The Soldiery

So we came in on a Friday night looking for a new board game. I tend to go for titles by Days of Wonder or a card game or even a monopoly night. So pretty much open to a range of games. I was looking for a specific game called Five Tribes by days of wonder. I called ahead and he said he didn’t have it but we had never been in the store so we wanted to check it out. The store was pretty much all role playing games with some people playing magic. No body was friendly at all. As a matter of fact we walked the entire store and no one even said hello. Maybe I’m a stickler for customer service but hello would have been a great start. I would say unless you know someone who can show you the store or knows what’s in it don’t go here because no one else is interested in helping you here.

If you’re a serious board gamer, you’re going to end up in this store eventually. The only question is, Will I patronize it more than once? Unless you’re an in-​and-​out kind of shopper, probably not.
It’s an old store with a long history, and the room shows it. The smell is legendary, and even when it’s not packed with funky nerds, you’re not likely to get a great service experience in any case. This is a store that I go in when I pretty much know what I’m looking for, and under no circumstances is it comfortable or clean enough for casual gaming. If you’re into card games, I’d probably still recommend the Guard Tower first, but if you’re into board games, you’ll probably split your time between this store and the far cleaner and better merchandised Guard Tower. (Or Amazon, which slays both of these stores in prices.)

I’ve been visiting the soldiery since high school (over ten years ago!) and I’ve always loved the stock and the staff. They have a great selection of nearly all nerdy collections. They have new table-​top books, and they carry hard to find classics. They have gaming nights for just about any games you can think up, and are always open to hosting new games.
Their prices might be a little higher than some of the other nerd shops in the area, but I can almost always find what I’m looking for. They are overflowing with everything from MTG, D&D, Warhammer, board games, Pokemon, etc etc. Any card game you want, they have. And if you want anything they don’t normally carry, they’re always willing to order it for you.
I love the soldiery, they’re friendly, helpful, and they’re truly a haven for nerdiness in Clintonville.

Drove out here with my brother for a regional tournament. I got to speak with the owner for a bit and he is really really nice and you can tell he really cares about keeping a quality place going. There is a no swearing policy in the shop, which I found great because sometimes shops like this can be intimidating or downright unfriendly to younger audiences. They have a great «play» space for events like tournaments, and overall seemed to have an amazing selection of new and traded stuff. I don’t live in the area, but otherwise we’d probably be big fans of this place.

I really wanted my first experience at the Soldiery to be a fluke, but alas, I’ve been there several times since, and they have done little to change my first impressions. Unfortunately, the place lives up to several nerdy stereotypes; namely, it often smells like BO, and the staff members aren’t the most socially warm people. That being said, I’ve not walked out of the store without the item I wanted. They keep the place well-​stocked, and their inventory includes supplies for pretty much any tabletop gaming venture. My loyalty lies with the Guard Tower, but I don’t mind checking the Soldiery if I’m in the neighborhood.

Ive been here multiple times now and I’m confused why people dont like it here. Apart from walking in and (slow motion) everyone stops… staring at the new comers, notices one of them is a female… You really can see it all over their faces and Mike C put it perfectly! But after a few times of going in they dont notice you anymore and the owner warms up quickly to frequent customers. By no means did he ever comes across as a guy who is creepy or mean. ever! I admit I was concerned at first because of some of the reviews on here but none of them were accurate. The negitive comments about him leaves me more & more confused every time I go in.
I don’t know how much money a store owner can make selling games and cards but I can say that if I ran a store like this I would very protective over my things as well, making sure I’m not under selling my things either. It’s really easy to make mistakes and lose money in a business like this and people seem to forget that his income is directly based on the number of things people buy from him, thus his prices are key! NEVER has he ever tried buying cards from us after we bought some nor has he ever changed prices in front of us before. In fact, he has lowered prices for us and given us deals.
My husband has collected card for years now and it’s hard finding stores with what he’s looking for let alone a supplier with a strong and steady supply and hours late into the night so we can go after work. Their hours are a bit odd…3pm-10pm & 1am on Friday. (check their site for weekend hours) Packs are cheaper here then I’ve found anywhere else (only by a few cents) and for that reason we go here first. I enjoy supporting local small businesses and the perks are unbeatable; the owner noticed a specific sets we were buying and took the liberty of ordering us in a full box… just in case we wanted it.
We couldn’t be happier!

