As a kid, one of my favorite book series was Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “John Carter of Mars.” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read the first, “A Princess of Mars.”
So I was excited to find Green Blood and Red Blood for Mars, a set of rules for mass combat on Mars in the Victorian Age. Now I’ve got one more excuse to get some of those neat martian figures that are circulating from various companies these days.
Prolific games designer Rudi Geudens offers Afriboria, a fast play, card driven set of colonial rules. What’s really neat about this game is that Rudi has designed some gorgeous custom cards, as well as labels to stick to six sided dice for use with the game.
Matakishi has written The Natives Are Restless Tonight, a set of free wargaming siege rules for any game involving a large band of natives, and a small, but stalwart group of westerners. They would work for any game in the colonial era, including the Zulu War, Boxer Rebellion, Foreign Legion, North West Frontier and Indian Mutiny.
The rules use a card activation system, and involve rolling handfulls d6s. Casualties are determined by summing the attack dice and removing a figure for every multiple of 6, 9 or 12, depending upon the defensive situation.
I’ve got a huge Boxer Rebellion figure collection. It’s a conflict that I’ve been interested in ever since I wrote a paper about it in the 5th grade. So I keep my eyes open for anything and everything about the conflict. Tuan is a set of Boxer Rebellion rules by Todd Zechiel, which was sold by Cellmate Miniatures. Now, they are available for free on the net. You can get them here.
I’ve noted before that there doesn’t seem to be a single period that someone hasn’t converted to the DBM / DBA rules. Here’s proof: DBM Zulus and Voortrekkers, for playing miniature wargames set in colonial South Africa.
Gabriel Landowski has written Colonia, a set of free wargames rules for colonial wargaming. The rules are well presented, with copious notes, and a program for designing landships.
Alex Self has designed the basic Universal Standard rules to accomodate any number of period add-ons. (See the original Universal Standard Post here). This expansion lets you use the rules to battle out the Zulu War of 1879. This is an ambitious set of free wargames rules.
Tanzanica is a set of free wargames rules for Darkest Africa adventures by Brett Abbott. The rules actually are a variant of Games Workshop's Mordheim miniatures rules, which are themselves free at the Games Workshop living rules archive. Mordheim is a neat set of rules for the kind of game where each player controls a small group of characters, with one uber-character and several flunkies.
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.
