Scrum in Miniature

My desire for a miniature castle with which to stage battles and play out stories of derring-do goes back to childhood, like so many things wargaming related. I remember playing with some Marx Co. viking and knight toy soldiers my best pal Jerry Bell had when we were young kids in Ohio. But finding more toy soldiers from that historical period seemed nearly impossible in the 1970s, while WWII and Vietnam-era army men were ubiquitous and could be bought by the bagful literally at the local grocery store. It made sense that we switched instead to accumulating large armies of those plastic green army men, and they entertained us for years. My pal Jerry must have lost or never inherited the castle and other pieces that accompanied this set because all we had were the vikings and knights themselves and none of the scenery. Jump ahead about four decades, and while attending  my first Fall In convention I played a game in which I had to help defend a castle from besiegers. It was a great...

Although I've been socially isolating and working from home for six weeks, my work hasn't really slowed down. In fact, if anything, working at an international financial NGO has meant my day job has become more stressful and frenetic these past several weeks as the pandemic has spurred on a massive global recession, just the sort of thing my employer was created to help address. But for my own sanity, I have made time to do a bit of gaming online with friends, including a cameo turn in a session of my friend Rich's ongoing Empire of the Petal Throne  campaign, and a session of his  Middle Earth Role Playing game that seems to be turning into a standing Sunday afternoon game. Steve Braun and I got in a game of TSR's Battlesystems (2nd ed.),  played remotely via streaming video from his dining room, as well as a go at a cooperative scenario recently released for Conan: The Board Game (Monolith). I’ve been waiting to play MERP since 1984. Good times sneaking ar...