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It is that time of year! The most wonderful tme of the year!

It is time for the Wargame Vault's Winter Offensive! Now is the time with up to 25% off across the site! There are thousands of Indie rulesets of all genres to choose from and they are mostly on sale.

https://www.wargamevault.com/en/browse?filter=44296&src=winteroffensive2025wgvl

So, what are you thinking of picking up?

Me? I am thikig it is time I got Perilous Tales by Planet Smasher Games.

 Easy E wrote:

Me? I am thikig it is time I got Perilous Tales by Planet Smasher Games.

I'm still holding out for a physical version.

Nothing new really catches my eye, I suspect modern indie has largely moved on from WGV.

It might be a long wait.

So, where are Indie wargames moving to then?

 Easy E wrote:

So, where are Indie wargames moving to then?

itch.io for publishing, instagram for marketing, patreon for funding, discord for development

and obviously crowdfunds

Other than publishig did that other stuff ever happen at the Vault? Now I am curious how it all developed.

Also, it wouldn't be Indie if you didn't have to chase it around, I guess!

I picked up the PDF-only supplement for Five Parsecs: Tactics. Neat little book. Also dipped into the RPG side of things and got the Suns of Gold sourcebook for Stars Without Number, print&PDF.

 Easy E wrote:
Other than publishig did that other stuff ever happen at the Vault? Now I am curious how it all developed.

Also, it wouldn't be Indie if you didn't have to chase it around, I guess!

I think the big flip is that now you get a following first by being a cool personality on social media, then you make a game. And your income generally isn't from selling the game, it's from patreons watching you publicly develop the game.

The results, honestly, tend to lean towards these indie games being heavily into the setting, vibe, art, and process, gaming doesn't usually happen all that much. So we've flipped from folks playing 40k with just legs on bases, into loads of folks having fully converted and painted forces that never see the table.

 lord_blackfang wrote:


I think the big flip is that now you get a following first by being a cool personality on social media, then you make a game. And your income generally isn't from selling the game, it's from patreons watching you publicly develop the game.

The results, honestly, tend to lean towards these indie games being heavily into the setting, vibe, art, and process, gaming doesn't usually happen all that much. So we've flipped from folks playing 40k with just legs on bases, into loads of folks having fully converted and painted forces that never see the table.

This is a spot on observation from my perspective too. Good, engaging rules don't sell games. Vibes, hype and fomo sell games so rules are rarely taken proper care of (this is true for a lot of crowdfunded boardgames now too). Creators sell the vivid and emotional but totally imaginary picture of how much a buyer will enjoy the game, they don't care about whether the customer will actually play the game once it is sold and how it will feel for real.

Also the fast gaming approach: pdf rulebooks so cheap! - buy a lot of pdf rulesets - never even play any of them before buying even more rulesets (replace "rulebooks" with "miniatures", "RPG manuals", "board games", "digital video games" etc for a full, sad view of a non-gaming, much-buying consummerist dystopia).

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 Easy E wrote:
Other than publishig did that other stuff ever happen at the Vault? Now I am curious how it all developed.

Also, it wouldn't be Indie if you didn't have to chase it around, I guess!

I think the big flip is that now you get a following first by being a cool personality on social media, then you make a game. And your income generally isn't from selling the game, it's from patreons watching you publicly develop the game.

The results, honestly, tend to lean towards these indie games being heavily into the setting, vibe, art, and process, gaming doesn't usually happen all that much. So we've flipped from folks playing 40k with just legs on bases, into loads of folks having fully converted and painted forces that never see the table.

Can't argue with any of that, except I am not sure that it is a new approach.

I guess making the money from Patrons as you develop is the new twist. People want to feel like they have a peak behind the curtain and been a part of the development of the game.

Cyel wrote:


This is a spot on observation from my perspective too. Good, engaging rules don't sell games. Vibes, hype and fomo sell games so rules are rarely taken proper care of (this is true for a lot of crowdfunded boardgames now too).

Sort of. You do usually have to have more than just interesting rules. A bit of vibe and some nice art helps, but there are some indie and rules-agnostic rulesets sell well mostly on the basis of good rules.

Space Weirdos. Has really good vibe, but it's the clever rules, dice mechanics and reaction tables that keep this little 'zine selling.

Dragon Rampant. Has Zero fluff and no real cool factor, but it's a well regarded game that just made it into it's second edition.

Grimdark future is finally developing it's own fluff, but most folks dont' care. They make a bunch of money off of their minis subscriptions but, they've still got a huge number of folks as Patreon's at the rulebook level just for the complete rulebook with additional rules options and monthly scenarios.

I've noted the same thing, especially in the RPG scene. Art books with a very basic, extremely derivative system attached are lauded as works of game design genius.