Friday 30 July 2021

Where is the new Duncan Macfarlane?

 

I think any wargamer who was active in the late 1970's and early 1980's can remember just how difficult wargaming as a hobby was due to a lack of information, a dearth of knowledge re their respective interests and basically how the hobby was struggling to build on its earlier successes following the release of several classic books by the likes of Charles Grant, Donald Featherstone, Charles Wesencraft and others. To be honest wargaming was stuck big style and effectively going nowhere.Yes we had several shows, yes we had magazines from the Society of Ancients, the Pike and Shot Society and Lone Warrior that promoted the hobby but their audience was a very small number who most likely subscribed to all three societies.Then out of the blue along came Miniatures Wargames the magazine that probably did more for the hobby than many other earlier attempts to advance wargaming from a niche hobby hiding in the shadows into a wider audience of would be generals. 

I was reading this months Wargames Illustrated that rightly had several pages dedicated to the late and wonderful Duncan Macfarlane. The article contained a very telling quote from Bryan Ansell who stated that 'Duncan was the man who saved wargaming.' And to be very honest he was. Simply because he produced a magazine that not only inspired wargamers by its wonderful content and images but also spread the word regarding our hobby to a much wider public as the magazine grew in popularity. Who could not be inspired by the photographs of the Peter Gilder collection and dream of owning such armies on such beautiful terrain. Yes to many it was unobtainable but I would argue a lot of wargamers took up the challenge and started producing equally beautiful units and battles that captured the imagination of many. Whenever I received my copy I would paw feverishly over each photograph trying to understand how the figures had been painted and how I could replicate them. I can honestly say my painting did improve and at one stage I thought I was the dogs bollocks until I attended wargames shows across the country which quickly made me realise there were better painters and clearly more prolific ones. I wasnt despondent I just understood I could never match the likes of Gilder, Allen, Robinson, Smith and so many others. I tried but never broke through.

But Miniature Wargames was the moment that wargaming was acknowledged as more than a niche hobby for retired generals, students and history lecturers and was in fact a fun thing to do especially if one could find an opponent.

And now? Having thought long, too long probably, regarding Covid and its effect on our hobby I believe there is a real need to have another Duncan moment.I dont think the hobby is in decline, I just think after this is all over we will be a leaner hobby with far fewer younger wargamers ready to take up the challenge to move the hobby into a bright and busy future. Instead it will be a hobby of gamers heavily influenced by their Games Workshop ethos of ever changing rule books, new super units and small oh so small so called battles.  

 After reading [looking at the pages] of all three wargames magazines its very obvious that they cater for a different audience than the one Duncan had to deal with. Gone are the history buffs desperate for additional information regarding their armies. Gone are the wargaming megalomaniacs with many hundreds if not thousands of figures in their armies and gone are the wargamers who spend hours over each figure, turning them into a work of beauty. Im not talking about the professional painters that exhibit in the current magazines, Im talking about the many hundreds who were determined to create copies of Gilderesque units by the score.

 In their place is the product placement articles [if one can call them that] of two pages of little information backed up by the inevitable professionally painted figure from the latest release from Warlord, Perry, North Star et all.

 What we have are gamers who for whatever reason use several dozen figures, usually on a 4x4 table or slightly bigger based around company or smaller level games, and nothing wrong with this if you feel thats what you want, but wargaming surely was about refighting the battles in history, re enacting the heroism, the blunders and what if's of a campaign. Basically wargaming. I appreciate I am showing my age by this observation but using a few figures on a small table is like eating a few crisps while dreaming of a big juicy steak.

 I appreciate that people of a certain age rarely read a magazine and inevitably resort to the internet for everything but the hobby needs a new stimulus to kick start our hobby as we lurch towards near normality whether in a printed format or by a decently produced social media product, but most importantly based around the ethos of wargaming for would be generals not sergeants. 

This week I secured my second victory in succession. I say this not in a crowing way but with a sense of mystification. How can me, a wargamer renowned for throwing crap dice with boring regularity actually win two battles in a row?
Perhaps its because both wins were using the most excellent Sword and Spear rules, but I doubt it given my previous abject record using these rules. Its certainly not because of superior generalship. But two wins? Being a Sunderland follower I fully expect this will result in immediate relegation to the outer limits of wargaming over the next few weeks as fate bites me in the skinny backside.











24 comments:

  1. I enjoyed that piece and wholeheartedly agree with your take on wargaming. I do play the odd skirmish game but it is the big battles which satisfy, win or lose.

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    1. Thanks George, there can be nothing better than commanding large armies on a big battlefield.

