"Favorite Miniature Wargames-Focused Magazine?" Topic

Do you have a favorite, and if so, which magazine is it?

Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy

Wargames Illustrated

Miniature Wargames

Can the defunct ones be part of this?

Courier

No, since I started coming on TMP, magazines lost their value.

Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy, Wargames Illustrated,

Miniature Wargames… but not necessarily in that order.

Miniature Wargames with Battlegames
Wargames Soldiers and Strategy

Of the glossies, I agree with Rich Bliss … TMP fills their role for me. WSS seems OK when I occasionally flip it, but the only essential periodicals to me are …

Slingshot
The Nugget
The BFFS Journal

… as these still have key content that isn't generally covered anywhere else …

Phil

No, but I will purchase individual issues that have content that interests me. I prefer themed issues as presented in Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy.

While TMP does fill this role now-a-days, I still have an almost complete set of original and re-born editions of "The Courier."

Jim

WSS But I really miss MWAN. (Midwest Wargamers Association Newsletter- A Reader's Digest sized publication with the feeling that someone is having a conversation with you.

I liked MWAN a lot. If limited to today's choices then it would me Miniature Wargames with Battlegames.

WSS for me.

Miniature Wargames with Battlegames.

But I really miss Table Top Talk and Wargamer's Newsletter

Don't have one…

I think the posts above cover it.

WSS, MW and WI in no particular order. It all depends on the theme or content.

Although, there is Ragnarok – if ever it gets going again.

sfsfw.org/ragnarok.php

Tony

WSS.

I find that it's the society journals/mags that have suffered due to the internet. Blogs do the same for me.

Wargames, Soldiers & Strategy, subscriber.

Society of Twentieth Century Wargamers (SOTCW) for me.

What's your favorited Mr Editor?

Back in the day, Practical Wargamer, then Vae Victus, but really since the mid 1990s, hobby magazines lost their appeal for the most part. Their role in my hobby was eventually replaced by blogs and miniatures sites.

Since Dick Bryant retired the Courier, TMP is the only "magazine" I read.

Currently my favourite is Miniature Wargames and previously it was Battlegames. So I suppose I must like what Henry is trying to do! But I really like (and subscribe digitally) to WSS as well. I like WI too but don't subscribe to that one because they don't do pdfs or similar. When that changes, I'll buy that one.

I keep on meaning to really checking out the more specialist period magazines too…

Battle fleet and Ragnarok

My favourite was always the now defunct Practical Wargamer.

I think Henry at Miniature Wargames best carries on the ethos and tradition of that magazine, with a twist that gives MW its own and good identity.

Definitely Practical Wargamer. Never equalled.

ACW Ezine

Technically not miniature gamer magazines but top for me in war-gaming

1)Foreign Correspondent
2) Strategy and Tactics

WSS is my favorite of current publications.

Back in the day, I favored Empires, Eagles and Lions and Courier.

It was before my time, but I also have fond memories of reading back issues of Jack Scruby's Table Top Talk.

Rick

Since I started reviewing all the three big magazines, I must say I find it hard picking a favourite. They all do something different.

I'd say that WSS is the best all rounder, but it's not always the most fun to read. It's like the reliable friend you can count on.

MW w/BG is a lot of fun. It's like your friend you like meeting up at the pub with. He'll have his opinions, which will get louder as the evening wears on, but you're glad of his company.

WI is like the hot looking girlfriend who is ever so slightly flaky. She'll mess you around a bit but, hey, she's hot and sometimes exciting.

WSS for me,I subscribe and find it's always worth waiting for, head and shoulders above the other two IMO.
Always full of good solid content and well laid out.
WI sometimes has something worth reading, but is rather erratic and apart from lots of nice piccies seems a bit superficial, a lot of gloss but lacking in depth in places.
MWBG for me has started to go backwards unfortunately after a promising enough start. So I'd go WSS, then WI and finally MWBG

MWBG for me has started to go backwards unfortunately after a promising enough start.

Please explain. I welcome constructive criticism, but that just sounds like a drive-by.

Henry
MWBG

I'd have thought individual fire was more effective for drive-bys.

WSS for sure

I recently took up the offer of a 12 month subscription at a six month price for Miniature Wargames. I'm now wishing I'd kept my money. Last two issues I've only read one article in each.

Miniature Wargames with Battlegames
Wargames Soldiers and Strategy

Both subscribed to.

