What motivates people to become interested in historical simulation or wargaming? Everyone has different hot buttons and different temperaments, so the triggers vary as well.

Doug Rogers' 15mm diorama showing Cadmus Wilcox's Alabamans defending the Codori-Trostle Thicket at Gettysburg.

It is important to consider a new JR III player's motivation if you want to keep him or her interested. Imagination is the key attribute that makes anyone want to play a game. The person's imagination is often seeded by an interesting teacher, reading a good book, watching a movie, seeing a reenactment, or even by playing a board game like BattleCry or making a model.

Fun must be the prime focus when setting up what I call a "Learning Game." This type of game takes the pressure to perform off the new player. The role of other players, and even opponents, is to teach the new person the game. Aspects that promote fun are friendly, helpful people who mentor the initiate. Food is also a good feature at such a game. This environment frees the new player to experience the creativity of setting strategy, employing tactics and allows them to focus on the intellectual challenge of learning the basic rules.

Competition is a strong motivator, especially for young players, so you want to set clear and simple victory conditions for the first game(s) (i.e. Take that hill, Make sure the game is a small simple action using basic rules only. It must be fastmoving, and getting bogged down in rule lawyering is death to the newbie. A meeting engagement of equal strengths and troop quality is best. If you can pair the new player up with a more experienced player on the same side to give advice, that is good. Visually attractive battlefields and troops enhance play. It's not impossible to learn with cardboard markers and masking tape, but not too fun.

Be sure to pick a convenient time to play for the new player. Friday night for a High School senior, or Sunday morning for a middle-aged deacon may not work too well. Comfortable, friendly surroundings are also to be considered. A heated family room will tend to keep players longer than a blighted storage unit in January.

One club I visited in Indiana had a nice public clubhouse setting with storage, tables, refrigerator and the works, but I'm sure that did not develop overnight.

If this approach is taken with new players, the new players have fun, are intellectually challenged, have made new friends, and are more likely to show up to the second and third game where the more advanced concepts of command control and replacements, etc can be learned. They can come to appreciate winning a good defense and achieving multiple victory conditions. Who knows? They might even become serious competition as steel sharpens steel, or they may even run a campaign some day... all under your guiding tutelage!

Doug Rogers, North Coast Historical Wargamers, Lake Co., OH
www.geocities.com/nchws2003