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I'd like to hear some stories from people who have got their partners into the hobby. thanks!

Better if I just point Aurelia at this thread, she'd remember it better than I do.

My boyfriend showed me his Blood Angel models that were painted up really nice. He showed me how to drybrush and whatnot and let me paint one of his Nurgle champions. It was horrid, to say the least, but he gave me a rhino to paint after that. I really liked sitting with him and painting, and now a year later I have an ork army and a budding Vampire Count army. Our room is messy and that's about the only gripe I've had about the hobby.

I married a gamer

We met over Vampire, She got me into D and D, then Pathfinder. I got her into 40K, Necromunda and we tried (then ditched) Fantasy.

She plays a vicious Saim-hann pirates army (fluff ahoy) with a desert theme and gold-plated guns, as well as a particularly vicious Dark Eldar Kabal

I run Orks and Necrons.

She's a far better painter than I am, but i'm more obsessive over 40K than she is, and paint more

Morathi's Darkest Sin wrote:Better if I just point Aurelia at this thread, she'd remember it better than I do.

So... there I was innocently watching Corrie and doing my nails when this mad man bursts into the room, ties me to a chair and forces me to read the 40k main rulebook cover to cover, all the while chanting something about the corrupting powers of Slaanesh....

...sound familiar darling?


In all seriousness though...

My husband (not yet even to-be at that point) played 40k and WHFB already and me being the artistic type... eventually got curious about the models, read the books, went 'ohhh those Tyranids are cute!' and baam... I had an army and started playing.


Edit: I should note I HATE soap operas really!

I will be watching this thread intently as this is step one in my master plan of turning a room in my house into the War Room.

I didn't necessarily get my wife into gaming.
My wife went from curious to very interested in the hobby, storeline, and painting aspects. She is very artistic, and a huge star treak and stargate fan. We were out with friends when someone chimed in "Hey aren't you supposed to be at a GT next weekend, good luck!" Upon which she asked, what on earth were they talking about.

I pulled out my army, Skaven horde, and showed her. She looked the models, and was immediately accepting. There is 1 catch: I must paint well to play, that is her insistence. As she mentioned "If you doing have painted models how can you really be a fan of a game with that much story and artistic options."

Since meeting her, she now picks all my color palletes, and even gets to put input on my conversions. We learned a interesting thing.. i am actually partially color blind. I had no idea, even got checked and the eye doctor said "yea we knew this for years, just its not that important." So she helped me learn how to pick colors even with not being able to see all the shades. I showed her websites on techniques... now i'm doing full elaborate scenic basing, ink lining, triple layer highlights, eyes, teeth... no more dry brushing for me.

All it takes is finding something in your hobby for your partner to grasp. For me, my wife likes picking colors and helping me come up with elaborate conversions. I just lucked out finding out she apparantly loves star trek in the process

I didn't and I haven't. Lord knows I have tried but I have failed. Although she did think Hero Quest was 'alright'.

I just said you can go to the local game store and play Warhammer or stay home and watch the kids. She was quick to come along.

filbert wrote:I didn't and I haven't. Lord knows I have tried but I have failed.

Yep, this about sums up how my attempts went She's got an Immolator and a few Sisters of Battle she's been painting, but apart from those and Dawn of War she's never shown any interest in actually playing / collecting. Still, she accepts my obsession with it all, so that's good

filbert wrote:I didn't and I haven't. Lord knows I have tried but I have failed. Although she did think Hero Quest was 'alright'.

I've said this before and I will say it again, if your lady-fella doesn't think its cool, that's fine, but most girls are at least willing to roll your dice for you or paint things (if they are artistically inclined and/or bored enough)

When I met my boyfriend I was a little put-off of the hobby because he spent (and still spends) hours a day making army lists or reading codexes. I haven't 100% figured out how to actually play the game, and I've made it clear that I just want to paint my army and roll some dice. I am absolutely in love with 40k and all things related, but it certainly took some time for me to warm up to the hobby. (Its a hell of a lot to jump into at once)

Us ladies like to feel included. You should ask her to paint a model with you, or maybe paint a really cool one for her. If that doesn't work, shake vigorously and keep refrigerated for 6-8 hours until interested.

I haven't really tried to get my GF into gaming. The fact that she's OK with me leaving her at home every Saturday so I can go game is good enough for me, though if she wanted to I'd love to get her into it.


I like my women like I like my army lists: min-maxed.

LadyGray wrote:

filbert wrote:I didn't and I haven't. Lord knows I have tried but I have failed. Although she did think Hero Quest was 'alright'.

I've said this before and I will say it again, if your lady-fella doesn't think its cool, that's fine, but most girls are at least willing to roll your dice for you or paint things (if they are artistically inclined and/or bored enough)

When I met my boyfriend I was a little put-off of the hobby because he spent (and still spends) hours a day making army lists or reading codexes. I haven't 100% figured out how to actually play the game, and I've made it clear that I just want to paint my army and roll some dice. I am absolutely in love with 40k and all things related, but it certainly took some time for me to warm up to the hobby. (Its a hell of a lot to jump into at once)

Us ladies like to feel included. You should ask her to paint a model with you, or maybe paint a really cool one for her. If that doesn't work, shake vigorously and keep refrigerated for 6-8 hours until interested.

Its good advice but my wife is sufficiently immune to geekdom, trust me. I have tried to get her involved through the painting side, through the gaming side, through the background side. Even tried not trying and relying on her to get interested through curiosity - no dice! Anyway, at least she is fairly tolerant and doesn't complain about the cost.

One day, while my supermodel wife was giving me a backrub, I said to her, "Rosie... lets do something different tonight other than the hours of sex that we usually have."

