New book on solo wargaming arrived

I had been eagerly waiting for the book "Solo Wargaming - A Practioner’s Guide" by David Heading to arrive in the post. It arrived a couple of weeks ago and I have been able to find time to quickly read it. So here is my review of the book after a first read through.

I enjoyed the author’s writing style along with how the book is organised as it explores the various aspects of solo wargaming, offering guidance, suggestions and examples.

The new arrival from Pen and Sword Publishing

Chapter 1 addresses the question of why one might choose to solo wargame, examining both the advantages and disadvantages.

Chapter 2 looks the different types of tabletop battle settings, including historical, semi-historical, scenario-based, and fictional. It was good to see a variety of game types considered, such as role-playing, skirmishes, small to medium-sized games, and large wargames. The chapter also covered generating terrain, choosing forces, and generalship, discussing options for playing both sides or using an automated general. Each area discussed has practical advice and often one or two example mechanisms. The chapter concludes with a quick discussion on how to address biases towards armies, one’s favourite units, and reading/information sources.

In many ways, Chapter 3 (Campaigns) and Chapter 4 (Personalities, Logistics, and Randomization) form the core of the book, emphasizing how a campaign setting and narrative can significantly enhance the interest of tabletop battles and influence the decisions made during these games. These chapters delve into the scale and scope of solo campaigns and provide guidance on setting them up, and looks at the various types of campaigns, such as narrative, map-less, semi-mapped, and fully mapped. Even diplomacy gets a look in with an example mechanism, very useful for campaigns with more than two forces. The challenges of taking campaign situations to the tabletop and back again is well covered. There is a discussion on when and how to abstract campaign detail so to avoid getting bogged down in a campaign.

It was nice to see consideration given to siege, naval and air wargames in their own chapter 5 and how they can be incorporated into campaigns, or be a campaign in their own right.

The final chapter, Chapter 6 - Advancing, includes some additional considerations such as sources of inspiration, levels or realism and choices about abstracting them, and a few suggestions and guidance for approaching Sci-Fi and Fantasy.

So, what did I gain from reading this book? I found the emphasis on narrative particularly interesting, especially in the context of campaigns. This approach helps the story telling aspect of the campaign and adds personalities into any decision-making. Most of my solo campaigns have been about connecting a series of tabletop games with minimal record-keeping, so this narrative focus has given me something to think about and consider using for my future campaigns to add to their story. The chapter on handling sieges has some useful ideas and mechanisms which I can see myself using in some future campaign.

A book I am pleased to add to my wargaming library.