The looks-like system

Ok I see your points about having the CiA games with a higher kit level, as there are so many others of us trying to run local games where look alike is welcome, but doesn't it make it just that bit harder to become an actual member of CiA. I'm sure you'll correct me if I'm wrong but the only way I can become a bona fide CiA member is to attend one of your games. This is hard enough as so many of them up north apart from Glock which sold out of Axis places as soon as it was posted up. Does the tightening of the kit rules make the whole membership harder for the new guys to achieve? I've been on this forum a while now, hosted a small game and probably achieve the kit level yet I cant call myself a CiA member untill I attend one of your games. I'll just have to hope I can make it to one in the future.

I wouldn't join a club that would have me as a member anyway.
Heh, you do have a point of course but three more games this year to have a crack, at at least one of which won't be a far as north Wales!

Only CiA run games I'm afraid. Look on it as a loyalty card, its a way of us recognising those that have taken the time and trouble to come to one of our games, without whose support none of this would have been possible.
In the time honoured fashion I'd point out that other games and organisers are available - and Taffy's cooking is better!

Here we are talking about all of this, whilst eight places remain on the German side for Operation Aerial. If you want to get CiA membership then book on!

Where are you, have you considered a asking someone for a lift?

1. Do not drive
2. My kit is not good enough.

Kit loan is often an option too.

For our St Lo game if you dont have all the right kit we are doing a loan thread!

The general lives in LLandudno way off the track I was going to try and get to some games this year but at the moment life is to fast and months are passing like days

As a "new" player I've read this thread with interest and I'm also in 2 minds.

I have a background in live roleplaying (at the more accurate and histoircal end, not the paint yourself green and call yourself an Orc end), Dark Age reenactment and Airsoft. I am all about high kit standards and as someone new to WW2 I have managed to pull together a passable generic British uniform for about 100 quid. Assuming I enjoy myself at Operation Arial I am quite sure my standards will increase and my 50's belgian battledress which looks OK will no longer be good enough for me, and I will be scouring ebay for the genuine article.

So I have no problems with high dress standards at events.

But that doesn't help me with a WW2 weapon. I Airsofted a lot from about 2000 to 2006 then tailed off in favour of more Dark Age stuff, and now I find myself getting drawn back to it I have a problem. I am not VCR registered and am not a mamber of an Airsoft club. I've joined Firevball in Birmingham with the sole intention of skirmishing enough to gte UKARA registered to buy some WW2 gear, but at the moment I'm stuck with my M4 and a VSR-10 sniper rifle. My membership of both Viking and Roman reenactment groups has expired as most of what I have been doing in recent years is LRP under the cover of provate sites rather than public demos, and event if I was still in Regia I doubt that they would be happy with me using my insurance as a defence against the VCR bill.

So I'm stuck. Either I use my VSR-10 - bolt action, wood stocked rifle which could easily pass as a generic scavanged civilian rifle for a soldier who lost his in the heat of battle, or I borrow an authentic one.

Now luckily I have managed to blagg a kosher WW2 gun for the next event, but even so I'd still be against a full on tightening of the looks alike rules because I'm stuck for the next game unless I can drag my ass to Fireball 3 months in a row just to get legal again.

Airsoft isn't my primary hobby, it's probably number 2 or 3, so while I am all up for as high a level of coolness and authenticity as possible, I think you need to consider the barrier for entry for new players carefully.

Well, there's the thing. You have made the effort and managed to sort yourself out for Ariel, so that's good.

And yes, you will have to 'drag my ass to Fireball' - the government made it difficult for you, Comrades in Arms didn't! It's really not up to us to make concessions in compensation, its up to players to make the effort. And there is no denying it requires an effort, but that's how it goes.

Incidentally, Gunman have also revised their 'looks-like' weapons list (although this seems to have gone without comment) and have gone even further by banning high-caps where there is no alternative available.

Well like i said, I'm keen enough to put the effort in. My main issue though is no matter how keen or how much cash I want to spend, until I get VCR registered I can't actually buy a WW2 weapon, so thats a major barrier to entry to events if the rules are 100% no non WW2 hardware. I appreciate that this isn't a problem of your making, and I do appreciate the desire to make things as 100% as possible, so that's where I have a major dilema here.

Ask me in a few months time once I'm managed to leap the VCR hurdle and I'll probably say make it all authentic

Be grateful, no matter how hard I try I still don't look like no man then again I'm not sure I'd want to

I think the CiA guys appreciate there are slight things to overcome, especially if you're new to the hobby and one of those is obviously the VCR and weapon of choice. I merely see it, where as once you could turn up in a boiler suit with AK, this now isn't the only option and you can pretty (depends how much of a scrooge you are) cheapily sort out a few ensembles, partisan/resistance being the cheapest option spending less than you would on even a boilersuit if you go to a charidee shop add to that thompsons and mp40s are in abundance now, meh it makes sense surely to change that perception slightly ?

