Prehistory

The Bunker started as an idea in 1996 when Games Workshop were looking for people to set up clubs independent from their own club nights. GW were to fund the first year of premises rental and buy all the things needed to run a club for the first year. Gareth Williams, Paul Chadwick, Russell Hodge and Pete Hillman could find nowhere at a reasonable cost in the Chelmsford area to rent, but travelled to Lakeside where one of the first of these clubs started. The first visit was to play a like minded group of gamers at a large Warhammer fantasy game, Orks v Empire, which the Chelmsford based gamers won. Time passed and still nowhere could be found to use as a base for the gamers, resulting in overcrowding at GW’s vet nights, until Gareth bought a house. In October of 1999, the Bunker met for the first time in Gareth's garage, converted to hold an 8 foot by 4 foot table, sufficient for use of four friends.

First club photo

Over the next few months, friends bought friends along who in turn bought more friends along until in March 2000 when the club was invited to attend a meeting of clubs in Lenton (GW HQ) to form a gaming group, now know as the GCN (Gaming Club Network). Gareth came back from this meeting with a host of ideas that had been talked about at the GCN and started to formalise the club. The first club committee was formed, Dave Farress as club president, Paul Chadwick as treasurer, Gareth as Secretary. The name came from the fact Gareth has a World War II bunker in his back garden.

Recorded History

2002

Our first Gamesday as a club

By January 2002 there were twelve members and more asking to come along to play various games, a better venue was found at The Essex Police sports and social hall, and the club started to meet on Wednesdays instead of Mondays. Over the next year the club increased in numbers and facilities, buying cloths to game on and scenery to use. Recruiting more members from the vets nights and Sunday gamers at GW Chelmsford. At the end of the year another committee was elected, and the club moved into playing GCN gaming, challenging other clubs across the country to do battle. Our first victory was against the Warhammer World club, which we won, and still hold the challenge certificate for. We attended Gamesday on a formal basis for the first time putting on a demonstration game of Warmaster, a game very popular at the club, and concluded with a trip to Lenton for GW’s thank you day, a day of free gaming, food and a trip round the museum.

2003

The Battle of the Fords of Isen

We went to Lenton again to challenge the Warhammer world vets and winning.We attended Gamesday again, where a 12 foot long table was built, and 100 riders of Rohan and their captains attempted to halt the forces of Isenguard crossing the fords of Isen. The Battle of the Fords of Isen was fought several times throughout the day. The majority of the battles stayed 'true' to the book and Theodred was slain by the Uruk-Hai. These battles featured in excess of 100 Uruk-Hai models, more than at the, GW run, Helms Deep table! Frantic 15 minute games of Mordheim were played with a prize going to the person who collected the most warpstone during the game. Each game was restricted to 4 players each with their own referee, so each player got on with the game at their own pace. The faster you went the more moves you had. (With random happenings going on, more turns wasn't necessarily a good thing!)

We ran games for the 2003 GW Eye of Terror campaign culminating in a 15,000 point a side mega game including over 4,000 points of Iron Warriors, 4000 points of Armoured company and (probably) a Great Company of Space Wolves. The result was a victorious massacre of the forces of evil. Plus great game of Talisman in the corner, which 40k Players missed out on.

2004

All 11 Murmaks

This year we outdid ourselves again at Gamesday and mounted an insanely large game with 200 riders charging down 11 murmaks all day long.

We hosted 3 tournaments: 40k in 40 minutes which was well attended, Fantasy battle, and Lord of the Rings. We also attended and won for GW Chelmsford the vets tournament at Lenton in this year.

2005

We started by attending Lenton once more to help run LOTR games teaching new players how to use armies and the basics of the rules. We invited a few clubs who were either joining or thinking of joining the GCN to an open play series of games, now know in GW circles as “clubbed to death” We then had a number of open days inviting anyone to come along and play our games, once more culminating in Gamesday with more sensible sized games of Wild West, Warmaster and Fantasy Quest, our Warhammer Quest variant.

2006

Seven Against The Odds

Mike White's addiction to the Legends of the Old West game proved to be the driving force for the Bunker's Gamesday entry this year. A scenario was conceived based around seven cowboy heroes defending a village against a large force of banditos - Seven Against The Odds! Rather aptly, seven magnificent members of the Bunker crew ran the table through the day and it proved to be a great sucess. The seven "punters" in each game were each given hero and two villagers based in or around a building; their task was to defeat the advance of four gangs of ten evil banditos controlled by the Bunker crew. Many people tried this game for the first time thanks to our table and everyone was entranced by the fast play and cinematic events it can easily produce.

2007

Chaos Bowl!

For Gamesday 2007, Phil Staines designed a 3D Chaos Bowl game, based on a special blend of Blood Bowl, Dungeon Bowl and 3D Star Trek chess! Players controlled one of four Chaos specific teams and their task was to get a severed head from the base of the board all the way to the top, blocking, passing and fouling their way to deposit the head into the Chaos Cup and earn a chance as becoming a demon prince.

2008

Gamesday 2008 saw the Chelmsford Bunker putting on two games - Treasure Islands (based on the Legends of the High Seas game from Warhammer Historical) and Stompa Bash (a 40K themed Ork Stompa all out scrap!) Twelve members of the club assisted although others came along and helped out just for the fun of it, one of our biggest ever turnouts for the event.

 

2009

 

 

 

For Gamesday 2009, the Bunker boys ran two games; Back From The Dead which saw a small force of Dark Angel scouts attempt to defend a city from an ever increasing swarm of plague zombies and Happy Hour, a traditional tavern brawl using the Legends of the High Seas ruleset which featured people pirates being thrown out of windows, annoyed barmaids and a bottle throwing landlord!.  Ten club members ran the games on the day andwe all had a blast!

Gamesdays Over The Years