Hi mate, great show with fantastic topics, and very interesting. I am very interested in the new 40k game so will keep an eye out for you content and thoughts on it. Thanks Jacob 😁 👍
Really great conversation guys. Yep i date back to the early 70s wargaming wise. To me at 62 Darth is a young guy who listens to new age music. I nearly started playing FoW at V1 but the guy at the shop told me to wait as V2 was about to be released. Even from V2 our group believed the categories of early, mid and late war are too broad and that each needs about 3 subsections. Such as a new tank released in January 42 is not competitive against a tank released in December 43. But under current rules in Africa October 42 a German army can have Tigers. So there needs to be an optional system for those who wish to be historical. Even in Team Yankee our group has and early or late designation so we turn up with fair armies. We forget that wargames provide an environment to learn and develop tactics and are not meant to be real a world simulation, we have computers for that. From another point of view there are plenty of rule sets that play excellent generic WW2 game but they all suck at playing a specific historic battle. I am first and fore most into war studies specialising in doctrine over the last decade both privately and work, ok im sick. I lost uncles in WW2 so i understand that its history is just still in living. Yet in historical wargames no one has issues with playing imperial Romans yet WW2 Germany can apply for the good guys by comparison its the distance of time that makes it difficult. If we do a historic battle then i use what is in the order of battle. I dont believe in substitution or put it another way if i ask how do you have your coffee, black or white? You answer neither i have almond milk. Well i hate to be the one to tell you but you have your coffee white. There is no problem if for whatever reason you cant go there thats fine but dont expext everyone to follow you. The propaganda of WW2 paints all Germans as NAZIS because it makes things easier. The average German was a practising Christian with values very similar values to anyone else. They were lead by a Nazi government that lied just as much to their population as the rest of the world. That government made it very difficult for a person to advance their career unless they joined the party. It was just something you did if you want to get better money for your family with no real interests in the party. Of coarse there were those who fully supported the party. So very German is a Nazi just made it easier for the occuping forces. The Hitler Youth is interesting as they were just kids who experienced their education having their moral goal posts continually moved. So they needed deprogramming. I also believe if you take things too far about Nazis you can cross a line were you begin disrespecting their victims. It must be remembered what they did and why their did it no matter how uncomfortable it makes you, otherwise it can all happen again just under a different name and new victims. If you do your research history continually repeats in this area but wargaming is about recreating battles not politics. Turning to a happier note i believe we are in a golden age for wargames but there is perhaps too much competition and the market place will eventually adress it. Back in the earlier 70s the manufacturers entered into an escalation war of who had the largest set of rules implying more accurate and realistic. The end result was we started to think of wargames as simulation and it killed map and counter wargaming. I have a friend who is highly envious of your good die rolling and about 30 years of rolling bad. I was there one night, i was play on a different table but all playing 40K. He brought all tables to a stop. In an assault he got to roll 30 dice and 26 of them was a 1, a pair of 2s, a 3 and 1 hit that made its saving throw.
I do apologize, I had a very long week and yesterday was a rough work day so I unfortunately went to bed far earlier then I had originally intended. I like having a bit of extra separation to the era's, most especially in mid war, sadly iv not really played early war so cannot speak to that. And yes, wargames are definitely as much a game as a learning environment. I personally prefer flames of war for my go to as its the best mix of narrative and easy to get into, if I wanted more simulation to the game itself id probably try battlegroup, but am not a huge fan of its complexity. When we are doing our more historical focused games, I will do the research to find out what was at the battle, and then restrict our unit choices to more closely match, leading to some sometimes difficult game play. Such as a few of our Stalingrad games where the Germans struggle to fight the Soviet T-34s lol. But thats what I like about wargaming, at the end of the day we are still playing a game, just basing it more on history then arcady match ups. Yes the propaganda does do that, and yes a large majority of the German armed forces were not party mbr's, and to varying levels agreed or disagreed with the party itself. But the fact remains that there do exist some in the hobby that venerate the party and its politics and are more then enthusiastic about representing it in their wargaming. And that is what MWM was getting at originally, that and the real world history might be some of the reasons why historical wargames just are not quite as popular as they could be. The Hitler Youth stuff is just a line I wont cross myself, especially now that I am a new dad. Its not that I want to ignore it, its just the topic for me is upsetting and all to close to home. I wouldn't stop someone from using them, as I said, I just personally will not. And same goes with my comment about Team Yankee due to whats happening in Ukraine, it is a current and ongoing conflict in nation whose cities do not look all to different from ours, especially when my day job is related. Sometimes when I play Team Yankee these days it makes me feel uncomfortable.. its difficult to explain. To much competition and market saturation is a worry aye, And also a problem because theres just to many games and there all so expensive lol! As for your mate.. well that may actually be worse dice luck then me LOL!
