My brother was a small time AW player back in the day, but when I heard about the pricing the practical part of me went as far as "Uhh, that looks really cool!" He migrated away from AW into something called "Real Life" and I didn't hear more about it.
Then back in '04, he brought his laptop and gear with him on a visit, and set up a little LAN game for us. Within minutes, I was good and hooked! Used to go to this strategy game or that every couple months, but since AH I haven't felt the urge to try anything else for a long, long time. Since then, I've spread the addiction to a teen who became an aeronautical engineer...and gotten a few others to try it out.