13 November 2020 ~

Friday the 13th has arrived. And it’s gonna get bloody. It’s entertaining enough when we have Angry Ardwulf on the podcast, but to reinforce him with Angry Cyrano? What madness is this!?

So, we don’t just skim the surface of the awards with a few pithy comments and a ‘thanks’ that they’re back. Nope. We’re going through every category. Every. Category. In detail. In some cases, excruciating detail. Or “what would you expect from Ardwulf & Cyrano?”

Given that this episode is sure to generate all sorts of discussion from the crowd, we’re linking you to our forum thread on the Charlies, rather than the usual podcast thread.

For completeness’ sake, and so you can follow along….

Milieu Awards

Computer Gaming Awards

Format Awards

Publication Awards

Overall Awards

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

6 November 2020 ~

Yeah, yeah…. this again! Inspired by a couple of videos that the guys over a Little Wars TV put together on YouTube, Brant, Jim, and Gary are joined by David Ensteness (The Wargaming Company) to talk about the state of wargaming, and the endless gloom-and-doom of the “wargaming is dying” refrains that have been chanted by the cognoscenti since around 1971 or so. However, all is not lost and our panel discusses all the ways in which “wargaming is dying” is both right and wrong.  And to their credit, the Little Wars guys do take a stab at “what to do about it”.

With our rose-colored glasses firmly in place, we look backwards at why our views on wargaming evolved the way they did, as well as casting a critical eye on the current state of where we are, and why.  We do brush across “what is a wargame” without ever coming to a firm decision, and we brush across the distinctions between the historical minis guys and the tabletop wargaming guys without ever worrying about harsh, bright lines between them.  Most of us ultimately agree that most of the complaining about wargaming “dying” is essentially “wargaming is different than it was when I started” and, as David succinctly put it: “duh!”

we have to open doors to those… that want an open door

Ultimately, to quote Jim, it’s that “we have to open doors to those… that want an open door” as players, and David’s thoughts on the self-awareness of members of the hobby are certainly worth sticking around for.  And does Brant admit to a change in his opinions?  Really?!

Plus, “angry Ardwulf” can be “fun Ardwulf” so long as he’s out of COVID range from you, so the world can always enjoy another good rant or three from Gary.

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

30 October ~

Author Henry Vogel and BuNine Member/DoD wargame practitioner Chris Weuve join Brant and BBMike to talk about all sorts of issues related to sci-fi gaming, theoretical space combat, role-playing individual level personalities, and what goes on your tombstone.  Henry gives is a peek into his books and what’s up next, as well as where his characters and storylines fit into a game.

There’s all sorts of conversations about how space warfare is more like submarines than ships-of-the-line, and why space navy ship classes are so often wrong. Which version of Star Trek is the best? How do military folks actually behave on their vessels? What’s the favorite sci-fi game to hit the table for our panelists?  And what the heck does Gunkata have to do with tactical FTL space drives?

Also, a bunch of Henry’s books are on sale right now – some for free! – so make sure you check out his author page for some golden-age-of-pulp-sci-fi action.

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

23 October 2020 ~

Doug is back to discuss the continuing development of the Horse & Musket series of games with Hollandspiele, including an overview of the series for those that don’t know what it’s all about. Tom & Doug cover the current state of the series, what’s coming soon, what Doug is threatening to work on anyway, and how designer Sean Chick’s overall vision has been implemented. Also mentioned: why playing with 30 optional rules at once is not a good idea.  Comparing H&M to ASL?  Sure, why not?!

Also playing the role of the fashionably-late Prussian cavalry, Jim pops in for the discussion of Hollandspiele as a whole, including the next few games out the door, the enjoyability of working on some obscure titles, the elevator pitch for Supply Lines of the American Revolution, and how much Paddy Griffith would love the games that Hollandspiele is able to push out.  We talk about the old BBC Battlegrounds show – for the second time this season! – and how a latter-day version might be a fun, if obscurely unprofitable exercise.  Oh, and Jim begs for a copy of a game from Tom.  Last season, we had separate podcasts for H&M and Hollandspiele; this time we’ve consolidated them

Once you’re done with the episode, don’t forget to swing by our MiD thread in the forums for Tolstoi’s inevitable companion post with all the links you need for everything we covered.

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

16 October 2020 ~

It is HERE! The glorious, gianticus, magnificus thing we call THE COMPASS GAMES HOLIDAY CATALOG (PDF here) and we dig through it with all its coolness, its warts, its tantalizing temptations, and its headscratching bewilderments. It’s not just the games, of course, as we dig into the branding, the general feel for where Compass is going, and the fill-it-out-and-mail-it-in paper order form (no, we are not kidding).