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  2. I'm lucky enough to have room for a 8'x5' wargame table in our third bedroom , at the weekend last we where visiting some in-laws who have moved into a modern house - 3 bedrooms whilst being shown round by the proud owners I kept thinking 'no room for a wargame table of any size !?' , and modern young people seem to have very little leisure time - busy paying the mortgage etc - little time to paint large armies, hence it's down the club with a skirmish game . I think wargaming has morphed to fit modern time/players and us 'Old Guard' can only look on and shake our greying heads .

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    1. When I started wargaming I used a piece of hardboard 6 by 2 laid on my sisters bed.I pushed around Airfix troops and dreamed of a wargames table like Charles Grant. Now im lucky enough to have a dedicated room. Between then and now I saved and traded to build up armies. It was a struggle and yes like most I didnt have much money and even less free time but I achieved my dream.The only difference between then and now is I wanted to refight history, I wanted to command large numbers of units simply because that was what I understood by wargaming.But then each to their own.

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  3. GW gave us the Perry twins, Rick Priestly and others. Possibly a conveyor belt of rule writers, sculptors and, who knows, a new innovator for the future of wargames

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    1. Im afraid the Perry's and Rick Priestly are more old school in that they love history and big battles, it will have to be someone younger really who can relate to the younger audience but realise that skirmish? gaming only leads into a cul de sac.

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    2. Yes, maybe. But I do say 'a conveyor belt of rule writers, sculptors and a NEW innovator of the future. Not that those I mentioned will forge the way but those coming through, maybe

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  4. I remember painting my Hinchliffe ECW Royalist army based initially on Gilder's units and his painting guide from Military Modelling, slavishly following his King's Lifeguard and Prince Rupert's regiment. Enamels and the first use of oil wipes for horses.
    Sold at Northern Militare.
    Those were the days.....
    Neil

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    1. And very happy days. When I saw the wonderful Lifeguard that Gilder painted I couldnt stop looking at the figures.They were even better in the flesh. What an inspiration.

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  5. Though I do play more skirmish games now, I still love the large scale battle with hundreds/thousands of figures on the table

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    1. I know you do Neil. As Ive said [probably badly] each to their own but the way things are going its increasingly obvious that wargaming has changed and personally not in a good way.Pushing a few figures around isnt what the hobby was about. Yes skirmish and one to one games have a place in the hobby but there is far more to it than expensive rules, a few figures and a pack of cards.

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  6. A very interesting and thoughtful/thought-provoking post. SMall actions and skirmishes are fine, but, all things being equal, give me the big battles and the zen-like focus to read, collect, prepare, and paint one's forces over time. Hopefully to receive two coats of glass varnish before all is said and done.

    Best Regards,

    Stokes

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    1. I agree, Stokes! Well, except for the two coats of gloss coat...

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    2. Unfortunately Stokes my friend you are out of step with the current wargaming practices. Im not denigrating what you are achieving because as ever Im envious of your armies but you are an anachronism in some respects. Still its nice to be out of kilter with modern times, in fact its the only kilter to have.

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  7. Miniature Wargames magazine was not only a shot in the arm to the existing wargamer, but it put a wargaming product on the shelves of a stationer that had an outlet in every high street in the country (UK), so was a fantastic platform to recruit and be out there in the public eye (as an aside - Games Workshop did exactly the same and more).

    If one sees that as a revolution, then it is probably the case that the internet is the second revolution and is repeating the media success of the early wargame mags (including my much loved 'Battle' and 'Practical wargamer' mags).

    So has the internet been Duncan 2? - which if you reverse that statement, puts Duncan up in his rightful place as a wargaming super influencer!

    The latest crossroads for wargamimg has been Covid. It has stopped the shows, but increased trader business (on the internet), stopped face-to-face gaming, but opened the discovery of mainstream remote zoom type gaming.

    In this regard, from my chair the hobby has lost its greatest ground, that of personal 'real' person-to-person interaction, though a traditional solo player might see it as a huge advance in 'interaction'.

    Either way, while I think the hobby pulse is good, I have seen several blog placed comments to the effect that they have lost their wargaming mojo because of Covid, so how can we help that change.

    My own view is that we we need a collective drive to get shows up and running again. That does not require a single Duncan style person, but rather many of them. We need a collective effort by those who are good at organising a show to get them back up and running again and as important, we need the collective cohorts of wargamers to get out there and support these shows, otherwise we are about to lose something that the internet can never replace.

    Currently we are letting shows and magazines slip away from their function in providing the glue that has bound the hobby (together with the club scene) for decades and we are allowing the internet to take that ground ..... at a cost I think.

    Glad you are enjoying Sword and Spear, I have been doing wars of the Roses with them and having great fun.

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    1. What Norm said.... with the only addition being that the putting Wargame product on the shelves of a stationer was the key advance.. Don tried to do it but ultimately failed...

