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Post by calithena on Mar 12, 2012 21:11:10 GMT -6
My father, who played Empires at Reed College and taught me Tactics-II and Africa Korps as a young man - although he never had much use for D&D - sent me this: www.gis.net/~pldr/fah.htmlDidn't recall if it had been noted around these parts or not. It makes an interesting companion piece to the perhaps better known "A Farewell to Hexes" by Greg Costikyan: www.costik.com/spisins.html
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Post by kesher on Mar 13, 2012 9:19:40 GMT -6
Weird--I just read the Costikyan piece for the first time last night...
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 13, 2012 13:31:08 GMT -6
I was very sad when Avalon Hill went under. I know that some of their classics have been re-released as expensive editions with fancy plastic pieces, but I miss the variety of games and the fact that cardboard counters were fairly cheap. My favorite AH game was probably Kingmaker, and I really hope they remake it someday.
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3d6
Level 3 Conjurer
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Post by 3d6 on Mar 13, 2012 15:23:51 GMT -6
oh, yeah, Kingmaker was great. Never owned it, but played it, I would definitely pick that up if they released it.
In terms of AH, I played Squad Leader and 1776 too. I could get into that sort of thing now but I just don't have the time.
Also the "lighter" Wizard's Quest.
Those were interesting articles.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Mar 13, 2012 16:03:32 GMT -6
Both interesting reads, thanks for sharing them One the other hand, it's hard to accept that wargaming in general is done and dusted. I'm not an active participant in the scene, but I do know, for example, that Warhammer and its various derivative games and Flames of War are internationally successful games today. The Wargames Research Group folks are still making new revisions of their wargames every few years. And there must be other games getting about that I don't know about. It doesn't seem to me to be all doom and gloom. It is simply that some enterprises have kept up with what the market wants today, and others have not.
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Post by doctorx on Mar 13, 2012 16:45:30 GMT -6
I'm a big fan of Avalon Hill's THE MAGIC REALM. I think it has a really nice atmospheric 'flavour' that makes it stand out.
Indeed, I'm trying to do something OD&D based with it if I can ever find the time...
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3d6
Level 3 Conjurer
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Post by 3d6 on Mar 13, 2012 17:55:09 GMT -6
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Post by jmccann on Mar 13, 2012 22:26:27 GMT -6
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Post by jmccann on Mar 13, 2012 22:28:52 GMT -6
I'm a big fan of Avalon Hill's THE MAGIC REALM. I think it has a really nice atmospheric 'flavour' that makes it stand out. Indeed, I'm trying to do something OD&D based with it if I can ever find the time... I definitely agree about MR, somehow it oozes theme despite being rather generic fantasy. I have also been kicking around a loosely-MR-based design for some years but never seem to get much progress on it.
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Post by kenmeister on Mar 14, 2012 10:03:58 GMT -6
Those articles broke my heart. The wargamers loved their hobby every bit as much as we do D&D, and apparently it is totally gone. I wonder if they have a website where the hardcore wargamers still get together and talk about it and hopefully still play it?
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Post by DungeonDevil on Mar 14, 2012 11:07:34 GMT -6
Those articles broke my heart. The wargamers loved their hobby every bit as much as we do D&D, and apparently it is totally gone. I wonder if they have a website where the hardcore wargamers still get together and talk about it and hopefully still play it? theminiaturespage.com Here in the US, wargaming is all but deceased, except for a few pockets of resistance fighters holding on to the hobby. *waves* ;D I live in an area with no gaming-related stores, and unfortunately I didn't even hear of AH until I was internet-savvy.
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 14, 2012 12:59:29 GMT -6
Those articles broke my heart. The wargamers loved their hobby every bit as much as we do D&D, and apparently it is totally gone. I wonder if they have a website where the hardcore wargamers still get together and talk about it and hopefully still play it? Keep in mind that AH was bought out by TSR, who was bought out by WotC. WotC has an Avalon Hill section of their boards, but it doesn't get much action. (At least, it hadn't last time I checked.) I'd love to see some Kingmaker chatter here. I'd open up a section of the boards if enough folks wanted to talk about it, but I suspect there would only be a couple of us....
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2012 13:01:14 GMT -6
I loved AH's Blitzkrieg and B-17: Queen of the Skies.
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Post by doctorx on Mar 14, 2012 13:26:26 GMT -6
I'd found the latter but not the former. Fascinating stuff! Many thanks!
