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Old 11-18-2017, 07:37 PM   #1
mstlaurent
 
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Default How I Came To Love Ogre

Back in 1977, when I was nine years old, I saw an ad in the back of my brother's Galaxy magazine for Metagaming Microgames. The first one was a game called Ogre, a futuristic game of tank warfare. Being nine years old, I had no idea what a wargame was, but I had bought plenty of plastic soldier kits from the back of comic books, and I was very excited to buy one that involved futuristic tanks. So I gathered up $2.95 from my savings and had my mom drive me down to the post office to buy a money order and mail off my order. A couple weeks later I received, not a set of plastic tanks, but a rulebook, a paper map, and some cardboard counters in a plastic envelope. I was so disappointed. But, being an intelligent and inquisitive kid, I started reading, and actually became interested. And it began a lifelong interest in gaming in general and Steve Jackson games in particular.

Now, today, after over 40 years, I have finally received my little plastic tanks. The quality is excellent, so I will forgive the egregious multi-decade shipping delay. ;-)
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Old 11-18-2017, 08:44 PM   #2
Tom H.
 
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Default Re: Ogre Miniatures Series 1 delivery thread

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Originally Posted by mstlaurent View Post
. . . Being nine years old, I had no idea what a wargame was, but I had bought plenty of plastic soldier kits from the back of comic books . . .
Thanks for that story.

I must be about your age, so I remember at that time comic books advertising plastic soldier and vehicle sets (with a lot of figures for a cheap price) that seem to claim to come with a game to play them.

This was before I knew about war games and it sounded exciting. Unfortunately, I didn't have the patience to place the order and wait. Looking back I often wondered how involved a war game came with those figures.

An acquaintance at the time claimed to have bought a set. The supposed gimmick to qualify for the cheap price was that the plastic figures were all flat, standing up on flat bases instead of 3D molded.

On another note, my dad had bought me a plastic model set of the Anzio beach landings with many little vehicles and scenes. I was so fascinated with it. All these little Ogre miniatures remind me of the detail in that play set.

It's easy to become kind of jaded after so many years in the world, but the impressions and sensations of cool stuff as a kid is so vivid.
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Old 11-18-2017, 08:48 PM   #3
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Default Re: Ogre Miniatures Series 1 delivery thread

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Originally Posted by mstlaurent View Post
Back in 1977, when I was nine years old, I saw an ad in the back of my brother's Galaxy magazine for Metagaming Microgames. The first one was a game called Ogre, a futuristic game of tank warfare. Being nine years old, I had no idea what a wargame was, but I had bought plenty of plastic soldier kits from the back of comic books, and I was very excited to buy one that involved futuristic tanks. So I gathered up $2.95 from my savings and had my mom drive me down to the post office to buy a money order and mail off my order. A couple weeks later I received, not a set of plastic tanks, but a rulebook, a paper map, and some cardboard counters in a plastic envelope. I was so disappointed. But, being an intelligent and inquisitive kid, I started reading, and actually became interested. And it began a lifelong interest in gaming in general and Steve Jackson games in particular.

Now, today, after over 40 years, I have finally received my little plastic tanks. The quality is excellent, so I will forgive the egregious multi-decade shipping delay. ;-)
That's an awesome story. I suppose the game would seem underwhelming at first to someone new to board games. But glad you looked beyond that and saw a gem!

I'm now inspired by this to share my introduction to the world of Ogre. I wasn't aware of it until the fifth edition, the one from around 2000 in the hubless VHS tape case. I dabbled with D&D a bit, and played Star Frontiers and Rune Quest with a game master as a teen. Other than that, I didn't get into speculative gaming until the late 1990s. I played Young Jedi CCG and Starship Troopers, the 1970s version from Avalon Hill. Well, I wanted to play more sci-fi games, so I asked my friendly "local" (1 hour away) game store owner if there were any recommendations for a game that someone who likes Starship Troopers would enjoy. Without a pause, he said, "You would love Ogre." And I asked, "What's Ogre?" He said that the Ogre is a "giant computerized tank the size of..." and he looked out the door to the Wawa market across the street. "The size of two Wawas! And it takes a a small army to take it out. One guy plays the Ogre and the other plays the army." And it sounded straightforward enough. He told me to buy the VHS version and move on with the deluxe version if I like it. So I took it home and found it very easy for a Starship Troopers, or any Avalon Hill player, to pick up. Much later, it turned out that my dream was true and the two games are compatible (Space Gamer article). But returning to the story, needless to say, I was an instant fan, and my brothers and I started collecting the deluxe edition with metal miniatures. At the time my brother made good money and often gave me cash to ride up to the game store and pick some minis. I'd often buy an additional set too with my own money. I gave some a base coat of paint. I wish I hadn't because I'm not a good painter and the colors were strange. Olive Paneuro tanks, for instance. Most remained unpainted. And from then on, Ogre has remained in my top five favorite board games.

Oh, yeah. Car Wars is on that list too!

Last edited by ParadoxGames; 07-14-2019 at 10:54 AM. Reason: clerical stuff
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Old 11-18-2017, 10:21 PM   #4
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Default How I Came To Love Ogre

I have moved the preceding three posts to this new thread, in that A) they are unrelated to the original thread, and B) are really good reads! Plus I'm sure there are other equally great stories out there! Feel free to share your story.

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Old 11-18-2017, 10:44 PM   #5
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Default Re: Ogre Miniatures Series 1 delivery thread

Man, I need to get off of all of y'all's lawns.

I've had a copy of Ogre for a whopping 4 years...having won the pocket edition from the two MIBs who would go on to be my recruiters...but it was a rough time in my life and I didn't get to actually play the game until 6E hit earlier this year; have only had Car Wars for about 3, but have been playing that since day 1.

