For several years now, there has been a pretty active and eclectic gaming group meeting monthly (and more) in the American Eagles shop in South Tacoma. John Fernandes really got us started almost three years ago, and since Don and Gloria at the shop got a permanent upstairs room we could use there is usually something there every Saturday of the month. As a rule, fantasy miniatures (lots of Warhammer and Battletech) meet on the second weekend, a plastic modelers group on the third weekend, and two or more weekends a month historical miniatures, liberally mixed with historical board gaming, terrainmaking and campaign gaming take place there.

If there is a unifying theme to the group, it is that we'll try just about anything once. Most of the members have their feet into more that one aspect of the hobby, so that we have people painting historical and fantasy miniatures, building plastic models, playing historical board games, writing and modifying rules, doing historical research, and building terrain boards.

Frequently all or most of these activities are being pursued by the same people. This cross- fertilization helps every aspect of the hobby: in the past year we've woven two board games into campaigns that generate miniatures battles, members are re-writing board game rules into miniature rules, and some plastic modelers have turned their hands to Napoleonic naval miniatures as a result of exposure to a Trafalgar game.

The biggest current projects revolve around the 18th and 20th centuries. For about a year most of the club has been involved in a campaign called "The War of the Slobbovian Succession", set in the 1720's in a mythical country (the Holy Slobbovian Empire) represented by the old Soldier Kings board game map.

Now starting its fourth campaign year, the heavily-modified board game has generated a half- dozen 18th century land battles, fought out with 15mm figures and either Age of Reason rules or a hybrid set of rules homegrown by injecting Age of Reason modifiers into Fire and Fury and beating it with a word processor. Since last fall, the microarmor crowd in Tacoma has been playing with several new rules sets: Spearhead by Arty Conliffe, and a set of board game rules by one of our members (John Fernandes) that translated very nicely into miniatures at the same scale (platoon-sized units) as Spearhead. Single- tank/vehicle action still gets played out on Jim Moulton's gorgeous terrain boards with Panzer Tactics, and every once in a while Ray Austin brings the latest version of his rules around for another "brew up."

Most of the crowd has also been playing in a World War Two campaign based on the Advanced Third Reich board game. The original idea was to use this to generate miniatures battles, but since none of the microarmontes wants to paint up 1940 British or Italian tanks, the campaign miniature land battles will probably have to wait until the game hits at least 1942. On the other hand, Seakrieg WWII naval miniatures are being painted, so we may be polluting the Mediterranean with oil slicks in a month or so!

The latest interests in the club are both continuations of old favorites and some brand-new trends. Terrain for a Normandy mini-campaign is under construction, with everything from Point-du- Hoc and the beaches to some really ugly bocage - at least, ugly if you are a 1/285 Sherman trying to advance! Look for this game at ENFILADE! this year.

The Trafalgar spirit, picked up at the Adventure Gamefest in Portland, has several members rigging up wooden ships and trying some small actions on the tabletop. Chef de Battalion, the tactical Napoleonic rules that came out last year, has also gathered some interest. Here the plan is to build up the huge Chef battalions in 6mm, and perhaps try it later in 15mm. Out on the sidelines there are also some 25mm medieval figures lurking and a l5mm Culloden project, frankly inspired by the lovely Old Glory figures available for that battle.

I publish a (roughly) monthly newsletter for the club, the Tacoma Wargamers' News which, for want of other submissions, has a lot of news, battle reports and character assassination from the War of the Slobbovian Succession. If you call American Eagles Tacoma, we try to keep a schedule at least a month in advance of what's happening on any given Saturday, and if you want to play we never turn anyone away. Gaming usually starts between 11:00 and noon on Saturdays. We "pass the hat" for a dollar or two to defray the cost of the room and soda/snacks that are provided by the shop.