Miniature games - the good, the bad and the ugly.

I love miniatures games.

Show me some cool scenery or terrain and give me some nice looking figures to push around and I'm a happy camper. Miniature games appeal to me on many different levels and I can often be found at the local gaming conventions either running, playing or just observing the wide variety of miniature games usually being played.

Obviously, the main thing that draws me into a miniatures game, it the way it looks. Scenery and miniatures go hand in hand. As a kid, I enjoyed plastic models and took great pride in building and painting WWII fighter planes & Ships, Star Wars vehicles and Battlestar Galactica Viper and Cylon fighters. I also had a model railroad and loved recreating the world in miniature for my trains to run through. The operation of my tabletop railroad empire was overshadowed by my enjoyment of building it. I derived much more pleasure from making the mountains and trees and building the structures on it, than I ever did from running the trains on it. I've never outgrown this fascination for seeing a well built model railroad and I still have plans to someday build my own world in miniature.

Miniature games are also played by a different type of gamer it seems. Most games with miniatures are wargames of one type of another. You control a ship on the high seas, or maybe a spacecraft in the blackness of space, or maybe a squad/platoon/regiment of troops marching into battle. Miniature gamers like being the commander in charge. They enjoy seeing their men ambush another squad or outmanuevering another skilled admiral with their magnificent Ship of the Line in the thick of battle. These gamers like the additional information gleaned from seeing the battlefield in 3D, not just from hexes mapped out on cardboard or vinyl mats. To us, getting down low to verify that line of sight is essential to declaring a target to fire upom and watching your troops march across the board in perfect formation never fails to warm our hearts.

I think that the people that enjoy miniature games are also satisfying their creative talents as well, as the vast majority of them spend countless hours painting and detailing their miniatures in addition to building elaborate terrain and landscapes to fight upon. Some players are very fanatical about this and many of the historical miniaturists will detail their figures down to the exact color of that Civil War era belt buckle in an effort to be completely accurate. Flags and banners and other markings all need to be correctly painted or attached, tanks and other vehicles must be appropriately weathered for realism and even incidental counters or markers get "the treatment" as the miniaturist replaces that "out of ammo" counter with a miniature empty ammo box to place next to the unit.

For someone who enjoys miniatures, no game is safe. My gaming group is full of players like this and they have "miniaturized" many games that would normally be considered boardgames. Off the top of my head, I can think of Circus Maximus, Samurai, Kingmaker, B-17 and Mississippi Queen have all been "blown up"- as we call it, by our group.



After I introduced them to the 1st edition of Twilight Imperium, immediately we were discussing how big to make the hexes, what types of space miniatures would we need to get and all kinds of other details to make the game a "centerpiece" at a gaming convention.



Maybe those that collect and play miniature games thrive on the attention and praise that they are sure to get any time they run a game of it. I know that when I'm running a Man O War game, I do enjoy having people comment on how cool everything looks or how nice the paint jobs or scenery are, but - for me at least, it's definately not why I spent the untold hours painting and building everything. The truth is, I did it for ME, not for them!

Most miniature gamers would call themselves wargamers, but many wargamers don't like playing miniatures. You would think that the two types would be interchangeable, but I've found it to not be the case at all. I would venture to guess that it's because of the "fudge" factor that is inherent in most miniatures games. Typically, movement and combat is done in inches (though there are a lot of games with exeptions), and players usually use turning, movement or combat templates to determine where, how far and to what extent a figure can move, turn or shoot. Whenever a system like this is used, it's a given that disagreements over whether or not a unit can or can't do something will arise.

"Discussions" usually take this form...

"Hey! You can't turn that ship that much, you only get a single turn and it won't be tight enough to fire upon my flagship - I purposely moved to avoid that last turn and checked it when I was done!"

"What are you talking about? It's obvious I can fire upon you - you are WELL within my field of fire. I only made a single turn."

"Well, yes...NOW you can, as you turned too sharply. If you hadn't changed your mind about where to go 3 times already, your ship would have been in it's original place and then you would see that my ship is out of your turning arc."

"I let you slide two turns ago when you did your ram attack- which I still say was under the minimum range."

"That was completely different. My ship was moved accidently, there was originally plenty of distance between our ships."

