Wednesday, February 22, 2006
The indefatigable Jim Wallman has a new set of miniatures rules called “The Pirates of Yendor.” It’s for fantasy naval warfare, with rules for elf and dwarf galleys, corsairs and such. It also has an interesting pre-planned movement system using cards.
It all makes me want to get out my old Games Workshop Man O War figures.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
Ramming Speed is a set of miniature wargames rules for playing games with ancient galleys.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Planned Movement Production offers Beneath The Waves, a
simple fast played board game where you battle steampunk submarines against each other. The game involves crew management, planned movement, all sorts of weapons and more.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Andy Watkins offers Nelson’s Wars, a set of rules for miniatures battles in the age of fighting sail. The mechanics are based on the Silent Death rules, which use dice of different sizes (d4, d6, d8, d10 etc.) to distinguish between different weapons systems.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Friday, October 28, 2005
Corpen: 1889 is a set of free miniature wargames rules
for simulating naval battles in the late 19th century. It was inspired by GDW’s excellent Ironclads and Ether Flyers (I&EF) supplement for the Space:1889 role-playing game. It tries to preserve the “flavor” of that era that I&EF conveyed, while at the same time requiring less dice-rolling and record-keeping than I&EF did. It is based upon my earlier Corpen 18 WWII surface naval combat game, with significant alterations which were required to take into account the much different nature of naval combat in the late 19th century.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Maritime Supremacy Trafalgar is a set of simple free miniature wargames rules for replaying the famed battle of Trafalgar. Author Justo Perez writes:
These rules are ideally suited for kids and their dads or as an educational tool for history teacher; to increase student interest in history. The rules are simple and self contained; the necessary ships should be printed on regular card-stock sheets, then cut and glued as illustrated.
To address the historic superiority of Nelson’s fleet, the rules favor the British by having them move last (i.e. allowing them to maneuver after the Franco-Spanish ships move) and resolve gun-fire first (i.e. scoring damage on the Franco-Spanish ships before they fire their own guns). The typical and well known tactics of high-shots to the riggings (the French preference) and low-shots to the hull (the British preference) are not addressed in these rules. Rather than focus on such minute tactical details, the framework of these rules hinge on overall fleet strategy and gun-fire volume.
The dicing system is quite simple… each die that rolls a SIX is a hit and the same dicing concept is used for other game tasks. A roll of SIX is easily distinguished among other dice; it speeds up the game and produces reasonable odds. Where more favorable odds are warranted, the odds are augmented by having the player retain the dice that rolled a SIX and re-roll the remaining dice.
If you like rolling dice and quick results, these rules are for you.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Thursday, September 22, 2005
Mike Adams has written a set of rules for wargaming the naval end of the Russo Japanese War. He writes:
The rules are based on “De Bellis Navalis” by Colin Standish, published in Wargames Illustrated #143 August 1999. “De Bellis Navalis” were themselves based on “De Bellis Antiquitatis” Ancients rules, published by Wargames Research Group. I have made quite a lot of changes to the rules as published in Wargames Illustrated, so they are in effect a new set. However, credit and thanks goes to Colin for the original idea.
Mike also has a nice set of ship counters for the war for you to download, print, cut out and play with.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Struggle On The South Seas is a set of free naval wargames rules for lighthearted adventure. The authors write:
This is a fantasy naval battle game, which glosses over much of the encumbrances of reality for a fast and exciting game. Players will employ cannons and ironclads, dugouts and longships, galleys and sailing vessels. There will be boarding actions, collisions and ramming. If you’re looking for a historically accurate realistic simulation, you may well be disappointed. If you’re looking for a light-hearted fun game—-rejoice!
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Friday, May 06, 2005
Stephen Lorenz offers a new set of WWII naval wargames rules called Seas of War. The set is professionally done and presented in pdf format. It also includes the data on a huge number of ships of the period.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Thursday, April 28, 2005
Trireme, from Andy Watkins, is a set of free naval wargames rules. These are of the one-page variety, which means that there is much to recommend them. I also like the staggered movement system based on boat speed, which reminds me of the old Car Wars system.
Entry Permalink and Comments | Email this entry | List All Posts By Category
Page 5 of 6 pages « First < 3 4 5 6 >
Poll #1:
Cast your vote and then join the discussion to tell us why.
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.
|
|
|
|
|
