Several times in the last few weeks I've heard people being interviewed by the media with regard to Brexit, the potential winter-related crisis in the NHS, and the drone scare at Gatwick. During those interviews the interviewees referred to something called 'tabletopping' for activities that sounded very much like 'wargaming' ... and I began to wonder if this was a new, more acceptable term for wargaming.
In some ways, this would make sense. I am of the generation that grew up 'inheriting' the terms war game (as Donald Featherstone called it in his first book on the subject) and wargame (the translation of the original German compound word kriegsspiel) ... and have continued to use them. But the truth of the matter is that what I and most of my fellow hobby wargamers actually do is to fight battles, and it would be truer to state that we are fighting BATTLEgames.
If one looks at the wider range of activities that have hitherto fallen under the 'wargame' umbrella (including map games, Matrix Games, Dungeons and Dragons, planning games, boardgames, BOGSATs), it would be valid to refer to them as tabletop games or exercises. In this light, perhaps it would be more accurate to call what I do as a hobby tabletop gaming or tabletopping ... and for professionals, such a term might well make what they do more acceptable to the general public at large and their political masters in particular.
So will my next book be entitled THE PORTABLE TABLETOP BATTLE GAME?
No, it won't. WARGAME is a simpler, shorter term to use ... and anyway, I think that I'm too old to change my ways.
In some ways, this would make sense. I am of the generation that grew up 'inheriting' the terms war game (as Donald Featherstone called it in his first book on the subject) and wargame (the translation of the original German compound word kriegsspiel) ... and have continued to use them. But the truth of the matter is that what I and most of my fellow hobby wargamers actually do is to fight battles, and it would be truer to state that we are fighting BATTLEgames.
If one looks at the wider range of activities that have hitherto fallen under the 'wargame' umbrella (including map games, Matrix Games, Dungeons and Dragons, planning games, boardgames, BOGSATs), it would be valid to refer to them as tabletop games or exercises. In this light, perhaps it would be more accurate to call what I do as a hobby tabletop gaming or tabletopping ... and for professionals, such a term might well make what they do more acceptable to the general public at large and their political masters in particular.
So will my next book be entitled THE PORTABLE TABLETOP BATTLE GAME?
No, it won't. WARGAME is a simpler, shorter term to use ... and anyway, I think that I'm too old to change my ways.
My wife describes it as 'playing with toy soldiers' - but being a girl she doesn't understand these things !
ReplyDeleteThe Good Soldier Svjek,
DeleteYour wife isn't wrong. In truth, it is certainly what I do for recreation.
All the best,
Bob
I thought the term covered all kinds of games that weren't PC or console games, so wasn't just wargaming but board- and card-games as well.
ReplyDeleteKaptain Kobold,
DeleteI agree ... and suspect that is why the term has gained currency for certain types of wargame used by organisations that want to avoid using the terms 'war' and 'gaming' to describe what they do.
In some ways it us rather like the difference between people who play with toy soldiers and those that game with military miniatures. It's the same thing, but one sounds more adult than the other. (I'm firmly in the former camp!)
All the best,
Bob
Now where have I seen the term "Battlegame" recently?.....
ReplyDeleteRoss Mac,
DeleteYears ago Eric Knowles told me that there had been a bit of a spat between Donald Featherstone and several other early wargame book writers about the use of the words 'war game'. Donald wanted his use of the term in the UK to be acknowledged as paramount, and the others got around this by using 'wargaming' and 'battlegaming' instead.
All the best,
Bob
Hi Bob,
ReplyDeleteThis is interesting...trying to encapsulate the entire breadth of Miniature Gaming- as 'Wargaming' or 'Battlegames' or 'TableTop' Games is something that interests me.
I am reluctant to call myself 'a Wargamer'...which goes back to a Co-Worker who said to me- "I get it- Your a War Mongerer!"...and this really got to me at the time....So, these days I am most likely to refer to myself as "A Figure Gamer" OR "A Miniature Figure Gamer"...and leave it at that. Regards. KEV.
Kev Robertson (Kev),
DeleteBack back when I was in my late teens, we had the CALLAN series on UK TV, and the fact that he was a wargamer seemed to make the term more acceptable.
I've had similar reactions to my hobby from ignorant people, but I always pointed out that like a doctor who has to study an illness to understand and cure it, a wargamer studies warfare so that they can understand it and work to prevent real military conflict.
Nowadays I just tell people that I play with toy soldiers ...
All the best,
Bob
I can live with Battle Gaming but Tabletopping sounds like something people used to do, rather badly, back in the 1970's involving formica.
ReplyDeleteBrian Carrick,
DeleteA wonderfully argued reason why the term 'tabletopping' should be avoided!
