Dice Tower Top 5 wargame videos

Greetings!

I'm kind of new to this website, so it took me a bit to find this section to post this.

Dice Tower has a 3-man group of Tom, Zee, and Sam that does Top 10 lists. My friend Bart (The Chief) formed a "mirror, mirror" parallel universe version (if you are familiar with the Star Trek episode) of himself, Greg, and myself. I even grew a Mr. Spock-like goatee for the occasion. We call ourselves "HAMTAG" (Half as much, Twice as good) and we do top 5 lists focusing on wargames.

So far, we did these topics:

Top 5 wargames of all-time:





Top 5 wargames of 2013:





Top 5 WWII games:





Top 5 Non-CDGs



About every 3rd one, we do a non-wargame topic: we did Party Games (blah) and Ameritrash (yipee!)

I came to this site originally to share the Ameritras one and was pleased to learn that this site is more than just AT. Nothing wrong with AT, but wargames are always my favorite, but I do love some plastic and dice!

Enjoy and rock on.

(And before folks start going off on the non-CDGs, I came up with the topic, so I'm quite sure I knew what I was talking about. The original name was "card driven games that aren't Card Driven Games" but that was a mouthful. The next choice was "Card Assisted Games" and then this. Since Greg says in an upcoming video that Mark Herman's "We the People" was the first Card Driven Game" I knew he was in agreement with me on what a CDG was, but he backed off of the confrontation, where I'm always one to grab this bull by the horns. So no, it was not a "cop out". The topic wasn't "Wargames without cards" and any wargamer worth his salt knows CDGs are a genre rooted in We the People involving events, operation points, and almost without fail, 3+ choices for each card (exception being WtP that pioneered the genre, but who's replacement, Washington's War, DOES have 3+ choices per card).

*cough cough* bullshit *cough cough*

Combat Commander isn't a card driven game? Wait..what?




Yes I get the point that you have narrowly defined what you consider to be a "CDG". But the definition makes the list pointless. If you say that only games in the "We the People" genre count as CDG's then what is the effective pool of games of that nature? 10? 15?

If you define CDG's as games where the cards you are dealt dictate your options then you have a wide array of games. Command and Colors system games are certainly card driven. D-Day at Omaha Beach, while your actions aren't card driven, certainly the outcomes and AI are entirely controlled by card draws.

but then you get to a definition that is so wide and broad that it has no meaning. CDG means a certain thing to a group of people. and its a argument that's been beaten to death. Is Fields of Fire a CDG? how does that compare to WtP then? Maria? what comparison are you making...other than good/bad wargame?

Battle Masters is the best CDG. Accept it.

I think there's a very specific CDG definition. WtP, WW, Successors III... those are CDG. Combat Commander, Commands & Colours are not. In our own local wargamer community (whose members can be counter by the fingers of your hand), CDG means that. There's a throng of games that if you apply the literal "Card Driven Game" it fits.

Yes I get the point that you have narrowly defined what you consider to be a "CDG". But the definition makes the list pointless. If you say that only games in the "We the People" genre count as CDG's then what is the effective pool of games of that nature? 10? 15?

Pointless??? Narrow definitions are the most useful ones!

Consider the following scenarios when I'm talking about making appointment with a fellow wargamer from my group.

I want to play wargames. The chance of him bringing a game I do not want to play is huge!
I want to play CDG. I know exactly what to expect here.

And also a similar case.
I want to play block wargames. My friend sure as hell wouldn't bring C&C Ancients or Napoleonics. When I say block wargames, these are wargames that use blocks to simulate fog of war.

It's like when worker placement became the fad back then, every game with a piece called worker placed on the board is called worker placement. Cuba is not worker placement dammit!

Or that deck building farce!

Well, I said the list was made pointless by the definition not that the definition was pointless and that's because it's specificity excluded such a small number of games that practically any game could have been chosen.

Might as well have been The Top Ten Wargames Except These 15 Games Over Here.

PoG
For the People
Wilderness War
Washington's War
Hannibal
Successors
Empire of the Sun
Sword of Rome
Twilight Struggle
Virgin Queen
Here I Stand
Unhappy King Charles
Triumph of Chaos
Barbarossa to Berlin
Napoleonic Wars
Wellington
Totaler Krieg
Assyrian Wars
Shifting Sands
Thirty Years War
Tank Commander
Distant Plain
Cuba Libre
Andean Abyss
Tank Commander

Enough, I'm calling BS on there not being enough CDGs to make it a different category. Dick.

Well you take out the three COIN games which certainly don't fit the definition and you have 17 games listed there. So my guess taken totally off the top of my head of 15 was off by 2.

So suck it. Double dick on you!

I think it's more having to do with their personal slant. I know OP is a huge fan of Washington's War, so it's not out of stretch to think that most of his top wargames are CDGs. They want to do something else so they weed those out.

ThirstyMan wrote: PoG
For the People
Wilderness War
Washington's War
Hannibal
Successors
Empire of the Sun
Sword of Rome
Twilight Struggle
Virgin Queen
Here I Stand
Unhappy King Charles
Triumph of Chaos
Barbarossa to Berlin
Napoleonic Wars
Wellington
Totaler Krieg
Assyrian Wars
Shifting Sands
Thirty Years War
Tank Commander
Distant Plain
Cuba Libre
Andean Abyss
Tank Commander

Enough, I'm calling BS on there not being enough CDGs to make it a different category. Dick.

Labyrinth

1989

Pursuit of Glory

Kutuzov

Amateurs to Arms

Mr. Madisons War

Halls of Montezuma

Clash of Monarchs

And so out of 10,000 war games, they exclude 18!

My point remains valid and irrefutable.

PS. Kutuzov sucks, Pursuit of Glory is overly chrome laden, and 1989...well I know it's supposed to be like Twilight Struggle and to carry on a gamer tradition of proclaiming opinions on games we've not played I will say it's silly.

*Disclaimer: I do not know 1989 is silly. It may be very unsilly indeed. I've never played it.

I am assuming that 10000 wargames is a number you have excreted from out of your ass.

What else does repo have in his ass? Party games? Brunch? Poop? This is a fun game!!

I'm going to create a kickstarter tonight, it will take the hobby game world by storm: "What's in repoman's ass? A game of cunning strategy and laughs." ... who's in?

ThirstyMan wrote: I am assuming that 10000 wargames is a number you have excreted from out of your ass.

Ok, Mr. Exactitude Science Guy,

Doing a search on BGG of all games considered war games and excluding expansions I get 50 pages of 100 games each...so 5000 games in all

So lets make a list of the ten best war games leaving off .36%

Again, my point remains inviolate in it's tower of correctness.

And J.J., regarding the question "What's in Repoman's ass?", the answer quite obviously is "knowledge".

except for Thursday nights when the answer is ME!