Best Print & Play Historical Wargames
-
This list groups historical, quality wargames available for download, print and play.
It only includes games covering historical military conflicts and using hex maps most of the time...
The Quality criteria is a BGG rating of 6.90+. Games are listed by number of rating.
To sum it up: if you are looking for a good wargame to play right now, here is what is available to you just one click away...
Print & play historical wargames lists:
Best wargames: www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/18923
Average wargames: www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/19262
Poor games: www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/37849
Unrated wargames: www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/22215
FREE P&P Historical Wargames: www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/23887
-
 -
Lock 'N Load: Forgotten Heroes Vietnam is a fast moving, fun to play, tactical level game of small unit actions in the Vietnam War. While players will find it to be an accurate depiction of squad level combat you won't have to wade through a hundred pages of rules to play. In fact, you'll be up and playing after reading less than a dozen pages of rules!"
Availability: http://locknloadgame.com/_store/DeptProduct.asp?DeptID=1003&...
Price: $14.99
Printing/mounting weight: Medium (5 colorful maps) 
Number of ratings: 2021
-
-
 -
The game places you in command of the pilots and aircraft of a modern day squadron of U.S. Navy F/A-18 Hornet Strike fighters.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com
Price: 14.99$
Printing/mounting weight: Very heavy 
Number of ratings: 90
-
-
 -
To The Last Man! is a strategic level wargame of World War 1 covering all aspects of the western front.
Availability: http://landships.free.fr/TTLM/download.html
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Medium
Number of ratings: 34
-
-
 -
Corsair Leader is based on the Hornet Leader II core game, but with some significant changes. The game focuses on the Marine F4U Corsairs in the Pacific. The 2 campaigns cover the Solomon Islands campaign that lasted from late 1942 to early 1944.
Like the other games in the "Leader" series, Corsair Leader is a solitare game.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com
Price: 14.99$
Printing/mounting weight: Very heavy (75 cards)
Number of ratings: 26
-
-
 -
Algeria is a game simulating the conflict between the FLN Arab nationalist guerrillas and the French government from 1954 to 1962. During the game, the FLN player tries to erode the authority of the French colonial authorities and replace their governing structures with his own, to the point that Algeria makes the transition from being the 10th department of France to national independence.
Availability: http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product_info.php?products_id=5...
Price: €6.16
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 23
-
-
 -
Montebello is a complete free game meant to be an introduction to the Napoleonic Brigade Series (NBS). Its counter mix is small and the full game can be played in a couple of hours. It depicts the battle of Montebello, June 9th, 1800.
Availability: www.gamersarchive.net/theGamers/archive/nbs.htm
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 17
-
-
8.
Board Game: Espinosa
[Average Rating:7.07 Unranked]
 -
Napoleonic Brigade Series (NBS) playtest kit. Depicts the battle of Espinosa de los Monteros on November 10th and 11th, 1808.
Availability: www.gamersarchive.net/theGamers/archive/nbs.htm
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 14
-
-
 -
As the year 2015 came to a close it was clear the world was in a new trend. Instead of fighting wars with their own conventional forces, nations found it easier to pass the burden of conflict along to private contractors. They could be expensive, but a mercenary force was less politically liable than a country and more expendable. The best survived, and went on to glory and profit. The most famous and sought after are the mercenary pilots.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=668&pics=2
Price: 9.95$
Printing/mounting weight: Very heavy
Number of ratings: 13
-
-
 -
ACTION FRONT! Watchtower is the first in a projected series of DTP microgames covering tactical combat in WWII. Te game's expandable system is reminiscent of the venerable Panzerblitz/Panzer Leader games, with a feeling of the Five-Star series thrown in. Each game is played on 4 x 8 inch semi-geomorphic maps, with a fast, furious sequence of play that minimizes bookkeeping and maximizes the action. Players may play the included scenarios or create their own using the provided rules.