(Continue this arguement for 15 minutes at least)


When dealing with inches, fractions of an inch can turn a game drastically in your favor or tragically towards your opponent's. Most miniaturists accept this and make the best of it. Someone who likes the absolutenes of a hex and counter game will find this frustrating to no end. In a typical wargame, it's usually pretty obvious whether a unit can move 4 or 5 hexes and whether or not an enemy unit is defending at 2:1 odds or 1:1. Miniatures games...not so much.

I have run my Man O War game (Fantasy Navel Battles) at 2-3 conventions a year since 1994 and have found that usually the games go much better when I am being a referee rather than a participant. That's not because I would change my standing on a ruling during a game any differently as a referee than as a player, but simply because as a referee with no vested interest in the outcome, my decision seems fairer - although it's really not.



I have seen players totally lose it over whether or not a ship is at a 3" range to the target or if it's 2.99". Seriously. In situations like that, I have often found that a die roll works much better than me expressing my opinion, but some players will hold a grudge regardless of the outcome throughout the game. Players like this obviously are difficult to deal with in any type of gaming situation, but it seems like miniature games have a much higher percentage of them than other game types.

These rules lawyers can suck the fun out of a game as fast as a broadband connection and pointing out that they are doing so usually only raises the "I'm just following the rules of the game!" defense in full force. It's usually then I make a vow to not find myself across the table from them again in another game if I can help it.

Finally I think the biggest detriment to miniature gaming is what I call the "disparities of scale". I'm not talking about what scale the miniatures are, but how well the game plays by increasing the army size or number of players. Using my Man O War game again as an example, the best games are always 2 player, 1500 points to a side. With experienced players, these games are usually over in 2 hours at the most and there will be a definate, clear cut winner. Logic would dictate that adding 2 more players and cutting the fleet size down to 1000 points per player should only extend a game by 33% at most as you now have a 4000 point game instead of a 3000 point game. You would expect a game of this size to run at most another hour ( a 50% increase in time). Unfortunately, most games of this size are now in the 5-6 hour range - which is long by any definition.

My gaming group played a 9 player game of Fire and Fury the other night, which is a fun and well designed Civil War miniatures game. The scenario was a "meeting" encounter where both sides entered from different roads on the same table edge and raced across the 8 foot table to get control of the main junction where the two roads intersected. Each player had several units at their command and I was 4th in line to enter the game table on the Union side. Things got off to a quick start with Bob's calvary racing across the table and engaging the Confederates who had managed to secure the road before we could arrive, but then things changed. As each of the players brought on their units, things bogged down. At the beginning of the game, 2 players each had to move 3-4 units to complete their side of the turn. Three or 4 turns went quickly at that point. when the 2nd player per side arrived, it was now taking twice as long to get a turn down as they each had as many units as the 1st players did. The 3rd players got on the board eventually and with little room on the board to actually manuever, slowed down in the area where everyone would first deploy as they came onto the board.

When it was finally my turn to enter the board, it was literally 3 hours since the game had started! After several more excrutiatingly slow turns at this point, I was able to get into position and make my first few attacks by the time it was time to call it a game as it was 2am - 6 hours after we had started. Woohoo.

Was it still fun? Yes, in a way. I am a social gamer and the banter that occurs during these types of games is always fun. I like the group of guys I game with and these types of games are few and far between, so I can always "take one for the team" as it were. It's not that I didn't care for Fire and Fury - it's actually a really cool game, it's just that it doesnt scale well for more than 4 guys or so.

So there ya have it, my take on why I love (for the most part), miniature games. They aren't perfect - though some do come real close for me, they are open to rules lawyering - though often it's unavoidable due to the nature of the game, the look absolutely fantastic - no denying that! and they provide a appropriate outlet for my creative tendencies that is satisfying and appealing.

How about you? Do you enjoy miniature games? Have you had the same kinds of experiences? Do they appeal to you for the same (or maybe different) reasons? Have you played with a miniature rules lawyer?

I wanna know!

Boardgamegeek Frustrations & My Solution

Time to vent...

If you have done any significant kind of searching on the internet for information on Boardgames, chances are you have run across www.boardgamegeek.com - which is quite simply the most comprehensive database and community concerning boardgames you will find.

