For some miniature wargamers, it’s all about the winning. But I’ve noticed that the vast majority of hobbyists I’ve interacted with are in it for different reasons. One of those reasons – something that pops up again and again – is storytelling.

You need a sandbox or setting for your games, after all. And the difference between a tabeltop wargame and a game of Chess is that each piece on the table has the ability to represent a character.

We invest in these characters. We buy and paint them. We throw them into situations on the table and we see what happens to them. Sometimes it’s glorious victory, and sometimes it’s gruesome death. That’s all part of the fun.

Your characters will depend on your setting, of course. You might opt to play in a pre-designed sandbox like the Warhammer Old World. As a kid, this place drew me in from the day I discovered it, and it’ll always be my favourite lore within the hobby.

I’m not a huge fan of GW games or miniatures these days though. They are world-class at what they do, but they’re simply not for me. I’ll still play games in the Old World, and I’m naturally curious to follow what happens with this IP in the next few years. But I’ve started to collect a lot of miniatures that don’t quite fit into this setting (for example, the Oathsworn range).

In fact, I build all of my warbands and armies around miniatures I like the look of, regardless of the company or their intended game. That’s why I’ve gotten so into games that let you use any miniatures.

This has led to me creating my own settings for games and mini-campaigns. The beauty of worldbuilding is that you don’t literally need to build a world. You just need to build a place, and that place can be very small. It could simply be a village or hamlet, or a single farmhouse, or even a well.

Then, you need two opposing forces, a bit of background, and a reason for them to be clashing in this particular place and time.

That’s a lot more fun than lining up two forces on either side of a table and having at it, for no reason other than hoping you win.

Here are a couple of the sandboxes I’ve created recently.

Riversbrook

This one’s a 6mm-scale which is perfect for cinematic rank and file battles.

The village of Riversbrook is situated between two main trade roads. There’s woodlands to the East, and a mysterious ancient ruin to the South.

Here’s a view from the Western bridge, looking into the village of Riversbrook. Broken Tooth Hill is a key vantage point for defending the town against invaders.

Riversbrook priory, and view to the South-West.

There are dark legends surrounding the evil-looking altar in the ruins to the South.

The Eastern bridge, crossing the river into the village.

View to the South-West from the Riversbrook Tavern.

Here’s more on my 6mm terrain endeavours, if you’re interested in finding more about the buildings, trees, etc.

Middensbury

Next up is my 28mm-scale village of Middensbury.

It’s a rustic little settlement with some quirky and interesting inhabitants.

Most of the terrain is by a company called GameMat. Here’s my review of the houses, as well as the castle.

This layout is on a 4×4 mat (again, by GameMat) and I play with the Kings of War ruleset.

The village has seen better days. The castle was once home to a large and proud garrison of soldiers. Now, there are only a handful of jaded veterans remaining, and the building is partially derelict.

So that’s a whirlwind tour of a couple of settings I’ve built for my tabletop (or more accurately, bedroom floor) battles.

What about you? Which settings do you like to host your games in? Do you prefer fully-fledged pre-built worlds, or do you like to create somewhere from scratch? Be sure to let me know in the comments, below!

Escape the Dark Castle by Themeborne is a little gem of a game. I’ve been having a lot of fun playing it with my wife recently. I decided to do a quick write-up on it to help spread the love. There’s a number of reasons you might want to pick it up yourself.

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First up though, I know it’s cool to say you’ve unearthed this amazing new game by overhearing a drunken dwarf in a tavern mention an obscure podcast that then tips you on to a barely-known Kickstarter, and… etc etc

Well, the reality is a bit less exciting. I found Escape the Dark Castle in Waterstones. I’m really glad I did too, because shortly afterwards, the big ol’ lockdown thing happened.

Artwork & Visuals

What drew me to the game, sitting there on the shelf, was the artwork. The picture on the front looked a bit like a grimdark Castle Duckula (I mean this as a total compliment) and I was intrigued to find out more. The in-game artwork shown on the back of the box turned me into that “You had my curiosity, now you have my attention” meme.

I’m pretty good about not just buying new hobby stuff on impulse, but as this isn’t a miniature game, I saw wouldn’t be adding to my unpainted “pile of shame”. This made it easy for me to part with the £30 and take the game home. I was really excited to try it out.

Who Is Escape the Dark Castle For?

You can play with 1-4 players. It’s a co-op game, so you’re all working together to escape the castle. It only takes a couple of minutes to set up. The rules are simple to pick up, which makes it perfect for playing with kids, or if you have friends round for a few beers (when such things are allowed again!).

Because you can set up and get through a game in about half an hour, the barrier to getting started is really low too. It’ll satisfy your thirst for adventure whilst you’re waiting on your takeaway to arrive, then it can be tidied away as quickly as it was set up.

How Does Escape the Dark Castle Work?