Of course, we do talk about the games, too. Pretty much all of them. OK, not quite all of them. We leave off the panel with all the single-line-and-no-graphics listings, except to reference where a game is there and not on the main part of the catalog. It’s a good thing we did, too, or this would’ve actually clocked in at 2 hours of podcast after editing.

(Note that you’ll hear references to a 2-hour podcast while we’re recording it, but we were able to edit out a bunch of techno-glitches and a couple of waaaaay off-topic digressions that just distracted from the focus on THE COMPASS GAMES HOLIDAY CATALOG.)

So sit back, settle in, put on some kum-ba-ya music or gregorian chants to get in the mood, and chuckle along with the madcap romp through this year’s COMPASS GAMES HOLIDAY CATALOG.

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

October 9, 2020 ~

OJsDad and RockyMountainNavy pop in to chat all things First World War, from the trenches of France to the Anglo-Japanese-Canadian naval fight with the Germans in San Francisco Bay (yes, really). We discuss the Germans in East Africa, the myths of WWI, the early development of airpower, and Russian incompetence.

We also take some time to discuss the ramifications of WWI, whether political, industrial, or military. We also talk about the after-effects for the Germans, evolving game design in the portrayals of the war, and consider just how revolutionary warfare was in the 1910s.

{announcer voice} Grand strategic WWI games?  Doctrinally-accurate models of warfare?  The Bulgarians against everybody?  We got it all, right here onnnnnnnnnn…. Mentioned in Dispatches! {/announcer voice}

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

2 October 2020 ~

A full house this week! A full house of Mentioned in Dispatches rookies!  We’re joined by Sebastian, Caitlyn, and Nikolai from Georgetown University to talk about GUWS, the Basics of Wargaming class, their webinar series, game design for professional usage, teaching game design during a pandemic, and why no one should ever play Game of Thrones Risk with Sebastian*.

What kind of research did the students do for their class project games? What did the USMC think of their games? When will they hit commercial shelves? Will we ever stop asking questions?

You can find more information about GUWS and their seminar series on their website, and catch up on past seminars on their YouTube channel.  We’re usually highlighting selected upcoming GUWS events in our weekly Tuesday Newsday, too.

* he cheats

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

25 September 2020 ~

BBMike & RockyMountainNavy (aka, “Mike” and “Ian”) hold court on the oft-neglected Pacific Theater of Operations in World War II, including a wide-ranging set of topics from strategic ship-building plans to the logistics tail through the C-B-I, and from Russian intervention in Manchuria to the Cactus Air Force of the Philippines.  There’s a lot of ground to cover here, and it includes (obviously!) amphibious operations, high-level campaigns, naval yahtzee, and a couple of “what if” questions.

We talk about Star Fleet Battles (no, really!), and Empire of the Sun, along with Victory in the Pacific, Cataclysm, The Pacific War: Pearl Harbor to the Philippines, War Plan Orange, and Last Hundred Yards, to go along with Battlewagon, the Wings series, Cactus Air Force, and the Second World War At Sea series, and others.  We weren’t sure we’d have enough to talk about all the way through an entire hour, and really we probably need 2 more shows, at least.

There’s so much to cover, from Australia to Alaska, and from India to Hawaii, that it’s almost impossible to talk about it all in one show, but that didn’t stop us from trying!

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

18 September 2020 ~

Jim/Cyrano and Mike/OJsDad hop on to talk about the year in Tabletop Simulator, from just the Dragoons playing for fun to the vital lifeline it became for so many hemmed in by the pandemic. What will game companies do with TTS and similar platforms out there? How will they try to monetize it? What about digital-only content for online platforms that never gets printed/published?

We also talk about Mike’s ongoing efforts to create a TTS module, learning games (like LNLP’s W@W’85) through online play, and online “conventions” that played with these platforms (like ours!)

There’s also a discussion of the recent “Little Wars” video about (yes, again) the ‘death’ of wargaming, and some solutions they offer to the problem, including one that ties in rather closely with the TTS/streaming world that we spend the hour-and-change discussing.  Also, there’s a reason we spend time talking about The Wargame Network on this show

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…

11 September 2020 ~

Kicking off the new season, we bring in good friend RockyMountainNavy, and special guest, author Bart Gauvin (Northern Fury), to talk about wargaming the Cold War, with a focus on air/naval gaming.

We touch on the Fleet series, Speed of Heat, the Leader series, Blue Water Navy, Air War, Air Superiority, identifying with individual counters, building large scenarios, digital vs tabletop Harpoon, and telling stories in your games.

If you get a chance, please go hit the iTunes page for our podcast and give us a rating – whatever you think is fair!  We need some more reviews before iTunes will start recommending us in their podcast engine, so every rating helps!

We appreciate you checking out Mentioned in Dispatches!  Please leave us some feedback either in the comment area below, or in our discussion forum.  You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube…