Copyright 2003 T. Sheil & A. Sheil All Rights Reserved
There had to be something more than throwing dirt bombs at plastic army men. By the time we were eleven or twelve, change was necessary. Thankfully, change came in the form of a book by a fellow named Featherstone. The book was all about "war gaming". It involved the use of miniature soldiers in historically based games. The Featherstone book went further, showing how one could have nice little wars in three eras and styles. There was tank and infantry combat, World War II style. Then we could have the American Civil War, or the Hundred years War. Featherstone advocated use of Airfix miniatures and kits. Our only break from the advice was the use of Roco Minitanks instead of Airfix armor.
Featherstone's book opened u pa whole new world to us. It enabled us to enjoy army men in a more thoughtful land deliberate way. We enjoyed them immensely, backed with 50-cent boxes of Airfix troops and twenty-five cent Roco tanks.
What we did not know was 'proportion." There were arms races, to be sure. The big thing was to have the biggest and best, and that meant lots of heavy tanks. Our battles were vestiges of the Russian front, with masses of armor slugging it out. Realism? We played to make a point, not to be real. The whole point for us was a to WIN at all costs. If that meant an unhistorical interpretation of the rules to assure victory, so be it!
For kids, the Civil War and King Arthur are too tame. Big things impress kids, and that means TANKS. As quick as Roco churned them out and AHM could import them, we had them. Tanks were cool. That was because they were impressive, and because none of us ever had to ride in an armored vehicle for any length of time…yet! Many a game could not even get off the ground, because there were too many tanks.
Even as I approached "military age," tanks rules. While spending a summer at the Shore, I hooked up with some like-minded people and we had wargames. We were all teenagers at the time, which meant we also aggravated every adult and treated every kid with unreserved spite. The folks at the hobby shop tolerated us, but barely. Our purchases were mainly tanks.
That Autumn, I decided to leave school and join the Army. I did, and ended up in the self-propelled artillery. Armored artillery. Mechanized. Riding in big green metal boxes for hours on end….. Tanks and armored vehicles were no longer "cool."
After the Army, I emerged with a new understanding of tanks. So had some friends who also sought the "military experience." Our new focus was on the Middle Ages. We even had a new way to go. Featherstone? He was passé. A new set of rules called Chainmail had our fancy, and how fanciful it was! For one thing, the rules went so far as to include a "Fantasy Supplement" showing game combat values for mythical beings. We laughed that part of it off as picayune drivel for oddballs. Little did we know that it was a precursor of bigger things….
Chainmail was fun. We could use it with 25mm figures favored by the Upstate bunch, or the 40mm Elastolin troops favored by the Shore crew. We could play many eras, from the Romans all the way to early Renaissance. We could have mass battles, or run sieges. And if that were not enough, we sought other rules to help improve our game. One set, with neither publisher nor author, gave good rules for large -type battles. Another was more for man-to-man games. They gave us ideas to resolve some of the less acceptable aspects of Chainmail.
Chainmail came up short. I figured that the writers had never been in so much as a fistfight, never mind a brawl with polearms and axes. I had been in a couple of brawls that involved bats, barstools and other "field expedient" medieval weaponry. The weapon tallies for man-to-man combat seemed off, so I began to rethink them. There were some re-enactors around ho had their ideas, but their "game" never allowed much use of thrusting weapons like the spear. I did some research of my own, and soon we were adapting the rules a bit. The eventual result was "Castle Cracker", a faster and more enjoyable game. The Shore crew played it, but the upstaters had moved on to more serious game rules of a more historical bent.
Sometimes history took a dive. While the upstate crew was a stickler for getting everything in the same era, the Shore gang was not. At the shore, what 'looks cool" outweighed history. Thus, a siege might entail Huns, Vikings, Saxons and Renaissance Turks, not to mention onagers, ballistae and the occasional bombard. My "gun of choice" was a Renaissance field piece of a type with a flat trajectory, for blasting everyone in front. Backup was a large mortar that was a borderline howitzer, for dropping in some high-angle stuff over the walls. If I could not use the howitzer - its presence was debated every time, and sometimes was disallowed - there were stone-throwing ballistae with the same effect.
A genuine Norse Viking never faced so much as a cap pistol, but on our board Vikings might have to deal with anything from a line of Swiss harquebusiers to overrunning a pair of demiculverins.