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Post by jmccann on Mar 14, 2012 19:05:06 GMT -6
Those articles broke my heart. The wargamers loved their hobby every bit as much as we do D&D, and apparently it is totally gone. I wonder if they have a website where the hardcore wargamers still get together and talk about it and hopefully still play it? I think the hobby is less gone than you seem to think. talk.consimworld.com is the biggest site for boardgames. There is a lot of wargame representation at boardgamegeek.com as well. Lots of people play by email or by Vassal.
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Post by Sean Michael Kelly on Mar 14, 2012 19:16:19 GMT -6
Just this last weekend I attended Cold Wars the Historic Miniature Wargame convention in Lancaster, PA. Seemed to me that there was a pretty good turn-out all things considered.
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Post by jmccann on Mar 14, 2012 19:16:22 GMT -6
Keep in mind that AH was bought out by TSR, who was bought out by WotC. WotC has an Avalon Hill section of their boards, but it doesn't get much action. (At least, it hadn't last time I checked.) This is not quite right. SPI was bought by TSR, who pissed off all SPI's customers and released a few crappy games before basically shutting down the whole thing. Costikyan's article describes this well. A company called Decision Games got the rights to a few of the games and still publishes Strategy and Tactics. AH was bought by WOTC which is now owned by Hasbro. They similarly shut down nearly all of the real AH games. Multiman Publishing licenses the rights to a number of the AH games, and a few others have been reissued by L2 designs, GMT and others.
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Post by jmccann on Mar 15, 2012 20:56:20 GMT -6
Just this last weekend I attended Cold Wars the Historic Miniature Wargame convention in Lancaster, PA. Seemed to me that there was a pretty good turn-out all things considered. There are lots of conventions all over the countries well attended by wargamers. Every year there are a couple of big conventions with a lot of board wargames and a handfull of minis wargames, and a couple of minis-focused ones around western Washington. I'd like to go to Cold Wars some time. The problem is my in-laws are in Maryland, so it would be possible, but we always go either in the summer or for Christmas.
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Post by rsdean on Mar 18, 2012 6:50:04 GMT -6
>>As noted earlier, historical boardgames are fading. The decline started around 1980 and the 1982 fall of SPI was the result of this trend, not its cause. << --from the article
Note that he says historical *boardgames* are fading...historical miniatures finished fading around 1980 and have achieved a pretty healthy equilibrium since then. Even the boardgames may be in something like an equilibrium state by now, as that article looks to have been written in '99 or thereabouts.
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 18, 2012 7:52:34 GMT -6
Historical boardgames like AH used to make may be fading but boardgames in general seem to be making a resurgance, at least around me. Our local game store stocks many more board games than they do RPGs and seem to have quite a few players mong the high school age crowd. I teach HS and have quite a few students who play Battlestar Galactica and similar games on a regular basis.
The difference (I think) is that modern boardgames are all about the bells-and-whistles. Bright color mapboards, lots of colored plastic pieces to move around, full-color cards, and so on instead of little cardboard counters. A lot more effort is going into the production side of things.
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rleduc
Level 3 Conjurer
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Post by rleduc on Mar 18, 2012 9:36:03 GMT -6
Yes and no. I think of the popular Eurogames now, like Settlers of Catan. I do agree there are lovely production values, but the number of pieces is relatively small compared to many an Avalon Hill board game (curse you all for reminding me to look at eBay for these!).
Instead they tend to focus on interesting game mechanics that involve social interaction - not unlike the classic game, Diplomacy.
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Post by kenmeister on Mar 19, 2012 19:47:56 GMT -6
Those articles broke my heart. The wargamers loved their hobby every bit as much as we do D&D, and apparently it is totally gone. I wonder if they have a website where the hardcore wargamers still get together and talk about it and hopefully still play it? I think the hobby is less gone than you seem to think. talk.consimworld.com is the biggest site for boardgames. There is a lot of wargame representation at boardgamegeek.com as well. Lots of people play by email or by Vassal. That's good. A couple of years ago, when I was running a pbp Call of Cthulhu game, I was creating a map for the players on the train. A guy in suit and tie sat next to me, could tell I was gaming, and started talking about how he used to wargame so much. Another tidbit to share: For me, the tragedy of the Avalon Hill fall is not for the wargames, I love their strategy games. Dune, Britannia, Kremlin, Civilization, Wizard's Quest, etc. I just sold some of my AH wargames on eBay (Luftwaffe, Arab-Israeli Wars, etc.). They're just never going to get played.
