The Perfect Captain’s Battle Finder is a set of 64 cards—done in the usual high quality graphics—that you use to generate terrain for your miniature wargames battles. There also are rules for using the cards to create linear campaigns, and maneuver campaigns using the downloadable force counters, order and control markers. There are even revenue and siege rules.
Truly innovative stuff, and something that I’m going to use almost immediately.
Pete Pellegrino offers a set of rules called Sink The Bismark! Pete writes:
Sink the Bismarck! is based upon the Battle of the Denmark Straits, May 1941. The game is designed to be played by a team or ‘Flag Staff’ determining the actions of each ship in their force. The Flag Staff can consist of any number of players; though recommend not more than 8 - 10 per staff. The staff must have one Admiral in charge of the staff and acting as commander of one ship, and a Flag Captain, commanding the second ship. The remainder of the staff is divided among three departments; the Navigation Department (NAV DEPT) responsible for ship movements, the Engineering Department (ENG DEPT) responsible for battle damage repairs and generating smoke screens, and the Operations Department (OPS DEPT) responsible for guns, torpedoes, and air operations. Each department executes its duties through the use of ‘action cards’ which they hold.
The rules also include downloads for paper ships, status sheets and card decks.
Heimskringla – Viking Naval Warfare in the Age of the Sagas is a set of free wargames rules from the Red Guard Wargames Collective. This is an interesting set of rules in that I don’t think its a subject that has ever been done before. Turns consist of archery, movement and boarding action phases. There’s also a good explanation of Viking warfare based on the sagas.
Tough Men With Iron Balls is James Roach’s set of free miniatures rules for playing fleet actions in the age of sail:
The author writes:
These rules are designed for fleet actions of 10-30 ships that can be played to completion in a single evening. The focus is on ‘feel’ rather than detail because these are the type of games I prefer. However, if you crave more detail please feel free to add it - one possibility that I considered was referring to a critical hit table with fire tests and rudder damage whenever the firer’s throw tripled the defender’s D6.
As an after thought: what is it about naval games that inspires people to use such terrible double entendres in their titles?
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
