From epic tabletop battles to immersive digital skirmishes, #TuesdayNewsday brings you the latest headlines & in-depth analyses in the wargaming sphere, ensuring you stay at the forefront of the action.
Mentioned in Dispatches is back!
We kicked off last week with a discussion of our annual ACDC and other online conventions, and continue this week with a look at the old SPI classic quad games and a look ahead to Quad Fest at Buckeye Game Fest.
Later this season, we’ll also spend time on the OCS, Total War, and BoAR series; Fantasy 4X games; Historical 4X games after the new Civ 7 launches; Serious (Non-)Wargames; Brant ‘live’ at GAMA Expo; and more!
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SDHistCon Winter Quarters is this weekend, and no, it doesn’t overlap the Super Bowl, so you’ll be fine
Unfortunately, we have more sad news to share today. Our GMT family is mourning the sudden passing of Carla Horger, co-designer with her husband Jeff of our Thunder Alley series of racing games.
For those of you who’d like to donate in Carla’s memory and help Jeff cover expenses, see below:— GMT Games (@gmtgames.bsky.social) February 2, 2025 at 6:31 PM
there is a GoFundMe to support the family that’s already past its original goal
Hitting the shelves (and webstores) near you now!
- Hollandspiele started shipping Oblique last week, covering Frederick the Great in the Silesian Wars
- And there was much rejoicing, as EuroWarGames is now available directly from NUTS! Publishing; read Rocky’s thoughts over here
- S&T Press started shipping Strategy & Tactics Quarterly #29, focusing on the Ottoman Empire
- RBM Studios has released the digital version of Mark Herman’s Waterloo game on Steam; there’s also a discount if you buy both of the games in the collection (Gettysburg is the other one)
- Accurate Simulations has released Iraqi Freedom: Thirty Days to Baghdad, which has also been ordered by the US Air Force War College
- Wargames Illustrated #446 is now shipping
- Dawn of Battle: Scenario Pack #4 is available now from Blue Panther
- Paranoia: The Uncooperative Board Game, is ready to ship from Modiphius Games
- Alternative Armies has a nice set of Norman infantry in their quilted jerkins
- There’s a pretty styling Skeleton Army from Wargames Atlantic that’ll let you refight all your Jason & The Argonauts fever dreams
- Avalon Digital released their adaptation of Hispania on Steam
- Avalanche Press released their next Golden Journal (#44) featuring variant tanks and AFVs for their Infantry Attacks game, but you gotta join the Gold Club to get it.
- Steve Jackson Games started shipping a bunch of Car Wars expansion decks
Time to get those orders in now and then either (a) complain that it’s 2 years late, and/or (b) be surprised when it gets here sooner than you thought
- Ventonuovo’s latest wargame, The Lions of El Alamein, is on Kickstarter and already funded
- Three new games – Guns of August Deluxe, Blood of Lions, Take Cover – all on Kickstarter from Worthington
- There’s a new D-Day Dice game, as D-Day Dice: Pacific is on Kickstarter and way past its funding
- Neva Wargames launched their internally-managed P-300 system, where they’re booking pre-orders on about a dozen things and rather than link them all separately at this point, we’re just giving you the base page for them
- Central Michigan University Press just launched their new Keep the Faith game on BackerKit
- There’s a new Soldier’s Chess game on Kickstarter that’s unrelated to the old Soldier Chess book from S2Company
- As Kerry Anderson migrates more of his MDG titles to Blue Panther for printing, there’s 3 more titles up for pre-order with a projected 17 February ship date
- A bunch of Bolt Action! minis for pre-order over at Warlord
Looking for a deal? Getting more bang for your buck?
- WDS “Game of the week” is Naval Campaigns: Wolfpack for $29.95
- Easy Roller Dice has a BOGO on 7pc dice sets with coupon code BOGOP at checkout, through the 8th
- If you missed the release of In A Dark Wood from Thin Red Line, you can get one from Noble Knight for only $495.95
- Through the end of the week, if you spend $60 at Kraken Dice (easier than you think!) then you get a free mystery 14-pc set
- Combat Mission Black Sea is 50% off at GOG right now, and Combat Mission Cold War is 40% off
- Renegade’s GI Joe / Axis & Allies game is over 40% off right now on Amazon
It’s been a busy week for the regiment; here’s what you might’ve missed!
