New Year’s Resolution is a phrase that I am not sure we all truly understand….or maybe, we do. We resolve to change our lives, do something better, more often, when the calendar turns and time moves on to a new period of 365 days that we refer to as a year. But we very rarely follow through with that resolution for long. The definition of the word resolve is to “decide firmly on a course of action” or “firm determination to do something”. Keeping these resolutions for less than 30 days is hardly resolved or a firm determination. I think that we should change our use of the words resolution or resolve to wish or desire…but desire may be too strong a word as well.

new-years-resolutions

Well, no matter what your thoughts are on the practice of making and keeping New Year’s Resolutions, we all make them, try futilely to keep them diligently and ultimately fail and give up due to many reasons. So, I decided this year that I was going to create a list of personal resolutions as well as blog related resolutions. I won’t bore you with my personal NYR’s as they are just that…personal. But I will share with you my goals for the year with gaming and our little blog and YouTube Channel.

You see, when we started this endeavor in April 2016, I don’t know that either of us knew how our blog/YouTube Channel would be received or what progress we would ultimately make…if we ever made any progress to speak of at all! I think that we thought if we got a couple hundred views per day that would be great or if we had 30 visitors per day or if we happened to make anyone smile, or laugh or think about a game in a different way. But our little venture has grown and we are now having to decide what we really want to become…when we grow up. With that being said, I have created some blog/YouTube Channel centric resolutions, a few gaming resolutions and of course several off the wall, oddball, humorous ones!

Complete 60 New Designer Interviews on the Blog

I will start with an easy one! Why do I think that this is easy? Well, it actually takes quite a bit of time and effort, lots of follow-up, lots of time spent on forums, and social media trolling for a hint of a new or upcoming wargame that people might want to hear about. But, I do these weekly anyway so this shouldn’t be that bad. This will mean doing more than one per week but I will use the occasional 2nd interview as a place for Kickstarter interviews.

Earlier this year, I wrote a pretty in-depth look at my process for the Designer Interview and you can read that at the following link: https://theplayersaid.com/2023/11/10/the-art-of-the-designer-interview-a-look-at-the-process/

Play 50 New Release Wargames

50 new release wargames sounds like a lot…and frankly it really is! Typically, in any given year, we play between 35-45 new wargames. Some are large hex and counter affairs, some are solitaire games while others are shorter Card Driven Games, so they are not all the same and I know that we can get this done! This means we will have to play nearly 1 new game per week plus a few more but I think that we can get it done. We just need to put our mind to it and continue to carve out time.

We have not yet received any new release 2024 wargames but we have one on the way with Battles of Napoleon Volume 1: Eylau 1807 from Sound of Drums, which is a beautiful looking game from a new emerging company from Switzerland.

As a frame of reference for this resolution, in 2023 we were able to play 33 new games. Now, keep in mind that a good chunk of those were me playing solitaire games but we still got in a lot of new games. I truly believe that we can get this accomplished and look forward to giving it the old college try!

Replay Every COIN Series Volume

As you know, we love the COIN Series! In 2023, we were very lucky and got 2 new COIN Series games in People Power: Insurgency in the Philippines, 1981-1986 and The British Way: Counterinsurgency at the End of Empire. There are at least a few more that will probably drop in 2024 but I would like to replay each volume in the series in 2024. We regularly play volumes such as Fire in the Lake, Liberty or Death, Cuba Libre and Andean Abyss at conventions, but I really want to make sure to replay each of the 11 volumes in the series proper as well as The British Way again. That is going to be a bit of an undertaking.

The only problem we might have here is that this goal might conflict a bit with the previous goal of playing 50 new wargames. There is only so much time after all!

Play 12 Games from our Shelves of Shame

Here we go…another goal that might compete with 2 already established goals associated with the playing of games. But, we felt strongly about this one as we have a burgeoning wargame collection that is sitting on our shelves gathering dust. Plus these chosen games really contain some of the classics and are set in systems that we have come to love such as the Battalion Combat Series (BCS) and Standard Combat Series (SCS) from Multi-Man Publishing, the ’40X Series form GMT Games

We discussed this at length in our 2023 Retrospective Video and you can watch hat at the following link:

We have identified the 12 games we plan to play and we already have a plan of attack set about how to go about accomplishing this one. It is really very simple. We will play one of these 12 games each month until we have have played through all of them. These games and the tentative schedule are as follows:

January – Ardennes ‘44 from GMT Games 

February – Baptism by Fire from Multi-Man Publishing

March – Dien Bien Phu from Legion Wargames

April – A Victory Lost from Multi-Man Publishing

May – Brazen Chariots from Multi-Man Publishing

June – Day of Days from Multi-Man Publishing

July – Normandy ‘44 from GMT Games 

August – Almost a Miracle! from Against the Odds Magazine

September – War and Peace from One Small Step

October – The Fall of the Third Reich from Compass games

November – Crusade & Revolution from Compass Games

December – A Time for Trumpets from GMT Games

Of all of these goals I am setting, this is one that I really want to happen! Please wish us luck.

