If you’re into games, Gamer’s Haven is for you

Walk through a door off of Sherman Avenue and you walk into a war zone. To the left, plate-armored marines aim their devastating “bolters” at a ravening horde of arachnid bugs. To the right, green-skinned orcs clobber a line of elven warriors. And straight ahead, two mages battle for supremacy of a card table.

This is the world of the Gamer’s Haven. The shop on Sherman and 12th Street in Coeur d’Alene caters to gamers of all kinds: role-players, collectible card game fanatics, tabletop generals and board game enthusiasts. The interior sports walls are painted like a castle and a dozen tables are scattered across the floor. Racks hang with miniatures from popular lines such as Warhammer, WarMachine and Hordes. Glass cases with Magic: The Gathering boosters and assorted polyhedron dice frame the cash register. Modeling supplies and paints in dozens of colors await the hobbyists.

“I’ve played just about every game we sell,” said Russ Pickup, the store’s 24-year-old owner.

An avid gamer since he was 11 years old, Pickup snatched a long-held dream of his when he took over the helm of the shop last summer from previous owner Bob Kelly.

Pickup said he was struck by the social atmosphere and the support given the gamers when he first came to the store as a customer.

“The community of gamers is why this place is in business. The passion for the games, and just having a nice place where you can play a game and talk,” Pickup said.

The main focus of the store is the miniature game Warhammer 40K. Set nearly 40,000 years in the future, the game pits two armies against each other in myriad scenarios. The armies range from superhuman Space Marines to the hive-minded bugs of the Tyrannids. It has a parallel game set in a medieval milieu called Warhammer Fantasy.

Warhammer is a game that caters to generally male interests. However, it’s a hobby that rewards not only the strategist but the artist, too.

The miniatures come out of the box as plastic or metal models that must first be glued together and painted. Many hours go into posing and modifying the models and then applying intricately detailed paint schemes. Tournaments reward the best-painted armies.

“We actually have quite a few customers that I have never seen play a game,” Pickup said.

He said those hobbyists would rather paint than game: art, not war. Some of the best painters are the female customers, according to Pickup.

At any given moment, a half-dozen people sit at the tables playing a game, painting or just shooting the bull.

“Most of the guys come down here and talk about it,” Pickup said. “You can talk about baseball; these guys talk about 40K.”

The statement sparked a long debate about the army most open to exploitation, something gamers refer to as a “broken” army. Pickup comes down on the Tyrannids, while others have their own pet peeves ranging from the twisted Chaos Space Marines to the alien race of Tau.

Since taking over the store, Pickup has worked on maintaining that camaraderie while making improvements to the shop’s back end. He said he has focused on better inventory controls and that he is looking to apply other techniques he learned as a business student working on his degree from the University of Phoenix Online.

According to Pickup, the money in gaming comes from supporting the customer and providing accessories.

“When you go to buy a printer, what doesn’t come in the box? A cable. That’s where you make up 90 percent of your profit,” Pickup said.

For his customers, those accessories include dice, card sleeves, paints, modeling tools and game counters. It also includes running events such as tournaments and campaigns that give the customers something to work toward.

“We usually have a tournament every month for either 40K or Fantasy,” Pickup said. “Every week we have a Magic tournament.”

Magic: The Gathering and other collectible card games tend to bring out the younger players. After school and on the weekends or during school breaks, the store populates with the next generation of gamers who have perhaps less disposable income but all of the passion of the older players.

“We like having kids here,” Pickup said. “We’re having a lot of customers who are having kids. We always have kids coming in and learning the system.”

“We’re a safe place, too,” he added. “Parents don’t have to worry about their kids coming in and spending time here.”

In a time where most people think of games as what you do on the Xbox or computer, the Gamer’s Haven provides an oasis for those who crave more interaction with both the games and the players.

For Pickup, the Haven is heaven.

“The best thing is coming to work every day and have my hobby be my job.”