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A few months ago, myself & several other local 40kers decided start a 40k club. We had a meeting to decide on a name and where to meet, exchange #s & so on. Then a couple weeks later, this guy comes into our LGS with a flyer for his 40k club. Which is cool, but none of us had ever heard of them or even seen them at the various LGSs. Plus we all ready started a club. We've since then run a few tournaments, painting comps and an escalation league. All this time we've really seen nothing out of this other club. But lately they've been dropping flyers at the LGSs and posting ads for thier club on the forums we use. Supposedly they have sponsorship for paid trips to out of state tournaments & free minis. I didn't even think that was possible. I haven't seen it yet but have heard that they've been knocking our club in thier bat-reps.
I could really care less about these guys & if they want to participate in our events that would be great. Even better, they could host some events & I would gladly sign-up. What do you think about this situation?

Don't talk to strangers, and if they try to lure you into a van with promises of some free finecast miniatures then run home and tell your mommy...

Sounds like the other club is trying to get some new members by advertising.

Have you actually tried talking to them? Or considered approaching them about merging both your clubs, so as not to "compete" for members?

There can only be one...

Firstly, the phrase is "I couldn't care less"

As to the club situation, as long as it's meeting on different nights, why not go along?
At points I've been members of up to three wargaming clubs at the same time.
Diversity is good, and it opens up your playing circle.
I don't see anything underhanded, a club is advertising for new members.
To be honest, from what you say, this other club sounds better organised than yours.
Before making any judgements, I'd go along and see for myself.

Absolutely nothing to be concerned about, and barely worth mentioning.

They're just adverstising nothing wrong with that. As for the "heard but haven't seen" that they're sniping at you, don't even repeat that until you've actually seen evidence. Even if it turns out they are, there's no reason to get involved in the third grade name calling contest, Don't even acknowledge it as if you get involved, even if you win, you will NOT come out looking better than before you got involved. Nothing good can come of that kind of pissing contest.

Keep doing what you're doing, and maybe visit their club sometime. Nicely.

Join them.

A Rival Club? AWESOME!

You can run tournaments against them! How cool would that be?

Anyway, your reaction will really depend upon what you want from your club. If you want ever-expanding membership, you are going to be competing with these guys for members sooner or later. So your choice is to either try to outcompete them (you say your offerings are better, so advertise these!) or you can merge with them (two clubs become one and has the advantage of more regular members).

If the goal for your club is more like a tight knit group of buddies who meet to play games and who don't have a huge interest in adding new members, then just keep doing what you're doing. If it's all about making time to get together with some buddies and playing, it won't really matter as much what the other guys are doing - since your main draw is your friendship.

People might choose to join BOTH clubs - and nothing wrong with that. Of course, usually people will only have time in the long term for one club with the rare few truly having time for both.

Do what it takes to make your club unique but remember - what people want the most from game clubs most usually is GAMING. If they can count on having that on a regular basis, I have a feeling you will do just fine.

Cool thanks for the input guys. I have no problem with the Strength 10 guys and I think its great what they're doing. I think it'll be good to have a little friendly rivalry in our local 40k scene.

http://www.meetup.com/Albuquerque-40k/
http://areswargames.websitetoolbox.com/post?40k-Nation-Club-Strength-10-Chapter-5497123

marv335 wrote:

As to the club situation, as long as it's meeting on different nights, why not go along?
At points I've been members of up to three wargaming clubs at the same time.
Diversity is good, and it opens up your playing circle.
I don't see anything underhanded, a club is advertising for new members.
To be honest, from what you say, this other club sounds better organised than yours.
Before making any judgements, I'd go along and see for myself.

This.

I've also been a member of three different gaming clubs at the same time. They met on different days.
If they meet on the same days as your "club" and/or attempt to gazzump your venue hire, then it's a different story.

I am blessed to have several gaming clubs within my typical gaming area. Variety is not a bad thing. Look at it this way, if you run an event once every other month, and they do the same, that's at least 1 weekend of gaming through the entire year if you guys coordinate correctly.

Look at this as an opportunity to expand your playing base and experience. As far as the battle rep thing, I'd just sign onto their website and take a look. You may find the whole thing is a misunderstanding. You may also find that after you guys meet and game, those battle reps may have good points, tactical advise, and see things you missed in the game.

