March 29, 2024

“Song For War” Launches, and Goofy Poll Results ~ #TuesdayNewsday 2/28/23

The Armchair Dragoons’ #TuesdayNewsday is the weekly update you need to stay current on the strategy gaming world

4Newsday-headline

We’ve been tracking Song For War: Mediterranean Theater for a while now, and we’re thrilled to announce these guys FINALLY got it launched on Kickstarter, effective today1.

We first saw these guys demo’ing at Origins in October of 2021, interviewed them at The ACDC in January of 2022 (and had a dedicated designer seminar, too),  gamed with them at Buckeye Game Fest in April of 2022, and roped them into our bunker with us at Origins in the Summer of 2022 (and this Summer, too!).  It’s a fantastic game that has some ahistorical bits to it, but gets the ‘spirit’ of the conflict largely correct, and keeps players engaged throughout.

Here are some of our photos from Buckeye Game Fest of their prototype, and there’s more to ogle on their Kickstarter page

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Again, they’ve just launched on Kickstarter, so you can get in on the ground floor, but we are (obviously) big fans/cheerleaders hear at Armchair Dragoons, and wish Invicta Rex nothing but the best in their new launch.

 

4Newsday-Otherheadline

Last week, we asked 2 short questions of the audience

  • What’s your preferred method of connecting with wargamers online?
  • What’s your most-frequently used method of connecting with wargamers online?

The options available to choose were:

  1. Company-sponsored forum/site
  2. Club/organization forum/site
  3. Independent forum/site
  4. Facebook
  5. Twitter
  6. Mastodon
  7. Discord
  8. Slack
  9. Blog comment sections
  10. YouTube (and comments)
  11. Groups.io
  12. Email list / Listserve
  13. Usenet / Google Groups
  14. Other (tell us in the comments at the end of the article!)

We got a decent response around the audience, and quite a few people asking deep, meaningful questions looking for underlying definitions for something that was, honestly, just a goofy little poll we ran because there were no particularly significant headlines last week.

We did have a number of people who commented that they selected “other” for either BoardGameGeek or ConSimWorld, even though in our minds we saw both of those as “Independent forum/site”.
We had more than a few people who’d never heard of Mastodon, which just tells us they’re not reading our site, since we published A Wargamer’s Guide to Mastodon last month.
At least a few folks asked on social media what we meant by “connecting” – as if we’d actually given this that much thought!

There is obviously some self-selection bias, as you’d expect a greater percentage of responses from those channels through which we advertised the poll’s existence, but we tried to cut a wide swath across multiple social media channels.  However, there’s not necessarily a good way to whip up participation within YouTube comments, or Discord servers to which we don’t below, or club websites with small audiences that never saw the original poll.  In the end, it’s entirely possible there was some self-reinforcement of the channels through which we were best able to promote the poll in the first place.

What’s your preferred method of connecting with wargamers online? What’s your most-frequently used method of connecting with wargamers online?
preferred frequent

click images to enlarge

Obviously, there are going to be some differences between the two or we wouldn’t’ve asked 2 different questions.  However, over 70% of the audience matched on both answers, with just over 29% giving different answers between the two.  Intuitively, that does make sense, as you’d ideally like your most-frequent method of connection to also be your most-preferred.  But it does leave open an interesting question for those that don’t match to possibly drop into the comments at the end of the page and give us some insight as to why the mis-match.

In the end, this was a goofy bit of fun, and we’ll probably run a few other polls over the course of the year just to see what people might have to say.  If there’s a topic you want us to ask about, drop up a note in our forums, or in the comments below, and let us know.
It’s entirely probable that we will dig into some deeper and more meaningful data collection & analysis at a later date.  Our editorial director has an academic background in social science research and was the co-author of one of the largest hobby gamer surveys ever, back in the mid-00s.  It’s something we’ll probably get to, but not before the Summer.

Meanwhile, thanks to everyone who participated, shared, commented, and even griped!  We appreciate the engagement with something that was a little off-the-cuff but still helps with understanding the hobby a bit more.

 

4Newsday-released

What’s shipped this past week that you’ll find interesting

Oy vey, not a lot of board wargaming got released this week!

 

4Newsday-launched

Crowdfunding or pre-orders ~ if you can order it now, here it is

Meanwhile, we’ll wait for this one to get launched

 

4Newsday-sale

Save a few bucks with these deals

 

4Newsday-Regiment

What’s happened with the Dragoons this past week

 

4Newsday-Convetions
Consolidated-Calendar-Splash

Don’t forget to check our consolidated event & convention calendar for more!
You can also submit your own events for our calendar here.

Oh, and within a few weeks, we’re going to have a special event announcement for the weekend of 20-22 October, so stay tuned, and block out your calendar now!

ConnexOnline 23 Stack

The Connections Online executive committee is pleased to announce the theme of this year’s Connections Online conference: “The Enemy Gets a Vote — Playing Red.” We’ll look at playing Red in wargaming, as well as what various professional communities mean by the term “red teaming.” (Hint: The definitions overlap, more or less, but terms frequently has discipline-specific connotations that may not be entirely obvious.)

The Core of the conference will run from 18-20 April 2023, with events scheduled from 1000-1600 EDT. Extended events (including both games and workshops) will run from the weekend before to the weekend after. Core events will be accessed through YouTube; registration information will be forthcoming. Previous conferences are accessible through YouTube (2022 and 2021).

More info – core event schedule / registration details / etc – coming soon

 

4Newsday-allies

Other great content creators from the wargaming world

 

 

4Newsday-Industry

News & notes from the business end of the gaming world

 

4Newsday-professionals

Don’t forget we’ve got a dedicated area of our forums for the professional wargamers.

 

4Newsday-different

Something neat from outside the wargaming world we wanted to share with you

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Got Weird (@gotweird)

 

That’s all for this week!
Be sure to drop by our forums and join the fun, and next Tuesday we’ll drop some more news on you.


We appreciate you visiting the Armchair Dragoons and hope that you enjoy our weekly news dumps!
Please leave us your feedback in our discussion forum, or in the comment area below.
You can also find the regiment on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, and occasionally at a convention near you.


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Footnotes

  1. and a special thanks to those guys for launching on a Tuesday before #TuesdayNewsday went out
  2. 3rd Thursday of the month

Armchair Dragoons PAO

Official Public Affairs account for The Armchair Dragoons, for official site news, and other contributors.

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One thought on ““Song For War” Launches, and Goofy Poll Results ~ #TuesdayNewsday 2/28/23

  1. As a kid of the 1970s, that last bit you posted about kids (almost entirely boys, if memory serves) scrounging up whatever old plywood and cinder blocks they could find around dumpsters and vacant lots to build a ramshackle ramp was *totally* true. Blame it on television coverage of the daredevil Evel Knievel. There were a few glorious moments, but I suspect many more cuts, scrapes, and tears from the frequent wipeouts. Like most kids of those days, bike helmets were practically unknown, and wearing one would most likely result in you being mocked by your peers. It’s also true we zoomed around town in our parents’ cars without wearing seatbelts. Somehow, many of us survived to see the 21st century. 🙂

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