Ideas for Miniature Battlefields

Introduction

by Nic Birt

Solo Wargamers' have a great advantage in that they can experiment with ideas related to their hobby without disrupting club games or offending opponents. Such freedom can produce rethinking of the basic elements of miniature wargames. In this respect I have been pondering about the wargames board or miniature battlefield.

My ideal miniature battlefield would be:

Small

As I have limited space to pursue my hobby so I need to keep the largest aspect of the hobby as small and easily storable as possible. Also I often will be unable to finish the game in one sitting and so require an easily transportable surface (even through doorways!) while remaining flat so the terrain and figures remain in their relative positions. Other benefits of small gaming boards are the ability to continue wargaming even if illness caused you to be bed-bound or conversely if you travel a lot and need a portable wargaming kit.

Having a small battlefield means that there is very little wasted space. The action can easily cover the whole area. This is of course a very efficient use of space but it means there is no room for reserves on this battlefield and no room for sweeping flank movements or flanking marches but this deficiency can be overcome.

Hex shaped

This correlates to 'campaign friendly' in my case as I use maps with hex grids in my wargame campaigns. Setting up the miniature battlefield is much easier if it's the same shape as the grids on your campaign map. Campaigns are a core activity for many solo wargamers' as the armies' campaign manoeuvres give the scenarios for our miniature battles. At the same time as providing a reason for the battle and immediately establishes the basic orders for both sides i.e. attack or defence, objectives and defended points, etc.

I have taken the hex shaped idea one stage further and now use small hexes (30mm across opposite corners) on my wargaming board. The advantage of this is that movement and ranges are easily ascertained without the need to check with tape measures. Also it is easier to establish if a figure is in one type of terrain or not e.g. the figure is either in a woodland hex or not. Having hexes drawn all over your wargaming board can distract from the visual spectacle we aim to achieve with our finely painted figures and carefully modelled terrain so I use small holes drilled into the board where the corners of the hexes meet. This gives enough visual clues for the mind to visualise the hexes without having hex shapes actually drawn all over your board. Terrain features can also be built up around the hex shapes, which assists with this visualisation.

Open flanked

By this I mean that around the edge of the wargaming board there should be an area separated from the centre of the board and used for reserves and flank movements. Battles were often won and lost by bringing on reserves in the right place at the right moment. Having a margin around the board divided into sectors would permit such movements. There must be some risk element connected to this action. A dice throw should be required before a unit can move back on the battlefield area of the board. Dice throws will also be required to see if units can move from one sector to the next in an outflanking move. As cavalry are quicker and more suitable for such actions I permit them a better chance to return to the battlefield or move to a different flanking sector.

Throwing a D6: 3,4,5,6 permits a cavalry unit to undertake these actions on each move. Infantry will require a 5,6 from a D6 throw. Sometimes flanking forces may oppose each other. You will need to dice for the combat result with severe casualties for the loser (this risk factor again) using simple combat result rules based on numbers engaged on each side. The loser always has to fall back one sector.

More Ideas

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