THE LAST WORD

Long term contributor to Miniature Wargames

With Arthur Harman.

When John invited me to contribute my thoughts as ‘someone who’s made a significant contribution to the hobby’ I feared he was as sadly mistaken as the gentleman who, obviously disappointed to meet me in person when I was demonstrating an Artillery Kriegsspiel at the Victorian Military Fair many years ago, exclaimed, “I’d always imagined from your articles that you were a retired fifty-five year old lieutenant-colonel!”

I’m probably not a ‘proper’ wargamer: I don’t possess a dedicated wargame room, a large table and rows of shelves groaning under the weight of numerous beautifully painted miniature leaden armies; I haven’t actually painted a toy soldier for years, certainly couldn’t achieve the standards that often feature in these pages and have no aspiration to do so.

Whilst admiring the painting and modelling skills displayed by many wargamers, I regret the fact that the hobby seems to have become unduly preoccupied with them. Wargame soldiers now are sculpted with a degree of detail, perfect for display pieces but not really necessary for tabletop manoeuvres, so they take more time to paint and must wait longer to see action. Colourfully illustrated rulebooks today present an ideal that few newcomers will ever be able to emulate, whereas the black and white photographs of simply painted Airfix or early

Minifigs in the books by Donald Featherstone and Terry Wise showed armies that were easily achievable, even by youngsters.

I find myself increasingly drawn back to the wargames ‘classics’ – Little Wars by H.G. Wells, Charge! by Brigadier Peter Young and (the real) Lieutenant-Colonel James P. Lawford and The War Game by Charles Grant.

Why? Firstly, they employ toy soldiers, which I have always loved, ever since I used to spend my weekly pocket money of two shillings on a box of Airfix figures. For years after meeting Bill Leeson, who translated the 1824 Prussian Kriegsspiel rules into English, I only played such ‘closed’ map games, which were both realistic and challenging. Now, however, I prefer the more relaxed atmosphere and aesthetic appeal of toy soldier games – but regard them as only brightly coloured caricatures that no more resemble a real battle than do early nineteenth century engravings in which even the cavalry horses charge in step.

Secondly, they are written in a pleasant, readable style, rather than that of a legal contract or statute (I had to read more than enough of those during my Law degree!), with simple, playable rules that my aging brain can understand at first reading, and do not require me to learn gamespecific definitions of words or esoteric new abbreviations. These days I simply can’t be bothered with wargame rules that fill more pages than I have fingers. Life’s too short to learn lengthy, complex

“Wargame soldiers now are sculpted with a degree of detail, perfect for display pieces but not really necessary for tabletop manoeuvres, so they take more time to paint and must wait longer to see action...”

– and often expensive – rules that may not, after all that effort, provide an entertaining game; if a concise, simple and cheap – or, better still, free – set doesn’t satisfy me, I can discard it and lose little thereby. I prefer rules like Bob Cordery’s Portable Wargames and Ross Macfarlane’s Square Brigadier on his Battle Game of the Month blog, tinker with other interesting rules I find on the internet and write my own games.

Lastly, the ‘classic’ books encourage readers to use their imaginations to create fictitious countries, whose armies they can lead to new tabletop victories or defeats, that will not be affected by hindsight, as are refights of historical battles. If I win a glorious tabletop victory in an imaginary battle it will be the result of my own skill, not because I was taking the role of my long-nosed namesake and so adding bonus modifiers to all my die rolls.

My only armies now are 10 mm ones, wearing Napoleonic style uniforms but not those of any actual country; instead, they are simply Red and Blue ImagiNations armies, so I don’t have to spend hours studying historical uniforms, nor worry lest some new research in dusty archives should prove theirs to be inaccurate. I’m out of step with the modern hobby and don’t take wargames too seriously; you, dear readers, should often take what I write with a pinch of salt. I can only hope this piece – Editor permitting – will not literally be my ‘last word’ in this magazine… ■