Historians would have PALED!
Of course, we were buying these 40mm scale kits from a teddy bear of a man named Henry. Henry owned Continental Hobbies, which imported some truly wonderful things. Among them were the Elastolin figures, and Henry could get them unpainted! We bought loads of them. As for Continental Hobbies, we were getting spoiled. Not only did the store carry prime goods, from ships to soldiers to trains, but Henry was probably the most knowledgeable hobby dealer around. He really knew all the products he carried.
While our crew was dealing with the inaccuracy of early gunpowder artillery, another storm was rising. Chainmail had led to Dungeons and Dragons, and little game that had three booklets in a little box. It was ponderous, cumbersome, and a bit obtuse to anyone with a background in mythology and folklore. I tried it a few times, since some of the upstaters were getting into it. It didn't feel comfortable, though. The trolls were too cute, the mythic beings watered down too much, and everything was odd. Dungeons and Dragons didn't win me over.
What really won my approval, along with our medieval miniature games, was a new shop named "The Compleat Strategist." Where Continental Hobbies was a place for our miniatures, the "Strategist" was a place for games. They had them all, and I mean ALL! There were the TSR games like Chainmail and Dungeons and Dragons, the boxed games from Avalon Hill, and every game in between. You could find games like Tunnels and Trolls, Empire of the Petal Throne and GURPS, and beside them were racks with min-games in plastic bags. Yes, mini-games complete with everything you needed to play: dice, game board, rulebook and cardboard counters. I loved it and bought them all. One set of favorites was from a company called Metagaming. Their Melee rules for fighters and Wizard rules for magic made a lot more sense than the Dragon games, so I bought them. When they came out with advanced versions, I bought them, too. There were even "programmed" solo games using the rules, and I bought some of them. Metagaming was super.
The upstaters had, by this time, fallen by the wayside. They and I were on a different path, and my new upstate crew was a small bunch who liked the Metagaming rules. We had a LOT of fun with them. They were truly enjoyable.
I was getting busy with new pressures put on by everyday life, and dropped out of gaming before the mid-80s. My miniatures were lost while moving, as were some of my books. Life roared in. I lost contact with all of my wargaming pals. Most were moving on, to new jobs and new places. Me? I was busy with my work, too. Hobbies had to take a back seat for a while.
I have always loved miniatures, so there was no 'comeback," really. I had been using my old game rules all along. The Metagaming ones had been lost, though. What surprised me was how many of the games makers were gone.
Gone! Wow! So were some of the miniature makers. Meanwhile, several games had migrated to the computer. A few had pretty much gone "mainstream." A few big outfits replaced the plethora of small ones. Among the casualties were the mini games in plastic bags. Those games were great……
This Wargaming section is very new, so PLEASE be patient with me. I want to add more links to the best miniature wargaming rules and sites out there. Keep coming back, as I will be searching for sites that have enjoyable, realistic games rules on them.
In 1998, I started compiling the fragmentary rule sets my friends and I had used. These became the Sandy Hook Battle games, a quick and fast set of rules aimed mainly at kids. I am now working to make supplements so older gamers will find the rules useful.
Henry Bodenstedt of Continental Hobbies was a fixture at some of the local wargaming shows. He would host a wargame of his own making, the "Siege of Bodenburg." The game featured 40mm Elastolin figures and a castle with siege tower, parapets, cannon and catapults. It was a fun, easy-to-learn game that always attracted a crowd. Henry gave out thousands upon thousands of copies of the game rules. He enjoyed seeing folks use them.
I have taken the time to copy the "Siege of Bodenburg" rules in their entirety. They are loads of fun, and you can easily swap out other figures for the recommended pieces. (For example, crossbowmen for harquebusiers, etc.) This game only requires a 6' by 6' area.
Oddball rules - I found these old Ancient and Medieval Era rules from 1975, which have no publisher information nor any copyright marks nor even the author's name. They are reproduced here. They are a pretty good rule set for miniature games involving ancient times (Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, Gauls, etc.). and for the Middle Ages
I had mentioned the Metagaming role-playing game system for The Fantasy Trip, involving medieval style warriors and sorcery. It is a simple, practical system which is plenty of fun. Copies of the rules can be had from this website, which I found recently: