"Your essential five rules sets?" Topic

Inspired by a thread on boardgamegeek about which five board wargames people would keep if they could only keep five of them.

So, which five sets of rules would you hang on to if you could keep only those five?

Mine would be

Lost Battles
Commands & Colors: Ancients
Modern Spearhead
Spearhead
Johnny Reb II

Reasons given here: link

Cheers,
Aaron

Fire and Fury
Command Decision
Full Thrust
Dirtside
Variants of the above

Going by what we have played in the last bunch of weeks and months:

The Sword and the Flame
Flames of War
Warfare in the Age of Reason
Empire V
Hillbillies and Aliens

Ask Dear Editor in Chief to crosspost to Poll Suggestions.

Mine would be:

Johnny Reb 2
Orders to Eagles
Luftwaffe 46
Action Under Sail
Blitzkrieg Commander II

The Sword and the Flame
This Very Ground
Desperado
Volley and Bayonet

Fire and Fury
DBA
Wings of Glory
Form Line of Battle
Action Stations

Fire and Fury Regimental
Age of Eagles
General de Brigade
British Grenadier
Battlefront: WWII

Not really "essential," just what I play most.

-- Red Sand, Black Moon (great for small skirmishes and just about any melee duel -- I use mine to play samurai)
-- After the Horsemen (post-apoc skirmishing/rpg campaigning)
-- Zombicide (my easily accessible zombie go-to)
-- Mice and Mystics (Something for fun)
-- Conan (yet unreleased board/skirmish game of my favorite brand)

In no particle order

Sword and the flame.
Johnny reb
Flower of Chivalry
Black Powder/Hail Ceaser
Bolt Action

Volley and Bayonet
command Decision
Mars Needs Steam
DBA

I guess I only have four.

Bloody big battles
DBA 3
Wargames
Dux bellorum
Lion rampant

Probably something like:

Starship Troopers/Battlefield Evolution
A Fistfull of Miniatures
Chain Reaction Swordplay (the 3.0 one, not the Final Version)
Mighty Armies
Warring Fleets

Flames of War
Bolt Action
Sails of Glory
Legends of the Old West
Dead Man's Hand

LOTR SBG (and the defunct historical variants)
Lion Rampant
Warhammer 40 k (yes, I said it)
Black Powder
Muskets and Mohawks (thw)

DBA 2.2+
House rules based on Clash of Arms map & counter games for Age of Reason
Fire & Fury (and variants by Age of Eagles)
Song of… series by Ganesha Games
Goalsystem series by Scott Pyle

Battlegroup
Maurice
Longstreet
Warhammer 2nd & 3rd Editions
Rogue Trader

Pig Wars
The Sword and the Flame
The Warre Game 1632 (by my compadre Captain-General)
A Coat of Steel (by The chaps at Perfect Captain)
Red Poppy, White Feather

I Ain't Been Shot Mum
Bag The Hun
Impetus
Die Kriegskunst
British Grenadier

Song of Blades and Heroes
Kings of War
Mech Attack
Necromunda
Warpath

What I play/value the most.

*DBA 3
*FoG-R
*Neil Thomas
*Lost Battles
*PBI

Some notable absences … Basic Impetus, Black Powder, NQN/Megablitz/OP14 etc. I play more than 5 historical periods so 5 is too few to make the selection intelligible unless it is simply 'used the most'.

Phil

Maurice
Fire and Fury(both variants)
Piquet Field of Battle/Pulse of Battle
Impetus(Advanced and Basic)
Operation Squad

Strong contenders- Bolt Action,BP, FOW, SAGA, BG, LaSalle

Games yet to try that look promising: Battlegroup series,Longstreet, DBA 3.0, Dux Bellorum, M&T, Lion Rampant

Christopher

A Coat of Steel/ Crown of Paper – we wouldn't play WotR without them!

I Ain't Been Shot Mum – all time favourite company level WW2 rule set we keep coming back to.

Bag the Hun – despite abstractions, it recreates the pace and uncertainty of aerial combat much better than systems which give an unrealistic "God's eye" view of what is going on and lose the element of surprise.

Battlefront WW2 – I have invested quite a bit to get a new battalion- level project off the ground (NWE in 10mm) in order to play these rules, and doing without them is not an option!

Dux Britanniarum – waaaaay better than Saga in my humble opinion and the Gripping Beast/Musketeer figures are too pretty not to play with regularly.

