BATTLEGAME BOOKS
Minden's line of BATTLEGAME BOOKS is an expanding series of wargames professionally published in book format. They cover a wide variety of topics, game systems, and eras. All game components, rules, tables, and background material are found within the pages of each volume. These are complete games... you simply need to scan and print any components on your own.
Regular books involve passive learning; readers receive the words and arguments presented. BATTLEGAME BOOKS are interactive, in that you are invited to take an active role in learning through the playing of a simulation game on your table top. These games of strategy allow you to understand and better appreciate historical events while having fun doing so.
BATTLEGAME BOOKS are inexpensively priced, and all are available directly from Minden, or via Amazon (including Amazon.co.uk). Several volumes are now available; more are in the design / production pipeline. Each emphasizes playability and historicity... and the fun of wargaming. You may find prices and ordering information for all of these titles at the ORDERING PAGE. See also the Specials page.
Battle of Dogger Bank (Volume 1) of the Battlegame book series simulates the World War I naval battle using the NavTac game system. This 84-page book contains full rules and advanced options, 54 1/3000 scale British and German warship facsimile counters (BB, BC, B, AC, CL), various scenarios, and historical background material, allowing those new to the system to experience it in full, or providing NavTac veterans more ships and options for enjoying the system.
Masada: Epic Last Stand in the Desert (Battlegame book Volume 4) is a solitaire simulation of the great Roman siege of Masada in A.D. 73. Masada is more of an "experience" game, in that it places you in the role of a bystander, watching the events of the siege unfold. Though the odds are heavily stacked in favor of the Romans, nothing in life (or in games) is a sure thing. Masada is a fully revised version of the design first appearing in Panzerschreck, and contains in its 58 pages sufficient maps and rosters to play several games, plus short historical background articles and illustrations.
Battle of the River Plate (Volume 8 in the series) is a tactical game of the famous battle between Graf Spee and three Royal Navy cruisers in December, 1939, using a slightly simplified Battleship Captain game system. The 42-page book contains additional ships and scenarios to allow you to play Mers-el-Kebir (July 1940), Denmark Strait (May 1941), and more... 20 warships overall (BB, BC, CA, and CL) from British, German, and French navies. For those new to the Battleship Captain system, Battle of the River Plate provides an excellent and inexpensive introduction.
Torpedo Raiders: Advanced Edition (Volume 2 of the series) is scheduled to be released in late 2018. This 50-page volume contains the previously published standard game, and adds advanced options, five additional advanced scenarios, and historical commentary about the role of torpedo bombers in WW2.
Battle over Dunkirk (Battlegame book Volume 7) is scheduled for late 2018 release. It contains an introductory Battle over Britain game system, thus providing an inexpensive entry level game into the BoB system... covering the British-German Dunkirk campaign of May, 1940.
Panzer Digest has a history of publishing "special" editions from time to time, and this volume continues that tradition as Panzer Digest Naval War Special, also cross-published as Volume 6 of the Battlegame book series. Besides wargame articles and variants, this 90-page edition also contains three naval games: Monitor vs Merrimac 1862, Tsushima 1905, and Great War NavTac 1914. Each of these games has been updated and revised from out-of-print earlier editions, with all the authentically rendered scale ship counters, rules, tables, game markers contained within its pages for easy scanning and assembly. As a bonus, a new mini-game Jutland '16 is also included. All told, this issue will appeal to Panzer Digest fans, as well as naval wargamers in general.
Originally published in 1976 as Yellow Submarine (Commonwealth Games), Beatles Diplomacy is a revised 2nd ed. multi-player game, which now includes solitaire rules. Volume 5 of the Battlegame series, this 52-page book simulates the career of the Beatles in the 1960s, using a Diplomacy-style game system. "This is truly a unique game, both in subject and system, with fascinating cross purposes among players... pulling in separate directions while "Brian" works for the common good.... And yet they must all work together. I heartily recommend it to devotees of Diplomacy, Kingmaker, and, of course, to Beatle-maniacs." Campaign magazine #78
