Wars of Ozz: Black Powder Mass Fantasy Battle in the Post-Apocalyptic Lands of Ozz is launched.
Wars of Ozz is a fantasy miniatures game, written by John R ‘Buck’ Surdu and set in the marvellous World of Ozz, first chronicled by L. Frank Baum in 1900, later turned into movies by MGM and Disney and now the inspiration for a totally unique mass battle tabletop experience.
Wars of Ozz is:
• A new genre for mass fantasy tabletop gaming
• Horse & Musket ‘Fantasy’
• Designed for solo, 2 player & team play
• Features a balanced Magic System
• Rulebook contains full background, army lists & painting guide
• Supported with over 70 packs of unique miniatures
• Backed with new factions and new releases for years to come
• Fun to play, streamlined, intuitive & based around reactive game play that keeps both sides continually involved
• Game length 2-3 hours
Wars of Ozz™ began as idea that Russ Dunaway of Old Glory had been planning for several years. He has often asserted that as a miniatures manufacturer, he wanted to do something new and different, but that just about every period and genre had already been done many times. In developing both the figures and the rules, we wanted to steer away from copyright infringement, and there have been whole books written on the legal maneuverings of Disney and MGM over Oz rights. That is why we spell Ozz with to z’s. Wars of Ozz™ is based on the Oz of the L. Frank Baum novels (in the public domain), but it is different.
Ozz is set in a horse and musket, massed battle, post-apocalyptic world (what isn’t these days?). In the “last great war,” the Madness Bombs were released, and as biological and chemical weapons are wont to do, the effects grew out of control very quickly. The war ended, but no one even remembers who won or what the war was about. For hundreds of years the survivors were beset by manias of all sorts. The effects of the Madness Bombs also caused mutations such as, but not limited to, pumpkin-headed men, giants and trolls, witches and wizards, and Gillikins and Winkies. After hundreds of years of tribalism and chaos, Zoraster the Wizard arrived and began to reestablish order based loosely on the Baum books. The Munchkins under Zoraster and Quadlings under Glenda established a solid alliance, defending themselves from desert nomads, screamers from the Forbidden Lands, Gillikins under the Witch Arella, and Winkies under the Witch Evora. Caught between these frequent wars of conquest by the Winkies and Gillikins, King Jack of the Land of Harvest did his best to keep his lands free of Gillikins and Winkies. This is the setting for Ozz, one of frequent, small wars between the four major nationalities and their assorted allies.
Wars of Ozz is supported by an active Facebook Group.
Many new releases are planned for Wars of Ozz over the next few years including complete new factions and additional units for existing factions. Buck and the rules development team are already working on companion rulesets that use the streamlined, intuitive and reactive games mechanisms developed for ‘Ozz’and apply them to ‘traditional fantasy’ in Wars of Orcs and Dwarves and historical ‘horse and musket’ in Wars of Colum, Line and Square.
4 thoughts on “Wars Of Ozz – Now Launched”
11/12/2020 at 18:22
I have been really intrigued by this. About the rules—I see they say solo/multi/team play friendly. A lot of my gaming is “play both sides” solo. Are the rules friendly to that? Ie, not a lot of secret information, bidding, hands of cards, etc.
12/12/2020 at 11:17
Hi Nathaniel, there is no reason why you could not play both sides in a solo game. The rules do not use secret information or bidding or hands of cards. There is a clever mechanism built in to facilitate solo play against an ‘intelligent’ system opponent using the concept of force posture based on relative morale / casualties / objectives, but that is completely optional, you can easily make decisions for both sides if that is what you like to do.
13/12/2020 at 20:19
Hi Chris, thanks for the reply—sounds great.
17/12/2020 at 19:16
As an aside, during the Kickstarter campaign, folks who pledged got access to the Beta version of the rules, so they have been playtested by not just my buddies and me but by other gamers. They have been very complimentary of the rules. We frequently complete four-player games in under three hours.
There is a Facebook page for Wars of Ozz as well as a Groups.io group, GreatWargamingRules, to ask questions and follow future developments.
I am in the process of adapting the basic engine for massed battle, generic fantasy games. Wars of Orks and Dwarves (WOOD) will allow people to play with armies that may have been orphaned by other game companies and/or bring whatever figures you have. There is a spreadsheet-based tool to help you determine the point costs for an arbitrary unit that you define. Those who have Wars of Ozz (WOZZ) will be able to be a Beta tester of WOOD in the near future.
Finally, after completing WOOD, I’ll be adapting the engine for general horse and musket battles, and I plan to use them for Napoleonic, SYW, ECW, and many other periods.
Take the plunge!