Of all the years I’ve done some sort of Game Plan for the year (because I do recognize I am far more productive when I have a plan and stick to it) I have the least idea of what I want to do… It’s not that I’m losing interest in gaming or miniature gaming – quite the contrary – I feel pulled in too many directions at once and can’t really settle on just one thing!
Game Weekend
I’ve been dragging my butt about organizing a game weekend,
as I couldn’t really settle on any one thing to do for the weekend – too many
fun games that could be played. Ultimately I have settled on playing a A
Song of Blades and Heroes campaign using some elements of Song
of Deeds and Glory and elements of other campaign systems to play a
somewhat abstract map campaign.
Gaming Our Way Through
History
We have one more volume of Story
of the World to read through and I have a bunch of games lined up to play as we
go through it.
Board Games
China
the Middle Kingdom– not just modern history – this is a game based on
Britania which covers a great deal of the history of China – players play
successive groups of peoples that rise to power and the eventually fall to
newer groups from 400BCE to modern day.
Maharaja
- similar to China: the Middle Kingdom above. The time period of the game runs
from the Aryan invasions of 1500
BC to the establishment of the British Raj in
the mid-1800s – so mostly stuff we’ve already covered, but hopefully the game
will be a good review…
Soldier
Raj India again – a little more focused on the period between 1767
and 1846. By the same guys that did Soldier
Kings (which we tried… but didn’t get to play a whole game of…)
American
Civil War - The Eagle Games production – as it allows for more than
two players and has lots of little toys!
Railways
of the World - because history isn’t JUST about war!?
Railways
of North America because the map is basically just Canada… We can
built the CPR!
Prairie
Aflame - a game of the (Canadain) Northwest Rebellion of 1885. I
doubt it’s covered in the book we’re reading – but I thought I’d add it in for
a bit of Canadian history.
Bittereinder…?
A game of the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902). I ‘ve had this for years. I
may or may not try it with the kids…
Axis
& Allies 1914 - a lighter strategic game of the Great War…
possibly if the kids are up to it I might try Paths
of Glory
Red
Russia for the rise of Bolshevism and the Russian Civil War
Popular
Front for the Spanish Civil War
Axis
& Allies 1942 for a lighter strategic game of the Second World
War
OR (if we can find the time!)
Axis
& Allies 1940 Europe AND Axis
& Allies 1940 Pacific because that would be fun… we’d have to
find some more players and set aside a weekend to play it…
Twilight
Struggle for the Cold War… only two player… so maybe we’ll play a few
games of it.
Fire
in the Lake - a grand strategy game of the Vietnam War.
Port
Stanley: Battle for the Falklands another game I’ve had kicking
around for decades that I may or may not get to playing with the kids.
Labyrinth:
the War or Terror 2001 - ? - to bring us right up to the present day…
Power
Grid Deluxe again, to add in a little something that ISN’T just about
WAR!?
Third
World War? as a bit of a “how it could have gone down”? I have this
entire series of games (Including Arctic
Front – Battle for Norway, Southern
Front – Race for the Turkish Straits, and Persian
Gulf – Battle for the Middle East) I’ve always wanted to play them
all together…
Miniature Games
One
Hour Wargames - I’ve been meaning to get in a game of this… I’m
running out of useable time periods. The more modern options presented in this
book don’t really appeal to me.
Ever
Victorious Armies which I had, at one point, modified to play some
colonial actions…
G.A.S.L.I.G.H.T.…?
(without the Giant Steam Robots or Martians) as an alternative to the modified
EVA…?
Contemptible
Little Armies for a simple game to cover some actions in the Great
War, Russian Civil War, and the “Back of Beyond” (China, etc)
Wings
of Glory - for some WW1 Dogfighting.
A
World Aflame - one of the Osprey Wargames I picked up a few years
back to try out. Meant for the “inter-war” period. I thought I might try it out
for some Spanish Civil War actions (though I don’t have any SCW specific
miniatures – I do have a lot of generic early 20th Century civilians
armed with bolt action rifles that might make due for some of the combatants).
Bolt
Action - for some skirmish action in WW2. I have no shortage of
options for this!
Force
on Force - I can use this for Vietnam and other Cold War and more
modern actions…
Cold
War Commander for some larger scale actions in the Cold War and more
modern conflicts – I’ve been thinking about re-doing some of my forces for this
game in mirco-armour… perhaps that won’t get done in time to play with the kids
during our study.
Flying
Lead…? For smaller scale actions in just about any 20th
century conflicts…
Saturday Game Afternoons
I know I’ve been saying this for
years, but I’d really like to start hosting longer games on Saturday
afternoons/Evenings once (or twice) a month. I did get in at least THREE this
past year… (There was probably more if you could ones where just my family
played – but I’m thinking about games where people OTHER than my family join us
to play a longer board game…).
Eldrtich
Horror - actually already played a 7-player game of this on 2 January
2016 – but I’d like to play it AGAIN!
Firefly–
already have a couple afternoons set aside to play this – once with just Amanda
and the kids, and again with some other guys!
Soldier
Kings I tried it as a three-player game with the kids and it didn’t
work out so well… I’d like to play this as a 7-8-player game…
Game
of Thrones - 6-players… I had started reading the first book again
with the kids. Maybe when we finish it, we’ll recruit a few more players and
have a go.
Arkham
Horror having played Eldritch Horror now, I kind of like it better…
but I’d still like to play this a bit more (especially since I picked up a few
expansions on sale over the holidaze!?)