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Thorulfr
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
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Post by Thorulfr on Mar 21, 2012 11:34:09 GMT -6
The difference (I think) is that modern boardgames are all about the bells-and-whistles. Bright color mapboards, lots of colored plastic pieces to move around, full-color cards, and so on instead of little cardboard counters. A lot more effort is going into the production side of things. A few years ago, I played the re-issue of Cosmic Encounter. I bought my first copy through the mail when it was advertised in Starlog magazine in '77; my friends and I played the hell out of that game but admittedly, the production values were low. The new version has fancy plastic pieces and a plastic "attack cone" with fiddly little slots where the attackers and allies went. It was very pretty, but honestly - it added absolutely nothing to the game. For me, at least, it actually detracted from the game because it was so time-consuming to get all those pieces slotted in place. Give me my old cardboard cone and die-cut counters (biodegradable and ego-friendly - a plus these days); its faster, cleaner, and leaves more time for arguing about how this flare affects your three powers which are counteracting my three powers. (That's why I stopped playing - my friends were up to dealing five flares at the start and choosing three powers. The games always degenerated into endless arguments. I think that Eon should have quadrupled the number of "Sanity" cards in the deck. ...I also avoided playing Railroad games with my old crowd. There's a joke about the reason they supply crayons with railroad games is that you can't trust a railroad gamer with anything sharper. )
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rleduc
Level 3 Conjurer
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Post by rleduc on Mar 21, 2012 15:15:14 GMT -6
Curse you all. If wargaming was dead, this thread has caused me to inject enough cash on eBay to singlehandedly spearhead a revival!
Buying Brittania, among others, on your recommendation!
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rleduc
Level 3 Conjurer
Posts: 75
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Post by rleduc on Mar 21, 2012 15:16:55 GMT -6
I'll just tell my wife that it's cheaper than a sports car.
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Post by jmccann on Mar 21, 2012 22:33:23 GMT -6
I'll just tell my wife that it's cheaper than a sports car. We should start a thread in the Resources topic: "Things to point out to your wife are more expensive and bad than gaming" 1. Sports cars 2. Crack cocaine ...
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busman
Level 6 Magician
Playing OD&D, once again. Since 2008!
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Post by busman on Mar 21, 2012 23:18:54 GMT -6
...I also avoided playing Railroad games with my old crowd. There's a joke about the reason they supply crayons with railroad games is that you can't trust a railroad gamer with anything sharper. ) You played the wrong railroad games... 1830 and friends (collectively known as 18xx) are some of the finest games ever produced. They aren't the crayon games (Empire Builder variants, iirc).
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3d6
Level 3 Conjurer
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Post by 3d6 on Mar 22, 2012 14:39:23 GMT -6
...I also avoided playing Railroad games with my old crowd. There's a joke about the reason they supply crayons with railroad games is that you can't trust a railroad gamer with anything sharper. ) lol ;D ;D That's a good one but Empire Builder's aok by me. GG gave it a good review too, "a game for those who enjoy contests which are short on rule reading long on playing enjoyment... the best boardgame to come out in a long time." Besides, my 5-year old's favs are (modified) Dungeon!, Puppy-opoly, and Empire Builder (just drawing crazy tracks on the board, not actually playing). So just leave us to our crayons, ok! (Just Kidding )
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Post by barrataria on Apr 3, 2012 7:07:42 GMT -6
I hadn't seen this article before, and always assumed Meier had simply licensed Civ from AH. Silly me. My first game was D-Day, and I had and played a few of their other old chestnuts: Waterloo, Stalingrad, France 1940. Flat Top is a really good game. I also liked some of the later offerings. New World was an interesting exploration/colonization game, and Blackbeard is a greatly enjoyable game. I think Sid Meier must have liked that one too
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Post by thedegenerateelite on Apr 3, 2012 22:21:59 GMT -6
Like most articles written by old SPiers, this is terribly outdated. Wargames are going strong and experiencing a fairly large resurgence. And we are talking about large, complex, and detailed wargames, not boardgames with war. Look at the publishers sites: www.gmtgames.com/ - Produce large numbers of games on very specific conflicts and general systems for ancient and Napoleonic periods. www.columbiagames.com/ - Produce Wooden Block wargames that incorporate fog of war elements to complicate planning - Also produce the Harn RPG books. victorypointgames.com/ - Produce a variety of historical and sci/fi titles, many solo games, and losts of reprints of old SPI stuff. www.multimanpublishing.com/ - Produce Advance Squad Leader and lots of accessories for it, in addition to other games, like Lincoln's War. www.avalanchepress.com/ - Produce the Panzer Grenadier series of highly complex simulations and many others. So not dead, but flourishing.
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