It’s almost like a book. In fact, it reminds me a bit of the old Fighting Fantasy titles of my childhood. In particular, House of Hell. I wonder if that was an inspiration for the game’s creators?

You play the role of a character attempting to escape the castle. These characters are selected from a deck of cards, and each one has their own strengths and weaknesses.

The castle is “built” from a deck of chapter cards. You draw 15 cards to create your castle, so no two adventures are the same.

You turn these cards over like the pages of a book to reveal each chapter. The chapter presents a scenario to you – usually a gristly one. You and your comrades must decide on the best course of action, and will usually end up in a fight to the death with some grotesque undead fiend.

You pick up item cards along the way to aid you on your quest. Combat is a fun and simple dice-based system, with the strength of your opponents weighted, based on how many you have in your party.

If you manage to negotiate your way through all 15 chapters without anyone dying, you’ll then fight a Castle Boss. There’s 3 of them, and you’ll draw 1 at random to wait for you at the end of your journey.

So, Is It Worth Buying?

100% yes. If you’re looking for a game that’s quick to set up, easy to learn, yet still presents you with a challenge and endless variety, then Escape the Dark Castle is well worth your consideration.

I’m really grateful to the creators for putting it together, and a quick Google search shows there’s expansion packs available too. Scourge of the Undead Queen… Blight of the Plague Lord…

SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

6mm wargaming was something I got into as a kid, courtesy of Epic Space Marine, by Games Workshop. I got this game sometime in the mid-90s, when I pretty much wanted everything GW told me to want in White Dwarf.

I use the term “wargaming” loosely because I doubt my friends and I ever played the rules anywhere close to how they were written. However, we did have a lot of battles in that big cardboard city that came in the box.

A few things happened recently which prompted me to write a wee bit of 6mm wargaming. Firstly, I returned to the hobby after a long exile. I was immediately drawn back to the popular 28mm scale, which does remain my favourite.

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However, after a few games of Kings of War – which I love – I started to see how hard it’d be to organise a clash of two large armies over a sweeping battlefield. I don’t have anywhere near the room for a 6’4 table, and my (painted) miniature collection is still quite small.

I decided to pick up some 6mm-scale troops from Irregular Miniatures. I found the company after a bit of Googling. Not the best website, but good value minis and great service.

I like the Kings of War rules so much that I simply converted inches to centimetres. I later found out on Twitter that this was quite normal in 6mm wargaming circles.

A few early games of this worked really well, helping quench my thirst for large-scale battle strategy. Coincidentally, I also ended up back in possession of a huge box of minis from my childhood. Amongst the haul was a small amount of my old Space Marine stuff.

Here’s an attempt at a diorama I’d made as a kid. Because these minis were so small and so plentiful, I felt like I had more than I could ever need back then.

I even found some of the sprues, untouched after all these years.

A handful of my childhood 6mm wargaming forces. I remember there were Space Marine, Ork, and Eldar armies in the box. I also started collecting a Tyranid army for the game. I didn’t find any of those though, unfortunately.

Back to the present day, I had bought a set of two armies from Irregular. Medieval French and English. I split them into two balanced-looking forces, formed them up into units, then stuck them onto bases. The 28mm scale bases I had lying around worked for most, but for the archers, I had to make them with Fimo Clay.

6mm Wargaming Terrain

Initially, some of the terrain I’d bought from GameMat scaled down well enough to provide features to my 6mm wargaming battlefield.

Shortly after, I treated myself to a handful of buildings from Total Battle Miniatures.

Whilst painting these up, I decided to try my hand at making trees. I picked up some cones during a walk in the woods, which I think work really well, both in shape, and in scale.

Here’s my full post on how I made trees for 6mm wargaming.

As I was using Fimo Clay as the tree bases, I decided to try and make a little defensive hill position too.

Here’s my full report on putting together my 6mm wargaming terrain collection.

I’ll be looking to add more terrain and miniatures going forward, but this stuff has been more than adequate to get me started in the world of 6mm wargaming.

It was also a nostalgic journey looking over my old Epic Space Marine miniatures. I found a lot of other stuff on top of those, too. If you’re interested, check them out yourself.

• A Space Wolves Army for Warhammer 40k
• A Lizardmen Army for Warhammer Fantasy Battles
• An Undead Warband for Warhammer Fantasy Battles
• Miscellaneous Old Miniatures
• Monsters in My Pocket

And here’s my other 6mm wargaming posts;

• 6mm Terrain – Building a Little World
• Making 6mm Scale Trees for Miniature Wargaming

Next up: 4 Great Reasons to Give Solo Wargaming a Try

Open Combat by Second Thunder is one of my favourite games. It’s marketed as a “micro skirmish” game, and its rules are “suitable for pre-gunpowder historical and fantasy settings”.

It was exactly the type of game I was looking for following my return to the hobby after a long exile. It’s a “use whatever you have” game, in terms of minis. The rules were easy to learn, but with a depth that always keeps it interesting and fresh. Each game is unique. No two warbands are the same.