From what I can see (and IMHO) all it seems to me from this thread, is they've merely adapted the lists to incorporate the fact that noone did some of it anyways, like overalls (can't say I've ever seen that, only thing I recall is the ghillie suit chap that was like a meerkat popping up here there and everywhere).

And that reminds me - one thing we will NEVER ban is females taking men's roles. If there is one thing that sets the airsoft thing apart from traditional reenactment it is this.
If we can tolerate over 50's, modern haircuts, 'modern' body shapes and the unfit then we can tolerate those who have bits in the wrong places!
Indeed, I'd go further (at the risk of being patronising), they have been a positive asset in so many ways. Especially the cooking and washing up.
Yes, the cooking and washing up bit was a sexist joke - the positive asset bit wasn't.

Yes, the cooking and washing up bit was a sexist joke - the positive asset bit wasn't.

I had an army of assistance when I cooked last time at Husky, and even more with the washing up and non female reminded me of something though..... off to another post

Broadsword, here's something I'm puzzled by in your post. How do you reenact the Dark Ages? Surely the one thing that defines the Dark Ages is it's lack of historical recording. I'm genuinely interested!!

Also, come to a CiA game, become a member, then look into AFRA membership if your kit is up to scratch. That can also be a route to defence under the VCR Act.

The idea that society/civilisation plummeted into near chaos with the collapse of Rome is a misconception that seems to be propagated by school history syllabuses (at least when I was at school), to make things nice and simple.

There are written records, Bede and Gildas spring to mind along with poems like Beowulf and the Battle of Maldon or whatever, plus lots of archeological evidence, so it's very possible to make a good educated guess about what kind of gear people would have been wearing and using.

Plus of course you've got a wealth of Osprey books in full colour, so problem solved.

No doubt Broadsword will be able to expand on the above, I'm obviously no expert.

And some of the most extensive records of the period cover heraldry and the military. A lo of the surviving chronicles were commissioned to record the achievements of X or y king, and so tended to dwell on the war side quite heavily.

Also don't forget that the term "Dark Ages" covers a very wide and somewhat ambiguous period right up to early medieval. I think the end of the dark ages and start of the medieval period is generally taken in this country (by me at least) to be the Norman conquest.

So if you're after actual battles to re-enact there're Badon Hill and Camlan (Camluan?) through to Fulford Gate, Stamford Bridge and Hastings plus everything in between.

...Plus of course you've got a wealth of Osprey books in full colour, so problem solved.

Also don't forget that the term "Dark Ages" covers a very wide and somewhat ambiguous period right up to early medieval. I think the end of the dark ages and start of the medieval period is generally taken in this country (by me at least) to be the Norman conquest.

So if you're after actual battles to re-enact there're Badon Hill and Camlan (Camluan?) through to Fulford Gate, Stamford Bridge and Hastings plus everything in between.

Bede & Gildas eh ??? Methinks we'll be having an 'Arthurian' chat next time we meet if you're going start bandying mad Welsh monks around . . Sounds like you've been reading John Morris / Leslie Alcock Anyway ...away from my other historical interests ....although shield walls an' MP40s might be cool .....

So ...er ....started off as my comment and then I buggered off on holiday , an now it 6 pages .

TBH I don't have a great deal to add , most of my thoughts already expressed by the other three / five. Is it a done deal ?, no not really, nothings set in stone , but people self set their own standards, and this debate is reflecting that . The numbers of times I'd advised newbs not to rush out and buy everything ...and then watch their posts on 'latest aquisitions' .

Loaning guns ...er DDay , Hurtgen , Mist ......I've lost track of the number of people who used my whorey little MP40 . They always give it back , coz she's such an ugly bitch . Tell me your guns bust at one of our events , and you can use her too ....and plenty of other regulars feel this way too I know . Shit ...Headshot borrows so much of Kermit's German kit you'd have thought he'd moved in with him

Do I care that we may put people off who have never come to our games ?, maybe a little , but I won't loose sleep over it . The past few games I've known virtually all of the players by name (albeit sometimes the wrong ones ) . I see CiA now as closer a club thing . I like putting on games for people I enjoy being with . I've fought, drunk, won & lost with a lot of you for knocking on three years ...I do it for the cameraderie , nothing else .

In the end .....I didn't join biker clubs without a bike , or landy clubs without a Rover, so why expect to join a WW2 based club without the correct clobber & gun ?

So , I'd suggest requirements for individual CiA games are likely to change in the coming events , mainly reflecting players expectations , and also the organisers wishes . It may put some off, but the majority will hopefully see a benefit .

So there

The idea that society/civilisation plummeted into near chaos with the collapse of Rome is a misconception that seems to be propagated by school history syllabuses (at least when I was at school), to make things nice and simple

I was told the same at school, I think we got the impression that most people at the time were living in mud holes in the ground and all the monks retreated to fortress monasteries for protection. It wasn`t until a few years after I left school (many years ago) that I started reading up on the period and realised what a load of old tosh I`d been taught. Teachers my arse