A New Year, A New Old Resource

As I've said before, my first wargaming influences were Featherstone, followed by WRG, Lawford & Young and HG Wells. Who I haven't given enough credit to is Gene McCoy and his Wargamer's Digest. (Not to be confused with the similarly named Scruby/Featherstone publication.) When I came across issue Volume 2, Number 1 in November, 1974 (at International Hobbies in Montreal if memory serves) I was thrilled and eagerly awaited each issue through my college years even though the gaming presented tended to be of a very different style to what I was used to. The different gaming and rules style commonly used may have made it harder to relate some articles to my own gaming but the articles were still interesting and useful. Many dealt with things like applying military principles to your games (surprise, concentration of force etc), translating historical organizations into practical wargame  formations or translating historical actions into table top battles and articles on game theory and design.

I never did convert styles, and while I have played many of the slightly later CS Grant "Tabletop Teasers", I'm not sure that I ever played out any of the similar concept, "Battle Stations: Small Unit Actions"  despite reading many of them over and over. This year I intend to put that to rights. I got rid of most of my original copies during a purge of magazines in the early '90's, most, but not all and there is a Yahoo group which includes some articles in its files. Unlike the Grant Teasers, McCoy's Battle Stations came with a suggested solution,  so I'll have to take care not to re-read the solutions before playing them out! (Some of them had limited intelligence about enemy forces, I haven't decided yet just how to handle that!)

(Scan of the cover of WD1.2 from the Yahoo Group, my own copy is not in such good condition.)

Oddly enough, my first issue, one I still have, contained an article discussing Marathon, Thymbra and Double Envelopment. Yes, Thymbra, the battle where Croesus, King of Lydia was defeated by Cyrus the Great, King of Persia. Those who have read my other blog, Gathering of Hosts, will be aware that I am in the process of reforming my various ancients into Mede/Persian and Lydian armies. Last year I fought Marathon, it seems only right that this year I fight Thymbra. I have more troops to paint so look for it in June. A Battle Station should appear later this month.