Battleward reference shelf · Board game catalog
Historical wargames, strategy classics, and modern designs. Board games deserve a broad shelf: the same table can hold a Pacific campaign or a fifteen-minute argument over a route.
Browse the catalog
Original publisher and later editions are distinguished where a title changed hands. This catalog includes hex-and-counter wargames alongside other board games.
157 entries shown
1976 · Avalon Hill (bookcase edition)
Seven European powers negotiate alliances and submit simultaneous orders, with no dice to rescue a bad promise. The military rules are compact; reading the other players is the real challenge. Avalon Hill's 1976 edition brought Allan B. Calhamer's 1959 design to its familiar bookcase format. Best suited to a group that enjoys bargaining and can take betrayal in the spirit of the game.
1969 · SPI
Napoleon's 1813 campaign in Germany becomes a contest of concentration, maneuver, and coalition pressure. This is a campaign game rather than just a recreation of the final battle at Leipzig. First issued in SPI's Test Series in 1969 and subsequently revised, it offers an early example of the company's approach to operational Napoleonic warfare.
1971 · SPI
A scenario-based treatment of early medieval battle, with infantry, cavalry, command, and the danger of an army losing its nerve. Its appeal is the variety of tactical matchups within one system. Expect the abstractions and spare presentation of early SPI design; this is a historical battle game, despite a title that could easily suggest fantasy.
1972 · Avalon Hill
Individual aircraft fight for position in First World War dogfights, with speed, altitude, ammunition, and damage tracked alongside movement on the hex map. The attraction is the tactical problem of lining up a shot while staying out of the enemy's sights. Its record keeping and older movement conventions demand more patience than many modern aerial games.
1974 · Avalon Hill
The European war is fought through national economies, production, and land, air, and naval campaigns. Choosing where to spend a country's resources matters as much as the next attack. This is the original Avalon Hill game, distinct from Advanced Third Reich and A World at War. A substantial strategic undertaking for players willing to learn its detailed procedures.
1974 · SPI
Sailing warships maneuver and exchange broadsides in scenarios ranging from single-ship encounters to fleet actions. Wind, positioning, and the condition of individual vessels give the battles their character. A naval board wargame rather than an RPG, it is an appealing subject for players who want ship handling and gunnery to matter, with the procedural detail of its era.
1974 · SPI
Interstellar forces maneuver through three-dimensional space using a speculative system of star travel and conflict. Spatial thinking and anticipating enemy movement are central to its identity. Redmond Simonsen's design offers a distinctive alternative to treating space fleets like battleships on a flat ocean; the unusual movement concepts also make the learning curve part of the commitment.
1976 · SPI
A broad science-fiction strategy game about expanding and sustaining a civilization across the galaxy. Its focus is empire management and long-range planning rather than the details of a single space battle. The scale gives it an ambitious sweep, while the administration makes it better suited to players who enjoy managing an interstellar empire than those seeking quick fleet combat.
1978 · SPI
Richard Berg's enormous desert campaign joins land and air operations to exceptionally detailed supply and transport requirements. Moving an army is inseparable from keeping it fed, fueled, and equipped. Its scope is remarkable, but so are its demands on table space, organization, and time. This is a project for a committed group, not a casual evening's contest.
1978 · SPI
A speculative struggle for Antarctic energy resources pits small forces against distance, isolation, and a hostile environment. An optional scenario introduces a subterranean civilization. The unusual setting is its strongest attraction: this imagines a future conflict rather than recreating a historical war. Players interested in logistical problems and unconventional battlefields will find a distinctive premise here.
1979 · SPI
Kiev, Rostov, Operation Star, and Korsun present four separate operational battles in the Soviet Union between 1941 and 1944. A shared core system supports different problems of breakthrough, encirclement, and survival. The attraction is variety without learning four unrelated games; these are individual battles, not one linked campaign covering the entire army group's war.
1979 · SPI
An empire and a rebellion struggle for control through military operations and the missions of individual characters. It combines galactic strategy with the personal adventures that give space opera its appeal. The breadth of the character and campaign systems is the draw, but also the burden: expect considerably more rules and administration than a straightforward fleet battle.