It seems like a lot of people don;t understand what this place is. Its a game store. It buys and sells games and items. There focus on card games (MTG, YuGiOh, ect.), table top games (Warhammer/​WH 40,000) and board games. The put on tournaments for their customers all the time. Its wall to wall games.
On the trade-​in policy of giving 25% for a trade cash and 50% for in-​store credit: That is standard in the industry, not just this place. Remember you’re selling something that you have no use for and they have to store your goods until they find someone who wants to buy the same item or pay or a little more for new.
On location: most similar stores have to find out of the way shopping centers because what they’re doing has lower profit margin and the figures are really easy to pocket. Also the distance isn’t that far off 315 so I don’t why some many people complained.
The staff I’ve never had an issue with. Some people complained that the staff are nerds. They sell eclectic games that have hard core fans. You kinda have to be a nerd to run the place and keep place with said crowd’s tastes.
Now everything isn’t butterflies and rose there, hence why I gave it only 4 stars. The selection is great but not well organized. Why? The place is small and everything is stacked to the ceiling. On Friday nights (Magic nights) and some Sundays (YuGiOh tourneys) it complete chaos in there. Also if you want specific MTG card it takes them forever to find it because a lot of their stuff is just thrown into boxes.
I enjoy the place for what it is.

UPDATE: This place also will order games for you (if you can’t find what you are looking for) and email you when they are in! Also, after going to Origins– I have learned that their prices are better than most of the Dealers in the Dealer’s Room. Asking price for an item I was looking for was marked up in Origins by 75% compared to The Soldiery’s in store asking price!

Walking in here is always like a scene from an old western. The new sheriff in town walks through the tavern door and everyone stops. People put down their magic cards. A hushed tone sets in. Someone’s 20 sided die hits the floor and breaks the silence, but no one picks it up. Everyone’s eyes are upon weathered old Johnny Law as he walks over to the bar. No one says a word to him as he wades through the crowd. Don’t look weak and order the milk he thinks to himself. «A shot of whiskey bartender, make it a double.»
Really though this place isn’t too bad. They have a really good selection of board games (I can’t speak to the CCG and miniature aspect but it looks solid). Their prices are pretty much exactly the same as everywhere else in town, which is to say pretty high if you are spoiled by Amazon. Still, they are a local business and good in a pinch for people who like to look at and feel items before they buy. I have no problem spending a little more for these reasons.
They offered us a reasonable price for some games we traded in and the lady at the counter was friendly. The layout of the store is pretty wonky but it seems like they are doing the best they can with such limited space. If you are looking for board games, be sure to check all of the walls even if it seems like it is devoted to other stuff like CCGs. Also, look up! Some stuff is even up in the rafters on top of the shelves.

It’s always a drive for me to come out here, but this is where I’ve gotten all my cards — MtG, Pokemon, Digimon, Yu-​Gi-​Oh, D&D…you name it, I’ve found it here. I’m getting a WoW TCG collection going (both a playing deck and a complete collection) and this has been my one-​stop-​shop for all things tabletop. I’ve been coming here since 1999, so they’re doing something right if they keep getting my business.
For some things, though, you’re better off looking elsewhere. When the Mew promo holographic card was issued, the Soldiery wanted $ 150 for it in the first week. $ 150 for a card someone could easily get for free at the movie theatre. Right. All anyone had to do was go see the first Pokemon movie once in every theatre around town and they got the promo card at every stop. One of my friends in middle school did that using his birthday money and he had a ton of promo cards (he gave me one of them!). Storytime aside, if the Soldiery has a rare in its possession, they’re going to want an insane amount of money for it before a market value is even established. I guess someone keeps an eye on eBay because I’ve seen them change the asking price on an item right there with people in the store. Shop around and hunt online. You’ll get ripped off if you try to buy individual pieces here. I’ve found better prices at animé conventions, to be honest.
If you’re there for a tourney, guard your cards and/​or figures with your life. I cannot stress this enough. Don’t open your booster packs/​starter decks inside the store, either. I made the mistake of opening a booster pack inside the store after I’d paid for it, and the manager seemed ready to fight when I refused to sell a card to him (it wasn’t one I’d use in a game, but it was going into my personal collection).

