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Hermit boardgamer
By Mike | August 9, 2007
Being someone who cannot always commit to my beloved hobby due to business pressures or wifely pressures I find myself, not unlike many others, stuck with having to play solo. I do enjoy playing solo as I wont be letting anyone down if I cannot play on a certain agreed date so it does suit me somewhat. Only problem is I feel a bit like a hermit as some games go on for ages and you get so absorbed into the campaign at the exclusion of everything else but what the heck.
Most two player games are suitable for solo gaming but it is still hard to “surprise” yourself with a subtle move that you had come up with. GMT now have the Activation Group system where turns are randomised so you will not know what chit is coming out each time and this is an added edge for solo players.
I am interested to know what other players think of solo gaming and if they have some system whereby you can create a “fog of war” situation against yourself. I have tried some ideas out such as rolling a die to determine whether your squad has walked into a mined hex etc (used in Squad Leader) plus other innovations but it has its flaws.
If anyone out there has any ideas how we can make solo gaming “surprising” with “fog of war” then let me know.
Topics: General |
2 Responses to “Hermit boardgamer”
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August 16th, 2007 at 9:34 pm
Mike, I don’t like solo gaming myself. After leaving the Navy in 1987 my wargaming dropped off and eventually went to nothing with no face to face opponents in my area. I did not return to gaming until I moved to Dallas (new job) and found a wargaming group, North Texas Wargamers, on the ConsimWorld website. With 4 kids and no space to leave a game set up solo gaming is a no-go for me. When not doing face to face gaming I do my wargaming with Cyberboard and to a lesser extent, VASSAL.
John
August 21st, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Mike, being prior military myself (20+ years Navy) and now working in the real world, I was finding myself doing solo gaming as well. Avalon Hill came up with a good system for solo gaming the advanced Squad Leader series, one of my favorites by the way; but thanks to several real life ‘moves’ most of my gaming items have either went missing in action or have became casulties of war. Enough said, I still do like to work through an original ASL scenario. I’ve experimented with using the RAND function on Microsoft Excel with different naval wargames I have played or looked at. Bottom line, I enjoy the board games much more than a computer game!!