Are the fantasists taking over?

[Leman]

Topic title says it all. Was a time you couldn't move on the forum for Centurion tanks. Now it's goblins, dwarves and fairies. Whatever happened to history?

[FierceKitty]

It'll be spring in Mordor before I go the fantasy route. Fear not, the Old Guard are not in retreat yet.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Division of 1870 French to be finished soon!

[fsn]

Ah! The way I look at it is that if the whole Warband thing really takes off then Pendraken grows and perhaps we'll get a T35. I hope Warband takes off and perhaps some of the its adherents can be persuaded into something a little more un-fantasy (if I may coin a phrase).

Meanwhile, it's up to historical (and pseudo-historical) gamers to keep the flag flying. Post a few new threads chaps!

[Orcs]

Early war German infantry just being based
Early war Tanks next on table

There will be an Orc army soon, but its still lost in Mordor (lead mountain)

Of course you have the ultimate Fantasist in FSN - he lives in a fantasy world

FSN = Fantasy Seems Normal

[Maenoferren]

The Mahdi still lives in the Sudan as far as I am concerned and some Mongol chappies will be issuing forth from the Steppe when I can get my Mojo back
the dwarves are still sitting in their plastic packet as they have done for the last 3 years

[Ithoriel]

Fantasy and Sci-fi have the advantage of being limited only by one's imagination. No dry, dusty tomes to read. No rivet counters, no one to tell you,"That regiment had ochre cuffs not yellow!" A realm of heroes and monsters where death in battle is glorious not grubby, messy and painful. Indeed, a realm where being dead is no bar to taking part!

Couple that with the long term support from the GW juggernaut and I'm vaguely surprised any of us are left playing historical periods at all.

Most of the youngsters I come across are players not collectors. They want something they can take straight out of the box and on to the table, like Wings of Glory, Star Wars Armada and D&D Attack Wing. I think the collectable card game boom just reinforces that.

It's much the same with board games. I'm sure there are still people out there playing historical period hex-grid wargames but all the people I play with these days play "Euro-Games" like Catan, Small World, Ticket to Ride or Carcassonne.

FoW's packaging of WW2 in a way similar to the GW style may help keep historical gaming alive. Though perhaps not in a format traditional gamers would recognise!

[fsn]

There's fantasy and there's fantasy.

Goblins and hobbits and trolls (oh boy!) I left behind in about 1982 when the radio series of Lord of the Rings finished, I read Ursula le Guin (and found it wanting) and discovered that bitter is the drink for me.

I am prone to fits of imagination - such as everyone else on the forum being scantily clad, young and female. As I've said before, that's a lovely world to live in.

No rivet counters, no one to tell you,"That regiment had ochre cuffs not yellow!"

But dwarves aren't allowed cavalry, and people argue about what colour a troll is!


Does it really matter? I get sniffy remarks because I like a tank, poor old Kitty gets ripped for his Aztec perversion, and I take the Michael relentlessly out of the LoA (or LoFA as it is known in my house). As long as people enjoy themselves and the only real fight is on the table.

I'd still buy Aztecs before fantasy - FSN

[fsn]

The Mahdi still lives in the Sudan as far as I am concerned

I ran him over with an AMX13 this morning.

Sorry.

[Maenoferren]

I ran him over with an AMX13 this morning.

Sorry.

B*gger...luckily the Kalifa can take over, unless you ran over him at the same time

I have a large number of fantasy armies that just need taking out and playing with... I may do so tonight - just for parity of esteem purposes.

[Ithoriel]

But dwarves aren't allowed cavalry, and people argue about what colour a troll is!

Yes, but unless you can turn up towing a dead troll behind you, your views on the colour of trolls is worth no more, or less, than mine.

Last fantasy game I played I lost because Dwarven bear-mounted heavy cavalry, supported by a Dwarven mage riding a gryphon, sandwiched my paladin general.  Previous game that afternoon my army had been entirely composed of "trees" ... OK, Ents and Huorns but basically tree models  Free your imagination!

[petercooman]

Funny this thread pops up when i am pondering about selling my fantasy collection 

[Subedai]

At some stage I might dip my toes into the fantasy side of the wargaming river but at the moment I am busy enough with my historicals. I do like the imaginative grandeur of fantasy settings and of course, like SciFi, you can make up your settings if you so wish and no one can gainsay you.

[Luddite]

I really don't see a difference. 

All wargaming, no matter what period, genre, or setting, is primarily fantasy.  The only exception is where you're painting known uniforms on specific troops from a set historical period.

Consider a 'historical' refight of Waterloo.

1. Collect figures (these may be historically accurate – who knows?  Certainly a bit of fantasy involved)
2. Paint said figures (good treatises on colour, so this might be safely 'historical'?)
3. Research battle (bit of 'historical', but many accounts and details are disputed so some leeway (fantasy) is needed)
4. Fight battle (unless you simply move units to known moves and resolve engagements to know resolutions (where's the fun in that?!), this is firmly 'fantasy' here – after all in your battle Old Boney may win!)

Stuffed to the gunwhales with 'fantasy', no?

Going further back into ancients, you're even deeper into the realms of fantasy.  Seriously – who really knows what a Gaul looked like?  Or a Roman soldier?  What about Roman tactics?  We can guess and reconstruct from fragmentary sources but nobody really knows how manipular tactics worked.  So we make it up.

I look at a well painted Macedonian phalanx army with the same eye as a well painted High Elf army.  Both are basically made up – its just that one is given the 'historical' tag, as if that's something more 'worthy'.   
And compare the fun of painting a dwarf clan, compared to the 'fun' of trawling through the painting dirge of a wall of WWII khaki...

Personally I play historical of all periods and fantasy and sci fi of many different genres.  Aside from the similarities above, I see very little difference in terms of gameplay.  In fact, many fantasy/sci fi games and rules are better and more tactically challenging than historical rules.

General Quarters gives an excellent and challenging game of 'battleships', but compared to the tactical challenges of Dystopian Wars I'd choose DW every time.

As to Warband...well...only time will tell to see if a 'historical' version ever hits the market.

[fsn]

Absolutely agree, Old Chap - except some of like the "dirge" of khaki. 

Let's get it in context. Pendraken have released Warband. This has generated an amount of attention, and interest and generated sales for the company that we love so much. This is a good thing.

Fantasy isn't everybody's cup of tea. It's not mine. I prefer my tigers to have a Maybach engine, not Chinese dwarf riders.