by Another Tuesday, another round of news from the world of wargaming! Today, we’re pulling the professional news to the top since there’s a bunch of it, as we also explore the latest releases, the news crowdfunding, what’s on sale, and more!
CNA has gathered many of Dr Peter Perla’s papers, presentations, & writings into a collection on their site
There’s a LOT of wargaming wisdom to be found in this collection, for both hobbyists & practitioners
(h/t Dr Ed McGrady)www.cna.org/centers-…
— Connections Online (@cnx-onl.bsky.social) February 5, 2025 at 11:22 AM
ICYMI elsewhere, we’re bringing QUAD FEST to Buckeye Game Fest. The War Room opens on 28 April. The main convention opens 1 May. Quad Fest is going to run multiple days throughout the week, with 3 different Quads on Friday. Filter the events to find the ones categorized as “War Room” and then look for the ones with “Quad Fest” in the title.
Moe’s Game Table released an insanely comprehensive1 set of videos called the Air & Armor Academy, that teaches you every step of how to play in videos from 5-15 minutes, many narrated by designer Bruce Maxwell.
Focusing on the practitioner world ~ don’t forget about our dedicated area in our forums for the wargame professionals!
- Here’s a 19th century wargame designed by a Polish general –– h/t Jules from the Homo Ludens Discord
- Now-retired BG Rod Wooldridge2 is one of the principals behind the launch of the new Urban Warfare Institute, an outgrowth of their recent training focus on urban warfare, to include the Urban Warfare Planners Course where Brian Train’s QUICK made its debut
- Mike “Zilla Blitz” let a discussion on The World of Professional Wargaming at SDHistCon Online
- Interesting column on professional wargaming (and how to categorize it) from CIMSEC
- Good column on LinkedIn about educational wargaming with this key quote: “In educational wargaming, it is ALL about purpose”
- On Wargaming vol 2 is now available on Wargame Vault and when asked, the publisher notes “vol 1 is not yet written”
- Kings Wargaming Week at King’s College in London will kick off on 27 May
- This week, Mick Ryan calls attention to some podcasts on modern warfare
- The next GUWS webinar is Professional Wargaming in France on 4 March and then Tactical Wargame Design on 18 March
- The Call For Papers for Connections US is now out; the older cousin of our own online conference will be held 28 July to 1 August
Watch Jason Matthews talk about Serious Games and Cold War history
Hitting the shelves (and webstores) near you now!
- Compass Games has moved Pontiac’s War into the “recent releases” on their site, so we’ll say that it’s out
- The new AFWI3 takes the Littoral Commander underpinnings into the sky
- New scenario on the naval attack on Tyre just released for Molotov Cockatiel’s Arete ancients game
- Uboat Attack just launched on Steam, and it’s on a launch sale, and there’s a DLC bundle, too
- Mike Lambo has released his two Solacia books as a single 2-in-1 volume
- Muchkin: Taken for Granite is now shipping
- Battle for the Deep: Powered by Axis & Allies from Renegade is showing available for order, and MM has it on sale, too
- Welcome Back, Commander is a new release on Steam with a heavy 16-bit visual aesthetic and a ‘deadly plague’ theme
- When Kraken Dice threatens you with a new set of “lemon quencher” dice and says they “glow in the dark” you probably didn’t think they meant “will glow in a black hole” but here we are
- Modiphius released Triangle Agency, a paranormal investigations RPG
- A bunch of new minis sets from Wargames Atlantic
- Warlord Games have added a bunch of minis from other manufacturers to their site, so you can now order from one “store” and get stuff from these guys, too
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
- Firelock Games has a few days left in their Blood & Bayonets campaign on Kickstarter
- This week’s “announce on a Wednesday” winner is Compass Games, who put Spring Prelude on Kickstarter last week
- Flying Pig, however, did the right thing and launched their Broken Logic expansion to The Long Road today at noon
- Rock Manor Games4 also launched their StarDriven: Gateway game at noon
- Moon Base Clavius, a remake of the old Task Force classic that was reviewed back in Dragon Magazine #73, is on Kickstarter as a part of a PDF revival campaign from James Eisert/Powercell Games
Looking for a deal? Getting more bang for your buck?