Gamers are gamers. Not all are going to get along, but you all have a common ground and interests. Open a dialogue and expand on those interests. You never know, down the line you may up merging clubs and end up with 1 large club of friends. That's how the club i'm involved in came to be. We had 4-5 competitive gamers, another club had 10-12 gamers of which 4-5 played regularlys. Now we have about 15 guys who all game, with several willing to goto tournments who have all grown to be friends.

FYI~ 40k Nation is a parent club. They have a lot of representation, but the clubs honestly tend to be small 4-5 guys. We have representation in the NJ/PA area. Honestly, the guy who is their main rep is obnoxious. But he really means well at least.

Strength 10's leader is the founder of 40knation. Not only does he run his chapter in Albuquerque but he also in large part runs 40knation as a whole. We have chapters all over the United States and all over the world for that matter; all organized onto a central forum and teamspeak.

DODcrazy wrote:Strength 10's leader is the founder of 40knation. Not only does he run his chapter in Albuquerque but he also in large part runs 40knation as a whole. We have chapters all over the United States and all over the world for that matter; all organized onto a central forum and teamspeak.

I took a look at the website, it seems to show 3-4 chapters? Or are those special in some way, and other ones aren't listed? I see a lot of pending ones listed in the forums.

I was mostly curious about the Philly/SJ one. NJPC mentioned it in a post above, and I see it listed on the website, but that's the first I'd heard of the club at all. If someone from that club attends tournaments at my shop have them say hi and let me know about the club activities and I'll post them up.

My two cents worth is that the 'all over the US/all over the world' might be a bit generous at this point. Website and graphics look good though, and always good to see more battle reports.

mikhaila wrote:

DODcrazy wrote:Strength 10's leader is the founder of 40knation. Not only does he run his chapter in Albuquerque but he also in large part runs 40knation as a whole. We have chapters all over the United States and all over the world for that matter; all organized onto a central forum and teamspeak.

I took a look at the website, it seems to show 3-4 chapters? Or are those special in some way, and other ones aren't listed? I see a lot of pending ones listed in the forums.

I was mostly curious about the Philly/SJ one. NJPC mentioned it in a post above, and I see it listed on the website, but that's the first I'd heard of the club at all. If someone from that club attends tournaments at my shop have them say hi and let me know about the club activities and I'll post them up.

My two cents worth is that the 'all over the US/all over the world' might be a bit generous at this point. Website and graphics look good though, and always good to see more battle reports.

I'm not "calling you out" or anyone for that matter so why do I detect hostility in the text you just posted? The reason there are a lot of pending chapters and not a tremendous amount of official chapters is because we don't want chapters to simply fizzle out. We want them to be professional, regularly contribute material to the site, and essentially stay with it. Just because we don't have very many official chapters doesn't mean we don't have a good sized community.

Furthermore, just because you haven't heard of us means nothing; we don't base our success off whether or not mikhaila has heard of us, although thousands of other people have, not including all the popular youtubers that are in the community. The club in philly is very close to becoming an official club, but isn't at the moment. Why don't you come on our teamspeak and say hi. There's almost always someone on.

Our server address is tx.teamspeak.cc:9095

DODcrazy wrote:

mikhaila wrote:

DODcrazy wrote:Strength 10's leader is the founder of 40knation. Not only does he run his chapter in Albuquerque but he also in large part runs 40knation as a whole. We have chapters all over the United States and all over the world for that matter; all organized onto a central forum and teamspeak.

I took a look at the website, it seems to show 3-4 chapters? Or are those special in some way, and other ones aren't listed? I see a lot of pending ones listed in the forums.

I was mostly curious about the Philly/SJ one. NJPC mentioned it in a post above, and I see it listed on the website, but that's the first I'd heard of the club at all. If someone from that club attends tournaments at my shop have them say hi and let me know about the club activities and I'll post them up.

My two cents worth is that the 'all over the US/all over the world' might be a bit generous at this point. Website and graphics look good though, and always good to see more battle reports.

I'm not "calling you out" or anyone for that matter so why do I detect hostility in the text you just posted? The reason there are a lot of pending chapters and not a tremendous amount of official chapters is because we don't want chapters to simply fizzle out. We want them to be professional, regularly contribute material to the site, and essentially stay with it. Just because we don't have very many official chapters doesn't mean we don't have a good sized community.