1980 · Avalon Hill edition (original: Jedko Games, 1978)
The Allied campaign from the invasion of Western Europe to the advance toward Germany demands decisions about landings, reserves, supply, and momentum. John Edwards' campaign design originally appeared through Jedko Games in 1978; this entry identifies Avalon Hill's 1980 edition. Its appeal is the operational sweep of liberation rather than the detail of individual Normandy firefights.
1970 · Avalon Hill
Armored battles on the Eastern Front that helped make tactical board wargaming a major category.
1974 · Avalon Hill
The Western Front companion to PanzerBlitz expands the tactical system to Allied forces and new terrain.
1976 · SPI
Gettysburg in regimental detail; a landmark monster game with a matching demand on space and time.
1977 · Avalon Hill
Infantry, leaders, terrain, and morale combine in a hugely influential tactical system.
1977 · Avalon Hill
Pacific naval war through sea-area control, basing, and the timing of fleet commitments.
1978 · SPI
A theater-spanning monster game with the Pacific war laid across multiple maps.
1981 · Nova Game Designs
An approachable global WWII contest later brought to a mass audience by Milton Bradley.
1987 · Victory Games
Joseph M. Balkoski’s Fleet-series game portrays a hypothetical naval war in the Far East. Surface groups, submarines, and air power require careful coordination; the range of scenarios supports both shorter engagements and substantial campaigns.
1995 · Kosmos
Negotiation, resource production, and an approachable ruleset helped broaden modern board gaming.
2002 · GMT Games
Europe-wide card-driven strategy in which Napoleon’s campaigns, coalition politics, neutral powers, and the timing of peace all matter.
2004 · Days of Wonder
Easy to teach and tense to finish, with route cards turning a simple map into a contested network.
2005 · GMT Games
Card-driven global influence in which playing an event can advance your opponent’s plans.
2006 · GMT Games
Cards make command, timing, and battlefield surprises central to squad-level combat.
2019 · Stonemaier Games
Bird habitats and card combinations create a gentle-looking but thoughtful engine-building game.
GMT Games
The naval campaign of 1805 links fleet movement, intelligence, and the possibility of invasion. A campaign-level treatment of sea power, rather than a ship-by-ship recreation of Trafalgar.
GMT Games
The opening campaign in France and Belgium examines mobilization, marching armies, and the cost of pressing an offensive. Operational decisions take precedence over individual trench assaults.
GMT Games
Government, coalition, insurgent, and warlord factions pursue different goals in Afghanistan. The COIN system makes political control and competing priorities integral to the military problem.
GMT Games
Three factions contest Finland during the revolutionary crisis of 1917–18. Political organization and the escalation toward civil war distinguish it from a conventional two-army campaign.
GMT Games
Campaigning in eleventh-century Spain puts provisioning, service obligations, and siege operations alongside battle. The Levy & Campaign system makes assembling and sustaining an army part of the contest.
GMT Games
Four factions compete through government action, insurgency, and the drug economy. Military operations are one instrument among several, making this a useful introduction to asymmetric political warfare.
GMT Games
An operational treatment of the German Ardennes offensive. Roads, terrain, reserves, and the pressure to keep an advance moving give the campaign its central decisions.
GMT Games
A solitaire career game commanding an Italian submarine in the Mediterranean. Patrol events, attacks, damage, and crew survival build a campaign around the fortunes of one boat.
GMT Games
A global strategic game beginning before the historical outbreak of World War II. Political instability, diplomacy, and rearmament can create a war with a different timetable and alignment of powers.
GMT Games
Three Allied leaders bargain over wartime conferences while competing for influence over the peace. The central contest is coalition politics, with military progress shaping the negotiations.
GMT Games
A two-player COIN game about the French-Algerian War. Insurgency, population control, and the political consequences of military action make a battlefield victory only part of the larger struggle.
GMT Games
Card-driven infantry combat moves the Combat Commander system to the Pacific. Orders, terrain, and unexpected battlefield events create uncertainty at the level of small tactical engagements.
GMT Games
A compact four-faction COIN game covering the struggle against Batista. Government forces, revolutionaries, rival insurgents, and organized crime have different ideas about what winning should mean.
