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What's an Imagi-Nation? It's a fictional nation placed in a particular historical period to allow players to come up with their own uniform colour schemes, characters, orders-of-battle and national characterisitcs. It also allows those interested to come up with fiction about their country (or clan, or city state or whatever) much in the same way that 40k players might enjoy inventing a space marine chapter. This idea goes back to the 1960s revival of miniature wargaming and is found in books like Charge! Or How We Play Wargames by Brigadier Peter Young and Lt.Col. James Philip Lawford written in 1967.

The most common era that people seem to make imagi-nations for is the 18th century. There were lots of little duchies and tiny nations scattered around Europe and while some of them have remained independent, most were absorbed into other nations over the next few centuries. So it's a perfect time and place to stick a little kingdom or duchy to call your own. There are actually a pretty surprising number of blogs dedicated to wargaming in various fiction nations of the 1700s. The colonial era is another popular choice where new colonies or even new colonial powers can easily be invented. And then you'll see a bunch of imagi-nations made in the modern era. Usually they are small South American, African or Asian republics set in politically unstable areas.

I'm thinking of doing a campaign based on Imagi-Nations but set in the Sengoku period of Japan. The Sengoku is the "warring states period" where various Daimyo's and clans fought for over a hundred and fifty years before the Tokogawa Shogunate was established, ushering in the Edo period starting around 1603.

So instead of nations, I'm going to be going with imaginary clans. Each player will take the role of a local ji-zamurai/kokujin who all find themselves without a Daimyo to rule them. Who will succeed the recently departed Daimyo? What means will they be willing to undertake in order to expand their control over various villages, castles and forts? Who sent the ninja that killed the Daimyo and all of his heirs? Will they make deals with neighbouring Daimyo's and join their clans rather than trying to establish their own?

The other eras I am tempted to go for an "imagi-nation" approach include ancient Sumeria and Al-Andalus (Muslim Spain). Ancient Sumeria was ruled by competing city states trying to extend their influence and until Sargon the Great conquered the area, they were largely independent for a minimum of 1000 years. Al-Andalus started of as a unified caliphate, but become a region of competing kingdoms who also found themselves at odds with northern Spanish lords who were still Catholic. it's a perfect place to make up a little fuedal kingdom and use a wide range of miniatures representing troops from both the Catholic nations of Europe and the Medieval Islamic world.

When you do historical stuff, do you tend to do historical nations? Do you go so far as to replicate historical orders of battle, representing actual companies, brigades, etc.,? Or do you keep things generic, but still tied to a specific historical nation?

On the rare occasions I do it, i tend towards existing powers simply for simplicities sake. Germany is Germany and America is America. However I CAN see worth in it. Sengoku era japan had a LOT of smaller clans in between the "major" ones, and things like that gives you a little extra leeway in your painting and modelling choices that straight up "german field grey" so to speak.

For most historical eras that are well documented (so Napoleonic era counts) I don't. But, for moderns and near future I do a lot of Imagi-Nations. I also do it with Ancients a lot, since that era can be less documented so it's easier to slip a civilization in somewhere.

And even then, most of my imagi-nations are based loosely off of real nations. For instance, in one of my Cold War games, I tried out having a nation that was organized very similar to NATO but used a mix of Russian and British technology. They were mostly used in a conflict in the Middle East against Israel so that was an interesting campaign.

I think embracing an imagi-nation approach is less about looking for grey areas and lack of documentation and trying to fit into the unknown parts of history and more about accepting our own fictional creations as a valid part of the hobby.

The 18th century is incredibly well documented and we know pretty much every noble and when they were born and died from various records. There's no missing documentation or grey areas where you can put in a previously unknown nation and yet the 18th century is, by far, the most popular era for imagi-nations.

For my upcoming samurai game, I'm thinking of completely replacing Japan with a fictional analogue. My first thought was to have the participants be minor ji-zamurai while the big clans and daimyos who actually had an impact in real history did their thing, but I figured why bother? Why intentionally choose a setting for the campaign that predetermines the irrelevancy of the participants? So I'm probably still going to start small in terms of the scope of the conflicts, but I don't see any reason not to have the participants have full clans with daimyo level nobles fighting for the control of a nation rather than just a valley or something.

