Three dimensional games?

[chirine ba kal]

I have a question for everyone; I would like to run some games that have underwater and / or aerial aspects. I have both flying and and aquatic miniatures that I would like to use, but I've never really given a lot of thought about the three-dimensional aspects of movement on a table that could accommodate such things. Are there any rules sets that address this? I'm so old I'm a 'pre-school' gamer - I still use the original "Chainmail", for goodness' sake! - so I prefer something simple and easy to use on the table.

At the moment, I'm using colored poker chips as height / depth markers; each color represents a band either above or below the 'zero benchmark' of the table's top surface, and I put the poker chip under the base of the figure to indicate where it is in the air / water column. I also made height columns to put at the end of the table for the players to use to gauge their position, as well as smaller rulers to help people out.

All this got started when I began designing and building the next Dave Arneson Memorial Maritime Miniatures Mayhem event (I do this annually in Dave's memory); I wanted to do a game that was both above and below the water surface, so I used some 48" x 48" clear Plexiglass I had in stock to make a sort of 'supra table top' that allowed the ships and boats to 'float' above the bottom of the lake we're setting the game on. (I admit it; I cleaned out the local aquarium supply places for the scenery on the bottom of the lake.) Is there a set of rules that already addresses this kind of thing? I'd hate to come up with something home-brewed just to find that somebody's done a nice set of rules for just this kind of thing...

Thanks in advance for all your help!

- chirine

[Timbor]

Deep Wars by Antimatter Games is underwater:  http://antimatter-games.com/

The game is pretty fun, the miniatures are even better.  The basic rules are pretty simple, there are lot of add-on bits that increase complexity.

[Elbows]

No really easy way around it.  I think markers work okay but it becomes hard for people to visual the height difference.  The age-old car antenna trick works, or the new 1" screw-together rod sections are pretty cool.  Alternatively you could do a huge plexi-glass sheet (saw this once for a uboat game at a convention).  Lots of options, though none of them are particularly sightly.

[chirine ba kal]

Deep Wars by Antimatter Games is underwater:  http://antimatter-games.com/

The game is pretty fun, the miniatures are even better.  The basic rules are pretty simple, there are lot of add-on bits that increase complexity.

Oh! Thank you! here I was looking at the sea floor mats, and I spaced the game!

-chirine

[chirine ba kal]

No really easy way around it.  I think markers work okay but it becomes hard for people to visual the height difference.  The age-old car antenna trick works, or the new 1" screw-together rod sections are pretty cool.  Alternatively you could do a huge plexi-glass sheet (saw this once for a uboat game at a convention).  Lots of options, though none of them are particularly sightly.

Understood! I've used the antenna stands before, on aircraft and spaceships, and they do work; my problem is the number of miniatures that the game would have, and I have doubts about players being able to negotiate the forest of stands. Who makes the screw-together rods? I've never seen those.

I am using the Plexiglass sheet route at the moment; I have several large (four-foot by four-foot, over a meter on each side, on 'legs') sheets that I built - sort of 'supra-tables', like the one I'm using in this next game session. The sheets are transparent, so you do get kind of a water effect, and the risers / legs give room underneath to move figures. I have been using clear plastic bases with piano wires for my flying figures, and then the GW-style 'flight stands' but I've been growing more and more disenchanted with my old practice of using a six-sider to indicate 'altitude'; the dice get separated from the figures, and often don't get updated with changes.

The poker chips under the bases work, I think, due to the size of the bases in the rules that we use. The chips are relatively unobtrusive on the table, but I keep thinking that there has to be a better way to do this...

- chirine

[Steam Flunky]

The whole problem with 3D games is large bases and antenne/wires/etc that look crap and get in the way. Also you need a fairly flat board for them to stand on which means no nice terrain,
but all is not lost,,,,
At Tactica 2014 in Hamburg there was a danish club who put on an excellant 3D WW1 flyers game that solved the problem brilliantly!
Here are some pics (its in german but the pics speak for themselves):- http://www.hamburger-tactica.de/?p=2948&lang=en
Their terrain boards are made out of thick polystyrine/styrofoam and the wire rods are just pushed into the board wherever the plane flys to. The holes are so small that they are hardly visible and the boards only need a bit of glue, sand and paint to repair the damage after a year or two of playing on them!
I saw their old board that they used nearly 10 years long and it still looked good.