Axis & Allies (1914,
1942, or 1940
Europe, and/or 1940
Pacific) – these will probably be played as part of the Story of the
World studies with the kids – but the bigger ones (1940 Europe and Pacific)
could be played together as a weekend long mega game with eight players!
Joan
of Arc - as with the last two, I played it with the kids this past
year but would really like to play it again with six players.
I’m sure there are others… but
these are the ones that are at the top of the list to play. If I played just
one each month I’d get through… well.. MOST of them!? How hard could that be?
Other Events
ToonCon 2016 - 23-24-25 September 2016 – The Boy and I had a great time last year, so I definitely think we’ll be going again this year! Not sure about Amanda and The Girl… I know The Girl is keen to go, we shall see…
The Vimy
Project?
I don’t know… Maybe when I get
reading about the Great War with the kids it will rekindle my interest in this
project… I’d have a LOT to do to get this ready in time, now… it could be done…
but it’d be a lot of work.
Other Miniature Gaming
Other miniature games I'd like to play (or get back to playing) this year...
Dragon Rampant and Lion Rampant – Dragon Rampant just arrived last week and I’ve really enjoyed reading it and am looking forward to trying it out and getting back to playing some more Lion Rampant. Also last week I ordered a pile of stuff from Black Tree Design to fill out a few more Lion Rampant retinues/Dragon Rampant warbands
En Garde! We had a lot
of fun playing Ronin (also by Craig Woodfield) and I’m assuing it
will be more or less the same system – I can see the system easily porting over
to the new genre perfectly with just a few modifications – mostly for flavour –
and some new army lists. I have craploads of pirates and English Civil War
soldiers that could be pressed into service. I also recently ordered some
“Swashbucklers” from Wargames Foundry and wouldn’t mind picking up some three
musketeer types from Redoubt.
40K – the kids and some friends have shown some interest in this and I have a small collection of Imperial Guard I could use in this. I hope we can weave together some sort of narrative campaign for our various forces and steer away from the standard “bring 1000 points and have a battle” as that will get pretty boring real fast…
Frostgrave - I'm sure we'll get in a few more games of Frostgrave this year. I actually have a few new wizards and adventurers to be painted... and a pile of ruined city terrain in progress...
40K – the kids and some friends have shown some interest in this and I have a small collection of Imperial Guard I could use in this. I hope we can weave together some sort of narrative campaign for our various forces and steer away from the standard “bring 1000 points and have a battle” as that will get pretty boring real fast…
Frostgrave - I'm sure we'll get in a few more games of Frostgrave this year. I actually have a few new wizards and adventurers to be painted... and a pile of ruined city terrain in progress...
Flying Lead – I’d really like to
try this out some more in different modern periods
Men Who Would Be Kings – I have
to wait until September for this one, but I’ve been looking for a new colonial
era game.
Galleys & Galleons – I
haven’t played this since I did
some playtesting for it. I’d like to get in a game or two sometime…
Song of Drums and Tomahawks –
Another Ganesha Game I’d like to try out. I have miniatures that could be used.
Just need to find some time and sort out a scenario.
One Hour Wargames – I’ve been
meaning to have a go at these for some time. Hopefully I’ll get to it this
year.
Some sort of micro scale sci-fi
(Epic 40K or Future War Commander or Samurai Robot Battle Royale or Dirtside or
Horizon Wars) – I have a pile of 40K epic stuff that I’ve been eyeing up since
the kids got interested in 40K stuff… need to find some rules to use with them…
There are a number of other Wargames from Osprey coming out this year that I might like to try out - Rogue Stars and Broken Legions look interesting... I'll probably pick up Poseidon's Warriors and Chosen Men to have a look at...
Role-Playing Games
I’ve really had a lot of fun
playing in the Savage Worlds/Realms of Cthulhu/Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign
this past year. I’d really like to get back into running some role-playing
games…
Only War – mostly because I have
a PILE of Imperial Guard miniatures and it’d be fun to weave it into the
narrative 40K skirmish campaign. Also I’ve always been a fan of Military RPGs –
there’s no faffing about with “why are we going on this quest?” – you are given
orders, you carry them out to the best or your ability…
Rogue Trader – It just looks
cool. Between me and the kids, we have lots of miniatures that could be used
for resolving action on the tabletop…
Cthulhu – I’ve really enjoyed
playing in the Savage Worlds/Realms of Cthulhu campaign this last year and it’s
got be feeling like running some of the other campaigns I have – in particular
Beyond the Mountains of Madness. Maybe when we finish up Masks of Nyarlathotep.
Traveller? As a less dark alternative to Rogue Trader, I wouldn't mind running some other sci-fi game involving space travel...
Traveller? As a less dark alternative to Rogue Trader, I wouldn't mind running some other sci-fi game involving space travel...
Other Board Games
Of course there are lots of
other games I’d really like to play (or play more of…)… Dominion… Race for the
Galaxy… Carcassonne… Giro d’Italia… Onward to Venus… and others….
Is that enough to do this year…?
Coming soon on Tim’s Miniature Wargaming Blog:
Painting update – 40K, Swashbucklers and dismounted ECW
cavalrymen.
Perhaps a game report of the Frostgrave
we played over the holidaze…
Re: ToonCon 2016
ReplyDeleteYou know, a little mini event would be awesome...
Oh, I totally will run something again his year! I had a great time the whole weekend - and that included running the Song of Blades and Heroes game.
Delete