Yaah! "Conflict Games" Magazine Announced

www.flyingpiggames.com/yaah--magazine.html

Looks to be a magazine about "conflict" games, giving that definition as wide a range as possible. First issue is due to have a short game on Stamford Bridge in it. Quarterly, hits the newstands at $24 apiece.

They're due to cover games with direct player conflict, be they tradtional wargames, DOAMs, or even more lighthearted trashy games.

S.

I like the concept of not being all historical all the time and right off the bat it hits a few games that are favorites of mine. But I'm not terribly interested in the game so $25 is a bit much for my tastes. I wonder if they'd do a non-game edition for $5 or so.

I grabbed a copy of this. It has a couple of light Medieval scenarios for a new wargame system in it, plus a D&D module. Plus it's a first edition. I went $31 for the deluxe, pdf is available for $15.

I'll report back once it arrives.

S.

Downside is Flying Pig is now run by Mark H Walker after leaving LnL, possibly due to 'creative differences'.

This, alone, will make it an instant no for me.

I learned my lesson on magazine games years ago with S&T. Not play tested enough, rushed, rules a mess etc etc

Yeah, I'll buy a magazine to get the game if I've heard it's good, but other than that I'm buying for the magazine. The first issue of Battles was very good. Here's hoping this one is too.

Flying Pig dumped the contents via pdf onto my Kindle Fire immediately upon purchase, but I'll want to get it to a bigger screen to have a look.

S.

Well that's pretty awesome that they'll give you the electronic file with a hard copy purchase.

Just took a look and it appears to be very nice. What appears to be a solid write-up on the drama with Edward-Harold-Harald-William to go along with Stamford Bridge and Hastings. The game appears to be a Medieval warfare general system, with special rules and setup for Stamford and Hastings.

The Rivet Wars art has me considering it, when I have no interest in the genre or gameplay whatsoever. But damn those units are cutesy as hell.

Haven't read anything in detail yet but it certainly appears to be full commercial grade art and layout, plus an article at the very end on wargaming in academia that my buddy Tim will be on like a cheap suit.

S.

Sagrilarus wrote: The Rivet Wars art has me considering it, when I have no interest in the genre or gameplay whatsoever. But damn those units are cutesy as hell.

The gameplay is very fun, but very very light.
The aesthetic was cute enough to draw my wife into the game and want to play it. I brought home the Second Wave expansion and she made a comment that as soon as she's done with her research paper that we need to bring the game out again.

Well, I'll be honest, a lackluster effort on a number of fronts.

My first impression of the magazine itself is that it felt lighter than it should. I mean the actual weight of it. It's not high-gloss paper and I'm fine with that, but I actually turned through all sixty pages to make sure they were all there. And you can't riffle this mag -- the pages have a bit of friction to them, which when combined with the rigid spine made for difficult page turning and a bit of a handful to hold while reading. Bending the pages to riffle through to page 32 -- damn near impossible with this one's form factor. These are truly picky details that good content will trample, but they're the first thing you encounter.

Don't know why, but I read magazines from back to front. A remarkably bad habit. The result is that I came across a vapid piece on gaming in academia that actually spent time to define "wargame", one of the most hackneyed subjects in the industry and the brunt of more than a few jokes by veteran wargamers. The author may have been pulling his punches for the premier issue, because there's no content of any value to anyone in the education field.

Next thing I went for was the finely written article on the English succession leading up to 1066. This article was bringing the goods, but it has a printing error, apparently overlaying an image on top of some of the text on page 48. The top text in each of two columns is missing, a jarring error in an article focusing on the narrative and timeline of the Norman conquest. I continued reading past the first omission (I've read a bit on the subject lately so this was a good place for me to judge the writing in the magazine) but when I hit the second missing patch I gave up. A shame, because this is very good exposition on a very complicated subject. A shame as well, because handing the PDF to anyone prior to printing would have discovered the error. Out of curiosity I opened the PDF version just now and could dig the missing text out of the source code. Both patches were short (20-30 words) but my guess when reading the paper copy earlier was that the image at the top of the page had overlayed an entire paragraph or two in each column by mistake. There's no way to tell from the paper copy. When I hit the second error I lost heart, and since I already knew the ending of the story I moved on.

D&D/Pathfinder module, first paragraph warns of Total Party Kill, and advises you to tell the players, "there is a way to get into the dungeon, get the artifact, and for everyone to get out alive, if they’re smart enough." Translation: create throw-away characters because you have no control. Didn't continue. Next.

Attack Wing scenario is very short, appears to move each dragon in a random direction (and a random distance) each turn, last dragon standing wins. This strikes me as the kind of thing you bullshit on a moment's notice while standing at the table, and I can't help but think they could have come up with something better, or simply left it out of the magazine. C'mon guys.

Did not read the Rivet Wars article yet, which appears to be the biggest article in the mag. That may be a good one, but I don't have the game and didn't want to dig that deep yet. I'll likely go back for this one sometime this week.

