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Wargaming is a fascinating, engrossing, and exciting pastime that encompasses a wide range of different talents. In the course of pursuing his hobby, the average wargamer uses the skills of artist, designer, sculptor, illustrator, historian, librarian, researcher, mathematician and creative writer, as well as the more obvious ones of general, admiral or air marshal for large games, or perhaps lieutenant, commodore or squadron leader for skirmishes. Not only is wargaming a pursuit which calls upon many skills, but it also covers many aspects of combat, spanning the history of our planet. With science fiction gaming, we plunge into imagined worlds many thousands of years into the future and a fantasy gamer, of course, deals with eons of imagined history, as anyone who has read The Lord of the Rings will know. A wargamer may find himself recreating an encounter between a handful of adversaries one day, or a massed battle involving perhaps hundreds of miniature troops the next. Moreover, it is possible to play wargames that recreate warfare on land, on sea, in the air or, in the case of science fiction, even in outer space. This book aims to demonstrate the wonderfully varied hobby of wargaming with miniatures, looking at the broad scope of what it has to offer as well as detailed explanations of how to get involved, including comprehensive rules for gladiator combat, Wild West skirmishes and the horse and musket era, as well as lots of advice for anyone new to wargaming. Whether you’re a complete newcomer to the hobby, or a veteran of many years, you’ll find plenty in The Wargaming Compendium to entertain and inspire you.

Reviews

There is much to like about this book. Physically, the hardback is a thing of beauty, being very well designed and full of excellent pictures of wargames in progress, model soldiers and model terrain (I have the first Kindle edition too and there were several formatting problems in that; the hardback is magnificent though). It genuinely does contain pretty much everything that someone who wanted to get started in wargaming would need to know, particularly wargaming based upon historical conflicts rather than fantasy or science-fiction. It features an explanation of what the hobby is and how it has developed over time. It contains brief explanations of each of the ‘periods’ of history and their appeal for the gamer. It describes in some detail how to make many of the different kinds of terrain that one could want to create a battlefield to fight over, then it describes how a beginner might start to assemble and paint and base some appropriate models. The book contains a number of different rules: a set of ‘duelling’ rules set in the Roman period for gladiatorial combat; a set of skirmish rules set in the ‘Wild West’, and a full set of battle rules for the ‘horse and musket’ period (about 1685 – 1850 or so). These rules appear to be reasonably comprehensive, and on read through only, seem clear enough to follow and easy enough to use. They seem to me to resemble Rick Priestley’s ‘Black Powder’ rules to some extent. There is also a set of campaign (i.e. the conduct of the ‘war’ on a map between miniatures battles being fought on a tabletop) rules included and they look very good. All these rules are well-illustrated and explained, so an enthusiastic reader should be able to follow them unaided. The book then rounds up all the aspects of wargaming not covered so far: naval and aerial games, role-playing games (the combat orientated ones), pulp wargaming, multi-player games and solo wargaming. This latter is covered in some detail and as a large number of miniature gamers end up playing at least some games solitaire, then this was a very wise authorial decision. The author is clearly a skilled photographer too and goes into some detail about how to photograph miniatures to their best advantage. The book is then rounded off with a summary of the online and other resources out there to help the wargamer to obtain models and reference material. The book is very well written and the author always comes across as both knowledgeable and enthusiastic. It seems designed to replicate the spirit of many of the wargames ‘classics’ from the 1960s and 1970s and in those terms, the writer has done an excellent job and this work matches up very favourably to those volumes, particularly as inspiration for the beginner. Where the book is less good is for the more experienced wargamer – there will be relatively little in here for that reader’s benefit as he or she will already be aware of much of this kind of content. If the reader has subscribed to Battlegames magazine, then the reader will have seen some of this content before. On the other hand, if you haven’t been a long-term subscriber to one or more of the wargaming magazines or have pursued this hobby without much input from outside, then this book is a very good repository for lots of key knowledge and techniques. I’d recommend this book wholeheartedly to any beginners who have just taken up, or are considering taking up, the hobby. It is recommended as an interesting and useful book for more experienced gamers, although not quite as vital for those.

I missed out on this book when it was first published as the cover price seemed a little too rich for me at the time. As a wargamer of a similar vintage to the author the best I can say about this book it that it not covers many of the wargaming developments since the late 1960s to the time of writing but also passes on the best of this on into the current (and future) arena. I enjoyed the reminder of rules and books of the past and the acknowledgement of how these have all contributed to a lesser or greater degree to what wargaming is today. ‘Written on the shoulders of giants’ would be a great way of describing this book as the author readily acknowledges how wargaming’s early pioneers have helped to fashion and forge the hobby we enjoy today.

The sections on historical periods, army sizes and figure scales are all routine fare but the author describes them simply, eloquently and with many pertinent observations – both of actual games in progress and his own set up. There is practical advice and examples of painting, terrain making, designing rules and creating campaigns for a variety of periods. A wide variety of photographs of games and historical uniforms as well as diagrams, ‘how to’ sequences as well as list of figure manufacturers, wargames shows and modest but useful bibliography – not to mention some of the author’s own rules, complete the book.

I really enjoyed this book for a number of reasons. There was little contained in the pages that was new but what is contained therein represents a new baseline to start from for anyone considering embarking on the wargamer’s path. In essence the author has taken what could be described as an ‘old school’ style of wargames book and has made it the ‘new old school’. I highly recommend this book and am looking forward to the author’s forthcoming volume on campaigns in wargames (which will be of similar size!).

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“It is as complete a guide to the hobby of wargaming as you can currently get. Provides some excellent clarity for the newbie. Beautifully illustrated with 26 illustrations by Bob Marrion of troops of the period. Layout and production values of the book are quite superb. Lavishly illustrated with colour photographs which cover every detail discussed by the author. The rules have lots of diagrams and counters as required and there are a number of maps from the author’s campaigns. It all adds up to a great package.” Wargamer