This store is in walking distance of my house. I have visited it several times in the late afternoon after work, and have always been treated courteously and helped promptly.
I’ve only purchased card sleeves, dice for counters, and Magic: the Gathering sealed product from there, so I can’t comment on the rare/​collectible side of things, nor the tabletop RPGs, nor any rude power gamers.
But it seems to me that the Unilocal reviews are giving a false impression that this store would be of little interest for M: tG players. That is not true.

My daughter just got into Pokémon, and after the local Origins convention, I found out there were two game stores in Columbus that I never knew even existed. I made it my mission to visit both and see what each had to offer.
When I looked up the address, I was a little shocked as I found it it’s literally right behind Laughing Ogre comics. I’ve been there at least a dozen times and I’ve never notice that there was a game store behind the place. I’m not sure if this is the intention or by design, but from a retail perspective, they’d do justice to let people even know they are there.
I’ll start out and say as much as I didn’t want to be biased, I couldn’t help but compare the prior shop as ‘The Soldiery’ was the second shop I visited, the first being ‘The Guardtower’. While The Guardtower was definitely an older shop and was far from perfect, The Soldiery was a completely different experience.
After a comic stop at the Laughing Ogre, my two kids and myself trotted around the corner and found a small sign and up a few steps into a side entrance into what felt like a secret tome of gaming.
The Bad:
The first impression once in the shop, and I hate to be frank, was the overwhelming stench. This place really, really smells terrible. The first thing my 5 year old (who has no filters) quite emphatically said was… «what is that smell! Did someone fart?» As much as my daughter wanted to get some cards, she actually asked if we could leave as she didn’t like the atmosphere either.
I’d like to say I was embarrassed, but I really wasn’t. Honestly, fart would have been a compliment in comparison to the immense wall of smell that hits you when the door opens. The place was packed with individuals for what I’m guessing was an event they were running, and the pungent smell of body odor and unchanged garbage can was truly overwhelming. While they surely can’t control the body odor of their patrons, the large garbage can full of soda and candy wrappers by the register was filled to the brim, and combined with the heat of the shop really seemed to amplify the smell coming from it all.
Ok, enough about the smell. I loathe to focus so much on the smell, but it really had to be noted as it was a large part of our experience.
My daughter has quickly become a shrewd shopper with booster pack prices. She knows exactly what the packs cost at a couple other places we’ve looked. She was looking at boosters from the new B&W set and was surprised they were selling them for $ 4 a pack. That’s almost a dollar more than what she can get them at other places.
Lastly, the patrons. Again we popped in during an open event of some variety. I understand that they can’t control the actions of their patrons, but we experienced multiple situations of extremely rude and crude individuals pushing their way through as we stood at the front counter. One guy actually said «stupid f**king pokemon kids» when we were leaving. Who says things like that? What establishment would let their patrons treat others like that? It’s too small a location for things like this to not be observed.
Believe it or not, there were some good things.
The Good:
The young lady that was running the register was extremely helpful and very willing to answer question and sharing the open play schedule for Pokemon, and let me know they frequently have prizes for people who come and play and that because she was a beginner, they had people who would help her learn and get better.
My daughter was looking for some 10-​sided die for counters and she noticed when we were leaving that they had small colored die on the counter for only .50c. She started digging through, and the nice lady dumped them out in a box so she could more easily pick them out and even helped her get the colors she wanted.
However, as nice as the lady at the counter was, there is no way we will go back, despite our frequent visits to Laughing Ogre. If their goal is to be a secret clubhouse where only regulars are truly welcome, they’re doing a great job.