Furthermore, just because you haven't heard of us means nothing; we don't base our success off whether or not mikhaila has heard of us, although thousands of other people have, not including all the popular youtubers that are in the community. The club in philly is very close to becoming an official club, but isn't at the moment. Why don't you come on our teamspeak and say hi. There's almost always someone on.

Our server address is tx.teamspeak.cc:9095

The only one with any hostility in this exchange is DODcrazy. Also, despite the disclaimer in the first line, the later statment "we don't base our success off whether or not mikhaila has heard of us" is clearly calling him out. He's only asking legitimate questions, ones which I wanted to know also. Further he even offered to post notices of your events on the website of one of the east coast's largest gaming stores. Old sayings about "looking a gift horse..." or "biting the hand..." come to mind.

If you're trying to grow a club, I recommend giving inquiries like the above the beneifit of the doubt and answering their questions without assuming that they are being hostile. Far better to be helpfull and informative than defensive and assumptive.
All the best on the growth of your groups and the wider gaming community.

DODcrazy wrote:

mikhaila wrote:

DODcrazy wrote:Strength 10's leader is the founder of 40knation. Not only does he run his chapter in Albuquerque but he also in large part runs 40knation as a whole. We have chapters all over the United States and all over the world for that matter; all organized onto a central forum and teamspeak.

I took a look at the website, it seems to show 3-4 chapters? Or are those special in some way, and other ones aren't listed? I see a lot of pending ones listed in the forums.

I was mostly curious about the Philly/SJ one. NJPC mentioned it in a post above, and I see it listed on the website, but that's the first I'd heard of the club at all. If someone from that club attends tournaments at my shop have them say hi and let me know about the club activities and I'll post them up.

My two cents worth is that the 'all over the US/all over the world' might be a bit generous at this point. Website and graphics look good though, and always good to see more battle reports.

I'm not "calling you out" or anyone for that matter so why do I detect hostility in the text you just posted? The reason there are a lot of pending chapters and not a tremendous amount of official chapters is because we don't want chapters to simply fizzle out. We want them to be professional, regularly contribute material to the site, and essentially stay with it. Just because we don't have very many official chapters doesn't mean we don't have a good sized community.

Furthermore, just because you haven't heard of us means nothing; we don't base our success off whether or not mikhaila has heard of us, although thousands of other people have, not including all the popular youtubers that are in the community. The club in philly is very close to becoming an official club, but isn't at the moment. Why don't you come on our teamspeak and say hi. There's almost always someone on.

Our server address is tx.teamspeak.cc:9095

Well, didn't have any hostility last night.) I'm guessing maybe you took things the wrong way?

Was mostly just questioning the wisdom of making the 'all over the world' claim a tad bit too early in your building phase. I can understand you're advertising for new members and trying to build something up, but it seemed a bit of an ambitious claim based on what I read on your website.

It did make me curious enough to go look at your website and check it out. I read a lot of gaming websites, but the only other mention I'd ever seen of your club outside of this thread was a guy in Scranton in the "looking for a game" section. I support a lot of clubs, events, and tournaments. My store gave out over 2000.00 in prizes last year to a lot of tournaments, and supported events with gaming tables and scenery.
This is in addition to the 30-40 gaming events we hold each year at my store. So I interact with a lot of TO's and clubs, sorry if you took me asking questions about your club as anything other than curiosity. If I was hostile, I'd hardly complement you on your website, ask your philly group to get in touch, or offer to post your events on our website.)

I'll have to pass on the invite to teamspeak, have never used it, probably never will. I'm an old dawg, and have stores that are older than you are.) All my gaming is on a tabletop, not a computer, and have never had the need to set it up. If you're ever in the area, stop by for a game and a beer.

It would indeed appear as though I took things wrong, and for that I apologize. At the time I read it as calling us out or questioning our legitimacy for some reason but hours later I realize that wasn't the case at all lol. I guess all I can say is to check us out and see if you like it.

Has the OP tried getting his dad to beat up their dad, or at the very least threaten it?

Seriously though I would just go along to their night and check it out, play a game, shoot the breeze and this will all be water under the bridge.