Watchtower comes with 20 US and 20 Japanese units, allowing players to recreate the epic struggle of the 1st US Marine Division on Guadalcanal in September and October of 1942. USMC Raiders and Paramarines square off against Chi-Ha tanks and leg mortars. Special rules are included for Henderson Field and banzai attacks.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com
Price: 5.99$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 11
-
-
 -
This is an introductory version of the full 'Southern Italy Campaign' and is the first release in a series.
Availability: www.frontlinegeneral.com
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Very heavy (a lot of game cards)
Number of ratings: 10
-
-
 -
'The War of the Empires 1914-1918' is a turn-based war game for up to 6 players, with two confronted sides: Central power vs Entente
Both sides draw event cards in every round – Russian winter, famine, the possibility to get some neutral country to fight on your side, American intervention etc.
Availability: www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/42020
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Medium
Number of ratings: 8
-
-
 -
Island War Deluxe is a squad-level game of skirmishes in the Pacific Theater of the Second World War. You control Squads of Japanese and Americans, tanks, machine-guns, flamethrowers, bombers, fighters and Leaders as you fight battles on Iwo Jima, Okinawa, Tarawa, and Guadacanal.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=537
Price: 22.95 $
Printing/mounting weight: Medium (4 colorful maps)
Number of ratings: 8
-
-
 -
Covers the Syrian attack on the Golan Heights from October 7th to 11th during the Yom Kippur War.
Packs a lot into a small package (8 pages of rules) - Syrian bridging tanks, aircraft, mines, artillery, Sagger missiles, leadership, morale and night all get rules. Most of the fighting is fire combat between hostile units, resulting in disruptions (which must be rallied from) and step losses.
First published in Armchair General - May 2006.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=540
Price: 14.95$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 8
-
-
 -
Mountains Aflame is a game about the Spring 1916 Austro-Hungarian offensive on the Italian
Front, aimed to drive to Vicenza and the Veneto plain, west of Venice, cutting off the whole front in Carnia and along the Isonzo river.
One player controls the Austro-Hungarian forces, the other the Italian forces. Each player attempts to achieve, or maintain, geographical objectives to attain the victory.
Availability: http://sites.google.com/site/alvinczy/Home/depot/NT1_2010_Mo...
Price: FREE
Number of ratings: 8
-
-
 -
THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE
March on Rome is a multi-player family oriented game set in the declining Roman empire. Up to 4 players compete against events and each other to ensure their name is remembered by history.
Availability: www.angelfire.com/games2/warpspawn/MORome.html
Price: FREE
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 7
-
-
 -
Mark Woloshen's epic game covering the Russian Civil War has been teaching history students the nuances of this complicated period. Now, Firefight Games offers it as a wargame. The game is unique for the rules cover everything in simplicity yet, making the correct decision makes it tough to master! Political influence and recruiting plays a vital and realistic role, for these decisions will impact military units and their use! Technology (tanks, aircraft) is important but it alone cannot win the game. The beautiful area map conveys at a glance the massive expanses of the war, for each area plays a critical political role. The game is deceptively simple to learn, yet, like Chess, hard to master.
Availability: www.firefight-games.com
Price: 17$ printed / 11$ in pdf
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 6
-
-
 -
This stand-alone product contains everything you need to re-fight the great naval campaigns that shaped the face of the world. All of the rules you need to run a game as the admiralty of a great nation are included in this 80-page book. So stare down your opponent from across the sea, and make the important decisions that control the fate of kings! Nations that controlled the seas controlled their own destinies.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=267&Site=BGG
Price: 12.5$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 6
-
-
19.
Board Game: I Obey
[Average Rating:7.25 Unranked]
 -
This one is an operational game on Garibaldi campaign over the Alps during the initial and central phases of the Third Italian War of Independence.
