Is Nobody Big Battling Anymore?

[Leftblank]

News from 6mil-land. And the wargame magazine planet.

My favorite 6mm-trader Peter Berry from Baccus, in some circles well-known for his j'accuse rant against 28mm, started an interesting discussion about the dominance of 28mm skirmish games and the role of the wargaming magazines. Are we seeing a "a major trend in the hobby whereby historical gaming is now predominantly played at skirmish level and the big games are rarer and therefore become more noteworthy when staged"?  And do wargame magazines overemphasize 28mm skirmish scenarios? Do the magazines reflect the state of the hobby, or are they biased against small scale big battles? The editor of Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy and the subeditor of Wargames Illustrated reacted.
His full article here: https://www.baccus6mm.com/news/20-09-2017/Historicalgaming-'Thetimestheyareachanging'/
Full forum follow up here https://www.baccus6mm.com/forum/General/General/774-1-28mmgamesinthemags/

For quick readers: I wrote a shorter summary of his arguments and the editor's reactions on my blog: http://amsterdam6shooters.nl/node/1145

[jamesmanto]

Magazines are just reflecting current trends.

They aren't driving. 28mm skirmishing has a lower entry point to start playing so quick and easy to get in to.

[Plynkes]

As for this Berry character, I think rather than ranting it would be a better idea to do something constructive. There's enough polarization and negativity going around without trying to drag it into gaming by encouraging caustic divisions over scale choice. It's rather pathetic, actually. He complains about "pompous" 28mm gamers and their "one true scale" thinking it gives them the right to criticize and belittle 6mm figures. That's exactly what he's doing, in reverse. Take a look in the bloody mirror, mate.


There is room for everybody. If you think your chosen scale is under-represented (what does that even mean? Are there hordes of 6mm gamers out there who are somehow being blocked from showing off their work? Are the LAF moderators secretly deleting 2mm, 6mm and 15mm threads so as to preserve the One True Scale?) then do something positive to promote it rather than going on the attack. You really think that by calling people pompous gits you're going to win them over? Pot, meet Kettle.

I'm tired of division. Crybaby rants aren't the way forward. Flood the pages of LAF with beautiful images of 6mm big battle games and you might change some hearts and minds. But these sort of people never do. They just complain.


Here, let me do my bit to help, lest I fall into the same trap. Steve Dean's absolutely gorgeous 6mm Sudan thread. It's well worth a look:

http://leadadventureforum.com/index.php?topic=103864.0

It has actually tempted me to dig out my own old 6mm collection, that I abandoned in frustration years ago as "impossible to paint." 

[robh]

Peter Berry has been on this soapbox for years, makes him feel important in the hobby to be a provocateur.
Has become tedious and pathetic now, he really does need to move on.

Every scale has advantages and disadvantages depending on what you want to do.

[N.C.S.E]

I'd agree with his remarks that the different scales are heavily underrepresented in the big magazines (although just one article in WSS on 2mm ECW wargaming sorely tempted me to get into that scale). However I would disagree that the other scales are being played less and less. I'd suggest that thanks to the internet they would be played more. Were it not for the good old internet I'd still be stuck playing Bolt Action in 28mm (and grumbling about list building) . Thanks to the internet, I have Jutland in 1/6000 and the Cold War in 1/600. I have Napoleonics in 18mm and am currently deciding between the gorgeous AB 20mm figures and the altogether more practical (and friendly to my wallet) Peter Pig (not BF!) 15mms. I indulge my whimsical streak with 28mm Steampunk and my serious streak with searching for Cold War ORBATs.

I sense that whilst the magazines might paint a picture of wargaming as adventures in 28mm only, the internet has meant that people can be inspired by what the different scales have to offer. I remember at my local club being in awe of a few guys who had ancients in I believe 6mm, it truly looked like a battle, especially compared to our "skirmishes" in 15mm.

As ever in this hobby I sense there is a strong prescriptivist streak of: "you will play what I enjoy or else you're wrong". I indulge in it myself when I watch people playing IGOUGO rules. It's a hobby, play what you and your friend wants and enjoy. The internet makes it so much easier to see amazing things. I must echo another poster on here and say that if you want to inspire people, post gorgeous pictures of your [insert scale here] forces going at it. I'm sure you'll inspire more than a few.

[Arlequín]

I'm afraid it gets mentioned in the forum thread and in LeftBlank's summary; 28mm players provide content to the magazines for publication, while users of other scales mostly do not. Articles and scenarios don't write themselves.

I admit to being a scale bigot, I started with 'Airfix', graduated to 25mm when I joined a club and then on to 28mm when 25s got bigger (and moved away from 'big battle gaming' around the same time). I'm sure I will become a 32mm-ist when people routinely stop calling them 28mm. That probably makes me all that's wrong with the hobby in Mr Berry's (and possibly a few other peoples') eyes. 

I would feel a bit silly calling a small group of figures an 'army', so I use warband, platoon, company, or force et al, as appropriate. That said in the 7th Century King Ine did put it into law that an army constituted more than 35 men.

 

[stone-cold-lead]

28mm skirmish level gaming has a lot going for it. Low model count so low cost which also means low entry level to a new game. Fewer models also means less time and effort required to get an 'army' painted for the tabletop. Less playing area might be needed too. Gaming time is also a factor. A skirmish game might be done within an hour. It also allows variety so people can have a whole range of different games on the go covering all sorts of periods and genres. There's so much out there to play these days (and it's easily accessible thanks to the internet) that I think people are more inclined to want to do a bit of this and that.

