Solo wargaming is past and future, with the age-old option of playing both sides always available, now bolstered by a suite of titles designed just for the solitaire experience. The games below cover a broad range, yet all are designed, whether through dice, cards, counters, or all three, to fill the solo wargaming slots in your gaming life.
If you’re a solo player who’s a bit intimidated at the idea of a solo ‘wargame’, don’t be. These run the same complexity range as your more euro-style solo games, but are draped in a more historical theme. They’re still puzzles, stories, and adventures, and you can ease into them without feeling overwhelmed. In fact, I’d say they’re a great introduction to solo wargaming as a concept, a way to get your feet wet without the pressure of another person across the table.
And, if you wanna cheat a bit, nobody’s going to care, because you are solo wargaming.
I, Napoleon Lets You Tell The Emperor’s Story
GMT Games, arguably the most prolific ‘wargames’ publisher, has a flair for giving unique titles their shot. I, Napoleon (Ted Raicer) is more an interactive 
story than a crunchy tactical battle. You’ll be rolling dice and making decisions based on cards popping up, weaving your way through Napoleon’s life. As noted in the introduction, I, Napoleon states the case that a solo wargame need not be complex or intimidating. The rules here are simple, the choices largely constrained to what cards appear before you.
What I, Napoleon gets right is the emergent narrative. With a few rolls, you’ll be climbing through the eras of Napoleon’s life, trying to survive his early battles through to the French Revolution and his ascent to Emperor. The changing objectives, the challenges with diplomacy and keeping enough support on your side keep things tense, and, as in many solo games, a little bad luck could wipe your campaign early on. I, Napoleon isn’t a hard reset, though, and you’ll be back experimenting with a different strategy in short order.
If you’re a curious solo gamer wanting an experience lighter on rules and size, or a Napoleon buff eager to explore the Emperor’s life, then I, Napoleon is an easy recommendation. For those who want something grittier, with more combat and fewer cards, read on.
The Iron Dome Brings a Challenge
If you prefer games with immediate relevance, it’s hard to beat Reign of Chaos – The Israeli-Hamas War, October 2023 (Paul Rohrbaugh). An expansion to 2013’s A Reign of Missiles, you’re tasked with the dual objectives of defending Israel from rocket attacks while also keeping the conflict from expanding out of control across the Middle East. Both of these elements are largely driven through dice rolls and placement of your Iron Dome chits. You’ll start every round
with a dual roll, triggering an event that cascades into gameplay, with new threats and opportunities emerging to be dealt with.
It is, in a sense, a tabletop version of the arcade classic Missile Command.
What makes this one fly as a low-complexity solitaire game is precisely that focus, the melding of random luck with tactical tweaks as to where to place your defenses, and a juicy theme that only works well in a solo setup — what, you want to play as the missiles?
Reign of Chaos and its predecessor harken back to a more classic wargaming world, with print-and-play style components. Its small number of counters need to be glued and mounted, and the ‘board’ is more or less a sheet of well-covered paper. It’s priced to match, and the slim size makes Reign of Chaos and Reign of Missiles easy choices for travel. Break this one out in a hotel room with a side of room service, and you’ve got a solid game night on your hands.
A World War Two Street Fight
If you want urban fighting in World War Two, you tend to find it in the European Theater. Manila, The Savage Streets, 1945 (Michael Rinella) switches things up and sets you in the shoes of American forces attempting to wrest Manila back from the Imperial Japanese. You must fight your way in from the outskirts 
to the city center before troops run out or exhaustion halts the offensive. This latter bit is represented via a clever morale track that moves downward as your troops lose battles or too much time—nine turns—passes. Familiar solitaire elements are streamlined here to keep the action rolling too – there’s a random event table instead of a deck of cards, reducing setup time and fiddling. At the same time, Japanese defenses are hidden until encountered, making every game different and adding tension.
Do you charge in and risk encountering an elite force? Or send a probing attack and risk losing morale if your boys get bounced back?
Manila does what good, deeper solitaire games ought to and provides fertile ground for narratives. Your paratrooper assault might drop in and meet haphazard resistance to the south, only to find their easy road suddenly stymied by a cadre of elite Japanese reinforcements. They might counterattack, driving into your heroic paratroopers, who now find themselves in the fight of their lives. Can you get support to them in time, or do you make the grimmer choice and press on from other directions, knowing the elite enemy forces are occupied?
There’s an art to making a solitaire game with so many juicy decisions that isn’t driven by randomness or so much rules complexity to render the experience a slog of reference checks. Manila strikes this balance, keeping the moment-to-moment gameplay free from rules grit and involved turn-to-turn overhead. You’ll stay in the moment, making choices and seeing your efforts play out over several hours. Shorter, of course, should your troops find themselves on the wrong end of enemy rifle fire.
Also in Manila’s favor is its low counter density and mounted board. This game won’t envelop your table or require trays upon trays to hold all the little squares. The board design keeps what you need to play front and center – the tables you need are printed right there, making it easy to stay in the action. Perhaps the best part?
You’re racing against history, with your goal being to do better than Americans did in the actual battle. You’ll measure your progress against reality, and see whether your armchair general skills are up to the task. Of course, since this is a solitaire game, nobody need ever know if they aren’t.
Take the Pacific War on the Road
While none of the games in this article are deeply complex, Pacific War 1942 – Travel Edition (Mike Wylie, Grant Wylie) takes its name to heart, breaking out an adventure playable from start to finish in thirty minutes, even if you’re a few drinks into your layover.
Worthington Publishing puts together a strong package for solo wargaming here, with a well-made box and durable components. You’ll use those pieces to play the Allies defending against an advancing Japanese AI (this was 1942, after all) in a point-to-point assault. The rules are a snappy one-page, but carry enough room
for variety, a mix supercharged by a dice.
Bigger war games might use decks of cards or copious chits to drive decisions, but Pacific War 1942 has you rolling a six-sided dice to determine random events, your available action points on each turn, and combat results. While this inflates randomness, in a game this quick, the die rolls feel suited to the story: are your limited actions this turn because of a storm or low morale, or a couple of successive strong rolls because Pearl Harbor got its act together to give you support?
In a solitaire game, you have room to tell these stories. Head to head duels with this many rolls might leave one luck-poor side feeling cold. Here, it’s just another challenge to overcome (or not, which is a story in itself). Pacific War 1942 understands its job: a slim, adventure-packed game easily stuffed in a suitcase to ensure you’re never bored, no matter where you happen to be.
Solo Wargaming Is A World Worth Exploring
Slapping down a board, a bunch of counters, and telling yourself a story with a solo wargame has never been easier. There’s variety in scope, theater, and style, from card-driven narratives to dice-chucking point-to-point defense. You can settle in for a few hours with Napoleon or a quick hit in the Pacific while you’re on the road. And if you’ve never tried a solo wargame before (or solo game in general), these offer a compelling escape from screens at a friendlier price point than their bigger brethren.
That said, these titles are often in and out of stock, so use that Want List and make getting the game you’re looking for a stress-free experience. In other words, save the tension for the dice rolls, one of the perks of solo wargaming.
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