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Reply To: Is it time for some more critical analysis of rule sets

August 4, 2019 at 1:49 am #1421508

limburger

21704xp

I think there is a bit of a chicken&egg paradox for historicals.
The audience may be there, but without (good) marketing and a reliable (independent) source of news/reviews there’s no way to connect. I’ve only seen issues of Wargames illustrated, but they rarely review anything.

Heck, I wouldn’t have discovered Flames of War if it hadn’t been for two things :

seeing a demo at a local convention (which also was the last time I saw a wargame being promoted 🙁 because the conventions I’ve been to tend to promote boardgames only).
discovering ‘Flames of War For the Win’ and subsequently BoW.

I think BoW have done a decent job at promoting historical content in a way that is beginner friendly. I’d love to see the coverage expand into proper reviews and more in-depth analysis of rules.
I also suspect that with the exception of Warlord/Battlefront there aren’t any companies out there that can operate at a scale that allows them to be known outside of their niche.

Could it be that historical rules tend to focus a bit too much on specific battles and therefor rarely create an eco-system that has a low barrier to entry ?

Both Bolt-Action and FoW have invested in a good starter set and they have been actively promoting their games.