"Getting into Wargaming as a blind player" Topic

Hi All,

I'm writing here with what is probably an odd question, but I'd appreciate any thoughts from the community. :)

I'm a college student from the Pacific Northwest in the USA who is very much interested in wargaming, and military matters generally. I'm also totally blind, and have ben since birth. I've yet to actually play any games, on account of not having a satisfactory way to handle the miniatures most of them seem to require. My principle concern is that they'd tend to be knocked about when trying to feel for positioning, or measure, or what have you.
My primary interest at this point is solo wargaming of some sort. I have more than enough rule systems to try, just lack a way to set up minis or counters or an electronic equivalent.
So I'm wondering if anybody here has ideas for how I might deal with this? I don't want to commit a huge investment in time or money, at least not initially. :) I have a few ideas percolating but none of them really jumps out at me.

I could use existing boards and pieces, from my chess set for instance, which are designed to fit into round holes and thus avoid falling over. IF I stuck with my chessboard it would sharply limit my playing space for some of the systems I'd like to try.
I could get a Braille ruler, and try to avoid causing too much damage when I need to check for positioning and movement and so on. This would require me to actually buy minis, which I have no prior experience with. I guess a bright side is that I wouldn't need to paint them. :)
I could use some kind of virtual tabletop program on my Mac. This is ideal, but I have yet to find one which works well, or at all, with my screen reading software. Still, it would be economical at least.
Finally, I've heard recommendations for a couple products, such as Hexon boards. These seem intriguing but I am hesitant to commit to a purchase without first touching them.

So does anybody have any other grand ideas, or refinements on my existing ones? Any input would be greatly appreciated. If i could solve this single annoyance I would be off and running.

Thanks much for any thoughts,
Zack.

Heroscape tiles, mount miniatures on individual hex tiles. Should work for most genres.Can use Braille on individual tiles for reference.

using hexon/heroscape tiles seems a good idea, even more so if you have someone drill holes in them like your chessboard and mount your figures on bases with a peg

another idea, get some magnetic sheeting and mount your figures (and terrain) on washers

Welcome to TMP and welcome to the hobby.

Have you heard of Kriegspiel? It is the referee who moves pieces and reports results. You have hidden movement for things your general can not see. So that cuts down on what you need to learn each move. Mostly the game is about talking and listening to the referee(s). Perhaps you could use/find braille versions of maps? Please let us know here how you get on if you try this. I will be very interested to hear about your adventure in wargaming.

Kriegspiel is very exciting. The best game of my life was a few hours of Kriegspiel in the UK.

There is a web site for Kriegspiel here

forum.kriegsspiel.org.uk

Also, the Too Fat Lardies put out a set of the rules. (not that you really need to know them).

Large scale plastic cross stitch sheets some cut to map ref of map contours for hills you can have some edge cut identifier for woods and other terrain sections. Your figures or playing pieces would slot into the grid slots on the sheets, these playing pieces would have to be for you as a blind person easy to identify and I would suggest the 56 mm plastic figures pinned to the pegs,these figures come in many perods too, movement would be counted on the grid and moved. Identifying the troops would be though shape touch for you and as the figures normally come in basic core colors would be ideal also for your sighted opponents.
You would need to do a lot of test and development on this idea but I'm sure that would be part of the fun. I hope this helps
Cheers and happy gaming.

I'm intrigued to know how far you can go with this limitation.
I'd suggest you start basic. Also, I'm not sure about the scope of the game you want, but I'm assuming you are looking at a sort of strategic battlefield set up.
The chess board is a good start. If you expand on the board, by designating squares with different terrain features, that affect the movement and defence ability of each piece.
Then decide on the chance that each piece has of destroying the opposing piece, for example, queen takes pawn if it rolls a 2 or more on a 6 sided dice, pawn takes queen if it rolls a 6.
Now if you develop that idea and the pawn is an infantry formation, and the queen is a tank or a formation of knights, I think you have the makings of a wargame. Good luck.

You can also have square bases for one side and round bases for the oppositions side. You can tell the sides apart by feeling the bases.

tHanks for the ideas so far! :)

Initially I'm interested in skirmish level games, if only to cut down on the number of figures I'll need to keep track of. I have various rulesets from Two Hour War-games, for instance, I'd love to try.

I have heard the name Heroscape before but didn't know much about them. I guess I'll need to check into them. One potential issue with a lot of these ideas is that sighted help isn't always easy to come by. I might need to pay someone extra to do some of the work, much as a blind friend of mine does when Brailling board and card games.

I've always been sort of fascinated by Kriegspiel as an idea, but don't know what my chances of finding a game are. It doesn't seem super popular, and I'm certainly not a Prussian officer. :)

The idea of different base shapes hadn't occurred to me, though it's a logical extension of what's already done on my Chess board—the black men have pins stuck into their heads.

Thanks for the enthusiastic response.

My son is blind and we've been working through this issue as well, to try and plan for when he is old enough (and shows interest) to game – he's only 1, now.

My wife's idea was to pin the miniatures to their bases and extend the pin through the bottom of the base. Then, using a foam-based terrain board, you could stick the mini down into the foam and have it remain relatively resistant to stray movements.