GMT Games
Animal groups compete for survival as environments change. Action selection and adaptation make it a substantial competitive strategy game with an ecological subject rather than a military setting.
GMT Games
A card-driven Pacific campaign combines naval, air, and ground operations. Coordinating offensives across a vast theater is the main problem; individual tactical battles are deliberately abstracted.
GMT Games
Romans and competing Gallic factions struggle over allegiance, resources, and military control. The COIN approach highlights the political fragmentation behind Caesar’s campaigns.
GMT Games
A card-driven Union–Confederate campaign links armies, leaders, politics, and strategic will. It offers the sweep of the Civil War without resolving every battlefield at tactical scale.
GMT Games
Operational scenarios examine the 1940 campaign in France. Breakthroughs, withdrawals, and the placement of reserves make the contest about campaign timing rather than weapon-by-weapon combat.
GMT Games
Four factions pursue independence, authority, or revolution in British India. Nonviolent action is part of the COIN system, broadening the catalog beyond campaigns settled mainly through armed force.
GMT Games
Tactical scenarios portray Alexander’s battles through the Great Battles of History system. Leadership, formations, and the differing roles of infantry and cavalry drive the battlefield decisions.
GMT Games
A tactical collection covering battles associated with Caesar. Command and troop capabilities matter within the Great Battles of History system; this is a battle game rather than a Roman empire-management game.
GMT Games
Six powers contest the religious and political struggles of the early sixteenth century. Diplomacy, warfare, exploration, and religious debate share the same strategic stage.
GMT Games
Airborne troops and ground formations fight to connect a chain of bridgeheads. The road corridor and the timing of relief make Market Garden a distinctive operational problem.
GMT Games
Rival cities and political factions campaign in thirteenth-century Tuscany. Supply, service, and siege warfare put the practical limits of medieval armies at the center of the design.
GMT Games
British, Patriots, French, and Indian factions pursue overlapping and conflicting aims. The COIN system emphasizes control, support, and alliance pressures alongside military operations.
GMT Games
Teutonic and Rus forces campaign around the Baltic frontier. Transport, provisions, seasonal limits, and the obligations of individual lords shape what an army can attempt.
GMT Games
The invasion and early Normandy campaign are handled at operational scale. Beachheads, reinforcement, terrain, and German reserves create a contest over building momentum after the landings.
GMT Games
The 1941 desert campaign turns on movement, supply, and the changing balance of available forces. A theater-specific operational game for examining how far a successful advance can be sustained.
GMT Games
A card-driven campaign covers the First World War across several fronts. Reinforcement, replacements, operations, and political events compete for the same limited strategic attention.
GMT Games
Four factions navigate the breakdown of Roman Britain. Raiding, migration, rival British interests, and changing political institutions give this COIN game a different character from a simple conquest campaign.
GMT Games
Lancastrian and Yorkist leaders raise and sustain forces during the Wars of the Roses. Campaign logistics and political allegiance provide the setting for a contest of rival dynastic claims.
GMT Games
The Allied Salerno landings and German counterattacks become a compact operational contest. Building a viable beachhead is as important as winning the next local engagement.
GMT Games
A block game about the campaign that decided control of Japan in 1600. Hidden forces and loyalty cards make concentration and political reliability central to command.
GMT Games
Explore a hidden map, develop technology, and commit fleets to expansion and war. Economic preparation and uncertainty about enemy forces matter as much as the eventual space battles.
GMT Games
Tactical battles pit Republican Roman armies against their ancient opponents. The Great Battles of History system gives command, formation, and troop differences detailed battlefield roles.
GMT Games
An operational treatment of the German 1942 summer offensive in southern Russia. The campaign asks how much territory can be taken and held with finite forces and increasingly stretched support.
GMT Games
Spaceships maneuver and fight with ship information presented on the counters. Energy management and positioning make this a tactical fleet game rather than a galactic empire simulator.
GMT Games
The Soviet summer offensive in Ukraine becomes an operational contest of breakthroughs and counterattacks. Players must judge where to commit reserves as the front shifts.
GMT Games
Six powers compete in the later sixteenth century through war, diplomacy, religion, and overseas expansion. A broad multiplayer design whose political negotiations are part of the game’s substance.
