As mentioned previously, we’re holding an Old World event next March in Daventry (UK) at Battlefield Hobbies. As part of the planning, I thought it may be a good opportunity to do a series on organising a wargame event. Hopefully, this will give those who are looking to organise their own event an idea of things you need to consider.

The first thing you need to consider before anything else is where you’re going to hold your event.

Look at the options around you. Is there a school hall you can hire? Perhaps a village hall. Or perhaps like us, there’s a wargame shop near you that has a space you can use.

But don’t jump at the nearest and easiest choice for you. Think about how your players will get there. Will they have to drive for miles through the arse-end of the country? Is there a train station nearby, a motorway? If you’re holding a two day event, are there places for people to stay nearby?

What about lunch? Are you asking your players to bring their own? Can you provide it? Is there somewhere nearby they can go to get it?

If you’re using a venue that isn’t used to hosting wargame events, how are you going to get the terrain and mats you need?

You have to answer each of these questions individually to work out which of the options on your list are the ideal venue for your tournament.

We had three or four options:

• Football Club
• Battlefield Hobbies
• Local Community Centre

The Community Centre got crossed off almost immediately.

While this place is huge and can hold 200 people, and even provides lots of fold out 6’x4′ tables as well as its own kitchen, which you can use. It came in at a cost of £20 an hour to hire. For a single day, where you’re going to be using the venue for nearly 9 hours or more, you’re looking at an overhead cost of £180. The Community Centre is located in a village a couple of miles from a motorway exit and has a train station, so travelling for players would not have been a problem. But if you have 24 players (the amount we had at our last AoS event), then each players ticket already has an overhead attached to it of £7.50 for each day you use the venue.

That, granted, doesn’t sound like an enormous amount, and it isn’t. But what happens if only 10 turn up? Your overhead then shoots up to £18 per ticket. What about the overheads for organising your terrain, mats, and food?

In the end, we chose Battlefield Hobbies. They have the tables, terrain, and mats that we need and can host up to 32 players. On top of this, they can also provide food to the players each day. Plus, having the event in a hobby shop means the players can go and browse for new toys between rounds. Battlefield Hobbies charge £5 per player per day without food, which makes it easier if you’re only getting a few players in as they’ll adjust the cost to suit. Plus of we want them to organise food they’ll also do that for us for £5 per player per day. Perfect.

Daventry is also a short trip from the train station, have their own hotels if players are staying overnight and is near the motorway perfect!

Overheads

So far, then, by booking Battlefield Hobbies, our overheads per ticket are £5 per day per player.

Next time, I’ll talk through arranging terrain and mats that and the costs around those.