Welcome to Goonhammer Historicals Essentials. With Historicals being more accessible, more popular and more plastic than ever, it’s time for you to get involved, so we’re putting together step to step guides to answer your questions, solve your issues and get you started with gaming in the wild and varied world of Historical miniatures.
We’ve been publishing articles about Historicals gaming at Goonhammer for five years, publishing twice a week for three and we’ve been in the coveted “core games” category on our illustrious website for two, and yet you – yes, you! – still aren’t playing Historicals.
We know why. They’re a bit weird, a bit confusing, a bit different to Warhammer 40k and feature real people and real conflicts. It might seem like you have to paint 200 Normans, or purchase an ill-advised amount of French Infantry, But we at the Goonhammer Historicals Star Fort care about you. We want you to come play fantastic games with us, so we’re putting together a series of Essential articles on the why, how, what and when of Historicals gaming so that you can confidently take your first steps into a new, but decidedly old, world of miniatures.
Why Aren’t You Playing Historicals?
There’s a lot of myths and misconceptions around Historicals gaming, ranging from never finding a game through to finding a game but with real weirdoes, worrying about getting the paint colours right, what the hell “period agnostic rules” even means, and where to get them from. Article by article, we’re going to take apart these myths, showing you that Historicals gaming is much, much more than the old guys sitting at a table at a convention (though trust me, those guys can be awesome), and makes a fantastic addition to your mainline games.
We’ll be looking at:
- How to get into Historicals from other games
- Picking a period, army and ruleset
- Using models in multiple games
- Finding opponents and demo games
- How to make “your guys” in Historicals
- How much money you could save in the process
And much, much more. If you’re Historicals-curious, or better yet, you’re thinking “they’re never going to get me playing that!”, keep tuned as we do our best to convert you.
What’s Good About Historicals?
Historicals gaming has something for everyone. Whenever in history, and wherever in the world, interests you there are games, models, and opponents ready and waiting. Beyond an interest in history, though, there are plenty of reasons to get into Historicals gaming in 2025. Our scene has never been larger, healthier or more varied, so let’s have a whistle-stop tour of what we have to offer
Models
Historicals models have improved beyond all recognition over the last five years. Spearheaded by new plastics manufacturing with Victrix and Wargames Atlantic, and ably supported by classic metal casting, new 3D printing options and a preposterously wide range of manufacturers and stores, there isn’t just a model for everything. There’s ten.
Ranges tend to be well researched, at least relatively accurate and are all competing for your attention. You can go with impeccably detailed multi-part plastics, niche metals cast in a garage, and/or the most obscure 3D prints imaginable, in any size, scale or type. If you like big ships from the 1910s, you can get them in sizes ranging from 2cm to a foot long. Planes by the hundred, a thousand different versions of Napoleonic infantry, uniforms that existed for six months at the tail end of a forgotten conflict – if you like options, they’re all there.
Not only are the ranges massive, but they’re improving in quality on a daily basis. The best plastic Historicals now rival – or even exceed – the mighty Games Workshop in casting quality, poses and options. Multi-part plastics and 3D prints have made kitbashing and customisation easier than in any other system. Picking up a set of Historical miniatures can now present the same painting challenge and excitement as anything else out there, so if you’re gaming or painting focused, now is the time.
Games
Intense competition for the attention of players has refined and pushed Historicals game design into spaces that other systems dare not go. There’s straightforward rank and flank if you want it, but Historicals also offers challenges and opportunities for different kinds of gaming – asymmetric warfare, chance encounters, escalating engagements, fighting a tiny section of a larger battle with real mechanical consequences and anything else you could imagine.
For narrative players, we have campaign systems that really matter, where choice and narrative construction is baked into how the game works, not randomly rolled on a table afterwards or left to the nebulous whims of “narrative gaming”. Casual players can grab any number of pick up and play systems designed to get you gaming within minutes of opening up the rulebook. Competitive gamers will find better, tighter competitive design in Historicals than anywhere else, from the almost perfectly balanced, chess-like processes of De Bellis Antiquitas, to the savage cut and thrust of Saga. There’s even systems for those, like me, who spend most of their gaming time solo on the kitchen table – many historicals systems have fully functioning solo modules.
With Historicals miniatures working in many different games, you also get the excitement of picking up new games and new rule systems to try out without having to buy in to a new army. If you follow me down the path of Napoleonics, there’s systems enough you could try out a new one every day for several years – something there is going to grab you like no other game could. While it’s a big, intimidating space to find the perfect rule set, you can relax – that’s what we’re here for.
Prices
Ok this is the big one. Historicals are so, so much cheaper than any other miniatures game style. That single resin mini you bought for the Heresy? That’ll get you this:
There’s no hyperbole there. The most common systems we play at Goonhammer Historicals max out at about £40/$50. You can, of course, buy a lot more – we do – but that £40 will get you an army that not only functions in a standard size of game, but is competitive, useful and full of good stuff. The buy in cost is so minimal as to be ridiculous – want to play Cowboy Historicals? Three guys and a rulebook. Done.