Crossfire
Chain of Command
Piquet
Battle Troll
One Hour Wargames

Bolt Action
Saga
Firestorm Armada
Flames of War
Sails of Glory

But I'll cheat and claim all FoW periods and other rules from the Firestorm universe

Fire and Fury (Brigade and Regimental)
Force on Force
Battlegroup series
Shako 2
Sword and Flame

Chain of Command
Impetus
Song of Blade and Heroes
Beneath the Lily Banners
Black Powder

Flames of War…because I will always find an opponent wherever I go. That and I've got too much damn money invested in it!

7TV…love the game. Love it, love it, love it. I want to have its babies.

Black Powder. 1 rulebook, 200 years of wars to go with it. That's what I call value.

General Quarters. A pretty damn fine set of naval warfare rules for the two world wars.

A Set of WW2 Rules For 20mm That Covers Platoon And Company Actions At A 1 Figure/Vehicle = 1 Soldier/Vehicle Ratio. Whether that's I Ain't Been Shot Mum, Chain of Command, Battlegroup or my own heavily rewritten version of WRG 1925-1950 I don't know yet.

Spearhead (WW I, WW II, and Modern)
Fire and Fury
Seakrieg IV
Napoleons Battles

Only 4 that are critical. Blucher may replace Nappie's Battles at some point.

Medieval Warfare
Johnny Reb III
Fireball Forward
Napoleon's Battles
Check Your 6

On To Richmond
DBA
Epic Armageddon
Canvas Eagles
Rules with no name

Flames of War

Field of Glory Ancients

Field of Glory Renaissance

something that has not been released yet

something that has not even been invented yet

Tough one. I'd probably go with:

- SoB&H (if I can take the whole series with 1 selection, if not, I might end up taking several of my 5 slots with SoB&H titles);
- DBA (probably v3, with Thomas Thomas' HotT mods tucked into the book);
- Ludus Gladiatorius (although I could probably just remember the rules without bringing them and save a slot);
- Starmada (I was tempted to go with Starfire for the requisite spaceship game, but Starmada is so flexible);
- BKC2.

Close runner up: X-Wing (assuming I can include all of the ships and the accessories, as well as the rules themselves).

Doug

Command & Colours: Ancients/Battlelore/my own variants as well.
Songs of Blades & Heroes
Lion Rampant
Crossfire
Aeronef

Flames of War
Bolt Action
Black Powder\Hail Caesar\ Pike&Shotte
Muskets and Tomahawks
SAGA

And honorable mention goes to:

Legends of The Old West

Neil Thomas Napoleonics
Martian Empires
The Sword and the Flame
PK:Field of Battle
Little Wars

Mike

ELAN (Napoleonics)
Field Of Glory (Ancients)
The Sword & The Flame (Colonial)
A Glorious War (my SYW)
BlitzKriegCommander (WW2)

Loose files and America's can scramble
Fife and drum rev war rules
charge of the light brigade
wings of war

Loose files and America scramble
Fife and drum rev war rules
charge of the light brigade
wings of war
volley and bayonet

Fire & Fury
Impetus
DBAv3
Maurice
Piquet

Field of Battle 2
Company Commander
Starmada
Fubar……maybe

Many others are being tried as time goes on to see if they will be MUST play rules like Chain of Command, Altar of Freedom, Bear Yourselves Valiantly, IABSM and Snappy Nappy.

I clearly need to bribe more people :-)

For myself, not counting anything I've written myself it'd be:

Crossfire
Stargrunt
Some THW game, probably Nuts
Laserburn
Chain of Command.

Why are any of these "essential?"

Isn't it "what you play?"

Well, the question comes down to what rules are essential to YOU (if you could only keep 5 sets).

Doug

Chassepot and Needlegun
Sword and Flame
They Died for Glory
Disposable Heroes
Charlie Company

Here are mine:
Chain of Command
Pulp Alley
7TV/7th Voyage
Force on Force
Warhammer Ancients

Wings of Glory
Sails of Glory
X-Wing
Beneath the Lily Banners 2
My own 'Sword and Dagger' rules!

I'm not sure these are necessarily my essential rules as much as the rules that I'm currently using/plan to use for my five essential periods/genres (if you made me eliminate the other 40 or so…):

I Ain't Been Shot Mum
Bag the Hun 2
Silent Death
Song of…
Some pulp game (seriously, this is a golden age for pulp rules, I can think of at least 4 that I want to try – GASLIGHT, Pulp Alley, .45 Adventure, 7TV)

QILS
Wings of War
Caveman!
Mage Knight Dungeons
Gutshot

Warhammer Ancients
Hammer's Slammers
CY6
Tomorrow's War
Ambush Alley

DBA, Armati II, TS&TF, Rapid Fire, Saga.