Historo-Fantasy gaming

[rob_alderman]

Hey guys,
I'm sure the more learned fantasy gamers amongst yourselves will have heard of Flintloque and perhaps even Panzerfauste. There is also SPQOrc, but little is known about it, especially since the site went down.

What I want to ask is if anyone knows of any others, has any of these and if they would like to show some off. I'd also like to know just what period of history would you like to see fantasized?
If you don't like them, think of them in this way...

Popular fantasy games grab all their concepts from History, usually medieval or dark age... What comes next?
This is where Flintloque comes in and then Panzerfauste after that.

I am thinking about a Vietnam one... With ignorant Elves as the Yankorian marines fighting the Goblin Gookese... There's all sorts I could do...

Don't really know why I like the idea of merging real fantasy with history. I just do. It's a bit like Weird World War 2, you can find little things in history that you could use in a fantasy setting (i.e. things Churchill said, or that Napoleon did...).

Rob

[Onebigriver]

Cthulhu is an obvious one to do, I'm sticking to the 20s and 30s but in theory you could add Cthulhu to any point in history. I'm also working on a 1950s alien invasion game, using lists of US weapons from the Korean War and inspired by the 50s sci fi movies. The Harry Turtledove books provide good what ifs - the 4 World War books have Aliens invading during the second world war, resulting in uneasy truces between the axis and allies. He's also done something about the Confederacy winning the American Civil War resulting in a very different 1940s if I remember correctly.

[Will Bailie]

Rafm makes Vietnam-style orc grunts:
http://www.rafm.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=RAF&Category_Code=BB

I don't know who can stand in as the VC though.  Maybe wood elves, or GW forest goblins?

As for me, while I like the look of these fantasy-historical crossovers, I don't have the interest in collecting Flintloque or Panzerfaust.  I don't have the time or money to do all the historical gaming that I want, so I won't spend it on games like Flintloque (although I have been known to have crossovers with colonial troops fighting orcs, and a WAB/WHFB crossover with Romans vs Celts vs Orcs)!

[Wirelizard]

Fantasy Rules! (2nd or 3rd ed, I've played both) is a mass-combat fantasy system that still (like most do) has a good historical feel. We've done Romans vs many fantasy races, and one of the more interesting big FR! fights we ever did was Dwarves vs Steppe Nomads (Huns).

My Dwarven army had a full suite of artillery, magical machinery, monsters and such; the Huns had spellcasters and characters, but lacking monsters & most fantasy elements, took hordes and hordes and hordes of horsemen instead.

The Dwarves lost, swamped under waves of short men on small ponies, but it was a hard fight - they carved up big chunks of the Hun forces and refused to go down easy.

Romans VS Dwarves was interesting too, for different reasons - both armies are focussed on really good heavy infantry and are (in FR!) relatively low magic. Lots of skirmishing on the flanks as the main heavy battlelines ground toward each other.

Of course there's also the whole DBA/DBM/DBx tournie setup, which is pretty much historo-fantasy even if lots of the participants won't admit it - how is Samauri vs Zulus anything but historo-fantasy?

[Doc Twilight]

Fantasy Rules! (2nd or 3rd ed, I've played both) is a mass-combat fantasy system that still (like most do) has a good historical feel. We've done Romans vs many fantasy races, and one of the more interesting big FR! fights we ever did was Dwarves vs Steppe Nomads (Huns).

My Dwarven army had a full suite of artillery, magical machinery, monsters and such; the Huns had spellcasters and characters, but lacking monsters & most fantasy elements, took hordes and hordes and hordes of horsemen instead.

The Dwarves lost, swamped under waves of short men on small ponies, but it was a hard fight - they carved up big chunks of the Hun forces and refused to go down easy.

Romans VS Dwarves was interesting too, for different reasons - both armies are focussed on really good heavy infantry and are (in FR!) relatively low magic. Lots of skirmishing on the flanks as the main heavy battlelines ground toward each other.

Of course there's also the whole DBA/DBM/DBx tournie setup, which is pretty much historo-fantasy even if lots of the participants won't admit it - how is Samauri vs Zulus anything but historo-fantasy?

Heh. The whole DBX system went to fantasy years ago, anyway, when Barker completely bowed to the tournament types. Can be a fun game, but it bares very little resemblance to actual Ancient warfare as described by period authors (whom Barker generally disdains, even though the Archaeology tends to back them up with alarming alacrity in recent years.)

Of course, my favorite introduction to an Ancients ruleset was done for a fun little set of rules called "CLASH!" which I tried unsuccessfully to purchase the rights for years ago. It had some truly unusual ideas - the spirit of which was summed up in the introduction.

"These rules are designed first and foremost for fun, and were based upon period accounts, where possible. We refuse to discuss the accuracy of these rules with anyone who does not have direct experience of Ancient combat."

Anyway, you're right about the matchup. Aztecs versus Vikings, now that's fantasy.

In answer to the original question, I have had a pet project involving fantasy races and history for about as long as I've been a wargamer. I wrote a short story called "No Man's Land", and it just sort of gelled. However, without getting into specifics (I bet you can guess something, though), I don't know how marketable such a concept would be, and at any rate, fantasy gamers tend to be just as picky as the historical types when you get right down to it, just about different things!

