The Evolution of Fantasy Role-Playing Games - Michael J. Tresca [29]
In this chapter I lump together collectible card games with miniature wargames, as they have contributed to each other’s growth. Collectible card games took many of the wargame elements and incorporated them into card play. In turn, miniature games took the randomization and collectibility of card games and incorporated them into miniature play.
Collectible card games were first launched by Wizards of the Coast’s Magic: The Gathering. One of the distinguishing elements of collectible card games is that the rules themselves are dispersed across the entire collection of cards. It’s possible to play the game without possessing all of the cards and therefore play without owning all of the rules. Each card contains a self-contained rule that in turn interacts with other cards and their rules, creating a unique experience for each player. The collectibility element ensures randomization through scarcity of “packs” in which only certain cards can be purchased and traded between players.
In Magic: The Gathering, these cards are arrayed against another player known as a planeswalker. The planeswalker uses land cards to generate mana, each keyed to a different color and element (white, blue, black, red, and green) which summons creatures and effects. Creatures are arranged like miniatures, in a line against the opposing planeswalker. It is possible to have a lineup of creatures that rivals the setup of a miniatures wargame. Attacking or using powers of these creatures “taps” them, which means they are not eligible to defend. Creatures can die or be resurrected by other effects (Gottlieb 2009).
The similarity between collectible card games and miniature games did not go unnoticed by game companies. The “clix” system debuted with the WizKids Mage Knight collectible miniature game, wherein each prepainted plastic miniature included the necessary rules to play on its rotating base. To resolve conflicts, the player turns the figure on the base, and a display counter clicks into place as the creature inflicts or receives damage (Barrett 2003). Like the collectible card model, collectible miniature games were sold in randomized packs. The advent of Mage Knight heralded a new era in miniature wargaming, greatly reducing two barriers to entry: the prohibitive cost of collecting metal miniatures and the time-consuming task of painting them.
History
The first wargame was Wei-Hai (“encirclement”), a Chinese game known by its more common name of Go. Similar to Go was a game from India known as Chaturanga, the system from which chess evolved. In 1644, chess gave birth to the King’s game, which featured thirty pieces and fourteen military types. Despite the changes, it was still very similar in structure to chess. Interestingly, each piece represented an individual person (Fine 1983:8).
The first game to break away from the chess paradigm was created in 1780 by Helwig, master of pages to the duke of Brunswick. Helwig’s game expanded the board to over a thousand squares, each coded for a different rate of movement. Unlike the games before it, Helwig’s version had units rather than individual soldiers. Georg Vinturinus produced a more complex iteration in 1795. In 1798, he made the game more realistic by using a representative map of actual terrain.
The roots of modern miniature wargames can be traced as far back as 1811, when Herr von Reiswitz and his son modified a game called war chess into Instructions for the Representation of Tactical Maneuvers under the Guise of a Wargame (Mackay 2001:13). It was explicitly designed to teach officers about military tactics and as such has the auspicious beginning as a war game