She said no and proceeded to ravish me all the while giving me beer and pizza.

Then she changed her mind and memorized all the rules for Hordes, Warmachine, WHFB, and 40k all the while painting armies upon armies to Golden Demon standard.

filbert wrote:

LadyGray wrote:

filbert wrote:I didn't and I haven't. Lord knows I have tried but I have failed. Although she did think Hero Quest was 'alright'.

I've said this before and I will say it again, if your lady-fella doesn't think its cool, that's fine, but most girls are at least willing to roll your dice for you or paint things (if they are artistically inclined and/or bored enough)

When I met my boyfriend I was a little put-off of the hobby because he spent (and still spends) hours a day making army lists or reading codexes. I haven't 100% figured out how to actually play the game, and I've made it clear that I just want to paint my army and roll some dice. I am absolutely in love with 40k and all things related, but it certainly took some time for me to warm up to the hobby. (Its a hell of a lot to jump into at once)

Us ladies like to feel included. You should ask her to paint a model with you, or maybe paint a really cool one for her. If that doesn't work, shake vigorously and keep refrigerated for 6-8 hours until interested.

Its good advice but my wife is sufficiently immune to geekdom, trust me. I have tried to get her involved through the painting side, through the gaming side, through the background side. Even tried not trying and relying on her to get interested through curiosity - no dice! Anyway, at least she is fairly tolerant and doesn't complain about the cost.

This is pretty much how my girlfriend is.... she's kind of a girly girl and not so much into nerdy things like I am.

But I can try!!

I didn't, and honestly, I don't want to. It's my away from the house time and the time when she can go do Girl's Night stuff.

My wife understands the basic background of 40k and knows which armies I have. It took her several years to get to that point, and then I up and switched to Warmachine. She was pretty good about the 40k stuff (I was buying minis for 5 different armies at one point) but since I've jumped ship and gone to PP, she is always asking why I'm buying more, what happened to my Tau, etc... I honestly think shes mad that she knows all this 40k fluff and I don't even play it any more. She is not a geek or Sci Fi person at all, so her knowledge is pretty impressive.

My wife loathes my "minions".

Waxing poetic on the fall of Rynn's World and the difference between Craftworld, Dark, and Exodite Eldar, my wife is kind enough to keep her eyes pointed in my direction while they glaze over slightly.

Just as I begin debating the merits of using vanguard vets in a drop podding sternguard/Pedro list with myself, she manages to break eye contact long enough to complete a conversation of texts with her girlfriend.

After I complete my entirely one-sided conversation and slip into my painting chair, I hear a noise from the other side of the room and automatically respond with, "Yes dear."



I'm exaggerating of course, but Lady Thorne isn't interested in 40K at all. She loves the product of my effort, admires and provides excellent feedback in regards to my conversions and paintjobs, and supports the occassional gaming get-away, but that's where the line is drawn. The game holds no interest for her and while she's offered to help paint when I have a big job, she isn't interested in painting miniatures for her own enjoyment.

I was playing off and on when I meet my wife to be. We were in a comic book store one day and she randomly came over with a carnifex and said "Oh my god! It's soo cute, what is this? Can I play this in your game?" And thus she now has 3k points of nids and 2k points of DE. Though it's really hard to get her to play a WHOLE game without her getting distracted by shiny things, lol.

I told her I played. She was curious, watched a game or two, played one or two to try it out, then discovered Eldar. She probably has...about 750pts of Eldar, but all of it beautifully painted. She's more into the painting/modelling, but will play small-ish games with me and my friends.

Plus, she loves painting my special characters, which now look fantastic!

Bought her a box of Daemonettes to paint... nuff sed

AvatarForm wrote:Bought her a box of Daemonettes to paint... nuff sed

I plan to do a similar thing.... I might wait until plastic Sisters come out

I got back into the game when my wife was pregnant with our first boy (who is now almost 5). She was on bedrest unfortunately because we nearly lost him early on, so she had to spend nearly 6 months sitting still. Our gaming together began with her using a laser pointer to show who was shooting who, or who was moving where, while I moved the stuff around and we learned the rules. Our son ended up being fine (and now has a little brother) and I just kept at the hobby. Since then she has done some painting and playing here at home, but because it all started with something so dear to both of our hearts I can always talk her into a game. Anytime I have success with my Black Legion army in a tournament she never forgets to remind me that it is technically hers after all...

I bought my girlfriend the box of 5 tyranids for the supposed "cuteness" appeal, she built and painted them and now there sat in my room collecting dust, i dont mind because there inspiring me to start collecting tyranids lol

I kind of got back into the hobby myself after my gf and I found an old Hero Quest game from her childhood. It was something we planned to do together (she had enjoyed painting the figures). I think she was quite happily getting into 'the hobby' on her own without any help from me. She even picked up a few boxes of demons on her own, and some fancy new paint brushes etc...

But unfortunately my rekindled interest quickly turned back to obsession, like some sick crack addict flinging himself off the wagon. Soon I was lost in codex books again, buying crate loads of space marines, and talking about object-source-lighting and target saturation.

So now I've been banished to the darkest corner of the house to be nerdy on my own.



The moral of this story is... Over-enthusiasm, not helpful when trying to get wife/gf into 40k.

(Though I did manage to swipe her nice paint brushes! )

My wife is not a gamer nor has any intentions towards becoming one.

She does not, however, stop me from being one. It is important that I have a hobby, and as I had the hobby before we met (20 something years ago), it stayed.

She does point out miniatures or models she likes and makes me buy them for her though (WHFB fortified manor even though I do not play fantasy).

Well, 40k is like this: It costs your money, it costs your time, it costs your life (wife).

I've never tried because I'm single.