GMT Games
A card-driven campaign of the American Revolution combines army movement with political control. The struggle extends beyond battlefield victories to maintaining a viable rebellion across the colonies.
GMT Games
France and Britain compete for overseas trade, European alliances, and prestige across the eighteenth century. Peace turns build the position that players will carry into the game's major wars.
GMT Games
British and French forces campaign across North America during the French and Indian War. Strategy cards drive raids, alliances with Native nations, fort construction, and larger military operations.
GMT Games
Rival Roman dynasties compete during the third-century crisis through military, senatorial, and popular influence. Deck building connects control of provinces and armies to the actions available on later turns.
GMT Games
Axis, Western Allied, and Soviet factions conduct the European war at strategic scale. Army movement and combat share an activation system, while economics and diplomacy shape the forces available.
GMT Games
A solitaire infantry-command system recreates a rifle company's missions in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Terrain cards and command resources make communications and orders central to managing the fight.
GMT Games
Athens and Sparta contest the Peloponnesian War through a card-driven block system. Concealed units introduce uncertainty while naval operations, land battles, sieges, and pillaging affect the struggle for prestige.
GMT Games
Alexander's generals vie for legitimacy and territory after his death in this multiplayer card-driven game. Campaigning must be balanced against the political struggle over the royal family and succession; the linked cover is GMT's third edition.
GMT Games
Rome, the Gauls, Greek cities, and other Italian powers contend for ancient Italy using faction-specific strategy cards. Different abilities and shifting alliances connect military campaigns to political survival.
GMT Games
A block-based campaign game covers the Great Northern War and the struggle to end Swedish dominance of the Baltic. Provincial control, concealed forces, and several scenarios support campaigns of different lengths.
GMT Games
Competing Mediterranean powers raise armies, establish colonies, and manage political stability from 300 BC onward. Long turns and an unpredictable activation sequence portray the development of empires rather than individual battlefield maneuvers.
GMT Games
British and German task forces hunt, evade, and protect shipping in the North Atlantic. Trajectory lines represent uncertain naval locations, making reconnaissance and interpreting reports part of the operational contest.
GMT Games
Command a German Fw 190 fighter squadron intercepting American B-24 formations in a solitaire campaign. Pilot selection, approach paths, and aircraft equipment affect the risks of penetrating a bomber formation.
GMT Games
Railway investors buy shares and direct companies building routes through the American Midwest. Stock rounds alternate with operating rounds, linking personal wealth to track construction, dividends, and changing locomotive technology.
GMT Games
Polynesian peoples explore the Pacific, settle island groups, and develop culture and military strength. Limited resources force choices between canoes, warriors, new discoveries, and improvements to an expanding island network.
GMT Games
Aquatic animal groups compete to survive as prehistoric habitats change. Action placement drives migration, adaptation, and population growth across a shared ocean map; this is a separate game from the original Dominant Species.
GMT Games
Commercial enterprises explore and develop space across three eras, progressing from nearby planets to interstellar colonies. Card play supports travel, research, infrastructure, and profitable production, with a complete solitaire option.
GMT Games
Each player manages a team of stock cars rather than a single racer. Card-driven movement can pull several cars along together, while vehicle wear, pit stops, and race events complicate the team's scoring strategy.
GMT Games
A card-driven geopolitical game portrays counterterrorism and extremist movements after 2001. Asymmetric objectives connect military action to governance and international politics, with a solitaire system for the United States side.
GMT Games
This hypothetical modern Korean conflict combines land operations with air power and possible foreign intervention. Standard and advanced systems offer different levels of detail; the depicted war is a scenario, rather than a historical event.
GMT Games
A hypothetical conflict around Taiwan emphasizes amphibious operations, naval threats, and control of the air. Its advanced system expands operational decisions, and it can link with Next War: Korea for a wider fictional campaign.
GMT Games
A hypothetical India-Pakistan campaign focuses on Kashmir and the neighboring frontier. Terrain, bridges, outside intervention, and the possibility of nuclear escalation influence the operational problem; it portrays an imagined war.
Hexasim
Divisions and regiments fight the German offensives and Allied counteroffensives around the Marne in 1918. Three-day turns gain additional movement and combat sequences during offensives, reflecting alternating surges and pauses in the campaign.
