Following, in chronological order, is a list of the wargames I have designed which have been published commercially:
- STURM NACH OSTEN [I SHTURMI NA 3APAD!], 3W, 1980 This was my first commercially published game. It is a corps level game about the Russian Front in World War II, and it features both basic and advanced game systems and sets of units. The scale was 40mis/65kms per hex: 18 hexes from Warsaw to Moscow. The game developer/editor was England's Andy Bagley, who did an incredible job, helping to reduce errata and ambiguities to a minimum, considering the depth and subtlety of the SNO game system. Keith Poulter did a fine publishing job, and it was truly a "World Wide Wargamers" (3W) project, with the designer in Alaska (at the time), the publisher and developer in London, and the printer in Hong Kong! It is now a collector's item, and I have sole copyright to it.
- CLASH OF STEEL, 3W,..., was a double-blind game system using SNO's map. It was developed by 3W publisher Keith Poulter and chief of staff Larry Hoffman. I re-edited the map and provided a modified order of battle for which I received equal 3-way authorship credit, but I never learned to play the game (system). (I have heard, though, that it was a very good simulation of the fog of war and variety of intelligence sources on the Russian Front.) Like SNO, COS is out of print, but not valued as highly as SNO.
- RUSSIA'S WAR and GREAT PATRIOTIC WAR were poorly published by Simulations Games Publications. Not only did the rules get mangled in their
rewriting, the units were printed on thin cardstock. RUSSIA'S WAR's scale was 72 mis/120kms per hex: 10 hexes from Warsaw to Moscow. It was basically at army
level scale.
- DARK CRUSADE, 3W, 1984, was a very promising yet frustrating game.
It was a point-to-point game system at corps level scale, much
simpler than hexagonal-grid games. The game's developer was none
other than Ty Bomba, just discharged from the U.S. Army--and now the
editor of COMMAND magazine. With the designer (me) in Alaska at the
time, and the developer and publisher in California ... and rushing
to meet various deadlines ... DC's publication got ... confused, and
the errata were innumerable ... although once people sorted out the
game they became quite enthusiastic about it.
3W publisher Keith Poulter felt duty-bound to do a revision kit.
Here are the new/additional units from that revision for those of you who do have the original game and never got the kit. As we had agreed, Keith turned the copyright on DC back over to me after it was out of publication/print, in 1991.
Following, is a list of wargames I have more recently designed :
- THE BARBAROSSA FILE: DEEP BATTLE IN RUSSIA, 1941-42. [1997] This is a relatively simple division-to-front(!) level game about the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, excluding Finland. There are 100 Axis and Soviet units in the game-start. Map scale is 36mis/60kms per hex: 20 hexagonal spaces from Warsaw to Moscow. Time scale is 20 days per turn. BARBAROSSA FILE features a hidden Soviet setup, variable reinforcement/replacement rate, and three possible starting Soviet unit lineups: 1. Historical, 2. "From Marshal Budyonny's Stables," and 3. "The Tukhachevsky Twist."
- THE BATTLES FOR ALAMEIN [1997] This is a regiment-to-division level two-player boardgame about the attempts by the German general (and then field marshal) Erwin Rommel--"The Desert Fox"--to break through the British Commonwealth positions near El Alamein, to conquer all of Egypt and the Suez Canal for the Axis in World War II. Rommel was ultimately defeated and then routed back to Libya by British Field Marshal Montgomery, but maybe you can do better. The game includes all four major battles: 1st Alamein (1-10Jul42), Ruweisat Ridge (Jul42), Alam Halfa (Aug42), and The Battle of Alamein (Oct-Nov42). My son Robert did the excellent CAD-designed tank-aircraft-figure icons for the unit pieces.
- GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR, 2d ed. [1993] This is an army-to-front level two-player boardgame about the Russian Front in World War II. It has been published on Educational Resources Information Center microfiche (ED 361 256) as a bonafide instruction aid for grades 8 and up. It plays very quickly: the "Barbarossa" scenario--the first twelve gameturns, representing the first year of the campaign--can be played in little more than an hour. For the 1941 game-start, there are 19 Axis and 24 Soviet units and factories. There are other scenarios covering the 1942 Stalingrad campaign, the 1943 Battle of Kursk, and the 1944 overunning of Army Group Center. See the review in the Jul/Aug92 issue of FIRE & MOVEMENT magazine.
- SKY, SEA, AND JUNGLE: THE HORROR OF GUADALCANAL, AUGUST-
DECEMBER 1942 [1997] A fast, simple, combined air, sea, and land
combat system. Hidden deployment, sometimes compromised by Allied
"Magic" code-breaking intelligence. Primary emphasis on the naval
war, with a sleek, factorless combat results system a 3rd Grader can
understand. Game includes: B-17s and Bettys, Japanese "Long Lance"
torpedoes, YAMATO, etc. The Guadalcanal campaign (with New Guinea
attached) in 9 action-packed turns. I am very proud of my
CAD-designed ship and aircraft icons on the unit pieces.
There are reviews of SS&J, at www.Grognard.com and in PAPER WARS #29.
- And of course my fast, simple NAVAL ACTION [1997] rules set for battles between fleets of World War II (so far) model ships.
- And I have designs on the Battle of Leningrad (1941), the Murmansk Convoys (1941-44), etc. underway.
If you are a friend, and/or if you would like to share info and ideas about military and naval history and game designing and cardstock model shipbuilding, feel free to write me at: Lou Coatney, 626 Western Ave., Macomb, IL 61455 USA
... or e-mail me at
ELCOAT@Hotmail.com
You may also telephone me at (309)836-1447. You can leave a message and/or your mailing address on my recording machine if I don't answer; but I cannot afford to return calls.
Return to home page
URL: "/GameWrit.htm" [21Nov97, revised 15Aug07]