All the best,
Bob
Perhaps it is intended by some that "Tabletop Gaming" will become the PC term for our hobby. A trend which should be resisted AT ALL COSTS!. If "War Gaming" was good enough for H.G. Wells, Don Featherstone, Charles Grant and Peter Young - it's good enough for me!
ReplyDeleteDavid Bradley,
DeleteA very well-made point, and one with which I agree.
All the best,
Bob
I'm with you, David! Whilst I can see the logic of describing all sorts of recreational games as 'tabletop' games, a universal set of such games, if you like, I still want a more precise name to describe the subset in which I participate, and wargame is both hallowed by usage and reasonably clear. Would 'Battlegames' cover skirmishes and other low level combats, for example?
ReplyDeleteArthur1815 (Arthur),
DeleteMy understanding of the Linean system for categorising plants and animals is a bit sketchy, but I think that if it were applied to our hobby, your suggestion that wargaming is a subset of tabletop gaming makes sense. Battlegames would - in turn - be a subset of wargaming.
All the best,
Bob
I find the modern hobby meaning of "skirmish" "interesting" (in a slightly disapproving sense).
DeleteIt seems to me that in 18/19thC military usage a skirmish was a minor affair with no strategic importance but often involving hundreds, sometimes thousands of men. Now in miniature tabletop war games it seems to mean nothing bigger than a barroom brawl.
I'd go with Cambridge on this one: "a fight between armed forces".
Ross Mac,
DeleteI like the definition of a skirmish as 'a fight between a small number of soldiers that is usually short and not planned, and happens away from the main area of fighting in a war.'
All the best,
Bob
Duke Seifried (RIP), one of the early founders of wargaming in the US, called it "Adventure Gaming" so as to include fantasy, Sci-Fi, etc.
ReplyDeleteDick Bryant,
DeleteThat's as good a name as most for what we do, especially as it encompasses a wider range of activities within the tabletop gaming hobby.
All the best,
Bob
If one is being generous one could say that the nomenclature is evolving. After all language and the meaning of words changes over time. However, the crotchety side of me this is a manifestation of political correctness and people telling me what I can a=or can't do that is non of their business.
ReplyDeleteOTOH, I once described my miniatures as toy soldiers to one of my friends who promptly announced that what I did was far and above playing with toy soldiers.
Ashley,
DeleteI'm not sure if the use of 'tabletopping' is an evolution in the nomenclature; I rather think that it is being used by people who want to avoid the words 'war' and 'game'. As I have stated, I'm going to stick with 'wargaming' because I'm just too old to change!
All the best,
Bob
PS. Your friend is very perceptive!
I remember the "simulation" phase of the hobby. And, I take great pride in being referred to as a "gamer".
ReplyDeleteRick Krebs,
Delete'Simulation' always sounded a bit pompous to me, although I did use it for a time to describe the activities at COW so that we could book the venue and avoid paying VAT. (By describing it as a Conflict Simulation Design Course, it became educational and was zero-rated.)
All the best,
Bob
I play with toy soldiers myself.
ReplyDeleteStephen Briddon,
DeleteSo do I.
All the best,
Bob
I once made the mistake of saying to my wife I was bored with the telly and was off to do some modelling. "Not posing for the still life at the WI I hope" she retorted, while sipping rd wine and falling off her chair in laughter! .. ("15 - Love" or was that game set and match)
ReplyDeleteGeordie an Exiled FOG,
DeleteShe thought that you were not good enough to pose for page 3 of Wargames Illustrated? You'll just have to prove her wrong!
All the best,
Bob
The Women's Institute (WI) gave Tony Blair a hard time ;)
DeleteGeordie an Exiled FoG,
DeleteAnd there's me thinking that your wife could have been suggesting that the WI might produce a calendar of naked wargamers for charity!
All the best,
Bob
An interesting discussion. I was especially interested in the epithet 'war-mongerer' by one of your respondents. I don't think that expression is fair. Perhaps a few of us are. But there will be not a few of us who are rather more pacific by nature. I consider myself something of a pacifist - who just happens to have an interest in war as conflict, and as a narrative - that is to say: War as Story. Perhaps that is why I tend to collect Imagi-Nations.
ReplyDeleteAnd there we might have a whole different appellation: 'Story Gaming'. It suits my approach to the hobby, at any rate!
As far as real war is concerned, I am almost wholly in agreement with the closing comments H.G. Wells made to his 'Little Wars'. As a historian, I long ago reached the view that, as an instrument of policy, War outlived its usefulness sometime between 1789 and 1815. These days, from what we have seen in the Middle East and North Africa, I find it hard to see war as having anything to do with policy at all.
