Getting Started: War Gaming

War gaming's a very different animal from role playing, the topic of my last getting started article. While players in an RPG focus on controlling a single character, in a war game you take control of the entire side of a battle. It might be be better to call it miniature gaming because a number of games don't involve a war at all. Miniature gaming makes it sound like some sort of terrier, though, so we'll stick with war gaming.
War gaming involves two or more players plunking down miniatures and and rolling dice at each other until one side achieves a goal, or more likely, no longer has any units to roll dice for. Dirty looks and smug grins are exchanged, miniatures are cased, and rematches are planned.
Like role playing the first thing your going to need to is find a group to play with. Also like role playing, the best place to do this is the local gaming shop. They'll have dice, miniatures, rulebooks, and various other sundries there. Don't buy any of it. You want to find out what other people are playing before you commit to a game.
Ask whoever's around if the shop has a game night. Tell them you're looking to start and want to watch a few games. If everything goes well, you should meet a group of people who can answer all of your questions and show you how to play. See if it's something you would enjoy. If it's not, ask around to see if anyone plays anything else. It's not as diverse as RPGs, but there are still a lot of fish in this sea.
There are two basic types of companies that make war games: the type that sell miniatures unassembled and unpainted, and the kind that sell them in blind boxes. Games Workshop is pretty much the ultimate example of the first. Their Warhammer and Warhammer 40k are the definitely the biggest market share of the hobby. Wizards of the Coast and Wizkids both produce good examples of the second.
The big problem with the first type of game is that it's actually two hobbies. You can easily spend more time assembling and painting miniatures for these games than actually playing them. The other big problem is the expense. You can easily spend a hundred dollars to get a competitive army up and running. This is in addition to all of the rulebooks, dice, paints, and other stuff you need to play.
The problem with the second type is that with a few exceptions all the miniatures are blind-boxed. This means you're going to get 6-10 random miniatures, many of which you have no interest in owning. It also makes it difficult to get the miniatures you do want.
Once you've picked your game, you need to decide which army you want to play. Different games call them different things: armies, factions, sides, loose conglomerations of chance allies. The goal is the same, though: create groups with homogeneous looks and unique play style. Look around. See if anyone's playing anything looks like fun. Look at the website for the game designer and check out their miniatures gallery. See what you like the look of. If you're playing with blind boxed miniatures you won't have to decide right away, because you'll be getting the same miniatures no matter what. But don't start an army for a game like Warhammer unless you know that's the army you want to play.
That's all I've got for today. Check out The Jungle for some great articles on Warhammer 40k, as well as some other great links. See you in 48, Mav out.

--A psychologist would call spending eight hours moving tiny pieces of plastic around a table grounds for institutionalization. We just call it war gaming.