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    2. Excellent points Norm as ever.Certainly Covid has been a good thing and also a very detrimental thing. Good for increasing the revenue of traders but really detrimental for wargamers in general. I would argue that shows have been the lifeblood of the hobby for years and unfortunately Covid stopped that dead.I hope things will improve but somehow I can see numbers be much reducded for several years and suspect they may never recover

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  8. An excellent and informative post Robbie, I hope that wargame shows will bounce back over the next year.
    As Norm says the wargame pulse is strong and I believe that over the next year our hobby will advance to greater heights.

    Willz Harley.

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    1. Ever the optimist Will, it must be all those years of oxygen deprivation. Ive no doubt the hobby will bounce back, but what form will it take? Personally irrespective of Covid I think with would be wargamers being bombarded with small, skirmish type rules and figures that they will become the norm. I hope not but given some many other factors I can see this being more popular.

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  9. A thoughtful piece but perhaps a tad overloaded with gloom. The wargaming community has never been an homogeneous creature, but rather many subsets functioning on differing levels. In my 72nd year and looking back on over 50 years wargaming it would be easy to bemoan the current state of our hobby. I am now convinced this is an error of perspective brought on by my age and hobby experience. Things must grow or die, an immutable rule of life. Our hobby is growing, there is no doubt of that, but it's also changing as well. That is to say for many in our community it's a different looking hobby to mine and yours on the surface at least. But I've a lifetime of collecting and painting behind me as you do Robbie, so our hobby is bound to feel different to someone's whose just starting out on the wonderful lifetime journey that wargaming is. Look what is bought us in experiences, friends, travel and the joy of companionship in a common bond. We really don't need another Duncan I'd say, we have scored of them out there already and that's his real legacy.

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    1. Sorry about the gloom David. These last few months have been very hard for me personally and Im not certain why, Ive nothing much to complain about and certainly am better off than many. Maybe its my hormones and lack of decent beer served in a pub.I think however we are allowed a gloomy outlook occasionally and even you succumb to ill humours occasionally. Still we both continue painting and collecting our toys so for that I should be grateful.

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  10. Yeah....I am in two minds on this whole subject. I have been gaming around 45 years ( I am 59 this year and as an aside how did I get so old so quickly?!) and have always played historical games and mainly in multi player settings, but I find myself less and less enthused by battles involving an enormous table groaning under the weight of wall to wall troops, with traffic jams and no room to manoeuvre .... Recent smaller scale games of three or four units per player or even games such as Sharpe Practice have proved more enjoyable. Of course, this has not stopped me building up a decent sized Great Northern War Swedish force over the last six months, planned for use with Beneath the Lilly Banners (although the scenarios Barry Hilton presents do seem to be on the modest size too, which I quite enjoyed when I played a couple of trial games at the beginning of the year). I am not convinced by what I have seen of Bolt Action but that's partly due to the concept that it's a small scale infantry battle, yet an 88mm gun is sitting on a four by four table....it's out of scale and should really be at the other end of the house, or outside in the garden!

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    1. I know what you mean about tables groaning with figures. Many years ago I would always insist on putting every figure I had on the table, so I would end up with a slugfest and no flanks. It was one of the reasons that I sold everything and turned to 6mm, and yet years later I returned to big toys again but with proper flanks etc. Dont get me wrong Ive had some enjoyable small actions with few figures but a good storyline. But for me it was always the large actions and the history surrounding them. As for Bolt Action, the figures look great and especially the armour, but on a small table what chance would you have against a Jagdpanther?

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  11. It does seem like a glass half empty post,I like lots of troops on a table, so I paint them, so do my nephews , my nieces husband is just playing with our figures but is painting historical figures, all of us started with fantasy/sci fi gaming and have moved to historical, there is a club near one of my nephews which is primarily a 40k club and they're all trying bolt action. In a time when games shops are like most disappearing there is a warhammer shop in most towns, which while not your or anymore my kind of wargaming does point to it permeating society more than it did in 1979 when I started. Warlord are trying to apply the GW business model to historical gaming and are being successful, as David says you can't stand still,it's still wargaming, just not you're kind, we still have a golden age of supplies,rules and references, chin up, it could be worse!
    Best Iain

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My 6mm Napoleonic set up.

My 6mm Napoleonic set up.
Austria 1809.

Austrian Hussars

Austrian Hussars
Hinchliffe figures

Austrian Grenzer

Austrian Grenzer
Austrian Grenzer

Smoggycon 2013

Smoggycon 2013
Smoggycon 2013

Smoggycon 2012

Smoggycon 2012
Smoggycon 2012

Smoogycon 2009

Smoogycon 2009
My French getting another beating