I am a bit OCD. I am obsessed with clean, neat and tidy in my home, my dress and in my personal hygiene. In fact, I probably wash my hands about 25 times per day. With this condition and obsession I have always been OCD about my games. Their condition, their storage and their use and by whom (I don’t really loan my games out that often!). It makes sense that I must clip my counters in wargames to give them that neat and tidy appearance. In this edition of The Love/Hate Relationship, I will take a look at what I love about clipping counters and what I hate!

Love

First off, let’s talk about why people clip their counters or “round them” as it is sometimes referred to as. Sometimes when you remove counters from their sprue, they will leave little tufts of cardboard as they pull apart. Really thick and high quality counters don’t do this as much but there is always some fluff. If this fluff is left on the counter, then when they are stacked in their hexes on the board these tufts of fluff will catch on one another and are easily dislodged or move the counters from their position. As you can imagine, in a counter dense game with lots of high stacks of 3-4 counters this can spell disaster as they shift, tilt and fall causing total mayhem. Add in that I have sausage fingers and you can definitely see the problem!

Once clipped though, the counters have a much cleaner and neat appearance as there are no distracting frayed edges or corner tufts showing. They also will better stack in their counter tray wells and on the board. It is generally accepted that clipping is a part of wargaming but not everyone has been converted to the habit. Yet!

Let’s take a bit of a deeper look at this issue. Below is a picture of counters from a recent release called The Fate of All: Alexander’s Campaign Against the Persian Empire, The First Diadochi War and Other Deeds from Thin Red Line Games. They make good quality games, but I found in this new release that the counters really frayed a lot at the corners when removing them from the sprue. In my humble opinion, as is this game is not really that playable, although the counters mostly find themselves on the Army Mats and are not found in large counter stacks. I have clipped the Syrian 5 Skirmisher Unit shown on the bottom right and then compared that to the Mesopotamian 6 Skirmisher Unit that is unclipped on the left. As you can see, there is a huge difference when a counter is clipped versus one that is unclipped.

Here is a look at a higher counter density game in Demyansk Shield: The Frozen Fortress, January-May 1942 from Legion Wargames. This game is an East Front affair and as such has larger stacks of 3-4 counters on the board. Once administrative counters are placed on units after combat this can grow to 4-5 counter high stacks.

So now that you understand at least some of the reasons that people clip their counters, I want to share with you what I love about clipping!

First off, the neat freak in me demands that I clip my counters. It is something that I simply have to do. In fact, we have played a few games where the counters have not been clipped and while it was doable, it made me a bit queasy the entire time! There is nothing in wargaming quite like a well organized and beautifully clipped counter tray full of gorgeous manicured counters. And because of this, I really love clipping them. The process is a bit tedious sometimes and once you have come to that 500th or even 1,000th counter, your hand hurts and you are sometimes just ready to be done and to move onto the next project. But I find the process very soothing and therapeutic. I usually do my clipping in my man cave while watching television, either sports or shows with my wife. Clipping counters is my chance to tune out and just focus on something other than the daily problems in life like work, children and finances.

Second, the neat freak in me really likes the organization of the counters in a good counter tray. Sometimes I label my counter trays with the various formations or sometimes by turn of entry, but this becomes much more difficult in a large game as the box just can’t hold more than 1-2 counter trays. In Day of Days: The Invasion of Normandy, 1944 from Multi-Man Publishing, the box was a large 3″ box and held 3 counter trays nicely so organizing them solely by formation was possible. This speeds up setup and tear down as you can know exactly where you have to go to find those specific counters.

Recently, I was able to clip and organize Rebel Fury: Six Battles from the Campaigns of Chancellorsville and Chickamauga from GMT Games. Because this is a low counter density system, I was able to sort the counters by formation and even affixed hand written labels on the outside of the lid showing where the various CSA and Union troops were located for each of the 6 different battles. The various administrative markers took up the bottom 7 wells and I even had enough space to put the dice in the tray.

One other thing that I would like to share with you is my preferred “tools of the trade”. As you can see in the pictures above, I use a very specific counter rounder (it is not referred to as a counter clipper because the contraption was not made for that purpose but for rounding the edges of thin card stock or paper). The Oregon Laminations 2MM Deluxe model is my choice as the best instrument for the job. It removes just the correct amount of cardboard tufts and material from the corners of the counters and also does it in a fairly simple and repeatable method. Some people like the 2.5MM version but I find that it removes a bit too much from my counters. The 2.5MM works better on larger 1″ or 1 1/2″ counters but I find that most games use something smaller than that and the 2MM works the best for me!