@@LackofForesightGaming Well then first up congratulations to you and your partner for you new baby. My second great great child was born 5 months ago. I understand your concerns as my concerns now stretch across 4 generations. Weaponizing a child in anyway is just wrong and only the lowest would consider it acceptable. The hardest yards of my life was when I was young with new wife and child while trying to advance my career. There just didn't seem to be enough time in the day to do everything, but it does get easier as time goes on. My main concern with a type of group your talking about is that at best it's a group of stupid young people or at worst a recruitment device for white supremacy group. Either it's up to the local groups and community to say its just not acceptable. Both groups rely on the majority to remain silent. One of the smart marketing tools for Team Yankee is its based on fictional history that is primarily based on the books Team Yankee and Chieftains. However I would find it in poor taste to have a games night based on the current Ukraine war. That in turn brings us to the critical question of when will it be in good taste? This is really up to the gaming community to come up with the answer. I think the answer are in part of privacy and public. In the privacy of your own gaming table you could hold wargames based on the current war to explore a counter tactic to a tactic that's working too well would be exceptable as would a public discussion on the findings. To have public games based on a current war for your own enjoyment is not. As for when this would be acceptable is probably a touch and feel thing. I would start publicly gaming about 12 months after the war finished and then shut it down if I offend anyone I would shut it down for another 12 months and try again. As for private gaming you simply start when the group is comfortable with it but it must be kept off line. Back in the early 70s a friend and I got a copy of fantasy tabletop wargame rules but it was meant to be played on a 8'x4' table. The rules suggested that if you did not have the space you could join a local wargaming group, so we followed its advice after painting up our original and elvish armies. In our area there was only the one group so deciding was easy. We went along and as the rule book said they were very friendly and they set up a table for us. Then we started unpacking our armies. For the only time in my life I felt like I was shrinking and the room was growing. We played our game, packed up the table and some of them walked us to the door, how friendly. Once we stepped out we were told it would be best that we didn't come back as they really didn't cater for our kind .... of player. They were all historical players and this was their first experience of fantasy or science fiction gamers. How things changed over time. Scale and personality are perhaps the two most overlooked things in our hobby. By scale I mean does your tank model represents a tank, platoon or company. At each level of scale you find different challenges. Such as at a scale of company you can engage multiple targets but this will stretch out the unit diluting your fire power and so you need to keep an eye on it and take corrective action. Imagine a FoW a platoon engages two separate targets and as a result becomes two groups and out of command, usually caused by loses. Both groups will find it 1 harder to hit until they reorganise while moving but no firing. This is part of tidying up the line. Go higher up you must resupply a unit before it can launch an attack without penalty. So scale impacts on where you need to focus. The higher you go up the scale the less complex the rules should be and while going down in scale the rules need to be more complex to deal with the extra detail that will need addressing. Such as bolt action rifles rate of fire versus semi automatic rifles. With Personality my taking about fit and match of army to player. Such as if you are quiet and calculating you maybe should not take an army that requires bold action and leaping on opportunities to be best used. There was a guy in our group we labelled Greyman when he was not around as with him it did not matter which army he brings along he played them all exactly the same way.