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What I like to do is to set a battle in a known historical setting, like ACW, but use the template of a different historical battle. For example, I might take the history of a WoTR battle to set up the basic scenario. This hinders players from knowing the history of the battle and adjusting accordingly.

'Imagi-Nations' are a really cool idea for certain types of game. The Period of Empire Building (18th - early 20th century) certainly gives plenty of scope for this sort of thing. Especially as lots of small states rose and fell in that time and there where frequent clashes between them.

What I like to do is to set a battle in a known historical setting, like ACW, but use the template of a different historical battle. For example, I might take the history of a WoTR battle to set up the basic scenario. This hinders players from knowing the history of the battle and adjusting accordingly.

This is one of my favorite things to do as well. If a battle is particularly inspirational or exciting then adapting it to your period of choice should be no problem. Obviously there are some limitations, adapting Horse and Musket era battles for Modern era wargames may be difficult but it's possible. In fact I recall seeing a cracking battle report once where a group of Wargamers played a Waterloo game in 28mm and then the next week played a WW2 game in 28mm on the exactly same table with the terrain totally unchanged and the forces roughly set to mirror the 1815 battle.

I'm currently looking to adapt the Battle of Ia Drang to a WW2 setting to play it with my existing figures but I'm having some trouble as it's difficult to imagine how the 'US' side would land forces without helicopters. I’m thinking perhaps Paratroopers. But I'm also unsure how to represent the 'Vietnamese' side as of course the Germans are a totally different style of army. It would probably suit a Far East game more than a Northern Europe one but sadly I don't have any Far East kit.

I've always been a fan.

I like ot set games such as this in entirely fictional worlds. I think you are ont he right track when you just place it in "Not-Japan Japan".

I've considered building some sort of imaginations army in the Middle Ages, since that's a prime place for a small faction or nation to blend right in, but lack of other players interested in it makes it not a worthwhile investment. Ah well.

Yup, especially what comes to 20th century ones, I love concept of fex. AK47, Bongolesia, etc.

Im a long line history enthusiastic, and HC-model builder, so if I do something "really" historical, its done by counting bolts, so I do find it quite relaxing to work with some enviroment where mostly I (or my gaming companion) can tell what is right. Fex. the Mawusian campaign where I participated with my mercenaries (or PMC, Private Military Company as its called) I took glazes to hoares 5th Commando, SADF, RLI and Executive Outcomes ltd, but didnt actually base it in any of those, just took influences.

Ofc there is the bloc who says "there is enough misery, catastrophes or real wars going on, why do you make up new ones?" but then I must admit, that I just dont get it how its more wrong to pull entertainment from conflicts that didnt come than from ones which did happen and ended up as a genocide.

 MaahisKuningas wrote:


Ofc there is the bloc who says "there is enough misery, catastrophes or real wars going on, why do you make up new ones?" but then I must admit, that I just dont get it how its more wrong to pull entertainment from conflicts that didnt come than from ones which did happen and ended up as a genocide.

I don't understand this objection myself. Surely if you have an issue with games based around war and all the misery that comes with it, then a fictionalised version is surely more palatable than a real one because at least fictional world doesn’t have real victims.

I can see the logic behind the opposite viewpoint. I know several fantasy gamers who are quite happy with gaming death in their fictional world but see historical gaming based on real conflicts as distasteful. It’s not a point of view I subscribe to myself but I can at least understand it.

I really must admit that I dont understand that point of view at all - after all, its just game, and wont kill anyone, based on fiction or not.

Kilkrazy wrote:What I like to do is to set a battle in a known historical setting, like ACW, but use the template of a different historical battle. For example, I might take the history of a WoTR battle to set up the basic scenario. This hinders players from knowing the history of the battle and adjusting accordingly.