GMT Games
Corps-level forces contest the final campaigning year of World War I on the Western Front. Alongside the historical 1918 struggle, a hypothetical Plan 1919 campaign explores an Allied assault against a stronger German defensive posture.
GMT Games
Five Napoleonic battles are presented in a shared battle system, including Austerlitz and Aspern-Essling. Players maneuver formations and resolve combat in scenarios built around each battle's situation.
GMT Games
Three blocs pursue European supremacy between 1935 and 1945 through diplomacy, industry, technology, and military expansion. Concealed block armies encourage uncertainty, and economic or technological success can offer a route to victory alongside conquest.
GMT Games
The Union and Confederacy contest the entire war through seasonal turns and repeated action phases. Armies, leadership, rail movement, forts, blockades, and naval operations make maneuver and sustaining a national strategy more important than recreating individual battles.
GMT Games
Individually rated sailing warships fight actions from the Seven Years’ War through the Napoleonic era. Initiative and command rules keep fleets maneuvering without plotted movement, while wind, broadsides, raking fire, boarding, and damage preserve the character of Age of Sail combat; this entry identifies the expanded Deluxe fourth printing.
GMT Games
The Commune and the Versailles government struggle across political and military spaces during the two turbulent months of 1871. A compact card-driven system makes influence, objectives, momentum, and the final crisis compete for the same limited attention; the linked cover is the corrected second printing.
GMT Games
Three games from Richard H. Berg’s medieval battle series—Men of Iron, Infidel, and Blood & Roses—share a continuous-play tactical system. The collection ranges from early fourteenth-century combined arms through Crusader cavalry warfare and the heavily armored battles of the Wars of the Roses; this entry identifies GMT’s corrected second printing.
GMT Games
Individual Union and Confederate warships maneuver and exchange fire in tactical Civil War naval engagements. Ship and fort cards track the vessels while action and order cards help govern command, gunnery, damage, and the uncertainty of close ship-to-ship fighting.
GMT Games
France and Britain contest North America through army maneuver, diplomacy with Indigenous nations, raids, sieges, construction, naval operations, and battle. Historically based cards drive actions without conventional hand management, and scenarios range from a single campaigning year to the full war; this entry identifies the second printing.
2019 · Wehrlegig Games
Players build shifting coalitions, influence Afghan power brokers, and compete for dominance amid rival imperial ambitions. Victory requires reading the changing political balance rather than simply controlling territory.
2022 · Osprey Games
A two-player tactical campaign follows opposing forces fighting through Stalingrad. Casualties, battle damage and scenario outcomes carry forward, giving individual actions longer-term consequences across the campaign.
2023 · GMT Games
Four connected historical counterinsurgency games examine the final decades of British imperial rule. Each emphasizes the political and military pressures facing governments and insurgent movements.
2017 · GMT Games
Concealed-strength blocks recreate the uncertainty of the Western Front, while economies, air reconnaissance, naval warfare and technology choices influence the campaign. Scenarios permit both historical and alternate deployments.
2007 · Simmons Games
This treatment of Austerlitz emphasizes battlefield positions, deception and maneuver as Napoleon confronts the Allied armies. The area-based map and hidden information reward reading enemy intentions.
2021 · GMT Games
Japan, the Soviet and Chinese Communist bloc, and the United States-led coalition compete across East Asia and the Pacific. Diplomacy, economic development, hidden blocks and military operations create a three-sided strategic contest beginning in 1936.
2020 · GMT Games
A battalion-level treatment of the Ardennes offensive models divisional organization, command ranges and specialized combat units across the full Battle of the Bulge. Scenarios let players approach the large campaign in smaller sections.
2017 · GMT Games
Players plan and conduct the 1942 carrier-launched strike against Japan, balancing operational preparation, the bombing mission and the crews' difficult escape toward China. The design supports solitaire or team play.
2013 · GMT Games
The full German-Soviet war is presented at operational scale from Barbarossa to Berlin. A chit-pull activation system creates uncertainty while shorter scenarios cover major campaigns including Case Blue, Kursk and the destruction of Army Group Center.
