Alfred Wallace: Poking My Head In

It’s been kind of a long week.  Typically, the life of a history grad student is pretty sedate; that’s why there are more applications for grad school than slots available, despite the low pay.  We read; we write; we sit around and think; sometimes we go out for lunch.  Sometimes there are more complicated subroutines, and it’s hard to do all of this really well (particularly lunch), but that’s basically it.  Hence, when things become actually busy, we sometimes run around like we were suddenly called upon to plan the Normandy landings.

The past couple of weeks have been unusually busy.  I attended a conference, prepared for and took the GRE exam, got into a car accident, discovered that my bathroom ceiling leaks, and a couple of other minor crises.  There hasn’t been a lot of gaming; most of what little there was has been online.  What follows is, as I sometimes call it on the blog, “Quick Hits.â€?

I like to say that gaming saved my academic career. Partly I say that out of love of hyperbole; but, indeed, sometimes gaming has come in particularly handy.  Take the conference I presented at last week, down in beautiful Fayetteville, Arkansas.  It was my first-ever conference; most of the protocol escaped me.  For one thing, I showed up the first day in my “uniformâ€?—jeans and a long-sleeve collared shirt.  Everyone around me is in a suit, or at least a jacket and tie.  One professor—who I know has shown up to class wearing two different-colored socks—came up and said “Nice suit you got there.â€?  It was kind of a self-conscious scene, even though all the ribbing was in jest.  (At least I hope it was.)

I was curious how many things I would get wrong.  Over lunch on Day One—I was to give my paper on Day Two—I realized another thing I screwed up: I forgot to send my panel’s chairperson a copy of my vita.  My vita fits on a post-it note; this would be the first paper I ever presented; I have no (academic, history) publications to my name.  I figure I’ll try to track down the chair, and give him a little blurb about myself—the chair introduces the members of the panel, giving their academic background and whatnot.

I find him the next day, about two hours before I’m on.  I abase myself, apologizing for not sending him a vita.

“Don’t worry about it.  I have plenty to introduce you with.â€?
“You do?�
“Sure.  You gave most of your academic background during your Geek of the Week stint.  I wrote something up from that.â€?

It’s a strange world, sometimes.

BattleLore is as intriguing to me as it is to many, I suppose.  I’ve been a faithful supporter of the various “Commands and Colorsâ€? games, as Richard Borg’s own designs or in games inspired by them (such as Worthngton’s Clash for a Continent games).  I suppose I was hoping for a “straightâ€? medieval game, but a fantasy Agincourt has its own appeal.  In talking about the game with others, a few things came up that I’m particularly curious about, as far as making the game appeal to the tabletop fantasy gamers.

I play a bit of Warmachine, myself, so I have a toe of my own in the water.  Warmachine has a pretty simple base set of rules, and you create armies from a dizzying array of available miniatures, many of which have special rules that make the game more complex.  As I understand it, most other games are on the same sort of principle.  If BattleLore is going to have an expensive “core setâ€? with which one cannot play the game—at least until sufficiently many blisters and expansions are released—this may be a stumbling block.  Heroscape has thrived with a similar arrangement, but BattleLore is going to be more of a “hobby storeâ€? kind of game—aimed at Warhammer and Warmachine players—than a “megamartâ€? kind of game, where an everything-in-one-box approach works better.

I’m also curious if there’s going to be some sort of “authorized playâ€? set up.  This is one of the more controversial aspects of CCGs—everybody loves prizes and trophies, but there are limitations imposed by the companies (most notoriously, declaring certain cards/figures off-limits when a new wave comes out, say) and sometimes the whole competitive atmosphere can get kind of skeevy.  Not many boardgames have organized play, either with or without the downsides of the collectible games. 

It may be that boardgames simply aren’t popular enough to sustain, say, weekly or monthly tournaments in stores across the nation.  I think Days of Wonder—with a few legitimate hits under its belt, and probably another on the way—may be able to make the leap.  It’ll certainly be interesting; my suspicion is that BattleLore will be a major hit, reaching out to the tabletop gamers.  If BL can satisfy their expectations, it could be huge for the hobby as a whole, too.

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