These hints are abridged and quoted from "One Hour Wargames: Practical Tabletop Battles for those with Limited Time and Means" by Neil Thomas. This is a fantastic book for all wargamers, especially those who like their rank and file. I highly recommend if for anyone, especially those looking to develop their own games or scenarios.

Solo wargaming doesn't have to be a drag. You can reenact historical battles, (whether real-world or Middle Earth's chronicled legends) and see if you can do better than the historical generals. These simulations, while interesting, probably won't entertain for long. Here are the suggestions the author makes: throw a randomizer into the mix.

Dice rolls are at the heart of wargaming, but you can use cards as well. In his fun solo wargame, Rangers of Shadow Deep, Joe McCullough does just that with playing cards. Each turn the player draws a card, which is referenced against a table to determine random effects. You can make these global effects like nasty weather impacting shooting, or only affecting one unit, like a bad portent.

Many scenarios feature reinforcements or not putting all your units on the table first turn. Roll a randomizing dice to determine when and where they appear. Split the table into a grid of nine like tic-tac-toe and roll for a space. Most units can't fly, so they will enter from one of the edges and you can use a d8. You can also use a dice to randomly determine which unit will enter.

The aforementioned book has 30! scenarios, all of them generic to play in any time period. Some of them are based on historical battles. While these battles are for figures in trays a la War of the Ring, there's no reason not to try them with warbands not in neat rows. As suggested in the title, these are little games to be played on a 3x3' board.

Try them for yourself and let me know what you think.

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"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggie' until you can find a rock." -Will Rogers