"Wargame weather system" Topic

Dear all

Many years ago I found an article in a UK wargames mag about generating realstic weather for a campaign. It used ordinary D6 and a neat little hex chart to determine the weather for each day. I had a copy of the article and I used the system in a campaign a few years back.

I plan on using it again but cannot find either the article or the chart… :-(

Does anyone remember the article or possobliy point me in the right direction. FWIW the hex chart used with system had little clouds, rain, sun etc symbols on it.

TIA

Malibu Max

One brilliant, yet incredibly simple idea that I've seen used is to use actual weather records from the area in question and from the same days/months of the year. Historical weather records & weather forecasts are widely available on line.

So for example, if you're playing an English Civil War campaign for 1644, pick a year at random for which there are published weather records (e.g. 1987) and follow the weather records for that year.

Now there's a thought …

Or, depending upon where and when your game is set, using the current day's weather locally, or for the region the game should actually occur at.

There are lots of on-line weather sites too, where you can get that info.

Interesting suggestions.

We used the weather options listed with an old WRG Ancient Rule set; seasonal influences, geographical location, rising and setting sun. We did have to improvise with the moon illumination for night marches or engagements.

However, pulling a random weather record would work very well.

Cheers,

Speaking of the old WRG weather options, something I do miss, playing FoG for a 'big table' mainstream game, is the weather.

Barker was right that the performance of archers (most kinds) in northern Europe, at least, was affected weather (say, Lechfeld e.g., but that's at the extreme, of course)…

Mechanisms might have been a bit crude and clumsy, though …

The trouble with just using today's weather is that the game might be set at a different time of year. You might have three weeks of solid snow and ice now, but if your campaign is set in July… :o)

I usually throw a dice with some sort of table of probabilities based on historical weather pattens in that region at that time of year. One key issue is the persistance (or not) of weather patterns (such as rain fronts or morning mist).

I have a weather dice. I just roll it.

I like the idea of picking a random year, and then using the actual weather for the day and place when you are having your battle.
So your battle is 15th June 1644, in Cheriton.
Pick a random year, same day (say 15th June 1944) and use the weather in Cheriton for that day.

This sounds like the weather system you're describing:

PDF link

em-4 miniatures sells a D6 with different weather icons.

thanks Tekawiz … a useful link.

Using historical weather records has one great advantage over random weather generation in that it does actually allow you to have some chance of forecasting the likely changes if you can track the changes in pressure, wind direction, wind speed, cloud cover and precipitation at a particular location.

While this doesn't matter too much in most wargames, it does matter a great deal in one genre – naval wargaming in the age of sail. The players who know something about how weather patterns develop would have a massive advantage over those who don't. Those players are therefore clearly the superior captains.

In a 20th-21st Century Naval or Air campaign, you would actually have a weather forecast and know with some accuracy how the weather was going to develop over the next five days or so. In the case of WW2, the Allies would have a massive advantage here, having 5 days warning of bad weather, while the Germans would only have a day or two

Of course, all weather forecasts are subject to change by the time they arrive, so you could then use a random element.