LOL. I love the other reviews for this place, because even though they’re a bit harsh at times, they are right on the money about The Soldiery. This is nerd city for sure.
That being said, I do like the place. I’m a nerd, my husband’s a nerd, so its all good. Its not somewhere I’d ever want to to ‘hang out’ in, but if you need something, they have great prices and a decent selection of games, cards, books, and minis, so check it out. Without further ado, I give you the pros and cons of that enigmatic store know as the Soldiery.
The Pros:
Cheap Magic Cards. Husband is magic card obsessed. The packs are cheap and call me superstitious, but they seem to have better cards than other stores. 3 Plainswalker Jace’s in one month! Woot!
Kent, the owner. He is actually a cool dude, but I remember it took him awhile to warm up to new people. This place really has a regular customer base. Its like walking into a little neighborhood dive bar, but full of 13 year old boys and grown adults in viking helmets, oh yeah.
Need Something? Just Ask. The selection seems a bit off at first, but they have things they don’t put out — its a small place.
The Con’s:
Ok well really there is only one con and that is… the smell. This place reeks. I mean, there is no air conditioning, and in the summer, wow. Imagine the buildup of years and years of festering teenage boy BO and mountains of old french fries just composting in this tiny, ill-​ventilated space. It is truly unreal.

Absolutely horrible.
Undoubtedly the worst nerd game store I’ve ever been to.
I usually go to the Guard Tower, but I had been running errands in Clintonville and decided that I was so close to the Soldiery that I would give it a shot.
In Peter C.‘s review, he mentions that he ran into «some of the most unsavory adult power-​gamers I’ve ever seen in my life.»
What an understatement.
I’m pretty nerdy, I’ll admit. I like fantasy films and books, I’ve seen Star Wars about a million times, I play D&D on a weekly basis, and I’m terrible at sports.
But this place was unbelievable.
The entire store is basically a jumbled mess of different pen and paper games, sort of divided by game, but not well, with, for lack of a better word, crap everywhere. When I entered, the adult power gamers were taking up nearly the entire room (there is no separate gaming room, apparently), and I found that I had to weave my way through hoardes of fat, smelly dudes and one horrible woman whose child was drawing on the floor, bored out of her mind, because her mother would slap her hand and yell at her if she approached the table.
I had wanted to buy a figurine for my new rogue character (totally awesome, by the way – he wields a dagger that his father used to slay the family’s farm animals as an act of mercy, preventing them from dying of thirst after a severe drought), but within about 5 minutes, I just wanted to get out of there.
The only problem? I needed dice and I couldn’t figure out who worked there. I didn’t want to ask any of the clientele, but eventually, the «obnoxious grade-​n NEEEEEEERD» mentioned by Matthew B, called out to me from some sort of small office, made sure to correct my verbiage when I mistakenly called the loose dice «singles,» and didn’t have any dice in the loose dice box that matched the set that I ended up buying. So I gave the guy $ 14 for a set of dice that didn’t even match, and seconds after walking out the door, couldn’t figure out for the life of me why I’d given that man any money.
I thought about going back to try and return them, but honestly, it’s worth $ 14 for me to never step foot in that store again.

