Everyone has a different opinion of what makes a good miniatures game. When I sit down to play a miniature game there is one thing I look for in that game: enjoyment.

If I'm going to spend my time (and money) on a game I have to enjoy doing it. The first aspect in a game is its story or background (the “fluff”). I'm very happy if the game gives me an evocative scene unfolding on my tabletop. Whether its recreating a battle from WW2 or a horde of ravenous aliens devouring my marines, its all about the story. I admit that I'm a grown man that like to go “BOOM” when my tank explodes. To me thats fun. Even if I lose I enjoyed the story of that loss.

The next concern I have is the rules and balance of the game. These go hand in hand as the rules create the system by which you balance the game. But I want my cake and eat it too. I want variety in my game, having several different options of units and playing pieces. But the challenge with this is to make it increasingly hard to balance each and every unit. Some games purposely “adjust” point cost to make one piece better than the others. Sometimes its entire armies that have better point economy. When this happens the game becomes unbalanced. Cries of “Cheese” or “Beardy” (depending on what side of the pond your on) can be heard on the gaming table and across the Internet. And most of all my enjoyment factor begins to rapidly decline. Of course a game can be balanced by you and buddies playing at home. But that is not the point. I want to meet new people at the local game store, or travel to a tournament. And in these environments a game needs to be balanced for me to find enjoyment.

This brings us to the next topic, the rules. The rules are the basis of the game. I recognize that the rules are abstractions of the complex physical environment we call reality. I want rules to suspend my disbelief, but not break it. An example of this and one of my personal pet peeves is limited ranges on modern weapons that are out of scale with movement. Overly detailed and complex rules that take too much time and effort to use are also bad for me. If it requires a complex mathematical formula to move my model you might as well forget it. Somewhere in the middle of this is sloppy rules, They create loop holes that can be exploited (created unbalance). This is where background story, rules, and balance collide. Worse yet you spend hours debating a point in the rules creating the RAW (rules as written) vs. intent of the rule writer's argument.

In conclusion, I play games for personal enjoyment. Win or lose, have a good background, make the game balanced with well written rule-set that is moderate complex and I will play and if I play I will buy.