D&D General Why Isn't There a D&D Table Top Miniatures War Game?

[Clint_L]

There’s already Warhammer Fantasy Battle, plus GWs LotR game. A miniatures based game would be very expensive to launch and maintain, and going up against a VERY established market leader…I doubt there’s much upside.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I think "because Warhammer" pretty much definitively answers the OP question.

 

[Parmandur]

Not a lack of trying from TSR and WotC.

 

[Zardnaar]

D&D minis 3.5e was a great game and I believe did well. When 4e came out they discontinued it and the old unopened boxes skyrocketed in price. The new 4e version wasn't as good and it quickly died out and was discontinued by WotC. There hasn't been one since. Maybe they are hesitant to put out another stinker.

It was a fun game. It had several problems though.

1. Several tourney staples were in early products. They didn't cycle sets so expensive to get for basics.

2. They started banning minis often because of power creep.

3. They rebooted the game around 4E launch. Essentially killed the old one.

 

[Maxperson]

It was a fun game. It had several problems though.

1. Several tourney staples were in early products. They didn't cycle sets so expensive to get for basics.

2. They started banning minis often because of power creep.

3. They rebooted the game around 4E launch. Essentially killed the old one.

True story. My buddy and I went to a game convention here in Los Angeles a year or three(can't remember exactly) prior to 4e coming out. He comes up to me and says, "There's a D&D Minis tournament today. Let's enter it and learn how to play." So we did. I came in second place and it was then that I found out that the tournament was a qualifier to a pro tournament in Seattle, with top 2 getting invites. It was super confusing at first when they came up to me afterwards and started asking for my information. I couldn't make it, though. Still, it was fun to qualify for a pro tournament while learning the game.

 

[Jadeite]

There was also Dungeon Command as well as D&D branded Heroscape.
And since Magic and D&D are now intermingled, Arena of the Planeswalkers might count, too (it even had unpainted minis in addition to the badly painted ones).

 

[Stormonu]

Yeah, the owners of D&D have tried many times over the years to do a tabletop battle game, but it's always been a secondary concern suborned by the RPG and flawed in some way or another. That GW, who started off making D&D miniatures, has a chokehold on fantasy tabletop battles doesn't help.

Battlesystem - came with paper counters (or later, just a book), very limited range of minis (meanwhile, WHFB was well established)
Dragon Dice - dice, not minis
Chainmail (2001+) - unpainted, unassembled metal miniatures in an age dominated by GW plastics and Mageknight pre-paints.
Heroscape D&D - only two boxed sets, at a time that popularity for the game had fallen away
D&D minis - Merged into 4E and killed. Also, prices for plastic suddenly skyrocketed, and demand fell away (until revived by Wizkids)
Dungeon Command - A couple boxed sets with no expansions
D&D Attack Wing - Never caught on
Warriors of Krynn - too complicated, limited scenarios with no supported expansion beyond ties to the DL module
D&D Onslaught - who even knows about it?

 

[Hriston]

I'm a big fan of painting miniatures and using them not just for role playing games but also for table top miniatures war games. Over the years, I've bought and played a lot of them including Clan War (for Legend of the Five Rings), Warzone, Battletech, and some lesser known games you haven't heard of like Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40k. But it suddenly struck me today, why isn't there a D&D table top war game?

I am vaguely aware that D&D has made some attempts at producing some miniatures games.

Chainmail: This was kind of the precursor to D&D itself, but I was surprised to learn that TSR continued publishing it until 1985.

Battlesystem: This was produced for both 1st and 2nd edition AD&D. I remember seeing this on the shelf of my local game store, but I had zero interest in this type of game back then. I don't have any direct knowledge of it, but I hear good things about the 2nd edition version.

Chainmail: Back in 2001, WotC released another version of Chainmail. I remember buying a few miniatures, but never playing this one. At the time, I wasn't really in the market for miniatures games. Other than sharing a name, I don't think this has anything to do with the original game.

Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures Game: This came out in 2003 after they stopped producing Chainmail. Unlike most miniatures war games, you bought pre-painted miniatures and used those. I never played this game because I don't but pre-painted miniatures, but it was popular enough to last until 2011.

Despite being present in one form or another for decades, D&D doesn't seem to have a lot of luck on the fantasy war game front. And I'm wondering why? The recipe for a successful game is there. You've got years of intellectual property and a wide variety of factions which means plenty of options for interesting individual models and units. If you had a game from the Forgotten Realms you've got armies from Thay, the Sword Coast, and other regions and it could be just as compelling as Warhammer from Games Workshop. I'm a little surprised TSR/WotC hasn't done better in this area.

Nice summary. TSR also published Swords & Spells in 1976 for use with D&D.

 

[Minigiant]

They tried before but ran it like MTG when Minis gamers don't like randomization, junk cards, and bad art.

 

[The Soloist]

Illegal 3D printing is slowly killing tabletop wargames.