- Mentioned in Dispatches is back! We start off with Mentioned In Dispatches S14 E1 ~ The ACDC & Digital Conventions
- Saturday Night Fights ~ The Battle of Bautzen (2) for “Blucher”
- An American Grognard Reading EuroWarGames: The History, State and Future of Professional and Public (War)gaming in Europe
- Dispatches from Cyrano’s War Room, Part 2
- Wednesday War Stories ~ The Battle of Khafji, 29 Jan–1 Feb 1991
- The 2025 ACDC After Action Review
- AARs
- Gameplay this week
The Best Thing We Saw On Another Site This Week Was
Unfair Fairness from Geoff Engelstein1
The neat thing is that you can’t predict at the start which color will end up having the most chips. At the start there is an equal number of each in the bag – but it is an unstable equilibrium. Anything that adds more chips of one of the colors will make it more likely that chip is chosen in the future and create a self-perpetuating mix. One game you may get lots of blue chips, another red may be dominant, and then in a third the chip distribution may stay roughly equal.
This model is typically used in economics to explain the perpetuation of market share. If I have 60% of the market in chocolate chip cookies, that will tend to remain the same, all other things being equal. I will get more shelf space and more market presence, and that will lead to more people buying my cookies. Market share in all goods can shift, but for some it takes a lot more effort or a big shift in consumer sentiment.
Ardwulf’s counter clipping stream talked about The Best of GMT Games, Part VII: 2014-2016
Various news & notes from the business end of the gaming world
- ConSimWorld are holding their “annual”2 donation drive to help with website expenses, but seemingly never for a UI upgrade! There are a bunch of publishers that offer discounts for those who donate to CSW, too.
- ICv2 reports that the official spinoff date for the Asmoborg to launch as an independent company is tomorrow
- BoardGameWire looks into what might happen to board game TikTok communities if the app gets shut off
- Matrix Games announced this is the last month that you can order a physical manual to be shipped to you
- MMP’s site will be down on 11 February for maintenance, after which, they will presumably launch 7 new pre-orders on the 12th
- Latest weekly flyer from the fine booksellers over at On Military Matters
Wonderful thread here from Cole
This is such a great video. And, sadly, the conversation about rules and arousal is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to publishing (and design) best practices which are couched in half-cocked studies and which often try to cover for far bigger issues. Short 🧵
— Cole Wehrle (@colewehrle.bsky.social) February 3, 2025 at 2:05 PM
Don’t forget to check our consolidated event & convention calendar for more!
You can also submit your own events for our calendar here.
Upcoming Dragoons Events
- Wargame Days at The Gamer’s Armory in Cary, NC ~ 2 March and 6 April
- Next confirmed live event is BuckeyeGameFest, 1-4 May 2025
- Next virtual event is Connections Online, 7-12 April, 2025
Other Conventions & Events
- 5-9 February Game-on (Bellevue WA) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 8 February SDHistCon Winter Quarters (Online) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 14-22 Feb WinterFest (Strongville OH)
- 14-17 Feb Strategicon: Orccon (Los Angeles CA)
- 14-18 Feb DunDraCon 48 (Santa Clara CA)
- 15-16 Feb Cold Barrage (Havre de Grace MD)
- 15-16 Feb Connections North (Kingston ON)
- 19 February Georgetown University Wargame Society Game Day (Washington DC)
- 17-24 Feb PrezCon (Charlottesville VA)
Focusing on the practitioner world ~ don’t forget about our dedicated area in our forums for the wargame professionals!
- Heave to, and Prepare to Be Board Gamed – another Navy article about the professional utility of tabletop wargaming
- Fight Club International has added a new “raid” scenario with some extended rules for their basic Take That Hill! wargame
- MORS has another new course available, with their upcoming Gaming Weapons of Mass Destruction Course – From Policy to Practice in March
- Russian drones by way of Iran
- Time to start stat’ing out some underwater drones
- Time to update those Ukraine OOB’s again
- This week, Mick Ryan talks about that Ukrainian restructuring
- The next GUWS webinar is tonight! Nuclear Wargaming: It shouldn’t just be Game Over! And after that it’s Professional Wargaming in France on 4 March
- PaxSims are counting down to Connections North
The US Navy released a new photo of USS Preble (DDG-88) firing her HELIOS laser weapon.
— OSINTtechnical (@osinttechnical.bsky.social) February 2, 2025 at 10:49 PM
Something neat from outside the wargaming world we thought was worth sharing
That’s all for this week!
Be sure to drop by our forums and join the fun, and next Tuesday we’ll drop some more news on you.
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