This is a very good idea and bring up another facet to this discussion. When we have historical nations but never do any of the battles they fought in historically, we're already quite firmly in the imaginary. Whether the battles we do fight come from being inspired by other battles from other times, what-if scenarios we dreamed up or a points system we used to build armies.

LuciusAR wrote:'Imagi-Nations' are a really cool idea for certain types of game. The Period of Empire Building (18th - early 20th century) certainly gives plenty of scope for this sort of thing. Especially as lots of small states rose and fell in that time and there where frequent clashes between them.

I also think part of the appeal of Imagi-Nations in the 18th century is the ridiculous notion of gentlemanly war. Where you get your ranks of musketeers to stand shoulder to shoulder, have your cavalry ride around and see which general is the best and when it's all said and done, the point of dispute between the two nations will likely get resolved at the negotiations following the battle. Sort of like making the romanticized notions of 18th century warfare a reality.

I'm currently looking to adapt the Battle of Ia Drang to a WW2 setting to play it with my existing figures but I'm having some trouble as it's difficult to imagine how the 'US' side would land forces without helicopters. I’m thinking perhaps Paratroopers. But I'm also unsure how to represent the 'Vietnamese' side as of course the Germans are a totally different style of army. It would probably suit a Far East game more than a Northern Europe one but sadly I don't have any Far East kit.

What about a german formation that's been cut off and is assailed by soviet partizans? Or a "Patton drives east" where the same thing happens with the Americans as the surrender of Germany leads to war between the US and USSR?

Vortrey wrote:I've considered building some sort of imaginations army in the Middle Ages, since that's a prime place for a small faction or nation to blend right in, but lack of other players interested in it makes it not a worthwhile investment. Ah well.

I've taken a "if you build it, they will come" attitude and it's really paid off. I run games at local conventions (if they can so be called, they're very, very small) a couple times a year and find that if I build a good participation game and run it for anyone interested, exchange contact information and set up future games, things can get rolling pretty easily.

I guess I've been running game ideas for people that I come up with long enough now that when I just mention "I'm thinking of running another game" I get people asking to email me about when and where before they even know about the genre/period, scale, rules or anything else.

There are so many people out there that love to game but are not super serious about painting and terrain making that I've had no problem finding people to belly-up to the table. And if a ongoing campaign with imaginary samurai clans gets going and someone can't make painting work for them, I'm going to keep the model count small enough I'll be able to provide the figures for them according to their specifications (modified so that I'd actually want them in my collection, so no pink armour, for example).

Though I also understand that lots of Imagi-Nation play is handled on a solo-wargaming basis and there are some fantastic rules sets geared towards that. Rally Round the King by Two Hour Wargames would be a great way to go if you are looking for full army battles, while their free Swordplay set is good for a skirmish game with less than 10-20 models on the table.

MaahisKuningas wrote:
Im a long line history enthusiastic, and HC-model builder, so if I do something "really" historical, its done by counting bolts, so I do find it quite relaxing to work with some enviroment where mostly I (or my gaming companion) can tell what is right. Fex. the Mawusian campaign where I participated with my mercenaries (or PMC, Private Military Company as its called) I took glazes to hoares 5th Commando, SADF, RLI and Executive Outcomes ltd, but didnt actually base it in any of those, just took influences.

Awesome. I never really considered military contractors as a potential source for imagi-nations-- or imagi-corporations, I suppose. Great idea.

Ofc there is the bloc who says "there is enough misery, catastrophes or real wars going on, why do you make up new ones?" but then I must admit, that I just dont get it how its more wrong to pull entertainment from conflicts that didnt come than from ones which did happen and ended up as a genocide.

Trying to paint a moral shade onto the hobby usually ends badly. I suppose there might be those who would say that you are "adding to the misery" but to them, I'd say the same thing as if we were doing historical stuff-- toy soldiers aren't alive and don't suffer. And to those who find going with make-believe conflict to be less burdensome than going with real conflict, I'd say the same thing, but also be happy they found something that works for them.