With a very peculiar chit drawing activation method and a combat system that stresses fatigue over real casualties, I obey is a fascinating study of this neglected campaign, with a see-saw motion of the counters over the splendid map and the chance for both sides to gain an unexpected victory.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=554
Price: 6$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 6
-
-
 -
Bir Buyuk Turk Saldiri (The Great Turk Attack) covers the climatic end of the Asia Minor War that began in 1919. By 1922, the British, French and Italians had long abandoned the Greek Army's occupation of some 400 km in Turkey. Originally planned to recover the spoils of WW1 when Turkey surrendered, the Allied powers had promised Greece a part of Turkey, which the Greeks claimed was part of "Greater Greece". The Greeks by the Summer of 1921, had advanced to within 30 km of Ankara, there the critical battle of the Sakarya River ended the advance. The failure of the battle now turned public opinion at home and amongst troops in Turkey against the war. From 1921 to 1922, the Greek Asia Minor Army held a 400 km front line. The Greeks were hoping and desperately looking for a honorable way out of the mess that the British had got them in. Greece was going broke because of the war and depended on England to provide monetary loans. Greek morale wavered.
The Turks under Mustapha Kemal (Ataturk) were about to give a good reason for the Greeks to leave.
Availability: http://pweb.jps.net/~perrya/
Price: 11$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 6
-
-
 -
Play out classic sea battles of the age of fighting sail using the Ship of the Line rules. The pdf has everything you need to play (except dice) including rules, maps and counters. Ship of the Line is for two or more players and a typical game will take an hour or less to finish.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com and www.rpgnow.com
Price: 8.95$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 5
-
-
 -
Rommel at Gazala is a quick-playing game with a simple, accessible system. It is sufficiently easy for new players to enter board wargaming, but with enough possibilities to offer significant replay value to newcomer and veteran player alike.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com
Price: 10$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 5
-
-
 -
This is a 2 player game on the Battle of Hamel (Monash's Masterpiece) which occurred on the 4th July 1918 and was the shortest successful battle of the First World War.
It involved Australian forces employing an integrated combined arms attack planned by Australian General Monash against the Germans. It also marks the first offensive combat operation of US forces on the Western Front. Four American companies were spread out amongst the Australian Battalions in platoon lots. This attack set the stage for much larger battles notably Amiens.
Availability: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=742
Price: 5$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 5
-
-
 -
Island War is a game of skirmishes in the Pacific Theater of the Second World War. You control Squads of Japanese and
Americans, machine guns, flamethrowers, and Leaders as you fight battle on Iwo Jima, and other islands.
In Armchair General - Nov 2006 & to be downloaded
Availability: Armchair General Nov 2006 - e-version
www.qmags.com/Magazines/PubHomePage.asp?publication=92&issue...
Price: 3$
Number of ratings: 5
-
-
 -
BLOODBATH simulates the horrific, turning point, battle in the Greek attack towards Ankara in August, 1921.
Game scale: 12 hr. turns, battalions. Each hex is around 400 yds. Owners of The Great Attack 1922 will easily assimilate the rules, although there are some new ones to learn.
The game comes with one 11x17 inch map, 280 counters and rulebook.
Also availability at: www.wargamedownloads.com/item.php?item=322
Price: 10$
Printing/mounting weight: Light
Number of ratings: 5
-
-
|
|
Posted Fri Jul 25, 2008 9:57 am
Games from Wargamedownloads usually arrive in less than 5 min in your email box.
Firefight-games ones, around 36h...
Charlottesville
Virginia
Birkenwerder
what a wonderful list you posted! A job well done!!
Cheers
Andy (521tiger)
Trumansburg
New York
I know that one can subscribe to the list - I DO ! And If I go right away to check a new entry from my subscription BGG takes me to it regardless of where it appears in the list. But if I am busy and the list is as well my subscription tells me there are 7 new items and to view them I must go back and forth from clicking the "new item" link in subscriptions... a tedious process at best.
I realize that these lists benefit in some sense from the stratification into best, good and poor but I think few of us care whether one is a 7.04 and another a 6.58 rating - a few 10's or 0's will change that in any case.
I appreciate your considering my suggestion and thanks, again, for your valuable contribution with this list and the continuing contributions of BGGers.
Fisher
Illinois
Thanks for the list!