"Identity and Moral Dimensions" Topic

Have you changed over the years? I know I have and I've spent probably too much time musing over why I have built the armies I have and why I continue to play with some of them. By way of a perspective snap-shot – I am 48, male (perhaps obvious here) technically still married with two daughters who won't be taking up this hobby. Moving on, QUESTION: How important is it that you identify with a particular army and the cause it fought for?
I think it is becoming more important to me or, at least I'm consciously assessing it more than I used to. I believe I always had to but it was a decision made subconsciously – that is to say, unthinkingly.
When looking at the English Civil War, whilst I only have a rudimentary collection as yet unpainted, I could never build a Royalist Army. Whilst I only became a firm republican (Australian) in the last two years, perhaps it was always in me somewhere. I have always identified more with the Parliamentary forces and the figure of Cromwell ever since I possessed the Ladybird book on the man. I could build a Royalist army but only to play against a Parliamentary one I had first built.
My mid-seventeenth century ‘Dutch Wars' army is Dutch because I identify with the struggle for independence and for them the war was a win or lose at all costs. My WSS army is British/Dutch primarily because my heritage is British but also because they were fighting to resist the supremacy of the French Catholic superpower. I also am an atheist with feint protestant heritage and am inclined against religious orthodoxy so when religion is a principle organizing factor in a war, I am not going to identify with a Catholic army. Let me clarify by saying I am sure the hard-line puritanical Cromwellians were bloody awful.
I think for me there is a hierarchy of considerations. There is no philosophical preference for either side in the Franco-Prussian War (I think they were as bad as each other) and I am building the French purely on the romanticism of their uniforms. I believe most wars are caused through deeply cynical and more often than not, bloody-minded motives of decision- makers. So, when it comes to my love of the Napoleonic Wars, I find no side has the moral high ground so am happy to build my British royals armies in their efforts to maintain a wretched status-quo against the equally wretched French imperialism (regardless of their pretentions).
I tend to build both sides in my WWII armies but admit to a bias when it comes to the German blitzkrieg of 1940. I have an enduring fascination with early war Wehrmacht uniforms and equipment which goes against everything I have just written (damn and blast). I do draw the line at SS units if that makes any difference. Then again, I love the early desert Italian and British kit because it was crap – when designs were more experimental and transitional from pre-war technology before the relative standardization of the war's end.
I think much of my attraction to this period or than and one army over another comes down to romanticism – the brilliant recollection of the past through a rosy lens. Being the age I am, I grew up with tales of Custer and the 7th Cavalry (amongst many). Yes, that genocidal, nasty fame and fortune seeker with the worst type of blood on his hands. When I was younger, his stories were still related with the colour of heroism, nobility and tragedy. Whilst that veil is well and truly lifted, why does a part of me still want to re-fight his last campaign? Perhaps I tend to revere more the martial exploits of Crazy Horse and the Lakota (challenging as their paint jobs would be) but I still have some false sense of identification with the dead on Little Big Horn.
QUESTION: Have you got any armies which you no longer identify with?

I play with toy soldiers. I like history and painting figures. I enjoy this hobby.

That's about as much thought as I put into it.

First answer: Not at all.

Second question: No. See above.

DM

You have too much time on your hands. Its meant to be an enjoyable hobby, don't over think it. I am 64, been gaming for better than 40 years, it keeps me sane.

QUESTION: Have you got any armies which you no longer identify with?

Yes. After a lot of soul searching I've finally decided to stop identifying with Tyranids. Genestealer Cultists is more where my sympathies lie now.

I play with armies if their period interests me. Very few armies fought for causes that I would refuse to play (but there are some).

The horror of war seriously appals me. I enjoy my wargaming and I have total disconnect between those two things. I think there are people outside the hobby who might find that strange.

Greetings

The identity of forces I build and play with has nothing to do with my own political and ethical outlook but all to do with historical interest and perceived (game) tactical challenges.

That said I am cautious around modern counter insurgency.