6E definitely grabbed me with the 'ooh shiny' factor, given that I've got a couple friends who wished they hadn't missed out on ODE, but the copy of Minis Lite that came just this week is what's really capturing my imagination. I've been playing Battletech since the '90s, but eventually grew tired of the crunch [and the crunch's ability to scare off new players], so browsing Lite's 2-page rules was very much so a "Wait...so I can play Ogre as a wargame, with the CRT's simplicity and a couple extra rules for terrain's effects on movement?" was very much so a "Time to gather the guys and scratch that itch!" moment.

Car Wars grabbed me for the same reason...it's a skirmish game [which I enjoy], with cars [one of my main passions], and shares a lot of similarities with a wargame I already enjoy. And this is how I spent all last summer talking to Magesmiley and getting sawdust all over the house.
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Old 11-18-2017, 11:05 PM   #6
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Default Re: How I Came To Love Ogre

Since we're all trading war stories and waving our canes at the young'uns ...

I saw an ad for Ogre in a copy of "Analog"(*) in the high school library. I'd already read Keith Laumer, Starship Troopers, etc.; my older bother and I had the American Heritage battle games, then we started in on Avalon Hill games, then on to 'Panzer Leader', and this new one seemed a perfect fit. At a whopping $3. With rules you could easily remember.

What really grabbed me though was the artwork. Winchell Chung has corrupted many a youth in his time.

I'm guessing I got Ogre either in the Christmas 1977 era, or Spring 1978 -- memory is hazy there, as my Metagaming bagged version is the Second Edition, First Printing, and my GEV's only have M4 . I played the heck out of it over the Summer of 1978 at Six Flags (over Mid-America) with a buddy who had Melee, over our lunch breaks.

G.E.V. followed, then later, Shockwave and Reinforcements, but many of those years it was solo play. Like 'mstlaurent' above, the dream of little plastic tanks was always there, and I would guess that while the four bagged games cost me under $25, I likely spent several hundred (or more) trying to proxy minis in the last thirty years.

(*) I wonder what was the first issue Metagaming advertised in? I know Ogre grabbed me immediately. For a lark, I just ordered the full 1977 year of Analog. I'll find what ad it was ...

[edit: After I discovered the "Dorvack" line of 1:24 plastic kits for powered armor, I had a slug of them, and tried Battlesuit rules with them. By then I was a professional model builder, and we had a huge vacuformed pan left over from an RV air conditioner prototype set we'd built. I started making an Ogre using that as the chassis, and got as far as needing dozens of road wheels. The thing was over 30" long and 20" wide ... and was leaning towards the look of a Mk. II when I stopped working on it.]

Last edited by Mack_JB; 11-19-2017 at 12:20 PM.
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Old 11-19-2017, 12:00 AM   #7
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Default Re: How I Came To Love Ogre

I'm about in-between here. I started playing Ogre in the mid-to-late 80s, with my father. He thought wargames would be a good teaching tool, and he was absolutely correct. We got a bunch of micro games, and I later moved on to BattleTech, Car Wars, and so on. Eventually, I got the VHS-boxed edition of Ogre/GEV (which, sadly, vanished some years ago) and happened to stumble on the Kickstarter campaign for Ogre Designer's Edition. I was re-hooked.

What I didn't know until much later was that my mother was good friends with Winchell Chung in high school. She is by no means a gamer, but she recognizes the Ogre Mk V.
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Old 11-19-2017, 01:04 AM   #8
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Default Re: How I Came To Love Ogre

I've been playing since 1980, plus or minus one. My original Ogre has faded away except for a few counters living in my GEV pocket box. I'm pretty sure I bought both of those from Scott Bizar of FGU at his Waterloo game store in NY.
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Old 11-19-2017, 07:24 AM   #9
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Default Re: How I Came To Love Ogre

Since we are sharing...

Ogre is one of the first wargames I ever played, I remember buying it in a little hobby store in Owosso, Michigan, on a trip to my grandparents house in the summer of 1977. I picked up WarpWar that summer too, but it never held my attention like Ogre did.

I had read a lot of science fiction up to that point, including Keith Laumer's Bolo! The idea of self-aware cybernetic tanks that were willing to sacrifice themselves for humans touched me deeply. I was 13 years old.

Later that summer, I would go see a movie that my father thought I might like, it had a strange title though... "Star Wars".

I played Ogre with my gaming friends at school, we pretty much wore out my counters and map. We drew new maps, created new vehicles, larger and larger Ogres, you name it.

In 1980 I was with some gamer friends in Columbus Ohio, visiting game stores. We stopped at a discount store that sometimes carried closeout merchandise from game stores. While rooting around on the shelves I found some packages of lead Ogre miniatures from a company named Martian Metals. I still have some of those figures in my collection.

Over the years I kept buying Ogre miniatures, trying to build up my collection. The line would keep getting discontinued and restarted. It was frustrating. After a few years of nothing being available I would sell off parts of my collection. Eventually Steve Jackson Games returned to producing Ogre miniatures around 2000/2001, and I started buying again.

I spent a lot of time and money buying used miniatures on the secondary market to build up my forces.

The line went back out of print for a time, then finally came back as part of the Ogre 6e Kickstarter. Hopefully a way will be found to keep the line in print for a while. I’m very grateful that we have the miniatures in plastic now.
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Old 11-19-2017, 08:14 PM   #10
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Default Re: How I Came To Love Ogre

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What I didn't know until much later was that my mother was good friends with Winchell Chung in high school. She is by no means a gamer, but she recognizes the Ogre Mk V.
Oh, dear, I'm almost afraid to ask you what her name is...
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