Big battles in 28mm are costly in terms of miniatures and time consuming when it comes to painting them, regardless of whether they're the latest releases or 30 year old castings from Foundry! Smaller scales are are more economical but might still require a lot of work. Also, as much as it'll upset some, the quality of smaller scale models isn't always the best. I think it's been getting better over the years as expectations have increased but there are still some rough old ranges out there. Nice models painted well and presented in an attractive manner might improve things in favour of bigger battles but I think the market has changed.

[nic-e]

I have never come across this chap before but his rant and many of the follow up comments read like a meeting of Ukip members at the local pub, very angry at everyone else without trying to do anything practical!
the comments blame games workshop,fantasy, the young, the education system, Some secret 28mm cabal..
And yet if they would just show us these supposedly beautiful 6mm armies they all have (for why else would they complain so if they didn't all have gorgeous hordes hidden away?) then they might find people wanting to look at 6mm more.

It seems Mr berry is one of those people who would be very content for the hobby to exist only in his own house.

(Of course we all know it's out fault, us dirty 28mm usurpers!curse us for having fun and enjoying our detailed and personally identifiable figures!Now lets all do the secret 28mm handshake and go burn down a 6mm barn.)

[nic-e]

I've still never fully decided what conclusions to draw from that. It mostly depends on how cynical and vitriolic I'm feeling.

Perhaps it's to due with the suppoort structure around games?

Most fantasy and sci fi produces have a facebook page, blog, forum,twitter, instagram ect, a hundred lines of communication to say to their players "show your support, tell us what you're doing, let us know, spread the word!"
And whilst more recent historical rule sets like Saga and the warlord sets also have this, Alot of the rule sets produced for BIG games are either no longer being handled by their author, or are kept within a small group of players and only really promoted on forums dedicated to that game, made by the people playing it.

For example, The sword and the flame ,a very famous historical rule set with its own wikipedia page, has no obvious facebook presence , no social media presence, and no unified website from what i can find.
"GOOD!" you might say, But if you aren't at a club where someone is already playing that rule set then it isn't going to get new players, especially if you aren't making the effort to promote it yourself.

In short, I think fantasy and sci fi producers incentivise their player base to share more through images and articles where the myriad historical rulesets stick very much to their core demographic of show attendees or people they already know.

[stone-cold-lead]

Perhaps it's to due with the suppoort structure around games?

Most fantasy and sci fi produces have a facebook page, blog, forum,twitter, instagram ect, a hundred lines of communication to say to their players "show your support, tell us what you're doing, let us know, spread the word!"
And whilst more recent historical rule sets like Saga and the warlord sets also have this, Alot of the rule sets produced for BIG games are either no longer being handled by their author, or are kept within a small group of players and only really promoted on forums dedicated to that game, made by the people playing it.

For example, The sword and the flame ,a very famous historical rule set with its own wikipedia page, has no obvious facebook presence , no social media presence, and no unified website from what i can find.
"GOOD!" you might say, But if you aren't at a club where someone is already playing that rule set then it isn't going to get new players, especially if you aren't making the effort to promote it yourself.

In short, I think fantasy and sci fi producers incentivise their player base to share more through images and articles where the myriad historical rulesets stick very much to their core demographic of show attendees or people they already know.

It's called 'not moving with the times'. It's so easy to promote a game or rule set these days but if the people trying to do so are still in the SAE and catalogue without pictures mind set they're going to have a very insular outlook and appearance. That pesky internet thing is to blame. It's not how it used to be in my day.

[nic-e]

It's called 'not moving with the times'. It's so easy to promote a game or rule set these days but if the people trying to do so are still in the SAE and catalogue without pictures mind set they're going to have a very insular outlook and appearance. That pesky internet thing is to blame. It's not how it used to be in my day.

I hear even Citadel have a website these days!

[stone-cold-lead]

I hear even Citadel have a website these days!

Yes, it's dedicated to the destruction of 6mm historical wargames. 

[fred]

I don't think this is about old school rules authors and more modern ones. I think it is about size of organisations and their marketing budgets. Companies like GW and Warlord have far more resources (people, time & money) compared to the many one-man bands who produce many of the big battle rules.

These marketing budgets lead directly to more exposure, and because their marketing is driving exposure, then there are more gamers playing, and therefore more battle reports being written. Only a small percentage of gamers write up games on blogs, and even fewer for magazines. So if your player base is small there is much less chance of a report being produced or published.

Many of the small publishers are internet savvy, but they simply can't keep pushing out the content at the frequency the big guys do.

The group I play with is mainly focused on big battle games, currently Fantasy, Sci Fi and WWII all get a look in. And we mainly play in smaller scales. Some of the group play 40k with 28mm figures and some are interested in Bolt Action with 28mm figures - but neither are for me.

With smaller scales it is much more practical to buy and paint big armies. I find painting 28mm figures so slow that I can't contemplate even painting a platoon. Wheres in 10mm or 6mm I can crank out armies in no time.

[Elbows]

I didn't bother reading the rant/article...but getting the gist of the content from the responses here, I'd ask: "Who friggin' cares?"

Who cares what scale other people play games in?  How is that relevant?  This has a very "old man yells at clouds" kind of feel to me.  Magazines will cover what is relevant, what's new, and more importantly - stuff people provide them for free.  They have absolutely zero requirement to cover all scales, all periods, all games, etc.  This isn't some government organization playing to a disaparate citizenry...it's a hobby magazine.  They can focus solely on 8mm neanderthal gaming on Mars if they want - who cares?  It's their damn magazine.

Scale, game, etc. If it's good, people will play it.  If it's not, people will not play it.  The expectation that people "should" play more scales or certain scales is asinine.

[Gibby]

Better than ranting, Baccus maybe ought to get a nice gallery together, make some battle reports, and then share them around a few forums. Or heck, ask the community for some such content for him to put on his website. Negativity within the hobby is a shame to see, and won't do any favours to anyone I don't think.