Regards

Edward

When I was younger (really, a very long time ago), I had all sorts of strong opinions on all sorts of things, which also informed my gaming choices and armies I would/wouldn't play.

These days, I really don't care. I've even played WW2 Japanese, although my father would never forgive me if he knew.

I reckon people think too much, it's just a game. I've said it loads of times on here, 10 infantry tours of Afghanistan and Iraq, I'll happily play as Taliban or Republican Guard, so what, no one gets hurt.

…what they said. :) This is toy soldiers--actually getting shot at with live ammo is something else entirely. A "good thing"<tm>

somebody has to play the bad guys

When I was young I identified with different armies. Now it just don't matter.

Dear Unlucky General

You have reached a point in your life, dare I say "midpoint in our three score and ten" where you have begun to do philosophy, which as one of my professors once said was simple pondering "What do I mean when I say what I mean and what do I do when I do what I do." It's a stage we all get to where we begin to evaluate the verities by which we govern our life. I went that way about 20 years ago, and in your "passage through that dark wood" look around you'll see my empties. It also is a stage most gamers simply can't face because it is first of all uncomfortable, and second, indicting. "Why do we like what we like?"

I recall a game at Historicon once where I commanded an SS Kampfgruppe with artillery and Whermacht support attempting to take this Russian Village in 1941. I won a smashing victory and was congratulated by the GM. I said to him "I don't think I deserve much congratulation." He asked why, and I took two trucks out of his boxes of vehicles and put them on the road at the edge of the table. "What is going to happen in that village tonight?" He looked at me with a blank stare of incomprehension. I pointed to the trucks. "This is the Sonderaktion team" which tonight will go through the village, separate all the Jews and lead them off to be murdered, the men to be slave laborers in Germany, and the women and children??" I recall he said to me "Oh, you can't think about that!" My response was "Oh! Really! Well, obviously with a name like Otto Schmidt I'm of Austro-German descent, and I rather think that's how we got into all this trouble in the first place-- by not thinking about it."

Now… granted, as Don Featherstone said, when we game our games we create no little lead widows and orphans, and I have long maintained that the game is but a game and has absolutely no relation to real war; or if it does, it is the same relation as masquers at a Carnival have to the real life entities they deck themselves out as. Wargame figures are merely tokens and bear no mystical paradigmatical relationships to their prototype. They are little lumps of lead and plastic to which we ascribe mathematical values, which are the heart of the game.

Thus you could use any figures of any period to play any period you wished. I often talk about making game of Russians Versus Mongols. Only while the stands of Mongol Horse archers are Mongol Horse Archers the analogous stands of heavy cavalry on the other side (with exactly the same stats by which the game is played ) are Russian T-34 tanks. The Mongol foot archers are machine guns on the Russian side and so forth. This then prompts howls of protest from the other side who somehow see this as wrong, and which then assert that there IS some sort of spiritual connection a paradigmatic link between what we have on the table top and what we had in real life. Once you assert that, you put the two little trucks on the table. Let the Sonderaktion begin.

I read what you write and I understand fully what you call "Identification" is simply "likes." You like this guy over the other. That's entirely fine. I admit, Pantalons rouge is prettier than blue on blue. But remember that the term "like" allows you to partially accept some things and reject others.

Myself I solved all moral dilemmas by going entirely to Imagi-natons. In my World War Two game the powers are "Fahrvergnuggen or the 7 3/4 Reigh" or "The Workers Winter Wonderland of Freeland" or "The Newnited States."

guess who?

They are modeled on the powers of WWII transmuted into what they would be like if Mel Brooks, Graucho Marks, or the Three Stooges or Charlie Chaplin were God (and O who of us can forget those Stooges episodes purloined from "I'll never Heil again." Hungland and the Brutism Empire is a send off as to what England would have been like had Edward VIII and Wallace Simpson gotten to the throne. In short, a Max Lubitsch film, a screwball comedy about the penultimate paradigm of a upper class English Twit and the ultimate American Gold digger.

