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So how do you explain your hobby to someone who has never seen a table top game? Or do you even try? This came up at work the other day when I said I was heading to Hobby Lobby. Co worker asked what for and I said for some hobby stuff. Que can of worms opening.... She asked about my hobby and I proceeded to tell her about it. Her face glazed over and I saw I was getting nowhere. So.. I switched tactics and told her it was like model railroad stuff.

So how do you explain Cons, GT's, or just the hobby in general to a non gamer? Luckily my wife knows all about it and enjoys board games at the Cons. I'm not so lucky about other family members.

I just tell it how it is. it's playing with toy soldiers.

lol..Simplest way is always the best.

All you have to say is that your hobby is assembling (then painting) plastic models. Say once you have an army of them, you can play a game with them against someone who has done the same. Say the game is played with dice, measuring tape, and a 100+ page rulebook. That's plenty enough for someone who's never heard of it. No need to go further unless someone's really interested.

I just say, "DON'T LOOK AT ME!" and scurry away.

I tell them it keeps me out of the MP station on the weekends. Then they leave my room.

After they find the box labeled "Cash and Meth", I explain the joke, (Models are our drug) and give them the rundown.

My girlfriend found the box. She broke up with me


I died on the inside...

I need'th not explain. I just bring a model I'm proud of to school to boast.

I tell them what it is in excruciating detail; which armies there are, which armies I play, what the armies play like... I wait for them to stop me.

How many people have lowered their view of me after i've told them? Probably everyone. Do I care? Nope, which is why I tell them. No use sugar-coating it.

We had a builder in to explain how long he would take to demo our kitchen (we're getting it redone). He saw my desk and asked about the little guys on it.

I just told him they were toy soldiers, and you play games with them where they are ranked up and you roll dice to determine who shoots who and who dies, etc.

His response: Cool!

I never had to explain it to a girlfriend. The wife knows and doesn't care (it keeps me off the streets).

If they ask about it, I'll go into detail. Otherwise I'll brush it off as:


- I play with toy soldiers that you paint up and go have a war with.
- Similar to chess
- I play the bug guys, kinda like in starship troopers


Explain tournaments? "I'm going to play at some big tournament with a bunch of guys competition with one another"

I plan on a 3 day pregame with bros before the tos vegas this summer. They just say "Oh you do your toy thing on the weekend and we'll make sure you don't drink Friday/Saturday while we club at the luxor"

Most of my friends know about it, but just write it off as "Nerd stuff". Girls tend to not care/poke fun at it.

I bascially explain it as building and painting plastic and metal miniatures, then using them to play a game on a table. Kind of like chess with guns, but much more complicated.

Never had to, everyone's known someone who's played.

A hobby that involves building and painting model miniatures for use in a tabletop wargame.

...I hate it being referred to as toy soldiers....

L. Wrex

It's uh, like G.I. Joe, but with uh, Catholic Space Nazis and uh, chainsaw swords.

Whatever you do, don't be like me and try to explain it to an old lady giving you an interview for work at the animal shelter....

It really gets you nowhere at all

I tell them that every few weeks a bunch of my friends get together at my house, stay in doors all day, and play with one another.



What?

"It’s like chess mixed with risk if you played risk on a topographical map with Styrofoam cups as mountains."

Ma55ter_fett wrote:"It’s like chess mixed with risk if you played risk on a topographical map with Styrofoam cups as mountains."

I generally do something like that, tell them its kinda like a board game.

I tell them its expensive as smoking but actually provides long term enjoyment

I take little plastic men move thend a table whilst making pew pew noises.

I either use the 'playing with toy soilders' line, or on occasion: 'Its like chess that the Russians can't kick out asses in yet'.

I just point at the piles of money and chicks that come with being a gamer and it pretty much explains itself.

I say its kid of like chess, but with dice. And you have to paint the pieces before you play.

If anyone is interested in the universe, i show them to TV Tropes on Warhammer

I make hissing noices and run to a dark corner to inspect a new model..... (joking, I usually just say its painting some figures and going to war with them)

My friend knew Dawn of War

easy....

I get nasally and explain they're not toys, they're imitation miniatures at a representative scale involiving complex tactics and lateral thinking and that miniature painting is an artform far beyond anything they can comprehend. I deride thier intelligence and chide thier abercrombie and fitch attire.

Then I go look at cartoon porn.

Heh.

Honestly? When someone asks what it is, I give it straight. They're sci-fi and fantasy miniatures. I paint because iI enjoy it. I game because I'm able to, and it makes a nice change from a losing streak at poker.

I hand them a few to look at. They ask if I painted them, I say yes and they say they look awesome. When you're as devilishly handsome and charming as I am, it's a lot easier to be complete and total geek.

As for my wife, she likes it when I make things. Cake, Paintings, Dresses.... power armoured supersoldiers, doesn't matter, although she can't eat or wear them...

She thinks eldar are pretty.

Its like playing with toy soldiers but with dice thrown in.

"You don't understand me, you never could! Stop judging me! STOP JUDGING MEEEEEE~!"

Nah, so far everybody is cool with it.

Chowderhead wrote:After they find the box labeled "Cash and Meth", I explain the joke, (Models are our drug) and give them the rundown.

My girlfriend found the box. She broke up with me


I died on the inside...

First part is funny...

too bad about the second part...

RE:Topic
Sometimes when I mention 'modeling' in my facebook status folks think I'm a male model or something haha.