Boardgamegeek (or BGG as we affectionately call it) has listing on over 25,000 boardgames. Each listing has the standard information like the name, publisher, year it was made, ect... but it also has pictures of the game and it's components, files you can download like FAQ's, player aids, player made variants, BGG member ratings and comments, links to related web sites, marketplace and eBay listings and much, much more. You can enter all the games you own into the database and keep track of them and how you much you like (ordislike) them. Looking for missing parts? There is a section for that. Need a rule interpretation? Look into the game's individual forums for your answer. Wanna trade away a game you no longer play? Click the "For Trade: box for that game in your collection. There is so much more too, I'm only hitting the tip of the iceberg here.

Anyways, the site has continually been growing and changing in the last 5 years. New features, new changes - all kinds of things to make the site better and better. BGG quickly became my "home" page years ago and up until recently, it's been the ONE page I'd check 5 or 6 times a day to see what's new. It was like gaming Nirvana.

Yes, I said was. What has changed you ask? Unfortunately, I'm afraid the site is becoming less and less useful as it becomes more and more overloaded by the continually increasing demand on it's servers. Just this past weekend I tried continually to access the front page and the server gave me nothing but errors or "Database Busy" messages. Accessing the "Geek" this past month or so has continually been hit or miss with the constant "server not found" errors as well as experiencing painfully slow page loading - I'm telling you it feels like Im on a really bad dial-up service, and I know my DSL is faster than that!

I feel bad for the site's main administrator Scott Alden (or "Aldie" as he is affectionately known) as he is continually trying to keep things operational while still adding new features from the hundreds of member requests he gets weekly. He also has to continually be tweaking the existing ones to just keep everything running - yes just running at this point, I think the equipment is far too taxed to hope for "running smoothly".

Aldie quit his programming job to dedicate himself to BGG full time and his salary comes strictly from member support (of which far too few seem to do). He has slowly had to find other methods of generating income to pay for upgrading the hardware and adding new servers. The site is a behemoth at this point, too large for one guy (no matter how good he is!) to maintain and keep operational, yet I suspect there is not enough income to support him, let alone another dedicated employee. I think he must be very frustrated, as he is constantly against the 8-ball and appears to be losing a race to upgrade the hardware faster than the demand on it increases.

Maybe I'm over-reacting. Maybe it's just bad timing and once the new equipment is in, things will be ok again. I really hope that is the case. BGG is an extremely valuable resource for those in this hobby and losing it would be catastrophic. If the influx of new users continues as it has in the past and the percentage of supporters stays the same, I predict that it will be impossible to keep up with the demands of it's members under the present system of membership, there just wont be enough money to do so.

So what's a guy to do?

How can Aldie save his baby?

I think it's time for Draconian measures...

If you aren't a supporter of the Geek through a minimum $25 donation, you can't have full access to BGG.

Period.

New users who stumble across BGG through Google or somewhere else will only get to see the (as yet to be created) simplified game entry pages. You'll be able to search and find any game you want, but, you'll only see the basic information, a description, a rating or two and a few pictures. THAT'S IT.

If you can't fork over $25 bucks then you don't get access to the forums, you can't get to the marketplace, you can't have geekbuddies (friends whose opinions and comments you value and can track), you can't collect Geekgold (the site's funny money used to buy badges and avatars), you can't block any ads and most of all, you can't make comments and suggestions for more features, since you haven't paid for any of the existing ones.

$25 bucks is VERY Cheap for what the site provides and if everyone was a supporter, there would be a lot fewer problems, as money wouldn't be an issue. Aldie (and Derk too come to think of it) DESERVE to make a great living doing this, as it is - like any other great invention, something that filled a void that nobody knew existed.

BGG has a LOT of members. I'd say that there must be at least 10-15k members out of the upwards of 50k unique people that visit the site (per month), that would be willing to pay to make things better. At $25 a pop, 15 thousand members is $325,000 dollars a year. The wayI see it Aldie and Derkshould be pulling in 100k each, leaving 125k for equipment. It's that simple.

