I know a lot of people who now are getting into wild west skirmishes, thanks to the Warhammer Old West rules set. If you’re going to build your own Victorian west town for miniatures skirmishes, you’re going to need signs and wanted posters. Wargames Foundry is offering these free here.
For inspiration, you could take a look at pictures of the wild west town that I built seven or eight years ago.
I like to litter my miniature battlefields with little details like wagon debris and haystacks. Here are some instructions for building old-fashioned haystacks. They’d be useful for your figures to hide behind in a skirmish wargame.
Generic Outlandishly Big Spacefleets! is the game where you control vast fleets of
vessels of all shapes and sizes, from nimble little fighters to moon-sized planetsmashers.
Move your ships. Fire your weapons. Launch your torpedoes. And watch your enemies
explode into brilliant flashes of molten metal! Everything a budding megalomaniac… err,
defender of the galaxy… could want!
G.O.B.S.! is designed to allow you to build big, custom spacefleets and fight quick,
explosive battles with simple rules and little or no record keeping. Just move, shoot, and
(probably) explode. What could be more fun? Best of all, you can use G.O.B.S.! with any
spaceship miniatures you like, from those expensive metal jobs to cheap plastic toys to
scratch-built wonders made from household items. (Yours truly is contemplating a fleet
made from seashells.)
Factions is a squad based game of warfare between rival gangs. Many stories could be created as to why they are at war with each other. The Core Rule book covers all the rules you will need to begin playing. It includes:
* Short guide on how to play.
* Rules for creating a Space Marine Faction
* Weapons & Equipment
* Vehicles
Factions is similer in many way to a plethora of Games Workshop games (because that is what we based it on). It resembles, in my opinion, a mix of Inquisitor, Necromunda and Mordheim. To play you also recquire many dice including d4, d6, d8, d10, d12 and d20. Also having a d% (a dice with 1-10 on in and a dice with 10, 20 30 ect.) is helpful, although it can be made by having two seperate coloured dice.
Fight Dice is a set of free wargames rules for combat between giant robots in the Gundam tradition. It uses a neat dice pool system, where the players allocate handsfull of six sided dice to their actions.
Imagine Image has released Hex Command Nova, a set of free wargames rules in their Hex Command series. Not surprisingly, this one is about spaceship combat. It’s very well done, with a professional look and in pdf format.
Wizards of the Coast has put its collection of paper building models back up on the web. They had taken them down following the release of their “Map Folio 3-D” book. I’d advise going there and downloading them all before they disappear again. The buildings are excellent little models, suitable for 25mm to 28mm wargames figures. If you find them a tad small (as I do), they are very easy to rescale before prinitng.
Bill MacGillivray has a nice gallery of his Shang Chinese DBA army, and a Dragon Tail banner for you to save and print on your inkjet.The banner is in 15mm, but I’m going to resize it and use it for my Boxer Rebellion armies in 28mm.
Miniature Wargaming is part of the "adventure games" hobby, which includes r ole p laying and board games. Wargamers recreate battles on the tabletop with toy soldiers, like a more complicated game of chess. Models range in height from 6mm to 28mm tall, with 15mm and 25mm being the most popular. There also is a growing interest in toy soldiers and military models, such as the 1/32 and 1/35 scale plastic soldiers from Conte, and Marx.
The most popular miniature wargames are fantasy and science fiction based, such as Warhammer, Warhammer 40K, Warmachine and The Lord of the Rings. World War II games such as Flames of War and Axis and Allies are new favorites. Other favorite historical periods include Napoleonics, the American Civil War, and ancients, such as Romans or Greeks. Other gamers enjoy miniature naval wargames, recreating battles like Trafalgar, Jutland and the Coral Sea.
Hobbyists research historical periods and paint their tiny soldiers in accurate uniforms. Others develop "historically realistic" rules sets or build scale battlefield terrain using model railroad techniques.
For pictures, visit the gallery.
Some of the bigger hobby companies are Games Workshop, which produces Warhammer, Wargames Foundry and Old Glory Miniatures. Wizards of the Coast produces several lines of pre-painted miniatures games, such as the Star Wars and Dungeons and Dragons miniatures games, and a historical game with pre-painted miniatures: The new Axis and Allies game. Wizkids produces a fantasy collectable miniatures game, such as the Mage Knight and Heroclick fantasy games, the science fiction games MechWarrior and Rocketmen, as well as the quasi-historical Pirates of the Spanish Main.
