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The war game;: Ten great battles recreated from history
Book by Young, Peter
128 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1972
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 15, 2019
Background
By 1913 H. G. Wells had written two books on playing war with miniature soldiers. He is thus recognized as the father of recreational wargaming. Wargaming is recreating historical battles or testing theories in 'what if' situations. Little figures, often painstakingly hand painted, are positioned and moved around a tabletop battlefield where distances are measured with a tape measure and the effects of combat are determined by chance with the roll of the die. Rules can be as simple or as complex as the players wish. Generals and their staffs have often utilized the table top as well. Those on a budget for time or money can play with board games using printed game piece. This wargaming with miniatures and board games probable reached it's heyday in the late 70's and early 80's before the computer games evolved enough to steal a huge chunk of the market. Real life wargames can also be carried out by military units. I remember sneaking around in the woods with guys yelling "Bang! Bang!" when they ran out of blanks. By contrast I heard that the Russians used real chemical weapons in their games and didn't believe their games to be realistic enough unless there were a certain number of accidental fatalities.
Book Review
This book, from 1974, is one of my favorite and earliest of my collection. If any one book is going to give you a good example of what table top wargaming is all about, it is this one. Ten battles from different periods of history are covered and each is richly illustrated with color photos of the hand painted figures. Of course battlefield maps are included, though only listing the bare necessities. Being from the 70s, many of the contributors had combat experience in WWII.
While each chapter gives the background and historical facts to a particular battle, the last two pages are set aside to list items generally needed to play. Of course rules are not in evidence as there are so many to chose from, and vary in their complexity, as well as stressing what is felt to be relevant to each particular battle. If the heavily armored French Knights didn't charge the English over the muddy fields of Agincourt, or the Allies did not abandon the Pratzen Heights to Napoleon's troops at the Battle of Austerlitz, the battles would have turned out far differently, and so would have history.
This playing with toy soldiers is a world of difference from what I use to do in the sandbox. I remember going to the Gen Con Conventions the 80s and seeing massive battles being played out with participates pausing to take a break from a week long game and trying to get some sleep on the floor in a corner like some soldier on a campaign. I also remember reading an article in the "Wall Street Journal" about CEOs meeting to play their games in the cigar smoke filled basement of some grand hotel while their wives lounged by the pool that week.
Just like ipad games my grandson plays, tabletop wargaming can be quite addictive. My department manager at a pharmaceutical company once told me he stopped to watch a game in progress at his college and became so involved that he had to go cold turkey and quit or flunk all his classes.
On closing I will add one thing I learned from this book. Napoleon soldiers would follow him anywhere. They knew that their widows would receive pensions and the orphans would be educated at the state's expense. I have heard it said that many of Napoleon's laws were still on the books. This should probably be one of them.
By 1913 H. G. Wells had written two books on playing war with miniature soldiers. He is thus recognized as the father of recreational wargaming. Wargaming is recreating historical battles or testing theories in 'what if' situations. Little figures, often painstakingly hand painted, are positioned and moved around a tabletop battlefield where distances are measured with a tape measure and the effects of combat are determined by chance with the roll of the die. Rules can be as simple or as complex as the players wish. Generals and their staffs have often utilized the table top as well. Those on a budget for time or money can play with board games using printed game piece. This wargaming with miniatures and board games probable reached it's heyday in the late 70's and early 80's before the computer games evolved enough to steal a huge chunk of the market. Real life wargames can also be carried out by military units. I remember sneaking around in the woods with guys yelling "Bang! Bang!" when they ran out of blanks. By contrast I heard that the Russians used real chemical weapons in their games and didn't believe their games to be realistic enough unless there were a certain number of accidental fatalities.
Book Review
This book, from 1974, is one of my favorite and earliest of my collection. If any one book is going to give you a good example of what table top wargaming is all about, it is this one. Ten battles from different periods of history are covered and each is richly illustrated with color photos of the hand painted figures. Of course battlefield maps are included, though only listing the bare necessities. Being from the 70s, many of the contributors had combat experience in WWII.
While each chapter gives the background and historical facts to a particular battle, the last two pages are set aside to list items generally needed to play. Of course rules are not in evidence as there are so many to chose from, and vary in their complexity, as well as stressing what is felt to be relevant to each particular battle. If the heavily armored French Knights didn't charge the English over the muddy fields of Agincourt, or the Allies did not abandon the Pratzen Heights to Napoleon's troops at the Battle of Austerlitz, the battles would have turned out far differently, and so would have history.
This playing with toy soldiers is a world of difference from what I use to do in the sandbox. I remember going to the Gen Con Conventions the 80s and seeing massive battles being played out with participates pausing to take a break from a week long game and trying to get some sleep on the floor in a corner like some soldier on a campaign. I also remember reading an article in the "Wall Street Journal" about CEOs meeting to play their games in the cigar smoke filled basement of some grand hotel while their wives lounged by the pool that week.
Just like ipad games my grandson plays, tabletop wargaming can be quite addictive. My department manager at a pharmaceutical company once told me he stopped to watch a game in progress at his college and became so involved that he had to go cold turkey and quit or flunk all his classes.
On closing I will add one thing I learned from this book. Napoleon soldiers would follow him anywhere. They knew that their widows would receive pensions and the orphans would be educated at the state's expense. I have heard it said that many of Napoleon's laws were still on the books. This should probably be one of them.
August 4, 2015
Interesting read on how specific battles were fought. The emphasis on wargaming comes in the descriptions of the tactics and armies used. I useful primer for the hobby.
March 2, 2025
I learned a lot of history reading this book since I had little knowledge of historical battles prior to the 20th century and and nine of the ten battles here are pre-1900. It was really neat to see "illustations" of ancient battles done with miniatures instead of drawings or paintings. I was also pleasantly surprised to see some specifics at the back of the book regarding how miniature wargames are played.
March 11, 2022
Every so often, I would pick up the book and read about one of the 10 battles. The premise of the book was war gaming circa 1970. It did not achieve that goal, but of the 10 battles, 3 had excellent information and insight- better similar volumes are available.
December 21, 2019
Nice choice of battles, and the miniatures are beautiful. But the text is uninspired and the maps almost illegible.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews