While reading through my blog roll today, I came across a post on The Polemarch blog announcing a forthcoming book certain to be of interest to many of us: Solo Wargaming : A Practitioner’s Guide.
The author notes the book is being published by Pen & Sword and due for release in June 2024.
And there is another book on Solo Wargaming out too, by Gregory Ward, (published by Caliver Press, UK) and title: (bit clumsy) is,
Wargaming World Solo: Ancient to Modern Solo Wargaming.
see two different ads by Caliver, (both in uk prices) their webshop and their ebay shop respectively
https://www.caliverbooks.com/bookview.php?400an64phua2bl94p4cook5hq3&id=30429 [£17.50p plus P&P at 10% or min of £3.95 for standard / second class uk mail]
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/166644004279?chn=ps&_ul=GB&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&mkscid=101&itemid=166644004279&targetid=1405282543879&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=9046813&poi=&campaignid=17218284410&mkgroupid=142217514411&rlsatarget=pla-1405282543879&abcId=9300867&merchantid=109789308&gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwhtWvBhD9ARIsAOP0Goi81AXWu-jkevJwJEelJwmJgAMCpwIr9TQ0oh4eMSESde3rIQpI5PgaAgQaEALw_wcB [£18.95p plus postage in UK thats £4.95p]
Not sure if there is a USA publisher of same? Sorry I don’t know the fee for P&P to north America.
Carl
North Yorkshire, England
Hi CarlL! Thank you for the heads up on Wargaming World Solo: Ancient to Modern Solo Wargaming. It looks like for those in the USA, On Military Matters has it in their catalog (https://www.onmilitarymatters.com/product/1-242930) for $22.00 USD.
Knowing me, I’ll probably pick up both Ward’s and Heading’s books.
There’s further info on the chapter contents of the David Heading book in a new post on his blog-
http://ancientrules.blogspot.com/2024/
Martin
Thanks Carl if you want further details regarding my new ruleset Wargaming World Solo feel free to join the Facebook group of the same name or the website http://www.wargamingworld.net Thanks Greg Ward
There is little info out there currently on the Dan Heading book, Solo Wargaming A Practitioners Guide, other than blurb (from Pen & Sword). From quick read, Pre-order price for hardback is £14 plus P&P (full price for hardback planned to be £20).
I have not found a chapter list although the publisher provides a brief briefing (here https://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Solo-Wargaming-Hardback/p/50666 )
Not sure this suggests anything new for solo gamers, but it is hard to judge from such limited information.
CarlL
PS IF ANYONE ever gets the time, then a Compendium of SWA ‘Lone Warrior’ articles on Solo Wargaming and how to do it, would be very useful – and PROBABLY a BIG volume, I have only ever scratched surface of what SWA contributors have had published in ‘Lone Warrior’.
Carl, North Yorkshire, England
Hi John,
Many thanks for the heads-up on ‘Solo Wargaming : A Practitioner’s Guide’, and many thanks also to Carl for passing on news of the ‘Wargaming World Solo: Ancient to Modern Solo Wargaming’ book. Hopefully there will be some further detail on the contents of both books!
I also like Carl’s idea of a SWA Compendium of LW Journal articles! The titles in the index of LW Journals only hint at what the article contents might be, so a compendium would be a great help in that regard. I’m half tempted to volunteer, but I’ve only been a member for 12 months, so my version of a LW journal compendium would be a very slim volume indeed!!
Hi George, I like the compendium idea, too – I could finally let my print copies go! (I love them but they take up a chunk of bookshelf) I am not sure how that would work though (a compendium). It would presumably be easier (but not easy) if it is limited to all those for which a PDF scan exists (or those that are PDF native) but I don’t know anything about the journal side of the equation, so I don’t know what kind of rights issues would come up with using an author’s work in such a compilation.
Hi John,
If the compendium went ahead, I would suggest that we only addressed those Journal articles that were still accessible or otherwise available to members, new and old. With respect to the rights issue for compendium content, if the compendium is a summary of LW Journal article contents, then the summaries would be new work and therefor should not infringe on the original author’s work (i.e. original articles). Mentioning that an LWJ article contains detailed mechanics for campaign logistics is quite different to actually quoting or repeating the mechanics, so I think we’d be on safe ground there. Also, noting that previously published Journal articles can reappear on the SWA website as ‘Sample Articles’ (in toto) indicates that the SWA reserves the right to republish LW Journal articles at its discretion.
I had a thought that it would be great if the Compendium could be an online resource on the SWA website, so could be a ‘living’ document being updated as each Journal is published. If the Compendium entries could also be linked to key words, such as battles, campaigns, naval, skirmish, etc it could help people identify all published LW Journal articles on topics of specific interest. There appears to be something like that already for the SWA website posts.
It will be pretty big task (time wise) for one person to write the compendium, so recommend that a team of willing volunteers would be the best way forward. If we can nut out a template for the compendium entries, to ensure consistent content, and also the range of key word descriptors (if this is considered desirable), then we can break the historic LW Journal entries into manageable work packages and farm out the task to the volunteer writers. Maybe you or Dave Newport could act as final editors to ensure quality control of the final product before it is ‘published’? Or, alternatively, one of the Compendium volunteers could act as editor?
I think it is do-able, but obviously will take significant time and effort. I’m happy to help with the task, so count me in as volunteer #1!!!
Cheers
G
Some thoughts. George Arnold and I sorted out a few ways to make the wealth of Lone Warrior articles and blog posts accessible to website readers and journal subscribers. These survive. Yet, it is undeniable that a compendium, embedded in the website and searchable with key words, would finally unlock the total contribution of the many dozens of authors starting from the very beginning of the SWA. To this noble end, George, Carl, and John’s discussion above point the way. My judgement is that a compendium published and maintained on the website is fully within the copyright protections envisioned by the SWA. I think four additional steps would be useful in advancing the enterprise and recruiting the many writers necessary. First, could one or more folks develop a sample compendium entry? This gives potential recruits an idea of what is expected of their efforts. Second, someone needs to volunteer to head the project as compendium director to oversee all the aspects of development. This person identifies subordinate tasks and products (such as key words), orchestrates these into a development program, and recruits and assigns tasks to volunteers. At some point, the embryonic compendium is passed to the website editor who embeds it into the website for beta testing by the general viewership and final publication. Third, the issues of Lone Warrior that are not currently scanned and available as back issues need to be made so. This is a parallel effort and should not hold up the show on building entries for articles currently available. As writers and back issues become available, the compendium director farms issues out for writers to build entries for each article. Fourth, the group of us need to sort out which articles deserve an entry. Is there an entry for game, figure, or book reviews? How about articles that don’t address specific solo techniques? There is a wealth of interesting and informative material in the pages of Lone Warrior that does not introduce solo techniques. You get the picture. I’ll leave you with these thoughts for your consideration.
G’day Richard!!
Many thanks for your thoughts and support for the proposed SWA Compendium. Whilst Carl’s original request was for solo wargaming entries, if we have a robust suite of search/filter terms, then all the other article types you mentioned such as figure, board game and book reviews and other gaming options and concepts should also be just as accessible.
I believe the concept should be achievable within the current year if we can get the underpinning fundamentals sorted out. Some questions for the SWA ‘tech support group’, i.e. whoever has set up the SWA website and knows how it all works. Do we need a specific platform or ‘Search Engine’ to host the Compendium? The host platform may dictate how we frame or package the compendium entries, and dictate the number, form and function of the descriptors/key words/search terms able to be assigned to compendium entries. Noting the intent to make the on-line Compendium a living document, how easy is it to add new search terms/descriptors if subsequent articles break new ground and provide novel concepts and ideas that not covered by previously published articles? Or alternatively, if we subsequently decide that we need to include a search term/descriptor that we had not considered at the outset for which there is existing content amongst previously published articles? In this latter case, it would imply some sort of review function that allows the addition of newly defined search terms to existing compendium articles. So again, I think we need to know or otherwise decide how we intend to host the Compendium as the functionality of the search engine and associated database of compendium entries will dictate the technical parameters we have to conform to with the format of the compendium and its entries.