2021 · GMT Games
The Normandy campaign runs from the D-Day landings through the closing of the Falaise pocket. Chit-pull activations, weather, Allied air and naval support, and German reactions shape a compact operational campaign.
1985 · Victory Games
Rival great powers pursue colonial possessions, trade and prestige across the world. Diplomacy and overseas expansion share the stage with military intervention, while escalating confrontations threaten to bring on a general European war.
1978 · Game Designers’ Workshop (GDW)
Small spacecraft fight on a hex grid using vector movement: momentum carries a ship onward until thrust changes its course. Pilots must plan maneuvers and weapon fire around where opposing ships are heading. This is GDW’s standalone Traveller board game.
1981 · Game Designers’ Workshop (GDW)
Imperial and Zhodani forces contest the Spinward Marches through fleet operations, planetary assaults and reinforcements. Orders must anticipate the delays of interstellar travel and communication, making the timing of distant campaigns as important as local strength. This is the original standalone GDW board game.
1977 · Game Designers’ Workshop (GDW)
The expanding Terran state confronts an established interstellar empire in a two-player strategic contest. Fleet construction, movement between star systems and planetary conquest connect individual battles to a continuing struggle for territory. This listing covers GDW’s original game.
1977 · Conflict Games
Axis forces attack through central Tunisia as Allied defenders try to contain the breakthrough. Movement through difficult terrain and the placement of reserves shape the struggle for the passes and road junctions. This listing is specifically the 1977 second edition of John Hill’s Conflict Games design.
2018 · GMT Games
The North African campaign runs from Operation Compass through El Alamein as British Commonwealth and Axis forces maneuver across a broad desert front. Chit-pull activations create uncertainty while allowing the tempo of retreats, pursuits and counteroffensives to emerge.
2022 · GMT Games
A solitaire player commands an RAF squadron intercepting German daylight raids over southeast England in 1940. Individual aircraft, card-assisted dogfights and persistent pilot rosters support single patrols or longer squadron campaigns.
2019 · GMT Games
Platoon- and company-level actions after the Normandy landings are driven by initiative and an action-reaction cycle. Simultaneous maneuver, fire and enemy response emphasize small-unit behavior rather than a conventional sequence of isolated moves.
2020 · GMT Games
The leaders of France, Britain, the United States and Italy bargain over the issues that will shape the postwar settlement. Influence, domestic expectations, demobilization and regional unrest force each delegation to balance national aims against a workable treaty.
2020 · GMT Games
Caesar campaigns for wealth and prestige while the Gallic player directs independent tribes resisting Roman conquest. Cards drive army movement, political control, uprisings and invasions during the decisive years of the Gallic Wars.
2017 · GMT Games
Athens and Sparta pursue political leadership within their own leagues while directing the wider Peloponnesian conflict. Debate, factional standing, military expeditions and alliance prestige connect domestic rivalry to the conduct of war for two or four players.
2022 · GMT Games
Native nations resist expanding settlement, cavalry operations, wagon routes and construction of the transcontinental railroad across the Great Plains. Random faction order, regional control and card play create a compact contest for one to four players.
2026 · GMT Games
A solitaire president manages domestic policy, Congress, public opinion, diplomacy and crises across a four-year term. Interlocking action systems and unpredictable world events make governing priorities compete for limited time and political capital; this listing is the second edition.
2023 · GMT Games
Government forces, the New People's Army and nonviolent Reformers pursue different paths through the final years of Ferdinand Marcos's rule. Elections, personalities, resistance and popular opposition adapt the COIN system to a three-faction political struggle.
2023 · GMT Games
Historical politicians compete for party leadership, parliamentary influence and the premiership during Queen Victoria's reign. Debating bills, calling elections, winning royal favor and recruiting prominent supporters shape a partly cooperative contest for one to four players.
2025 · GMT Games
France and the Allied powers bargain over political issues while directing the campaigns that will decide Napoleon's fate. Diplomacy, government priorities and military operations are linked in a card-driven design for one to four players.
2025 · GMT Games
The Ptolemaic, Seleucid and Macedonian dynasties compete for legitimacy and influence as Rome and other powers reshape the eastern Mediterranean. Court politics, leaders, warfare and shifting regional agendas drive the struggle among three Hellenistic kingdoms.