It is also one of the reasons I do all my gaming in the 18th Century. Here we have a veritable burlesque of everything. Bumbling generals, brilliant feldwebels, scheming maids, lascivious countess', dashing highwaymen and Pirates who are actually noblemen switched at birth, bumptious barbers, every thing topsy-turvy, dancing peasants, Kings over the water, hidden since birth, over the river and through the woods, beautiful maidens in distress and absolutely fabulous involved silly plots such as would do any Opera proud and provide a new hit play for Messers G&S.

The point is that in whatever time period THESE people will not do atrocity. THESE people will wind up like the Pasha in I'Italieri I Algieri" or Baron Ochs in "Die Rosenkavalier" or "Cherubino in "La Nozze di Figaro" and so on.

So I understand where you are going and I have posted the same question on TMP many times before. The starlings gather round to croak and complain. But, beware, the peanuts are poisoned.

By the way, if you like philosophizing this way, we do a lot of it on "The Society of Daisy" My Yahoo group which is dedicated to Imagi-Natons, humor, whimsy, and friendship in games. We range all over the place there, from serious discussions to hobby news and battle reports and ideas about games and Imagi-Nations. But don't worry, when we get too high-falutin, some one will always takes down to the gutter with a discussion of whos females has the best racks, Klingons, Romulans, Vulcans, or Earth babes.

The questions you are pondering and the issues you are facing are important, good, and improving to ones character. By considering them you grow.

I leave you with that assertion Mozart made to Franz Joseph in "Amadeus."

"Be honest your majesty, wouldn't you rather listen to your hair dresser than Hercules?"

Well, Otto, that was entertaining. Which shows my age and the amount of free time I have….

As far as morality goes: Every person must decide for themselves what they feel is okay.

That's their decision and not anyone else's to make.

I've known old geezers who served in Vietnam and refuse to game it (or moderns). I also knew a guy who not only served but exclusively played the VC/NVA.

On a personal level, there are some periods I don't have any identity with and some I do, often for random reasons.
I'll play most armies.
I don't think I've ever played SS types in miniature, but I think I have in video games.

I'll go through periods where I tend to play one nation or another. If in doubt, I'll go for whoever lost historically :)
I do tend to lean towards playing the Reds if that's an option, so there's that.

As far as personal morality, I don't play colonial games because to me, personally, it's not something I find enjoyment in.

Have I changed over the years? Yes.

Has that had any effect on "why I build & play with the armies I do" ?

Not in the slightest.

Way back when, my friends had Fantasy forces and played Fantasy games.
Accordingly, I bought Fantasy figures.
Because then… I could join in the games.

When my circle of acquaintance expanded to include people who played other games, I collected forces for campaigns which were being actively gamed and which I enjoyed playing.

In short – then and now – I buy toy soldiers to play games with.
Their potential for tabletop use is the deciding factor.
Wouldn't matter if I was a rampant closet Confederate. If Somebody at the club would like to play ACW and already has Confederates: I'd be buying Feds.

Conversely – if I WERE a rampant closet Confederate, but nobody I knew was interested in playing ACW… I wouldn't be interested in buying a Confederate force.

Of course there were some historical forces which are more closely aligned to my own moral and/or political viewpoints than others. So what?
I have never felt the need to reflect my personal sympathies/antipathies on the wargames table at all, and to be perfectly frank, I've never understood why some people feel the need to.

Do you think agnostic chess players agonize about whether to leave out the Bishops?

Do you think agnostic chess players agonize about whether to leave out the Bishops?

My understanding is die-hard republicans don't play at all.

Great post Norm & long live pragmatism!

QUESTION: Have you got any armies which you no longer identify with?

I enjoyed the discussion, though I have never identified with an entire army… More a long the lines of some of the individuals, some generals. The 30mm Neapolitan Army I had of course included a gaggle of mistresses headed by Contessa Venetia and of course the leopard-skinned saddles for Murat.

I sold the army to go to graduate schoo1 and I changed, but kept the contessa and Murat. I never stored them together. I came back to Napoleonics with 15mm and 6mm. I'm shorter now too.