Forging the First Fantasy Wargame

The History of Wargaming Project is a wargame publishing house that was started in 2008 by John Curry to preserve, reprint, and expand classic and professional wargaming materials. By 2015 it had published sixty books and by 2015 this number had reached over a hundred ... and the total continues to grow.

The latest publication is FORGING THE FIRST FANTASY WARGAME: A COMPANION TO TONY BATH'S HYBORIAN CAMPAIGN, and it is probably the ultimate compilation of articles and documents that relate to Tony Bath's famous Hyboria campaign ... which was taking place as the earliest iteration of DUNGEON & DRAGONS was emerging.

The book is also a follow-on to TONY BATH'S ANCIENT WARGAMING: INCLUDING SETTING UP A WARGAMES CAMPAIGN AND THE HYBORIA CAMPAIGN, which included:

• The text of Tony’s PELAST AND PILA Ancient Wargame Rules
• The text of his campaign rules, which contained the following chapters:
• Map movement
• Contact, battles and after effects
• Playing with umpires and without
• Supplies and replacements
• Guidelines on running campaigns in other periods.

It has taken John Curry many years to search for and acquire copies of Tony Bath's numerous articles, maps, and other documents and meld them into a highly readable book that will fascinate anyone who has even a passing interested in this famous fantasy wargaming campaign.

The book has 246 pages and the following chapters and appendices:

• Foreword
• The Hyborian Campaign and Early Role-Playing Games
• Introduction to the World of Hyboria
• A Fantasy Game in an Ancient Setting
• Potted Biographies of the Main Characters of Hyboria
• Maps of Hyboria
• Part 1: Hyboria, the Campaign that Grew
• 1: Small Steps
• 2: Leaders with Personality
• 3: The Rise of Conan
• 4: The Road to Empire
• 5: Zembabwei and Shem
• 6: Treachery and Skullduggery
• 7: War for Sea Power
• 8: The Battle for Zembabwei
• 9: Battle for Kyblos
• 10: The Postal Campaign Begins
• 11: The Battle of the Wargaming Giants
• 12: The Battle of Nippur
• 13: Politics and Role-playing
• 14: The Battle of Zarka
• 15: Tax and Propaganda
• 16: The Final Settlement
• Part 2: A Wargamer's Guide to Hyboria
• 1: Empires, Confederacies Etc
• 2: Large National Units
• 3: Provinces, Principalities
• 4: Duchies, Counties, Etc
• 5: Towns
• 6: Royal Family Trees
• 7: General Notes
• 8: Sample Shadizar Herald
• Appendix A: Amphibious Campaigns: Greeks versus Persians
• Appendix B: Medieval Rules by Tony Bath
• Appendix C: Micro Ancients by Tony Bath
• Appendix D: Tony Bath's History of World War II
• Appendix E: The Society of Ancients
• Bibliography

The map of Hyboria that was included in the Second Portable Wargame Compendium.

Reading this book filled in a lot of the holes in my knowledge and understanding of the famous Hyboria Campaign and it now occupies a prominent position on my bookshelf of important wargame books ... and I suspect that a lot of other wargamers will enjoy reading and be inspired by this book.

---

FORGING THE FIRST FANTASY WARGAME: A COMPANION TO TONY BATH'S HYBORIAN CAMPAIGN was written by Tony Bath, compiled by John Curry, and published in 2026 by The History of Wargaming Project (ISBN: 979 8 1747 6787 4 [Paperback]; ISBN: 979 8 1709 7398 9 [Hardback]).