The Post Quiz: Mockups of Mayhem - Answers
Created | Updated Aug 16, 2015
You sunk my battleship. I'm going to take my toy boats and go home.
Mockups of Mayhem: Answers
Could you name these war games? This list proves something about people and games. Like, they'd weaponise spaghetti.
Here are the answers.
- If your card is higher, you win the 'battle'. War (the card game). The Edited Guide says authoritatively that it's 'fatuously horrible'.
- Try castling your king. Chess. Learn how to play it in the Edited Guide.
- In this Viking board game, you 'fight' using sheep's knuckles and strategy. It's called Hnefatafl.
- This Prussian tabletop war game includes a gamemaster. Invented in 1812, Kriegsspiel was a sneaky way to get Prussian officers to practise. We don't have a Guide Entry yet. Want to write one, Herr General?
- Sink or swim, this naval game can be fun. Battleship. Calling all nautical h2g2ers: we need an Entry.
- Do you like to play with your toy soldiers? We'll let you if you name the science fiction writer who invented a war game played with spring-loaded toy cannon. HG Wells. You knew that. He called them 'Little Wars'.
- Okay, it's still war, even if you are an elf or wizard. But don't lose your odd-shaped dice. You're playing Dungeons and Dragons, wasting undergraduate time since 1974.
- It's war, and perhaps as you know it. With model Dark Elves, Chaos Dwarves, and Vampire Counts. And it's classic. Warhammer has been around since 1983.
- The year is 1947, you're playing this electronic war game, and you're making history. You're not making your bosses mad, because they like it when you practice launching missiles. This thing was called the Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device, and it was invented by Professor Goldsmith of Furman University, and it actually used an electron gun. That's an illegal amount of fun. Anybody want to race the Editor for the Guide Entry?
- If you played this fictional game, you might accidentally commit genocide. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card is a complex moral tale about war as seen through the eyes of an unwitting child soldier. Have you read it, seen the film? Want to write about it?
Lots of games to choose from there. And most of the time, you don't even need to turn on a computer. Of course, these days, you can probably play Kriegsspiel online with real generals.