WALL OF TEXT: Wait....13 hours to play a trinary on trinary? What were you doing in between turns, field stripping a deer? A company on company takes me and any one of my friends about 4-6 hours, clanners go even faster with their firepower and I can only remember 3 hit locations (2, 7, and 12) and the rolls of 11+ on the cluster chart. I'd say alpha strike takes just as long as CBT when you have to take the time to look up what MHQ#2 means or arguing over who can see who with terrain. I'd disagree with the state of the hobby being good. If you play 40k or AoS then sure the hobby is good. Finding new people to play BT, Victory at seas, or TY/FoW with or ANYONE to play Monsterpocalypse, Kings of War, and NAM/FoAN are all nearly impossible. I can't talk to anyone about tabletop games without them trying to shove GW's garbage games down my throat. Sure you can order all sorts of stuff online but good luck finding anyone to play with if your friends show zero interest in the game. That's not even counting all the political garbage that is being forcefully inserted into each games lore. Warhammer is simpler then CBT? Your joking right? Strategems, command points, Primaries, Secondaries, all the different weapons and stat lines? Not even mentioning the new edition every year it feels like. I know it sounds like I'm making CBT a simple game, its not (especially Aerospace, need to know trigonometry and Latin to play with aerospace) but 40k/AoS has spiked to BT's level. I can see the S-Tank having Hammerhead like the HSTV-L...Oh sorry, the RDF-LT (what a stupid name change). Also curse you for saying the S-Tank is a STUG, I was not planning on any Nordic Force until you said that. The imperium of Mankind is not facist. Letting each world govern itself as long as it makes its tithes *coughtaxescough* doesn't sound like facism to me. Midwinter's take is dumb because its wrong. People don't play Historical because of the "National Socialists workers party", off the top of my head there are: Bolt Action, Flames of War Early/Mid/Late, Battlefront (yes there is a different game called Battlefront), Command Decision, Wings of War, Blood Red Skies, Sturmovik, Naval Thunder, Victory At Seas, and GHQ's rules and that's just what I know/remember. Go to Drivethru RPG and you'll be flooded with different rules. Star Wars may have 3 but its split between the ground, fighters, and large fleet battles. Fantasy basically has 3 games, Warhammer, Kings of War, and Lord of the rings. As for the N@Z1 (don't know if youtube will delete my comment if it sees the word) issue....its a stupid take. People LOVE to focus on them yet you yourself said the Soviets were worse. You know who else was worse? To the point the Germans sent an ambassador/envoy to tell them to cool it with their warcrimes? Imperial Japan. Yet no one complains when someone plays as those two. The problem stems from modern politics are influencing too many tabletop games today. If you disagree with a woke progressive you are a N@Z1. Not saying Midwinter is that politically but that kind of talk has "poisoned the well" so to speak so when someone says that and the person being accused defends themselves, it proves in the accusers mind that they are a N@Z1 so people get REALLY defensive and even angry when that word is tossed around stupidly. Yes saying people don't want to play as that is incredibly dumb. They could have just made a video about bolt action and world of warships without that. I used to not play historical wargames because Mechs, evil alien space bugs, dragons, and super heroes were cool not some dude with a rifle and a helmet. That I think is a MUCH bigger reason then there being N@Z1s in a game. Also the only time I've ever heard of someone of that "mindset" playing it was that dude over in the UK trolling the crap out of a warhammer tournament, so if they are playing they are doing what is proper and leaving their baggage at the door. I just do not understand people being skittish about TY because of the current war between to corrupt eastern bloc countries (yes zelensky is just as corrupt as putin). "We don't want to play because now its real life!" Yes because Poland still being a part of the Soviet Union or Chechoslavokia(sp?) still existing really mean the game is set in the real world. People today seem to be unable to play pretend anymore, your using little army men and plastic toy tanks ffs. It is not JUST rage bait for clicks, people can be frustrated and horribly disappointed with the direction of the fandom going and, in their mind, ruining the franchise and they should be allowed to voice their frustration. "Too much negativity" Stop defending corporations for their garbage practices. Disney does not defending for ruining Star Wars (check the sales of modern star wars). Games Workshop does not need defending for the constant screwing over of their paying customers. These are multimillion dollar corporations they will be fine if a bunch of nerds on the internet make videos. People tend to jump to quickly on the bandwagon and spout stuff they have zero idea on so that does not always help. I do enjoy your content, even this podcast because it made me think about things I had not (except THIRTEEN HOURS on 15v15 in battletech, wtf man) I just listened to you guys this morning at work so I had the last nine hours to let this stew and bubble in my brain, hence the giant wall of text. Also download Solaris Skunkwerks for your battletech record sheets, you can print most of the hit/cluster charts right onto the record sheet.
