@ Brian, Firestorm, and Grudge I appreciate the comments. I am not planning a book, just have enough time to actually sit at the desk and write a bit right now. It’s that sort of quiet around here at work that you only get when you are ticking away the days till your job is over.
Ahh… So quiet in the engine room now…
Grudge said: “I'm finding that the older I get the more this appeals to me. Unfortunately medical issues keep me from attending a lot of extended duration games.”
There are plenty of us who are not the spring chickens we used to be, that does not preclude being able to do milsim games, it just means that some effort has to be placed to find the just right spot to fit in. As I mentioned, the biggest obstacle anyone who is trying to run a good milsim style event has to overcome is leadership. If you don’t have what it takes to grind it out in the trenches figure out where you can go to find the challenge without having to use up all your real life “hit points”. A well run milsim needs effective guys on the sidelines keeping things moving. Last spring at East Wind for instance there were three of us in HQ who were still recovering from broken legs. If you learn useful skills, there is always a place for you helping out, providing guidance, working with guys on mission planning, dealing with signals or working with the command staff to help put together the big picture so things can run successfully. The more depth you add to a milsim, the more back line guys you end up needing to make it happen. Event have vehicles? They need drivers? Have supplies that need to be dealt with? That means an S4 to manage them. Have serious commo? That means you need a signals guy. Have a dedicated medevac vehicle that means you need a medic to run it. The list goes on.
Don’t give up your hobbies just because of health, just morph it into what you can do and keep doing that the absolutely best that you can.
Pusnagi said: “that's Milsim and it is in all of us”
Pretty much but I will specify that what really matters is if we are being honest with ourselves about what exactly we want from an event and bring the right frame of mind with us in our kit bag. Basically, it’s there if we want it to be there otherwise we just end up with everyone whining.