2023 · GMT Games
The Delhi Sultanate, Bahmani Kingdom and Vijayanagara Empire contest the Deccan while Mongol incursions threaten the north. Asymmetric commands, decrees, alliances and building projects portray a century of rebellion and state formation for one to three players.
2025 · GMT Games
Two sides contest whether Czechoslovakia should defend its independence or concede the Sudetenland during the 1938 crisis. Cards and influence model domestic resolve, alliance pressure, mobilization and Hitler's escalating demands in a compact political struggle.
2025 · GMT Games
Japan, the Guomindang government, Chinese Communists and regional warlords pursue competing military and political aims during the opening years of the Second Sino-Japanese War. The COIN system links territorial control, population support, resources and faction-specific victory conditions.
2022 · GMT Games
China and the United States compete through diplomacy, economics, regional influence and calibrated military pressure in the disputed South China Sea. Card play forces both sides to advance their claims while preventing tension from escalating beyond control.
2025 · GMT Games
Eastern Roman and Seljuk forces campaign across Anatolia before Manzikert. Medieval logistics, mounted raids, stronghold defenses and uncertain allied loyalties shape asymmetric objectives in the fifth Levy & Campaign volume.
2023 · GMT Games
Seven tactical battles trace the Normans and their successors from Civitate to Evesham, including Fulford, Stamford Bridge and Hastings. Ralph Shelton's Men of Iron volume uses hex maps and counters to examine individual engagements rather than a continuous campaign.
2017 · Multi-Man Publishing
Battalion-level formations contest the approaches to Kasserine in Dean Essig's second Battalion Combat Series game. A ten-turn campaign and shorter scenarios emphasize maneuver, command disruption and an Axis objective revealed during play. This is MMP's game, not Conflict Games' Kasserine Pass.
Compass Games
Allied and Axis players direct armies and corps through the Western European campaign. Strategy cards divide attention among operations, events, replacements and redeployment, while invasion choices and supply shape the advance. Michael Rinella's design includes a full campaign and a shorter Overlord scenario.
2022 · Steve Jackson Games
Armed cars duel in an arena using prebuilt vehicles, dashboards, cards and large-scale miniatures. Players select maneuvers, manage speed and damage, and combine weapons with driving choices in the faster-playing sixth edition of Steve Jackson Games' automotive combat system.
Lock 'n Load Publishing
NATO and Warsaw Pact formations fight a hypothetical 1985 campaign in West Germany. Platoon-level counters, formation cards and opposed combat rolls keep both players involved as mechanized forces contest the Fulda Gap across linked scenarios.
2019 · Dan Verssen Games
Players coordinate the Soviet defenders of Pavlov’s House with the wider 62nd Army effort while German forces press repeated attacks during the Battle of Stalingrad. Tactical defense inside the strongpoint connects to operational support, supplies and the approaching enemy assault deck.
Dan Verssen Games
A solitaire campaign game puts the player in command of United States close-air-support pilots and aircraft. Squadron planning, pilot stress, weapons allocation and tactical missions against armor, air defenses and other battlefield targets connect eight campaigns with variable operational situations.
2019 · Academy Games
Squad- and vehicle-level forces fight the opening battles of Operation Barbarossa on geomorphic maps. The third edition uses an action-point system, firefight scenarios and revised living rules to model the changing initiative and short, violent engagements of tactical combat.
2020 · Fort Circle Games
Two players direct the United States and Tripolitania through the First Barbary War. Card-driven events connect naval movement, piracy, diplomacy, land operations and battles in a low-complexity design that also includes solitaire rules.
2024 · Osprey Games
Corporate security forces and a mining collective fight for control of Callisto's resources with infantry, industrial vehicles and reawakened mechs. This standalone Undaunted design adapts deck-building and battlefield control to science fiction, with linked scenarios and solo, two-player and four-player modes.
2018 · Hollandspiele
Justice and Oppression contend over slavery in the decades before the American Civil War. A face-up card display, political capital and a shared sequence of actions make each side's choices shape the other's opportunities in a two-player design that also supports playing both sides solitaire.