Didn't read Roads to Stalingrad article yet, nor the D&D Attack Wing review.

Read the opening and the Ottoman Sunset section of the States of Siege article. Quite short, but nicely done. Looks like an interesting though entirely too-short game, but that's a knock on the game, not the magazine. This article was a good read.

I read the entire C&C Napoleonics article and it was good. I would have liked to see some more detail, especially regarding forming infantry into squares which, quite frankly, would seem difficult with C&C's card mechanic. It would seem to simply slow the game down though, more or less a reflection of how it works in real life. Is that fun? A good question, I'll have to see it in real life or read the game's rules to get more detail. The writer on this one is solid (could have used an editor to tighten up a little bit) and frankly should have taken another page or two to cover more details. I'd wager she had more to say but ran out of time or space.

There's the usual stuff in the first four or five pages of the mag. Editor's article, bios, etc. About what you would expect.

As for the game, haven't played and didn't read the rules yet. The map is MMP-quality paper and has that plasticy feel that gives you confidence that it won't rip or soak up unwanted liquids. The chits are small and thin, but c'mon, it's a magazine game. That's par for the course. A core rule set with two different scenarios, two different maps. What is nice is that the chits come in a ziplock, and the entire magazine comes in a ziplock instead of plastic you tear to gain entry. So the game components already have their storage solution built in. A nice touch.

S.

Hi Sagrilarus,

First, I want to thank you for buying the magazine, and for taking the time to express your opinion about it. And secondly, I want to say that I'm sorry that you didn't get more bang for your buck on this, and that you were disappointed in our efforts. I'm not going to go into a big long spiel about our efforts, dedication, etc., because the bottom line is, if you didn't dig it, you didn't dig it, and if it didn't come across as well-made, it didn't come across as well-made.

There are two particular points I want to address though, both of which had to do with content I wrote for the magazine.

The first is the historical article, and the proofing in general. Because you're absolutely right, that botch on page 48 is pretty glaring, and it absolutely should not have gone to press like that. It's not so much that we didn't proof it; we did. And it's not so much that we didn't get some outside eyes on the PDF; we did. The issue is that after we had "completed" that process, the layout guy suggested one last change to the chart on page 48. Just a little change. I said sure, go ahead. He did the change. He sent it back to me. I looked at it, saw the change, rest of the page looked the same, and gave it my okay. Obviously, it wasn't the same, and it wasn't okay.

What happened of course is, just as you say, when the new version of the chart went in, it overlapped the first two lines of each column on page 48. When I got my copy and saw it, my heart sank, because I know what that kind of error looks like. I take a lot of pride in my work, and to have something like that happen on my watch is extremely embarrassing. And, just so we're clear-- I just plain dropped the ball. That mistake is entirely on me, and I'm going to be smarting over that one for a long while to come. And I apologize for letting that go to press that way. It shouldn't have happened, and it won't be happening again. We're going to correct and own up to this mistake in the next ish, because I guess we're not really a gaming magazine until we have some errata.

And while you've already pieced it together, in case anyone else in this thread has a copy, and they don't frequent BGG or CSW, here's the missing text. From the sentence that takes us over from page 47:

"...Rather than lead Alfred and his men to safety as promised, Godwin delivered them to Harold Harefoot's men. Alfred's eyes were put out, and he died early the next year, never again posing a threat to Harold's reign."

And from the bottom of the first column on 48:

"...The House of Godwin had strong-armed the King, and won. When Godwin died, his son Harold succeeded him as Earl of Wessex. In 1055, the Godwin family's hold on power was strengthened when Harold's brother Tostig was made the Earl of Northumbria upon the previous Earl's demise."

The second thing I want to touch on are the scenarios, specifically your concerns regarding the D&D module. D&D/Pathfinder module, first paragraph warns of Total Party Kill, and advises you to tell the players, "there is a way to get into the dungeon, get the artifact, and for everyone to get out alive, if they’re smart enough." Translation: create throw-away characters because you have no control. Didn't continue. Next.

Actually, kind of the opposite is true; the players have complete and total control over how things go down in that dungeon. There is no "gotcha" traps, no enemies. You could run the dungeon without a single die roll or skill check. The whole point of the dungeon is that it can and does kill PCs, but that when that happens, it is entirely the players' own fault. It's not Tomb of Horrors. (It's also, as I admit in the article, not to every group or DM's taste. It's a strange little dungeon.)

I will be the first however to zero in on the scenario offerings in our first issue as pretty slim pickings. I've made a concentrated effort to improve that going forward-- to have more scenarios, and for a more diverse crop of games. Our second ish has six scenarios (in addition to the two games), including scenarios for Dust Tactics, Heroes of Normandie, C&C: Napoleonics, Rivet Wars.

I ain't saying all that to say, "Hey, you should give # 2 a chance"*-- just that you made some valid criticisms, and that I totally see where you're coming from, and where we can (and will) do better.

Tom Russell
Editor, Yaah!

*-- Though of course that'd be lovely, too.