I concur that we need to agree on the style, format, scope and content of the compendium entries. I envision each compendium entry would comprise several fields, perhaps identified by labels such as: article title, author, date of publication, list of topics covered, summary of topics, list of assigned key words/search terms? I’m not a database designer, so just plucking ideas from somewhere I’d rather not mention if you get my drift? Any database wizards out there amongst the SWA pack of lone wolves?
For would be Compendium content authors, the template of article fields would have detailed descriptions and/or example entries for guidance. I expect that the field format (sequence) for draft compendium entries would likely need to be rigorously followed to allow easy ingest into the compendium.
I have to admit that I was extremely frustrated in my attempts to locate articles on the SWA website for topics that I was researching in order to develop techniques and mechanics for solo wargaming. So I wholeheartedly support the development of an online SWA Compendium. I’m probably going to regret doing this, but if no one else wants to take on the ‘Compendium Director’ role, then I’m happy to step up so we can get the project underway. I was going to start at the beginning with the LW Journals because I think most, if not all, of the new members have no idea what concepts etc were presented back then, so it would be new ground for most of us and would likely also revitalise interest in the early LW Journals. Just a thought, happy to have some counter proposals. I would also like some input on appropriate search terms for the Compendium, so let’s have some feedback people!
For Richard, JohnY and George A, is there a consolidated list of the tags you are currently using for SWA blog posts? If so, it may be a useful starting point?
Does anyone have an example of how the compendium entries should look? If nothing gets put forward this side of Easter, can you guys just throw down some dot points on what you’d be looking for in a SWA compendium entry if you were searching for previously published articles on a topic of interest? Let’s go for a deadline for dot points by mid-April, so we can move forward with this project!
Finally, do any of you have some spare capacity either in the near future (say from mid-April), or at some point(s) throughout this year, where you may be able to review some LW journal articles and follow the template directions to draft corresponding entries for the Compendium? I’m hoping we can get an idea of the potential workforce to drive this project through to completion. The more volunteers we get, the sooner we will have the Compendium developed and online as a resource for SWA members and the solo gaming community writ large! As Richard said, this is a noble effort, and one worthy of the support of all SWA members as all will benefit from the results of this effort. Even if the majority of members sign up to write just one Compendium entry each, that will still result in a significant chunk of the work getting done a lot faster than would otherwise be the case.
I look forward to seeing how we go with getting the wider SWA community on board with the project!
Over to you guys!!!
Cheers
G
Regarding the tech side of things for the website, I’ve done some cursory investigation and there are ways, using plugins, to host a searchable database on a WordPress site. There may also be other ways to achieve this but as this project moves on more formally, we can determine the desired technical specifications which will then guide our search for a suitable method or plugin.
Off the top of my head, we will want the ability to export our data at will, for backup or migration. Whether we want a relational database or a flatfile database will factor into the choice of plugin or approach as well. My gut says relational makes more sense in this case, but I happily defer to those with expertise that says otherwise. The few examples of plugins I have looked at appear to be flat, fwiw, but that does not mean there aren’t relational options.
Finally, the question of controlled vocabulary vs a folksonomy rears its head (an, extreme, example of the former is the Library of Congress Classification System and an example of the latter is Instagram hashtags). Both have advantages and disadvantages with respect to search and retrieval. And it is also possible to do both (the way some library catalogs do. My MS is in Library Science and I work in the library field, hence my frame of reference!) for the best? of both worlds.
This is an exciting and long needed project!
Cheers!
– John
Back to original theme of recent publications aimed at Solo Wargamers, with this entry:
I see the Gregory Ward book and its author made it on to “You Tube” see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe6IumHoqXU
I see Caliver Books (in UK) have also got another solo wargames booklet out focused on Napoleonics. I am always fascinated by the mechanisms chosen for solo games whatever their period, but not seen anything on thois one save Caliver adverts at https://www.caliverbooks.com/bookview.php?&id=30444
It is called “Break through, Napoleonic Solo Battlegaming” by Gary Hutton, the Caliver blurb is very brief:
“Playing card based system to be used in conjunction with your favourite set of rules (surely General Brigade or Shadow of Eagles) Both sides field 7 brigades of differing size and integral artillery”
CarlL
Greetings to all and a Happy Easter
Having read all the above entries about a compendium, I just wanted to give readers the following link at Tiny Tin Men:
https://snv-ttm.blogspot.com/p/wargames-magazine-database.html
This lists two indexes of wargaming magazines we are probably all very familar with. I just wondered if the information in these indexes would perhaps be sufficient for Lone Warrior too – and not too difficult to put together.