Recently, I’d been building multiple warbands, and putting together a collection of medieval/fantasy terrain. I decided I wanted to experiment by using the Open Combat rules system to run a bigger battle. One with multiple warbands – and even a canon.

This might be seen as an odd decision given that, 1 – this isn’t what Open Combat was designed for. And 2 – many other games are tailor made for this type of battle. But there’s a fun in experimentation with rules and systems. I’m more about the storytelling than the winning. So what’s the worst that could happen?

Multiple Warbands in Open Combat

A typical game of Open Combat sees 2 warbands face off against each other. The average size of a warband is around 7. You can create small ‘elite’ forces, or larger ‘strength in numbers’ gangs of fighters. It’s entirely up to you.

Each warband has a break point, and when that is reached, the rival warband wins. But I decided to set up a game where each player controls 3 warbands, rather than just 1. So now we have a 3 v 3 situation. A bigger battle, but still essentially a skirmish.

The recommended size of the Open Combat play area is 24″ x 24″. But it’s a good idea to increase this slightly, if playing with more than 2 warbands.

Each warband is still removed from the table upon reaching its break point. But that doesn’t mean the game is over. At least until 1 player loses all of their warbands.

Open Combat is an “I go, you go” system, so there are a few different ways to approach a turn when working with multiple warbands. Players should agree on this before the game starts. Here are the options I’ve come up with…

• You can activate 1 warband per turn
• You can activate all your warbands per turn
• You roll a D6 at the start of your turn. A 1-2 let’s you activate 1 warband, on a 3-4 you activate 2, and on a 5-6, you activate 3.

I didn’t think it was necessary to come up with rules/limitations on how each warband worked when activated. For example, if they should to stay in a “squad” formation, like a game of 40K. To me, there doesn’t seem any need to do this. You just need to remember which minis are which, and which warband they belong to.

So that’s the multi-warband stuff. What about the artillery?

Big Guns in Open Combat

Continuing to experiment, I wanted to add artillery into the mix. This was quite simply because I’d “refurbished” the canon from Battlemasters – my first ever miniature wargame, the remnants of which I’d recently dug out of the attic.

The canon (and its operator) would be its own “warband”, with some modifications. The canon would have an ATK value of, say, 100, but no other stats. Its continued use depended purely on the survival of the operator, who’d be easily killed if the enemy could reach him.

I’m not a rules writer, and I can imagine my efforts here are full of holes. But one additional requirement here, was that the operator must be within 1″ of the canon in order to fire it. This is so he couldn’t go and hide in a faraway corner safe from enemy attacks.

Firing the canon takes 2 activations, so can be done a maximum of once per turn.

Firing

I decided that normal shooting rules would apply. Playing longways on a 22″ x 30″ mat, I imagined a canon would have no trouble with range, providing it had line of sight.

Here’s where I differed from the normal Open Combat shooting rules. You select your target, and take the shot, using the normal ATK Vs DEF modifiers.

The D6 results I came up with were…

• 1 = Disaster strikes. The canon jams, then explodes. Remove from play and lose initiative.
• 2-3 = Impasse. A terrible shot that flies harmlessly over the battlefield.
• 4 = The ball grazes the target, knocking them prone, and veers off in another direction, where it may continue to wreak havoc (see below).
• 5 = The ball clips the target on the way past, knocking them prone and scoring 1 Fortitude point. Canon ball ploughs on (see below).
• 6 = A direct hit on the target, resulting in immediate death. Canon ball ploughs on (see below).

On a 5 or 6, the ball would continue on in a straight line, providing the way is clear of terrain and obstacles. If there are any targets in that line (friend or foe), move on to the next one in the “queue” and perform an attack roll on them.

If you roll a 4, use the Random Direction Guide on page 57 of the Open Combat rulebook (the ‘Capture’ scenario) to see where the ball will go next. If it hits anyone else, perform an attack roll and continue with the above.

This could be slightly absurd as, in theory, the ball could bounce around the field forever killing scores of fighters. However, that is extremely unlikely, and I felt it added some fun to the attack 🙂

Summary: Open Combat Additional Rules

I’ve mentioned already that I’m in no way a games designer or rules writer. In fact, this is my first ever attempt at some “enhancements”.

The Open Combat system is totally robust, and I’ve no doubt that my own additions are flawed in many ways. However, I’ve had fun experimenting with them and wanted to share them with fellow players.

Miniature wargaming to me is about having fun, being creative, and creating memorable events on the tabletop. If you’re the same, then maybe this will help give you a few ideas of your own.

And if you’ve never played Open Combat before, you should definitely check it out.

Finally, if you’ve enjoyed these ramblings, then please check out some of the other articles on the site. I’ve covered things like miniatures, terrain, general hobby musings, and even created some free audio ambience to use as a soundtrack for your games!