Update: The Soldiery is the worst gaming store I have ever had to deal with and I hope Amazon puts them out of business, and quick. I do not use such an insult lightly.
Now this place is a real dive and I’ve never quite liked it, but it’s there, you know, and I used to buy a LOT of board games.
Now the place advertises that it buys, sells, and trades games on its website.
Only, it doesn’t. The guy who runs the place is an obnoxious grade-​n NEEEEEEERD about everything.
I learned a few months ago that when he says he «buys games» he actually means he’ll give you a quarter of their market value, then he re-​shrinkwraps them and sells them as new. At least, this is what he told me and my girlfriend, verbatim: «I like how you keep your games organized, I’m just going to shrink-​wrap these and put them on the shelf.» That seems pretty shady to me in the first place. Have games I’ve bought at the Soldiery been used games passed off as new without my knowledge?
He said «I’ll give you half value in store credit instead, because I don’t want people thinking I run a pawn shop.»
Alright, first of all if I thought this was a pawn shop I’d be selling you some real fucking valuable items, not a stack of board games. Second of all, don’t advertise you buy games if you really just want to trade them. Trading is cool. If you advertise trading, right on. Just take the «buy» out of there. It’s barely true. You don’t want to buy games. At all.
So the other day I had a crazy notion to go back in and see if I could trade my three D&D 4e core books for a single copy of the Star Wars Saga rules. I made the mistake of bringing the books in with the dust cover the books came in since I bought them as a gift set.
Welllll, as soon as he sees it he starts going on the internet, saying how he remembers Amazon selling the set for $ 50-​something. He confirms this to his own satisfaction and then offers me something like $ 20 in store credit or $ 10 in cash, for three books with a cover price of $ 40 each. I wanted to trade all three books, in mint condition, for a single book of the same exact value. Win-​win, right? Wrong.
Now, okay, if I hadn’t brought them in with the slip case he would have tallied the books up separately at cover price, and calculated trade credit from that. It would have been a bit higher. What?
Nevermind the fact that he has no idea when or where I bought them and whether I paid the $ 106 cover price for the gift set or whatever, but he assumes and lets me know that he assumes I bought it off of Amazon at a discount and then calculates how much he should pay me for them based on that. Wait, what?
ON TOP OF ALL THIS, he sits there and mocks me about it all. He’s like «You didn’t do anything stupid like write in these books, right?» I told him «Yeah, I filled out all the character sheets in ink,» which he didn’t find as funny as I did. Then he started tsking at me and saying «You need to keep your books cleaner.»
Look, nerd, I’m sorry I don’t think gaming books are archival copies of the fucking Word of God because I’m not a neeeeeerd. Also, they were near-​mint and only read once and the «dirt» he referred to was a thin layer of dust ON THE DUST CASE. THE CASE MADE TO COLLECT DUST.
Annnnd I’m certain that he would have taken the three books, thrown the case away, and sold them separately as three NEW books. He would have paid about $ 3 a piece for them if I had taken cash, and sold them for $ 40 a piece to unsuspecting customers.
Reprehensible. I will never go back. Take the time to go to the Guardtower. It’s an infinitely better experience and an infinitely better store run by an infinitely more friendly and welcoming staff.

I’m not the least bit ashamed to admit the fact that I was an adamant Magic: The Gathering player well in to my freshman year of college, but as soon as I transferred from The University of Akron to OSU I all but gave up the game completely. It might have had something to do with the fact that I couldn’t find a decent place to play at, or it may have been the rampant alcohol consumption that took place on my neighbor’s porch every night. The details are hazy.
Anyways, I decided to make an attempt at jumping back in to it for fun last summer, so I did some Googling and found this place. After driving up and down High Street at least four times, I finally gave up and asked the people at The Laughing Ogre (the comic book store out front) where this place was. Birds of a feather and all that jazz, right? As luck would have it (or so it seemed at the time), The Soldiery was located directly behind. Onward I marched.
Once I got inside, I found the layout of this tiny little shed of a gaming store to be dizzying. Backpacks and skateboards laying everywhere, rogue collections of tabletop miniatures crammed in to corner shelves here and there, and some of the most unsavory adult power-​gamers I’ve ever seen in my life. It all became clear to me why I quit this crap in the first place: hanging out at a place like The Soldiery is no way to spend a Saturday afternoon.
Like Matthew B. said in his review, I wish this place would just make up its mind. There’s way too much clutter here for this to ever be a legitimate place to hold sanctioned CCG tournaments, yet that’s exactly what goes on here several times a week. No wonder this place smells like stale Camels and armpits! The selection of goods here is spread far too thin over a needlessly large cross section of different games, most of which can’t have more than three or four die-​hard fans in the entire central Ohio area to begin with. That’s what the internet is for! Alas, my lone trip to The Soldiery brought back all the bad memories of competitive gaming that I swept under the rug the minute I left Akron, and I think that’s where they’ll remain for now.

The Soldiery can’t seem to make up its mind. Does it want to be a miniatures store or a board games store? It’s not big enough to be both, and is rather cramped and musty.
They hold CCG Tournaments as well as Miniatures gaming, so of course there are tables set up in the middle of the store. Toward a forgotten back corner are piles and piles of ill kept out of date tabletop gaming manuals and board games. You’re likely to find something rare and out of print if you dig enough.
You can sell older games here as well if you need the extra cash to support your hobby. Though you might not always get the price you want. While The Soldiery isn’t my first place to buy games, I do shop for all my Magic: The Gathering cards here.