Continue Faction Function/COIN Workshop Series on YouTube and the Blog

In case you didn’t know, we have started several new series of how to play/strategy focused articles and videos on some of our favorite games. In 2023, Alexander posted a new series called Faction Function and dove into two big wargames including Andean Abyss from GMT Games and Wilderness War from GMT Games. These videos have been well received and we want to continue doing them so share out love of these games but also to attempt to break down some of the learning barriers to entry to these games.

I also started a series of posts on the blog called COIN Workshop focused on some analysis of the various factions including a look at victory conditions, historical setting and actually showed how to use their menu of Commands and Special Activities. Due to the time commitment for these type of articles, I was only able but only get through one of the factions for Liberty or Death the Indians. I am committing to finishing this series for Liberty or Death, and actually have the British guide about half way done.

Attend Lots of Great Conventions

We have really grown our gaming convention attendance in the past few years and in 2023 we were able to attend the most that we have ever attended in one year. We hit several main stays with Basement Con (an informal gathering in a friends basement in St. Louis, Missouri), Buckeye Game Fest, WBC and GenCon but also added a new one in San Diego HistCON in sunny San Diego, California.

We want to continue this trend of attending more conventions, because they are fun and because we get to play big wargames, but also because we want to try some new ones out. We are planning to attend at least 2 new events but unfortunately will not be going to WBC this year as Alexander has a family reunion back in his home land. Our planned slate is as follows:

Winterfest – February 16-25th – Sandusky, Ohio – Very much looking forward to playing some monster wargames and getting to speak with several designers including Antony Birkett and Chip Saltsman. We will also hang with Gary Mengle with Ardwulf’s Lair.

BasementCON – March 20-22nd – St. Louis, Missouri – Attending our friends BasementCON again in St. Louis in March and hope to play several big games.

CircleCON – April 2-4th – Washington, D.C. – This is a new one for us but it is run by Kevin Bertram from Fort Circle Games and is an intimate 3 day convention in Washington, D.C.

Buckeye Game Fest – May 1-5th – Columbus, Ohio – This is a staple in our convention schedule and we look forward to playing some games, running some events, including a possible 2 sessions of Nations & Cannons RPG from Flagbearer Games.

GenCon – August 1-4th – Indianapolis, Indiana – Our hometown convention where we do more shopping and walking around than actually playing games. But as mentioned, I will be attending alone as Alexander will be out of the country.

San Diego HistCON – November 2-5th – San Diego, California – Back to sunny California for another small and intimate convention where we will play lots of prototype games, shoot designer interview videos and have a great time.

That is a total of 6 conventions we plan to attend this year! There might end up being others added but our slate is pretty full with these conventions and we hope to see many of you there!

Trim My Game Collection to 300 Games

This one makes me laugh, but also makes me sweat as I probably really need to do this but you know I have grown attached to those games, some of which I consider to be dear friends. This is going to be hard as we acquire many new games each year, adding between 30-40 to each of our collections, but also because, as stated previously, I have a hard time parting with any games. I am a collector after all but I also have a burning desire to broaden my experience with game systems and series and then using that experience in our discussions.

I currently have around 350 games and this was after reaping our collections in September and taking nearly 200 games to trade in at our sponsor Noble Knight Games, who in case you didn’t know gives you cash or credit for your old games allowing you to spend that cash or credit on new games! I am going to buckle down though and get rid of some of my games bringing that collection to a more manageable number of 300 games.

In case you missed it, I did write a post earlier this year on my collection and you can read that at the following link: https://theplayersaid.com/2023/09/27/wargame-metrics-a-look-inside-the-numbers-for-grants-wargame-collection-2023-edition/

I hope that you have enjoyed my attempt at both a humorous and a serious outline of our gaming/blog/YouTube resolutions for 2024. I appreciate all of you who read the blog and watch our videos, the many publishers that have worked with us, the great designers who have provided us information for interviews and most importantly, my good friend Alexander! Here is to a great 2024 filled with gaming.

-Grant