Ellis goes to War
Having done a list of my top ten euro games this is the matching list of my favourite wargames. In no particular order...
1. Squad Leader
An Avalon Hill game that properly deserves the "classic" label. This is John Hill's masterpiece of tactical level WW2 combat - squad level - in a box. Innovative and thought provoking. Not perfect, but bloody close.
2. Up Front
Billed as "The Squad Leader Card Game", the link was tenuous but the quality - amazingly - did leak across. Courtney Allen's ground breaking design was about individual man to man combat. And he used the cards to make sure that the certainty of Squad Leader was quickly forgotten. here, the next piece of ground was as much a surprise as the enemy fire. One of the best face to face experiences a gamer will ever achieve.
3. Summer Storm
The graphics wunderkind Rick Barber is a Gettysburg fanatic. So, it should have been expected his foray into design would be the popular field of battle so beloved of game designers. What couldn't have been expected was the fresh breath of wind Barber sent into the hobby through this Clash of Arms release. Here was a historical game that dared to try and put the battle into context by providing an operational game to layer on top. And, as for the battle, here was a design
that thrived on the chaos and gave the players a real challenge. Can you get the best out of your leaders and men before they break? And can you do it without the crux of knowing what ground is important? The removal of fixed geographic victory point locations was a minor stroke of genius. The down side? The rules were not finished. In the end the innovation seems to have gotten in the way of sales. A real shame.
4. Panzer Command
If Summer Storm was overlooked, Panzer Command - until recently - was ignored. But it was a ground breaking design from Eric Smith - a designer we could all do with tempting back to the hobby. This Victory Games game was about tactical - company level - combat in WW2. Smith took the brave step of fixing his system in a real time and place - near Stalingrad in 1942 - and showed what we had been missing in the scale. Here you got to command a division sized force with
a chit draw activation system. Chaos you could temper with some command resources so better forces tended to do more. Very fast. Sometimes a bit clunky when it came to tanks in towns. And lots of markers. But, really involving, challenging and highly instructive. No wonder it's a design that has been quietly adapted for an upcoming Arnhem monster.
5. Air Force
Individual plane against plane combat in WW2. Originally from Battleline and then republished by Avalon Hill. A Craig Taylor design. With individual plane cards and add ons for ships to bomb, this was as much a system as a game. You could virtually fight any WW2 planes. But you had to plot your moves and, at times, the play slowed down if you had too many planes. Nowadays people say the PC air combat simulations are a great experience. But, apparently their realism is only
skin deep. Air Force had its abstractions too - like the death by a thousand bullets combat system - but at least you could see them and tinker. Great fun on the most boring wargame map of all time: blank hexes.
6. Lee vs Grant
This was the Joe Balkoski game about the 1864 Wilderness Campaign which inspired the legendary - and still uncompleted - Great Campaigns of the American Civil War (GCACW) series. Lee vs Grant saw the first appearance of the core GCACW mechanics. It was not as graphically pretty or as well developed. But, it was a great starting point. Buckets of history. More than a history lesson; more like a series of lectures. And it was fun to play.
7. Ambush
This was a series of games and modules from Eric Smith and John Butterfield at Victory. You started with a squad and took them through missions. The mission might change and you were never sure where and when the enemy might pop up. If you survived you got to use victory points to improve your squad or buy in replacements for your casualties. Quite a few Simpsons died on the paper battlefield. The system handled the enemy according to a clever set of rules, a paragraph book
and random die roll. Now the PC does this for you. But if there's ever a power cut and you want to relive the glory days of design over graphics, get this game out and have a ball. Quite how they screwed up the solo tank version and the face to face version is a true puzzle.
8. L'Armee du Nord
Only once have I ever managed to sort my games table for a three map game. And when I did it was to play this fast moving and deceptively clever game of the Waterloo Campaign. For the best part of three months this was the only game in town as I repeatedly solitaired it. It was the first Waterloo Campaign that put the battle in context. Suddenly the campaign decisions by Wellington and Napoleon took on a new shape. Ed Wimble took some stick for the slightly woolly combat. But it's a tribute to
the flexibility of the package that a couple of quick house fixes worked well. It was so much fun and I was getting so deep into the campaign - reading and playing - that any unfinished edges faded away. This is a rough diamond. But it is still diamond.
9. Flashpoint: Golan
Mark Herman's modern, multi-scenario game about the Middle East. The political system allows you to create most plausible backgrounds for the start of conflict. The combat systems reflect his portrayal of modern combat with an emphasis on the lack of front lines and the impact of quality and quantity. The system smoothly straps on everything you could possibly want ina playable fashion. But, given Mark's modern consulting role, this was to be the last of the line.
Originally designed for a Cold War that went away, I live in hope that some talented designer will take this back the way to WW2 and show that era through a different lens. Fascinating stuff.
10. Air & Armor
Bruce Maxwell's bloody brilliant Cold War game. With hidden unit strengths and different command systems for the good and the bad guys, this was a blast to play just with the basic rules. Some of the more advanced rules were criticised for lack of authenticity - mainly the helicopter stuff I think - but there was plenty that was spot on. Want to know what it might have been like to command in a Cold War battle? This is your best answer. Packed with good ideas, simple
to play and lots of replay value.
My near misses in this area are also too many to list. But I'm going to mention The Russian Campaign, Great Battles of History, Glory, Prussia's Glory, Hell's Highway, Tobruk, White Death, City Fight, Tunisia, This Hallowed Ground, Black Wednesday and War Without Mercy. More than enough to be going on with.
Ellis Simpson
5 April 2004