The truth of the matter is, the other 35k or so that come to BGG each month really don't care too much about how the menu's work, or if they can customize modules or not. Give them a 30 day free trial membership to see if they want to keep it. You wont keep everyone, but should that matter? I have many gamer friends that are heavily into games who only come to BGG once in a blue moon. When they do come here, they could care less about how many columns the game pages have or whether or not their post was moved to another forum.

They just want the site to load quickly like it should when they click on it.

Like me.

So, these things may not happen this year, or even the next. But when these changes are made, just remember where you heard it suggested first.

Long live the Geek!

(And special thanks to Aldie and Derk for bringing the Geek to life and making it what it is today).

How to Make a Gamer - A Work in Progress

It's always somewhat amusing to me to see how people react when they find out I like to play games. I'm sure they think I mean kid's games - at least until I explain what kind of games I'm talking about. I always use it as a way to see if I can get another person into playing some of these great games and further grow the hobby. Just today, I was at Fed Ex sending some appraisal files to the home office. The lady behind the counter and I always chat for a few minutes and I mentioned that I had gone to Tahoe over the weekend to spend time with the family. After being surprised that we didnt go skiing, she asked what we did all weekend. The conversation continued on like this...

"Well, we watched movies, went sledding, played a lot of games... just kind of hung out as a family."

"Games? You mean like Monopoly or Life?"

"Well, not exactly. I like a lot of Euro-games that you probably have not heard of, but you'd most likely enjoy if you had played one."

"What's a Euro-game? Do you have to speak another language or something? "
*Laughs*

"No, a Euro-game is kind of an overall name that applies to the style of games that I play. Unlike a typical American game where you roll a die, move your token and do whatever it says on the space you land on, Euro-games offer you many choices each turn on what you can do and how you can work towards winning."

*Her eyes glaze over*
"That sounds complicated."
*Slight pause as she thinks about it*
Are they any fun?"

"They are a LOT more fun than your typical Monopoly or Life game. They just work a little differently. Usually the other players have something to do when it's not their turn. There is a lot more interaction and they are pretty easy to get into. I've converted most of my family and friends into fairly serious game players with them."

"Really?"

"Yep. They are really addicting - but in a good way. My sister and her husband started playing these a few years back when they would visit. Now she has a fairly large collection of favorites and is always letting me know of games she has seen and asks my opinion of them. Five years ago, you couldn't have forced her to play a game of Monopoly. My brother on the other hand, actively hated these games. He'd make comments as we'd play along the lines of Why are you wasting your time?' or That looks stupid!"

*Slight bemusement, but still a bit wary*
"So you didn't convert him I take it?"

*I laugh*
"No, he finally caved in and tried one after a few glasses of a good Merlot. Now he'll try almost anything and he actually went looking to buy a few for himself. He was really touched to get a game from me for Christmas."

*She cracks up at this, but definately was curious now*
"You're kidding. That's really cool."
*She thinks about it for a second and adds*
"My kids don't like playing games with me, I'm way too cutthroat with them - especially in Monopoly!"

*Both of us laugh*

"It's no fun to get eliminated in a game and have to wait for everyone else to finish. Maybe you should try one of my games."

"I'd have no idea what to do."

"Do you like playing Rummy?"

"The card game? Yeah, it's a lot of fun."

*Pulling out a pen to write some stuff down*
"Go to this store, and buy this game."

*Reading my note*
"Ticket to Ride? That's a game?"

"Yes, and a great one for you and the family. It's easy to learn and I'm sure you will enjoy it. It won't cost anymore than taking the family to a movie and you'll have the game to play again and again."

*Smiling brightly*
"Ok, thanks. I may just get this."

And I walked out. I don't know if she'll go get it or not. I hope so, but it might take a bit more persuasion. She was interested - especially after hearing that nobody gets eliminated during the game. I've decided to make her my next vict...errr... project.

We shall see.

I think this experience kinda sums up the way that most Americans feel about games. All they know is Monopoly or LIFE or some trivia game. The thought that there might be something else out there is intriguing. It's a tough nut to crack, but I have converted nearly everyone I know that had never heard of a Euro-game into a Boardgame geek.

Like me.

By the way...here's a picture of the game I recommended... Ticket to Ride.

Do you invest in the Stock Market? Do you like Movies? Have I got a game for you!

I thought I'd start off by giving you a "free game".