- Decision Games’ “Deal of the Month” is all in-stock folio games for $20 and there’s a few dozen to choose from
- DG also has a “Spring Sale” with most of the games anywhere from 15%-35% off
- WDS “Game of the week” is Panzer Campaigns: Bulge ‘44 for $29.95
- Osprey’s “February Flash Sale” has a bunch of their games, including War Story and Battalion and General Orders and most of the Undaunteds at 25%-40% off, depending on the game
- Dice Envy has a bunch of “wargame”5-themed d6 sets for $10 each and you can save 10% with coupon code HAMMER at checkout
- Lord of the Rings – Journeys in Middle Earth is 20% off right now
- Save almost $20 over at MM on Soviet Dawn: The Russian Civil War 1918-1921 (Deluxe Edition)
- Save $25 at Noble Knight in the recently-released Total War – Rome board game
- Easy Roller Dice has a B2G1 on their mystery dice sets with coupon code MYSTERY25 at checkout
It’s been a busy week for the regiment; here’s what you might’ve missed!
- Saturday Night Fights ~ The Great “Quadrant 13” Star Wars Experiment, Part One
- Mentioned In Dispatches S14 E2 ~ Quad Fest!
- 5 Questions With…Lee Brimmicombe-Wood
- First Impressions of the War Of The Austrian Succession
- Dispatches from Cyrano’s War Room, Part 3
- Wednesday War Stories ~ Battle of Manila…less the Bay – 4 February 1899
- AARs
- Gameplay this week
- Lots of Civ VII chatter in our forums
- We’re forming a biker gang in Elite Dangerous
The Best Thing We Saw On Another Site This Week Was
Kevin Zucker’s “Working at SPI” commentary in a series of posts over on CSW, including this little gem that’s certainly related to our upcoming Quad Fest at BGF
When the first quadrigame (Blue & Gray, 1975) was under development, I became aware that the four developers had been unable to agree on one standard set of rules. Each one insisted on his own system. However, this was not at all the concept as it was understood by Jim and Redmond. So I took it upon myself to call a meeting of the fours, Kip Allen, Edward Curran, Irad B. Hardy, and Tom Walczyk. When I had the four of them in Playtest Room #4, I locked the door behind me and announced that no one would be leaving until we had an agreed set of Standard Rules. This was a necessity for our production schedule, as we could not afford the time to produce four separate games. This project had only been alloted the production slot for one game, and if I had not succeeded the Art Dept. would have been swamped. I kicked off the meeting by laying down the Movement Rules, announcing, “If you want a special bridge rule, you can add that; but you have to use these standard paragraphs.” Of course, the developers hated me. But in the overall scope of things, that mattered little. The fact is, we did get an agreed-upon set of rules from that meeting, and those rules went on to do service in several more quad games.
h/t to Ardwulf for pointing it out to us!
Ardwulf’s counter clipping stream was billed as “Filling the Gaps in Your Game Library” and turned into about Let’s Talk About A Bunch of Random RPGs Instead
Various news & notes from the business end of the gaming world
- ICv2 has some more details about the Diamond bankruptcy auction as well as the fate of Alliance, the game distributor
- BoardGameWire reports that the end is nigh for Mythic Games
- Here’s a look ahead from Matrix Games on what’s happening with Combat Mission going forward
- Chaosium needs GMs for GenCon
- The latest newsletter from On Military Matters with this week’s book releases
- You’ve got until Wednesday to complete this marketing survey from Tabletop Tycoon
- RIP to Brandon Petitpren, owner of Pandemonium Games in Michigan, who passed away on 5 February after a battle with cancer
Impact of tariffs on boardgames in the US. Long thread, but straight from someone whose entire business is directly impacted.
K! So! We spent this week figuring out how the tariffs, inflation and other bullshit is going to affect business. Time to thread.
For those not in the know, I’m the Director at Hachette Boardgames USA and I import games for foreign publishers and market and sell them in the US.
1/?— T. Caires (@theonetar.bsky.social) February 7, 2025 at 10:35 PM
Don’t forget to check our consolidated event & convention calendar for more!
You can also submit your own events for our calendar here.
- 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 confirmed virtual event is Connections Online, 7-12 April, 2025
Other Conventions & Events
- 14-22 Feb WinterFest (Strongville OH) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 14-15 Feb Battle at the Crossroads (Cambridge OH) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 14-18 Feb DunDraCon 48 (Santa Clara CA) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 14-17 Feb Strategicon: Orccon (Los Angeles CA) <– THIS WEEKEND!
- 15-16 Feb Cold Barrage (Havre de Grace MD)
- 15-16 Feb Connections North (Kingston ON)
- 17-24 Feb PrezCon (Charlottesville VA)
- 20-24 Feb Genghis Con (Aurora CO)
- 20-24 Feb TotalCon (Marlborough MA)
- 23-28 Feb GAMA Trade Show / Expo (Louisville KY)
- 28 Feb-3 Mar CincyCon (Hamilton OH)
- 5-10 Mar Dice Tower West (Las Vegas)
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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