Archduke Piccolo,
DeleteThank you for your very interesting and considered contribution to this discussion. For my part, wargaming has helped me to see war as the absolute and final means by which one country should impose its national will on another, and that it should never be entered into lightly and without all the alternatives being fully exhausted first.
'Story gaming' is a good description of my wargaming as well, and is particularly relevant when applied to many Matrix Games.
You are right to remind us about H.G.Wells' wise words, which I quoted in toto not so long ago.
All the best,
Bob
Interestingly, in German speaking countries, what is known as "miniature wargaming" in the UK is called "tabletop" (using the english term). This has probably to do with the problematic cultural status of war related stuff, especially as a recreational enterprise.
ReplyDeleteTo be honest, I don't think it is that important how the thing is called... wargaming, adventure gaming, figure gaming, tabletop - there are good reasons for all of those term and I tend to use most of them, depending on the context and who I'm talking to.
Thomas Branstetter,
DeleteI had no idea that the term 'wargaming' was not used in German-speaking countries, although I can see why it isn't.
As long as we enjoy what we do, the name or names we call it by is more or less irrelevant to us ... but words have a power of their own, and in certain circumstances using the right or wrong term could influence the reaction of others to what we do.
All the best,
Bob
Interesting points. I don't particularly mind 'wargaming' as a term. I often say I play with toy soldiers (my wife and son refer to it as being a nerd which is probably fair enough 😀)
ReplyDeleteI like Tabletop gaming though as a catch all term...I play lots of boardgames as well, not all of which are wargamey, so I guess this would encompass things like Settlers etc.
Alastair,
DeleteThis has been an interesting dicussion, both here and on the Wargame Developments Facebook page.
The general consensus seems to be that whatever we call what we do, we all enjoy doing it ... and that is - in the end - the most important thing.
All the best,
Bob
I thought "tabletopping" involved dodgy velour seating, a G-string and folded bank notes? Thankfully, a significant percentage of those involved in wargaming are of a gender, age and disposition to not give a toss if someone considers the name (or the hobby) inappropriate.
ReplyDeleteJeremy Ramsey,
DeleteYou've obviously had a much more exotic life than I have! :^)
I'd not thought about it before your comment, but one advantage of the 'greying' of the hobby is the 'so what?' attitude that tends to come with age.
All the best,
Bob
PS. Your comment reminded me of a joke I heard many years ago. A doctor was talking to an old lady and asked if she'd ever been bedridden. She replied, 'Many times, young man ... and on the table as well when I was younger and fitter!'
I have yet to encounter "tabletopping" as a verb. But I think tabletop games is a good umbrella term for gaming with miniatures, board games, card games, and rpgs.
ReplyDeleteI paint a lot of miniatures that are not soldiers, which sometimes makes an explanation of what I do take more than a few words. Most people have heard of toy soldiers, but if I mention that I paint miniatures some people think of small paintings, others think of something more along the lines of porcelain figurines or small dollhouse dolls or the like. Some people have heard of Dungeons and Dragons, so sometimes I mention that I paint figures like the ones some people use for D&D.
I play games with miniatures, but they aren't all wargames or even battlegames or skirmishes (in the military sense). Some are adventures or are more story driven, although there is often some sort of combat involved. So maybe adventure gaming and/or story gaming comes closer to the mark for me; although those terms may be less familiar.
Fitz-Badger,
DeleteThe consensus seems to be that 'tabletopping' describes the family of games to which wargaming (in all its variants) belongs.
As I am not great shakes as a painter, I tend to play-down that aspect of the hobby, although I do admit in conversation to playing with painted toy soldiers ... and leave it up to my listeners to decide quite what that means.
I think that quite a few wargamers enjoy the storytelling aspect of what they do, and I am firmly in that camp when it comes to recreational wargames. I like to know a bit about the back-story to the events that unfold, and if possible to give names to the main characters who take part. To me, 'General Reynard's Division' sound much more interesting than 'the 1st Infantry Division' when writing up a battle report.
All the best,
Bob
Hi Bob, I wonder whether the use of "tabletop" is just a contrast to the more prevalent computer games. I suspect if you mentioned "wargaming" to many people they would think of computer games before toy soldier, board or other tabletop games.
ReplyDeleteOn the general point, "wargaming" is clearly an adequate catch-all term, but, like you, I also like to refer to it as "playing with toy soldiers". I am old enough now that my mother has come to terms with the fact I am never growing up.
Todd,
DeleteYou may well be right that the use of 'tabletopping' has gained currency to differentiate it from computer games.
I think that not growing up helps to keep one young. I'm 68 - going on 69 - and playing with toy soldiers keeps my mind very active, my imaginative juices flowing, and has gained me loads of friends. What's not to like?
All the best,
Bob