Regards
G’day Pete,
Many thanks for the heads-up on the Tiny Tim Men site! Very useful for the issue at hand!
Cheers
G
Ah, yes. Solo Wargaming, A Practitioner’s Guide, by David Heading, to be published by Pen & Sword in June.
The author would be me. I can do a chapter list:
Chapter 1: Why Solo Wargame
Chapter 2: Battles
Chapter 3: Campaigns
Chapter 4: Personalities, Logistics and Randomization
Chapter 5: Siege, Naval and Air Wargames
Chapter 6: Advancing
I hope that everyone will find something new in it. The book aims to be comprehensive, but there is only so much you can get into 70000 words or so.
If you have any questions, drop me a note through the comments on the Polemarch blog (ancientrules.blogspot.com).
Regards
David
In last week to ten days three booklets noted here have dropped into my letter box and some brief and personal thoughts on their contents below.
Gary Hutton’s “Breakthrough – Napoleonic Solo Battle Gaming” I found disappointing. It has many ideas seen in the Portable Wargames 3×3 grid approach, mixed with long standing idea of randomly chosen forces from a list of possible combinations, and ideas to generate ‘AI’ style control like randomly timed arrival, randomly located arrival, and randomly chosen order status (defensive, cautious, offensive) and randomly chosen CinC location. Ideas that would be familiar to most readers of the ‘Lone Warrior’ or long standing solo players. But those new to solo gaming may find it useful. 28 pages (A5 size roughly 6×9 inches) including all its charts.
Mike Lambo’s “Battles of Napoleonic Europe – A solitaire wargame” is VERY interesting BUT loans many ideas from boardgaming and is in fact a book of 9 Peninsular War map / board game battles, 8 done twice to give player chance to play each side against his ‘AI’ mechanisms [which are good if sometimes I disagree with the ‘logic’ (tactical assumptions) he has built in for his period.] And one battle Rolica is present four times. The ‘AI’ mechanisms are laid bare so make interesting reading. The ultimate problem is that all his battles have to be confined to a map / board that are essentially 10 columns wide so this shifts the scale of representation without actually being commented upon. To his credit each game has its own set of ‘AI’ assumptions. But the ‘AI’ mechanisms rely on everything being contained to ten (hex) parallel columns which you fight up or down. And each column is usually 9 hex grids deep / tall. So this might all transfer to a tabletop game using a grid of 10 wide by 9 deep / long, where the ten is always the starting base line for either force player or AI controlled. 73 pages (A4 size, roughly 8 x 11 inches) with maps, counter page and initial acknowledgements.
Gregory Ward’s “Wargaming World Solo – Ancient to Modern Solo Wargaming” initially, I read a lot of ‘good press’ about this booklet, (although you never really know who is writing the good press, and my experience of bloggers giving a good review of a book or rule set, only to find out later they never touched it bar to look at reviewing it, has made me quite sceptical of the ‘good press’). However I was disappointed by it. Yes lots of glossy images, lots of tables, ideas clearly noted as borrowed like objective markers / focal points. BUT it really had me thinking this is a set of ‘universal’ rules for tabeltop gaming rather than anything clearly solo gaming in focus, beyond the old acorn of preparing multiple battle plans and randomly selecting these for each side; and a ‘marker’ phase (read dummy or are they dummy units / positions). 79 pages (A4 size, roughly 8.25 x 11.75 inches) including appendices.
Remember, this is my personal view, after a read through and trying to get to understand what they have to offer the solo gamer (tabletop figures or boardgamer). You may see or read them differently.
Carl, N.Yorks., England
“And there is another book on Solo Wargaming out too, by Gregory Ward, (published by Caliver Press, UK) and title: (bit clumsy) is,
Wargaming World Solo: Ancient to Modern Solo Wargaming.”
If I have understood correctly this book is a ruleset with an AI opponent book rather than a general treatise.