The process of using these Oregon Laminations clippers is really pretty great! I just place the counter into the slot, depress the handle ever so slightly, and then presto the annoying tuft comes off dropping through the contraption and onto my clipping surface where I can easily clean the detritus up. You don’t need to apply a great deal of pressure and in fact you shouldn’t as it will lead to the unit breaking over time. I have seen some people glue a dice or spare block to the handle bottom to stop it from going any further than needed but I have not seen the need to do so.

The only problem with these units is that they tend to break over time! I have owned 3 separate units since 2016 and each of those has probably clipped 15-25,000 counters. The one that I currently use has been in use since 2021 and currently has logged about 10,000 counters (maybe a bit more). I expect that it will break soon and the only problem with this is that they are a bit pricey at $60 to $70. I do see that Noble Knight Games has a number of units available (10+) and their price is currently $64.95. You can purchase that from the following link: https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147679505/Counter-Clippers—Deluxe-Hand-Held-2mm-Radius

There are also the more barbaric and imprecise heavy duty steel rounders from Oregon Laminations that will last forever but I have found are really hard to use well and a bit inconsistent. Alexander swears by this unit but take that with a grain of salt! They are a bit cheaper on the Noble Knight Games site at $47.95. You can purchase that from the following link: https://www.nobleknight.com/P/2147484904/Counter-Clippers—Hand-Held-2mm-Radius-Corner-Rounder-Cutter-Heavy-Duty-Steel-5-64

So I think you now get the point as to why I clip my counters and also why I love counter clipping! It is just a perfect match with who I am and I am good with that. I will continue to clip my counters and play my wargames. But, now I would like to share what I hate.

Hate

Such a strong word, but there are plenty of things that I dislike about counter clipping. None of these things have ever caused me to consider giving it up but they are ever-present and cannot be ignored.

First off, I somewhat hate my obsession with clipping! As I mentioned earlier I am compelled to clip a game before we can play it and that really bums me out. Sometimes I just want to play a game immediately once I receive it but I know that I have to give it time to finish up my current clipping project before moving to clip a new game. I also cannot start and stop projects very easily and like to see things through. This does drive me to do clipping though, especially as some of the games I clip are huge, but it can challenge me in the time area. I recently have been on a really great run of clipping games and since the start of March have finished 7 games including Day of Days from MMP, Rebel Fury from GMT Games, Almost a Miracle! from Against the Odds Magazine, Sekigahara 1600 from Serious Historical Wargames, The Fate of All (nearly finished) from Thin Red Line Games, Baptism by Fire from MMP and Manila: The Savage Streets, 1945 from Revolution Games.

My biggest complaint with counter clipping is the physical toll that it takes. Yes, I know that seems ridiculous but when you do the same motion over and over again for thousands of counters you are bound to have various ailments including muscle pain, blisters and callouses. As I write this, my left thumb hurts as it is used as my guide thumb when clipping. It has a fairly sizable callous formed on the skin just near the finger nail and when I grab something quickly there is a sharp pain in that area. I also have some right arm fatigue as that is the muscle that does most of the work. I am right handed and have tried to clip with my left but it just doesn’t work as well. Each time I clip, there is a slight pain in that muscle and joint of my elbow and I know that this comes from my clipping. But you know what? I am not going to stop, or change or do anything different because what I do works and there is no need to fix what isn’t broken….well, until something does break. Either my clipper or my elbow!

There has been a bit of movement in wargaming production recently to pre-rounded counters. All of the larger publishers have done some games with pre-rounded counters over the past couple of years including Compass Games, GMT Games and Worthington Publishing. Don’t get me wrong, I like that I don’t have to clip those games and can table them as soon as we get them, punch the counters from the sprues, organize them and read the rules but there is something that I miss about the intimacy of clipping the counters prior to playing. I feel that through the painstakingly slow process of clipping that I get to know the game a bit better. Understand the values and formations and capabilities of the different units. There is a familiarity that comes with the hours spent clipping. But I do applaud the publishers who have moved in this direction as it is much appreciated.

What are your thoughts on clipping counters? Do you like doing it? Do you feel as obsessed about it as I do? Please share. Consider this free counseling for those of us who are counter clipping addicts!

For now though, back to my clipping! And remember, that you can’t really trust anyone who doesn’t round the corners of their wargame counters!

PS If you love clipping counters as much as we do, you can order our Clipping Counters Mug from our Spring site by clicking the link in the picture below.

Or if you prefer, a Clipping Counters T-Shirt:

-Grant