Further, if the base is large enough, you could braille the base with some sort of unique identifier so you always know which miniature you are handling.

Good luck!

Aaron

You can try using a felt sheet and velcro on the bases of the miniatures and terrain.

For measuring you might be able to use a digital laser ruler, they might have one that audibly give the distance.

You could also use a string, make it tight from one model to another and then measure the length of string on your braille ruler.

I've always been sort of fascinated by Kriegspiel as an idea, but don't know what my chances of finding a game are. It doesn't seem super popular, and I'm certainly not a Prussian officer. :)

Last game I played was set in a school. We were attacked by Zombies. I prefer the "Prussian" type games. But they come in all shapes and sizes. I agree it is hard to find. First start with your local gamers and see if they like the idea. You may even try to drum up a group here to play online via Skype or one of the role playing web sites that facilitates games.

Love your enthusiasm!

Gwen, send Bill an email. I am sure he can set you straight.

Hexes may be a good solution. A board marked with hexes and the hexsides are raised, say with glued down matchsticks. This would give you a touch sensitive board and a formal grid.

the figures could be mounted on large bases, say 3" x 3", so they sit in the hex as a single unit that is easy to move around.

a lot of rules can be converted to hexes, say 1 hex equals 4" in the rules, so a unit that can move 8 inches can move 2 hexes and because you are using a formal grid, the relationship between the various units and their locations may be easier to handle.

A hex board can be fairly compact, a 2' x 3' board can hold a hex grid that is eight wide by six deep if using 4 inch hexes, which is a handy size to hold both terrain and figures at the same time.

Hi All,

I love the idea of a game conducted online, as I spend a great deal of my time at the computer anyway. I have more than my fair share of geek in me.

As for these other proposed ideas, I'm wondering where I ought to begin. HeroScape looks to be out of print, but Amazon seems to list a lot of material available, some fairly expensive.
I'm trying to find a compromise between breaking my wallet and the environment I'm currently living, a college dorm. I'll be relocating back home around Christmas, so perhaps extravagant plans will have to wait. I'm hoping I can do most work myself, if only because I won't depend as much on forcing other people to help me with what is ultimately my hobby, of little interest to them.

So practicality is important to me. The only real war gamers I know of around here are of the Warhammer persuasion, which is not quite what I'm after. Maybe a cab ride to one of the couple shops in town is in order, to see if there's anything I can actually feel to get a sense of things. I guess what I'm saying is figuring out where to start is kind of overwhelming :)

I've got something else I've been pondering, but I'll write up another post about that. :) Thanks again for all the ideas.

This is a sort of primer to wargaming over the 20th century. Some of the stuff in there may interest you, some of it may just be interesting to know about:

PDF link

There's a lot of stuff in there that doesn't use miniatures. Miniatures are actually not a very good way to do wargames in a lot of cases, but they're fun if you were into toy soldiers or enjoy the craft aspects of the hobby. Most miniatures games actually only use the base for game purposes – an appropriately sized base labeled in a tactile form would work most of the time, ditto for terrain. It's pretty common to use patches of felt for forest, for example.

That PDF is making for interesting reading. :) Thank you. I wonder if I can find some examples of rulesets which use some of these techniques. I guess it's time to Google…

Have you ever heard of a game called "Feudal"? It's more of a strategy chess-type game than miniatures, but the pieces look like minis and it's played on a peg-type board.
It's out of print, I suppose, but used copies can be found. try Ebay?
Speaking of which, if you want to build your own stuff (half the fun of gaming as far as I'm concerned) and save $, Menards has pegboard that you could buy cheap. Raise it off the table with shims. Get cheap plastic army men at a Dollar Store and glue small beads to the bottom of them for pegs. Put beads on the helmets of the enemy forces to tell them apart from your own troops. Make terrain walls out of styrofoam and put beads on the bottom of them too. Same with trees, etc… you get the idea.
You wont need a ruler with this sytem.
Hope you find something that works for you. Game on!

Zack,

This is moving a little away from your concept but do keep in mind you live in a corner of the world with many wargamers and groups, referring to the overall northwest – your little corner might not be the richest niche. Perhaps you can get in contact with one of the groups in your area and see what develops. Also, plan on attending Enfilade next year if at all possible. Oh, I guess I should mention that Enfilade is a convention in the greater Seattle area. While a lot of wargamers are a bit short on some essential social graces, there are many others who are great folks. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to run across one of the latter, maybe more than one.

On your basic idea, my first thought related to somehow adding sounds to the figures using very small speakers (as used in the model railroading world, maybe) and watch style batteries. I guess the big challenge, other than the cost which sounds like it would be an issue, is having enough different and easily recognized sounds. I also recommend you look into the rules called Brink of Battle – they are designed for a very small number of figures on a small board, only two foot by two foot.

And don't forget that some figures come in 54 mm scale (or about the same as 1/35th). These give you greater tactile area for identification by touch. They also can handle bigger bases that might hold those sound units if you end up going that way. Sure, they are more per figure but you won't need large numbers for skirmish gaming.

Good luck on your challenge.

How do you visualise the battlefield? How do you know what is where?