Really.

It's something a little unusual and maybe calling it a game is a bit of a stretch, but the truth is, it's a lot of fun, it combines two of my favorite pastimes (Games & Movies) and it's addicting - which is always the sign of a good game.

I'm talking about the Hollywood Stock Exchange. It's a really odd combination of movies, movie stars and investing in the Stock Market. The premise is real similar to the actual Stock Exchange in Wall Street that you are most likely familiar with. You buy stocks in indivual movies or movie stars (actors and actresses) and hope that they go up in value instead of down. It's that simple.

(I'll leave out the part about the obsession with wondering how much "money" you've made and how you'll be checking it multiple times a day to see how well (or how poorly) you are doing!)

You simply need to click on the link at the right and sign up for a free account. Don't worry about spam or them selling your name or anything, like I said, I've been doing this for a looooong time and it's never been anything but fun. Pick a good username and be sure to change your password to something you'll remember right away as the one they give you will easily be forgotten.

Once you have an account, you'll get a gift of $2,000,000 to start investing with. You simply search for a movie title and when you find one you like you can purchase up to 50,000 shares of it.

Moviestocks come in a few catagories:

Concepts - Typically, they are drawn from whispers and rumors about a "new" project. These are pitches or ideas which are not in active development, and may not ever be turned into real movies.

Development - This is the second phase in the life of a Moviestock. Development begins once a project has attracted interest. Producers commission a script, talents are attached, and funds are being spent. There is no guarantee that the movie will be made simply because it has reached the development stage, but it definitely has a good chance.

Production - This is the third phase in the life of a film. Moviestocks that fall into this category are currently being filmed and has an excellent chance of reaching a theater near you.

Wrap - This is the fourth phase in the life of a Moviestock. Movies that have been "wrapped" have completed filming and post-production (effects, editing) is taking place. MovieStocks that are wrapped for three years without a release date will cash out at with a value of zero!

Release - This is the final phase in the life of a Moviestock. Movies in the release phase are currently in theaters. This is where traders put their money where their mouth is and find out what the buzz was about.

Of course, the earlier you buy a Moviestock, the cheaper it will be and the more potential profit you will earn. Then again, it could tank before it ever gets off the drawing board and then you are out of luck! (I've lost 1.7 million alone on the never to see the light of day sequel... Spaceballs 2!)

Moviestocks get put on "hold" the weekend of their release and all trading is suspended while the HSX (Hollywood Stock Exchange) awaits the Box Office returns late Sunday night. Moviestocks usually get adjusted to the rate of 2.8 times their box office take for the opening weekend.

For example, Basic Instinct 2 opened this past wekend and here are the numbers:

Basic Instinct 2 (BASC2) This is the HSX stock name.
Halted: H$19.73 (This was what it was selling for when the price was halted on Friday morning)
Weekend: $3.2M (This was the abyssmal weekend box office take)
Adjusted: H$8.96 (This was what the Moviestock adjusted to on Sunday night)

If you owned 50,000 shares on Friday, by Sunday you had lost H$ 538,500! (That H$ is HSX dollars by the way).

The fun is in trying to pick the winners and avoid the losers. Of course everyone owns shares of Spiderman 3 (currently being sold for H$203.16 per share, but not everyone can say they bought it for H$95.50 like I did!!)

The movie Starbonds work differently and there are other types of investments that you can make too. The HSX site is a real community as there are forums, reviews, discussions, market analysis tools, ect to help you get the most out of your time there. It really is a one of a kind website that will keep you ahead of your friends when it comes to hearing about the latest movies in the works in a real fun and interactive way.

Everyone starts with the same $2,000,000... the trick is to make it grow! (I'm currently at $343,000,000 and still going!).

Check it out, you'll have some fun.

Welcome to Nothing But Games!

*Turns on the Light*

Hey! There you are. Welcome to Nothing But Games. I'm Scott and I'll be the one babbling about just about every game related topic I can think of. If you aren't sure what to expect, don't worry, you aren't the only one - I'm new to this too. I'll do my best to keep you interested and coming back for more.

I see they've just about finished the painting and the rest of the decor in here, so I'm gonna come back after they've cleaned up and get things going. Hope to see ya back in here in a little bit!