Thank you! This is exactly the kind of interaction I was hoping to have, love to have a conversation mate! The 13 hours take more being the referencing and socializing we end up doing lol. Its been almost 15 years since I last played classic tech roper but I Do remember just a lance on lance taking us close to 4 hours? though I think alot of that was just it was the first game of tech id played in two years so alot of referencing. Alpha strike can easily become bogged down with all the extra rules and depth you can bring to it, we mostly have played using the basic rules with some of the variable damage rules and have gotten through some pretty big games pretty quickly. Totally a fair statement if thats what you are experiencing. I admit with our neck of the woods I have been able to find players for most games iv been into pretty easily, so could just be based on our own experience? But finding so many different gaming options these days beyond just GW is so so easy (current stock issues aside but .. thats another conversation separate at this point) Out of order but easier to put it here, the Imperium itself is a weird amalgamation of Fascism, Monarchy and end stage capitalism. Its simply a caricature of all the Bad of humanity rolled into one really. That said Individual worlds often get to have their own form of governance, but the overarching state control embodies like 11 pf the 14 core features of fascism. Mind I studied history in university, not polisci. As for the warhammer being simpler, I am unsure if we clarified but this take was based n the current look at tenth edition thats been previewed and so far does seem to be simpler. Again, could be misremembering the level of rules interactions in classic tech, though I do recall the game steps being pretty dense with reference charts, about on par with how often we are referencing for classic warhammer fantasy lol. Im Not sorry about the stug comment because its 90% of why I want them myself lol! Midwinters take is dumb because its wrong.. now thats where we have to disagree I think. My take away from his video was simply him exploring some reasons why historical are less popular, main points being the political histories behind the armies in play, the real life history behind the conflicts in play in WW2 gaming, and I think they are valid points/reasons why the genre is less popular. People focus on the National socialist because they are an easy target, the Soviet Union a close second yes. Imperial Japan, yes 100% should be held on par with the other 2, and even the western allies commit war crimes to some extent. I think the key is to bring things back around to being able to have those kinds of conversations without it just becoming a mud slinging match. Of course, boiling it down to 'nazi's bad' is an easy simple statement and hook for a short video that is looking to start the conversation id say. Now, Nazi's in the hobby.. iv sadly encountered them myself, as a teen one of the local gamers had NSDAP symbolism all over his tau, straight down to Nuremburg style banners on the back of his fire warrior commanders. and later in life, when I worked for one of our LGS, we had to deal with a few individuals who leaned to varying degrees into the appreciating the third reich unironically camp. So while they are few.. and in this case somewhat anecdotally only in my experience, they do still exist and while my ay job does have me often addopting a stance of political neutrality... Fascist ideology just straight up is a hard no for me. As for the rage biat.. enough of the videos I saw just straight up didnt seem to have actually listened to Guys vid. The ones I was referencing were saying he accused historical wargamers as all being nazi's basically and thats straight up disingenuous. Next, yes I am a bit hesitant to play it sometimes. Why? Because innocents are being brutally murdered by a power hungry megalomaniacal asshole in the kremlin. Its not about two corrupt states, its about one state trying to genocide a nation (again..) and completely disregarding the international rule of law. I could really go into this, but I shouldn't because I will get very angry, and face trouble at work. Current conflict aside, it still makes me uncomfortable to play sometimes Because it hits to close to home for me sometimes.. could just as easily be me fighting these battles, fictional or not. And that speaks a fair bit to one of Guy's points about the real life uncomfortable history behind these games, and why that might be another reason folks are hesitant to play. Yes I think the allure of the sci-fi setting is a Larger reason for it, I am guilty of it myself, especially with being so burnt out on WW2 right now. But that feels like its almost such a given I feel like that why it got basically no time in his video. That said, while I may disagree with you, I am happy to have received your comment. Your comment proved that we id something right because its continuing the conversation, making folks think (was hoping for no anger, but that still interaction). And never apologize a wall of text, Im always happy to see it. Hope to have you continue enjoying our content and leaving comments in the future, and I would love to see your 80's Swedish stugs when you get them painted up! Cheers!
Well with all due respect when players are very meticulous with their planning and target numbers end up being 10-12 at ranges of 5 or 6 hexes from movement partial and such then yes 13 hours is what it takes. Now this was also 30 years ago. I agree classic is a bit quicker now but to say it's just as fast as alpha has me asking what are you doing while playing alpha? Lol
