cowboys and Indians when I was little. I'd make a lincoln log fort and have half my soldiers defend it while the other half took it.

Yeah, that reminds of that game Crossbows and Catapults we played as a kid.

That game rules.

http://www.babble.com/CS/blogs/droolicious/archive/tags/battleground+crossbows+and+catapults/default.aspx

Looks like they remade it and released it, too!

Avalon Hill's Gettysburg (1st edition) was my first official boxed wargame.
Before that it was Marx Fort Apache figures and home rules.

Yes, I have been around awhile.

WW2 wargame using simple rules by Donald Featherstone, closely followed by Warhammer in 1984.

I saw my freinds Tau Battlesuits and asked him what they were. He told me and played a game of 40k with me to show me what it was. I became hooked and have played ever since.

I guess Diplomacy doesn't count as a wargame. In that case, my first wargame was a Battle of Trafalgar naval combat game sold at the HMS Victory exhibit museum shop. I think I was 8 or 9 years old when I saw it and used up my entire summer vacation allowance to buy it. Jeebus, that's over 20 years in the past...

Unfortunately, when I was 8-9 years old I had not started to learn english in school. Additionally, the rules were fairly complex and all of my friends wanted to play with Transformers or something, so I had to play solo with the rules being translated by my father (imperfectly).

Thankfully, when I discovered RPGs a few years later, I had started learning english in school. Motivation is everything - I never got anything but top grades in english for as long as I studied it

To this day I wonder what that Trafalgar game was called. It was played with 2d black and white paper ships, and there was damage, ammunition and wound conters.

Not really sure if it is classed as a wargame per se, but the two games that got the ball rolling for me were the HeroQuest and Space Crusade board games from MB.

Axis and Allies was the very first "war" game that I ever played.

The first miniatures game I played/collected (and still collect, albeit for just the monsters now) was D&D Miniatures.

My first true tabletop wargame was 40k though.

Has to be checkers when I was five.

Wooden Ships and Iron Men.. or Tactics II

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/237/wooden-ships-iron-men

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1574/tactics-ii

Was taught both in the summer of 1977 by a colleague of my parents (Math professors)

@filbert
Ah yes, Heroquest was the shizzle! I loved that game. I played that before 40K and now that I think about it, I played Battle Masters before 40K, as well.

Those were fun games. Hero quest was awesome.

Funny, back then I played lots of games, not it's pretty much only 40K. Less time, bigger group of people playing the game. More stuff. Plus a lot of the smaller games went out of business while 40K keeps on trucking strong.

Heroquest was mine. Already was into D&D when I got it, but the addition of minis sucked me in.

Before that, I had the army men, and Lego men reenacting scifi movies, Aliens, Star Wars, etc.

Forgive me for this but a year ago i would laugh ad poke at the kids playing Warhammer (The cruelty of kids) About 9 months ago i bought dawn of war, Walking past a gw and was like omg its those guys from the game. Played a demo game and fell in love, several hunderd pounds and half a year later i dont regret it.

other - (technically Bloodbowl was first game but) first war game was space marine then 2nd ed epic. Then years of collecting, painting and obsessing since

OGRE/GEV and Battletech.

And I'm only 24

Crap didnt notice risk was a choice untill to late! Actually picked 40k dispite playing risk, numerious RTS games and heroclix (for about 5 min) I fail

1977, Avalon Hill's D-Day. I was the ripe old age of 10 then.

I guess my first wargame was War. Like the card game. But that's only in name and its so lame I won't count it. I remember playing Stratego when I was very young. I loved that game. Risk and Battleship too. But Stratego is my choice.

From there I started with the original C&C on the computer, but for miniature gaming I got a LotR starter and played that with friends until I noticed the cool armored space warrior in the pamphlet and it has been 40k ever since.

@EagleArk
I know a lot of guys who got into the game through DoW. I still play the game from time to time, they nailed the feel of the universe. I liked the earlier 40K games, but DoW was the best.

LOTR