Would love to see a crossover done well that would succeed, though.

-Doc

-Doc

[rob_alderman]

Aye.
I hate picky gamers.

SPQ.Orc never picked up, it is 'Noman' Orcs fighting the Halfling 'Boche' tribes. Excellent game that's veyr fun, but I think the company went down.

This genre of gaming never seems to pick up... Flintloque was close, once...
New version of Flintloque is very good.

Doc, I'd probably pick it up. I'd like to hear more on it, however, if it is based on the period I am thinking... How close is it to Panzerfauste?

Also, veyr interesting that people are talking about what I see as Historical being fantasy (i.e. Zulu vs Samurai). You do raise a very good point...

What if it went the other way? A game based entirely on real armies, but in a different world fighting for different causes.
Let's say the 'British' Colonial forces of Mordor fighting the Zulus of Gondor...

God this thread could get mad. 

[Gluteus Maximus]

I don't know who can stand in as the VC though.  Maybe wood elves, or GW forest goblins?

How about GW's Lizardmen, painted in satisfying camo colours, rather than the bloody awful toxic blue they favour?

[Doc Twilight]

Aye.
I hate picky gamers.

SPQ.Orc never picked up, it is 'Noman' Orcs fighting the Halfling 'Boche' tribes. Excellent game that's veyr fun, but I think the company went down.

This genre of gaming never seems to pick up... Flintloque was close, once...
New version of Flintloque is very good.

Doc, I'd probably pick it up. I'd like to hear more on it, however, if it is based on the period I am thinking... How close is it to Panzerfauste?

Also, veyr interesting that people are talking about what I see as Historical being fantasy (i.e. Zulu vs Samurai). You do raise a very good point...

What if it went the other way? A game based entirely on real armies, but in a different world fighting for different causes.
Let's say the 'British' Colonial forces of Mordor fighting the Zulus of Gondor...

God this thread could get mad. 

Rob -

I think you're on to what I was thinking of. It would be historically close to Panzerfauste, certainly, though of a certain earlier period.
I have a lot of concepts down, and I really would like to see some of them produced, but as you intimated, this can be a risky endeavor to undertake - the Alternative Armies guys came the closest, but (with all due respect to them), it seems like they dropped the ball on it at a critical moment.

Still, I'm not opposed to making it happen if there's enough interest. I have two words for you: Goblin Zeppelin.

(There's more too it than that, yes, but... I dunno. Something amusing about that thought.)

-Doc

[rob_alderman]

Panzerfauste covers WW1 & WW2, the games is 'early 20th century style'. 

Steve has done a great job of making a fantasy game using elements of history from the period of the two wars.

I don't know who can stand in as the VC though.  Maybe wood elves, or GW forest goblins?

How about GW's Lizardmen, painted in satisfying camo colours, rather than the bloody awful toxic blue they favour?

I could even sculpt PJ's on them.
I was thinking maybe Elves. The Vietnamese are described as being delicate and ornate. But unwarlike... Elves can be warlike...
I don't know...
That toxic blue is quite awful...

[Mad Carew Snr]

I thought that all wargames were a fantasy - how naive of me! 

Sounds like a great idea Rob - post a game report when you get started. Wood Elves as VC sounds reasonable to me - perhaps they're being unofficially supplied by Lothlorien?

[Gluteus Maximus]

What if it went the other way? A game based entirely on real armies, but in a different world fighting for different causes.
Let's say the 'British' Colonial forces of Mordor fighting the Zulus of Gondor...

That's one in the pipeline. I have hundreds of plastic LOTR Moria Orcs to paint after they were issued as freebies with the LOTR gaming mag a few years ago. I picked up loads of packs for next to nothing and intend to do a VSF/fantasy crossover version of the Zulu Wars at some point.

I still have a copy of Ty Beard's Colonial/Fantasy crossover rules somewhere, which I downloaded years ago. I can't remember the name, but think it might be "Orc's Drift"?

I've already tried 19thc British vs a combined Viking, Late roman and Saxon army and Vikings vs Sudanese/Darkest Africa tribes with Almoravids as the warrior elite.

 The possibilities really are endless  

[rob_alderman]

I thought that all wargames were a fantasy - how naive of me! 

Sounds like a great idea Rob - post a game report when you get started. Wood Elves as VC sounds reasonable to me - perhaps they're being unofficially supplied by Lothlorien?

I'll see what I can do, want to get through my current projects right now...

Orcs sound right for the yanks then? Lots of destruction, ruthlessness and no care about collateral damage? I'll have to discuss this a little more for more ideas.
I am no historian, what other forces fought the Vietnam war (in very simple terms)? 

[Plynkes]

French, South Koreans, Australians and Kiwis, off the top of my head, you also have the forces of South Vietnam.

Oh, and China and the Soviet Union, in very minor roles (mostly Ack-Ack, I believe).

[rob_alderman]

cool.
Any stereotypes? Anyone they were allied to?

[rob_alderman]

Is that all you got?

You boring lot!