The massive expansion of plastic kit options in the last few years has made this even cheaper. A single set, well chosen, will set you up for multiple games for less than the price of a pretty rubbish meal, or five man squad of space marines. Put aside a single month of hobby expenditure and you’ve probably got two armies – absolutely no exaggeration.
Research
We want to get you into the joy of Historicals, and for many of us, part of that joy is in finding out about the lives and experiences of the people we’re modelling. Contrary to what you might think, noone expects any Historicals player to have encyclopedic knowledge of the models they’re playing with (purely coincidence, I say nervously looking at my three shelves of Napoleon books), but the opportunity is there if you want it. It’s a fantastically interesting rabbit hole that starts with googling what weapons to give your models and ends with a determination to model a particular guy at this particular time in that particular conflict.
There are endless resources out there to help you do this, but the absolutely fantastic thing is that Historicals are still weird and loose enough for you to create your own, unique guys. While you can look up the exact right shade of green to paint your soviet tanks in the summer of 1943, real life is messy, full of unexpected events, and, especially in wartime, chaotic. Not only can you find just about any reason to model anything – did you know an entire battalion of Napoleon’s soldiers fought a battle in carnival costumes because they thought it was funny to do so? – but the answers to many questions are “we don’t know”. It’s a perfect blend of research and freedom – something for every shade of pedant.
Best of all, our research material is really, really good fun. Ever watch Sharpe? Whole games made out of it, and you can buy a hundred plastic and metal versions of Sean Bean. Does Oceans are now Battlefields ring a bell at all? Fancy recreating the first battle in Gladiator? Or fighting Nazis and Discrimination as the Tuskegee airmen? Movies, video games, books and comics are all there, all widely accepted as great sources of information and inspiration and history provides an awful lot of stories.
But Lenoon, I Play….
Okay, I hear you, I hear you. You already have a favourite system. You love it, and it’s totally different from Historicals. Over this series, we’ll have articles directed straight at you, talking about your favourite game and why the bits of it you love can also be found in Historicals gaming. While we’re here though, the big four are too easy to resist.
Warhammer 40,000
Competitive gamer who loves stratagems, balance and a true test of generalship? Try Bolt Action, a game with a tournament scene and meta development rivalling the 10th edition, and terrain rules that actually work with good looking tables to boot!
Casual pick up and play, loves rolling dice and bashing models together? Lion Rampant, Never Mind the Billhooks and so, so many more systems were made for you.
Narrative gaming your thing, and you love the bookkeeping of Crusade but you wish it had, you know, actual narrative supporting elements? Sharp Practice, Infamy Infamy, Guards of Traitors Toll, 0200 Hours. We do narrative better than anyone else, honest.
Age of Sigmar
Competitive Sigmar player struggling with the current state of the game but still in love with abilities, combos and powering up your units for the go turn? Try Saga, doing what Sigmar does since 2011 and excelling at it. We love it. It even has monsters (look, you try stopping an Elephant with a spear, alright?)
If you love all the tooled up, specialised troops supported by leaders with game-changing abilities that Age of Sigmar Promises, we’ve got you covered there too. Barons War is for you, letting you specialise units, tool them up with auras and commands and unleash them on your enemies – you even have most of the terrain already.
Fancy the idea of normal guys with guns facing down eldritch horrors from beyond comprehension? Absolutely no problem – Weird War Historicals are absolutely our thing too, so check out Silver Bayonet, Konflict ’47 or War Transformed.
Battletech
You guys are already more than half way there. Hexes? Hit locations? Ammo tracking? Units sorted by Historical era? My god, pick up a fleet of Battleships to go with your mechs, I’m surprised you haven’t already.
On a more serious note, our most detail and process oriented readers will love any number of Historicals games. Algy Pulls It Off has you track bursts of machine gun fire from rickety planes that should never have been able to fly, while our cousins in the chit and counter world provide more hex-based combat than you can shake a Dire Wolf at. We’ve got your Perigrin already, come join us.
Heresy
Do you want to play narrative battles where the narrative actions actually exist on the table? Pillage is there for you, get starting fires and stealing sheep, or scale up with Soldiers of Napoleon and Chain of Command.
If you’re more into meticulous research and recreating the exact shade of blue the Nightlords wore during the Battle of Pharos, then comrade, let me tell you about Osprey Publishing. Indulge every single button counting urge you have, then play Et Sans Resultat and tell me about it.
Where Should I Start?
If we’ve convinced you already, fantastic! We wax lyrical about the games and models we love every Monday and Thursday, so if you’re interested in more about why we think Historicals are great, pick an article and get reading. If you’re going to start right away, check out our model reviews, pick up a box of something you find interesting (for a very modest price) and we’ll help you find a game you’ll enjoy to play with them. If you’re still on the fence, stick around as we dive into Historicals Essentials – I guarantee we’ll have something that catches your attention.
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