Sorry Henry, nothing personal, but when you put in an article about where you went on your holidays c/w pictures I sort of wondered if you are short of material and needed a filler? It felt like a throwback to some articles in other magazines of years ago,the sort of thing I could have come across in Airfix Magazine possibly, and while you pride yourself on being a representative of 'old school' wargaming, I wondered where this fitted in with a wargaming mag as it isn't about wargaming per se. I know, as you often say, you are at the mercy of deadlines and having sufficient quantities of suitable articles, but a piece that is mostly historical in nature isn't about actual wargaming, no matter what it might inspire some readers to do. I'm just hoping you don't go down this route regularly. Like I say, nothing personal you understand?

And there was me thinking that a short (two page) highly illustrated article about one of the most important fortified cities in Europe would be interesting. Silly me.

I give up.

Henry

Just remember the old axiom about pleasing, people, and time, Henry.

Don Featherstone's Wargamer's Newsletter if I remember correctly had articles titled something like.
"I Have Been To _____" wherever. Descriptions of ____ would be the bread and butter of the article. Thus, Henry's Cadiz article is A-OKAY by me. An occasional change of pace such as Cadiz serves as inspiration for table top action or planning one. At a minimum it provides illumination.
***
Respectfully,
Bill P.
***
PS Here is my article about fortifications in San Juan, Puerto Rico and Brimstone Hill on the island of St. Kitts.
link

The Courier, Historical Gamer, Wargamers Newsletter, Table Top Talk, and the host of small fanzines people put out. All of these had REAL CONTENT about the games, which I find all three of the big glossies simply do not have. Of the latter, Wargames Soldiers and Strategy is the probably the best, followed by Henry Hyde's. Henry TRIES to put out a good product and most of the time does so. But all the rest have FAR too much bad-rehash-rewrite of classical history accounts with no gaming connection.

TMP a magazine? What a laugh. There is no real content here and in real magazines the authors aren't dawghoused.

2nd Otto.

Maybe it should be:
What box full of old issues are you willing to dig through to locate that article? For me,it's
1-Courier
2-anything edited by Duncan Macfarlane

Or:
What old copy will you come across,pick up and start leafing through,then sit down and read,with a warm glow spreading through your system,ending up with a goofy grin on your mug?

1-MWAN

Of the current 3 glossies, I think they are all good. I currently subscribe to MWBG and WSS, and buy occasional issues of WI.

Magazines are relatively cheap. A single issue is like what – the price of a sandwich and a drink at lunch? For that money, I get a good read, some inspiration, some photographs, the feeling of belonging to a wider community.

Granted, not every single issue always has content you as a specific individual can immediately use that specific month. But when you have a subscription, and take the collection of a year's worth of articles, the content you get for your money is really good.

My apologies to Henry Hyde, however he did ask my opinion. However, perhaps I was being a bit premature in judging as this month's issue was in my local newsagents today and, tempted by the front cover picture I bought it, and I have to say that from my points of interest it's a very good issue.In fact I'd go so far as to say the best in ages as far as content goes, certainly better than this month's WI which I've cast aside for later now. I expect I'll have a post from an unhappy WI Ed now as well. All I can say is as Henry Martini put in his post above.

As Joes Shop says.
Unfortunately similar article in MWBG to the one by the same author in The Wargamers Annual 2016 which came out a few weeks ago.

I'll tell you where MW scores over WSS: Putting wargaming into a bigger context. Now take the series of articles about Vauban forts and Cadiz, for example. WSS would have pieces on modelling them or giving you scenarios with them, but MW gives you something to read and look at which should inform your gaming better. It is wargaming related, but in a knowledgeable way rather than just reducing history into wargame-able stats.

Tie between MWBG and WAS with WI in third place. I am old school and my local war game store Eagle and Empire here in Alexandria, Virginia holds a copy of each of the three magazines for me.
Cheers
Joel

I found the 3 main mags to be too basic. The only wargames mags I buy now are old issues from wargames vault, such as The Courier and MWAN, for specific articles. I'd like to see McCoy's Wargamer's Digest made available again in pdf form.

Other sources of information have replaced the mags, such as Pinterest. And with google translation, it is easy to read websites in foreign languages.

Miniature Wargames with Battlegames and Slingshot are top publications.

I do miss some of the classics now just memories (e.g. Table Top Talk).

In descending order (and for today only – bar the top 6):

Battle for Wargamers – my all time number one perfect magazine.

Lone Warrior

Practical Wargamer

MWAN

Battlegames

Miniature Wargames with Battlegames

Slingshot

Miniature Wargames

Wargames Illustrated

WSS – never read it enough to really have an opinion. Mostly enjoyed what I have read though.

the sort of thing I could have come across in Airfix Magazine possibly

I really enjoyed the wargaming articles in Airfix magazine back in the "Golden Era" of that magazine (~1966-1975).

Wargamers' Digest