By Troy Hill

The game Saga, from Studio Tomahawk, seems to be on a growth curve, and our little corner of Indiana – the NorthEast corner – is no exception. Our game group recently hosted a tournament for the “Age of Melee” at Power9 Games in Fort Wayne Indiana. With twenty players scheduled, eighteen actually managed to make it in that day. A great record for our local group.

Players from as far away as Columbus Ohio, Indianapolis, and Crown Point Indiana made the trek to bring their warbands, throw some dice, and curse the gods of the tabletop when we didn’t do as well as we’d hoped. Despite volunteering to be “ringer” I got to field my Milites Christie and compete, despite two last-minute drops.

By Troy Hill

Well, 2022 was an experience for No Dice No Glory. We were not visited not by the jolly old fat man in the red suit, but by Google Chrome’s red screen of death, citing malware.

In a nutshell, that was caused when we shuffled the site across the same set of interweb servers to a new account as one of our Toms on the steering committee stepped down, and another Tom took over the site hosting responsibilities. And that’s when the Russian Hackers infiltrated and stabbed us with the malware fork of doom.

Even if you see the red screen of death via Google’s Chrome browser, Google says we’re cured. But…

By Troy A. Hill

An author friend of mine, M. L. “Matt” Buchman, connected with me over a year ago at a writer’s convention in Florida. Matt was excited to show off a beta model of his new card game. One that plays like a board game, and is tied into his best-selling Miranda Chase series of political thrillers.

Well, in the midst of the pandemic, supply chain issues, and other issues kept the game from hitting our shores until earlier this year.

Fortunately, I was able to catch up with Matt a year after our first meeting and get a rundown of the game. It’s quick, plays easily, and is a cooperative game, or one fit for solo play. I caught up with him a few weeks later, when he sent a promo copy of the game my way. Read our conversation below.

A series of short video tutorials are available here from Librarium Games and Alexander Massar, the designer of the game.

By Troy A. Hill

When it comes to gateway drugs in miniature wargaming, a historical period like the dark or middle ages isn’t a period one would expect to draw in new miniatures table-top wargamers. Is Lion Rampant Second Edition that gateway drug?

Is it another Song of Ice and Fire miniatures game that can use pop culture to bridge Hollywood fans into table-top gaming like a Crisis Protocol game for a certain Comic-to-Movie franchise? Or even a historical game with interesting meta-gaming twists like Saga and their battle board/saga dice system?

Is it a game that can draw in the Win At All Cost (WAAC) meta netlist players from that space orc game, and get them to play historicals?

Probably not, unfortunately. But, it is a stand-alone game in a crowded field of historical and fantasy-style historical-esque games. It’s a welcome addition to my gaming library.

By Troy Hill

What do we eat on the Russian Front during Operation Bagration?

Baggy Rations, of course.

At least, that’s what gamers snack on while playing a historical-themed event this past weekend. Anything to support the FLGS, right? Whatever snacks the store had disappeared as our local Bolt Action players munched their way through three rounds of operational madness.

By Troy Hill

Well, Warlord did it again.

They released a new game. That uses rules from their other games. For an entirely new game. Or something like that.

Combined Arms is both a stand-alone board game, and a campaign set for Warlord’s suite of World War II games, Bolt Action, Blood Red Skies, Cruel Seas, and Victory at Sea.

And my gaming group in Indiana has been salivating for a campaign system we can use. Warlord timed the release of the game well, right as gaming is ramping up across the globe after two years mostly in pandemic lockdowns.

By Troy Hill

Prolific wargaming and historical author Mark Barber recently sat down via email with me to discuss the ins and outs of writing books for the gaming community. If you’re not sure who Mark is, here’s the blurb from his Amazon Author page:

Mark Barber writes in the military history and wargaming genres. He has written several military aviation titles for Osprey Publishing and spent several years working with Gaijin Entertainment’s record-breaking ‘War Thunder’ software package, acting as a historical consultant, in-game content writer, and article writer. He has also written several titles for Warlord Games’ Bolt Action tabletop game and has written fiction for the Kings of War and Gates of Antares franchises.

Mark has written several of the popular campaign books for Bolt Action, including several of the D-Day series.

by Troy A. Hill

“For the love of God! Troy! Here we are painting up stuff in 28mm and you go batshit crazy in 12mm…” was what one of my local gaming friends posted under the photo of my newly arrived Epic Battles French and British Waterloo sets on Facebook.

He might be correct.

Warlord Games took a gamble on their Epic Battles Scale, and its first incarnation with the American Civil War (ACW). And that gamble paid off big. The napoleonic era seemed to be the next logical entry into the Epic Battles line. So I wasn’t surprised when I learned that Waterloo was the next focus for Warlord.

But why such tiny figures? Warlord is known as the go-to company for 28mm historical (along with their friends the Perry Brothers, who fill the gaps around Warlord’s ranges.) Why produce such a small figure size that doesn’t line up with the other majorly produced conventional scale?

By Troy Hill

After two years of miss or hit, mostly miss gaming, we’ve finally had our first Bolt Action tourney in North-East Indiana. Power Nine Gaming in Fort Wayne Indiana hosted our Rumble in the Fort, Bolt Action tourney. I was the humble Tourney Organizer (TO), and we hoped to have five tables. Going into the week, it looked like we might make that.

But, cold-like symptoms, such as sore throats, kept two players home. We ended up with seven players, and I jumped into the roster as the “ringer.”

By Troy Hill

The long awaited chance for Warlord Games to get a decent set of army special rules for the Italian forces is finally …. not here yet.

Don’t get me wrong. The new Campaign Italy: Soft Underbelly book is great when you hold it in the context for which it is intended. That being a historical approach to gaming the invasion of Sicily during Operation Husky and beyond.

For those Bolt Action gamers hoping for a new set of Italian Army rules that brings the Italian army into the competitive zone most other armies get in the game… yeah, that didn’t happen here either. In context, a competitive Italian Army wasn’t to be had in the invasion of Sicily nor the Italian mainland.

But, if you’re into a historical approach to your gaming, instead of just pounding away with the meta and special rules to dominate in tourneys, this is an excellent book.