2024 · Compass Games
Six rival kingdoms fight across four linked maps in scenarios ranging from evening battles to decade-long campaigns. The basic game emphasizes movement, terrain, recruitment and alliances, while the advanced rules add heroes, monsters, magic and powerful artifacts.
2024 · GMT Games
Four factions contest the future of a settled Mars through political organization, protest, security operations and armed revolt. The twelfth COIN Series design adapts asymmetric action selection, shifting support and non-player systems to a science-fiction conflict over Martian independence and corporate rule.
1967 · Ideal Toy Corporation
Players leave Earth, visit the three planets assigned by a mission card and race home. Numbered fuel cards control orthogonal movement across the grid, while planetary stops and movable fuel ships replenish spent cards. This licensed family game was the first published Star Trek board game and the only one released while the original television series was still in production; it is a race game rather than a tactical starship simulation.
2024 · Catalyst Game Labs
Two forces of BattleMechs maneuver across mapped terrain, manage heat and weapon ranges, and trade damage across armor locations and internal systems. This 40th Anniversary boxed edition combines eight assembled miniatures with maps, record sheets, rules and introductory setting material for the contemporary tabletop game.
2022 · Avalon Hill / Hasbro
Explorers reveal a different haunted mansion room by room, gathering items and surviving ominous events until a haunt transforms the cooperative exploration into one of fifty scenarios. The third edition uses scenario cards, revised rules and new characters to determine how the traitor, heroes and house interact.
2018 · GMT Games
Unionist and Secessionist players contest political capital across the armaments, secession, public-opinion and political dimensions of the crisis that preceded the American Civil War. Three compact rounds of card-driven area control culminate in a Final Crisis, where cards reserved during play determine the last political confrontation.
2023 · Hegemonic Project Games
Players guide the working, middle or capitalist class, or the state itself, through an asymmetric simulation of a modern nation. Companies, wages, taxation, trade, public services, strikes, unions and proposed policies link each class's economic choices to the shifting political balance.
2022 · Wehrlegig Games
Players occupy offices within the British East India Company and collectively steer its sprawling bureaucracy while pursuing their own family fortunes. Trade, military expeditions, appointments, patronage and political consequences make cooperation necessary even as each family competes to benefit from the Company's rise or decline.
1986 · H. P. Gibsons (original edition)
Several peoples rise, migrate, fight, and decline across sixteen turns spanning the Roman invasion through the Norman Conquest. Each player controls multiple nations with different periods of strength and historical scoring opportunities, so success depends on balancing immediate survival against points that may not become available for centuries.
1975 · Metagaming Concepts · original edition
Exploration, colonies, industry, research, and fleets form one strategic contest. The early Metagaming game rewards long-range planning and an interest in the economy behind a war; bookkeeping and a gradual buildup require patience. Initial publication is variously dated 1974 or 1975.
1977 · Metagaming Concepts · original MicroGame
One cybernetic tank advances against an army defending a command post. Target selection and sacrifice give both sides distinctive problems. This review focuses on the original compact game, rather than the contents of later editions.
1977 · Metagaming Concepts
Strength, Dexterity, equipment, and positioning create meaningful choices in a compact game of individual combat. Reviewed together with Wizard, its compatible magical companion and a foundation of The Fantasy Trip.
1978 · Metagaming Concepts
Intelligence and magic expand the physical contest established in Melee. Character construction and spell resources give the duels their interest. Reviewed alongside Melee, with the later role-playing framework distinguished from these original combat games.
1979 · Task Force Games · original pocket edition
Ships are represented by compact rows of system letters, tying construction and damage tracking to fleet combat. The original tactical game is an appealing design study; later strategic expansions and editions need separate assessments.
1979 · Task Force Games / Amarillo Design Bureau
Command individual starships, squadrons, or fleets through detailed energy allocation, impulse movement, shield management, weapons fire, and damage to specific systems. The 1979 pocket game grew into an extensive tactical system and a distinct Star Fleet Universe based on the original Star Trek television era under license.
1979 · Task Force Games
Human and Cetian forces contest an alien planet, with special forces disrupting military infrastructure. Its ambitious setting deserves attention, alongside published criticism of slow movement and limited strategic opportunities.
A curated starting catalog, expanding over time. Entries identify the named release; later editions may have different publishers and dates.
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