It all began in the year 1989 with the game "Tank General". Followed by Tank General 2 and 3, and also some offsets with names like Star General or Fantasy General. The PC game Fantasy Wars and the successor Elven Legacy are of newer dates, but they still contain the same good concept as the old games.
You play these games with troops that are arranged on a hexagon map. Both games are played in rounds, normally the player starts with his troops in one edge of the map, from here he starts over to carry the enemy's positions who is holding the rest of the map. Between the levels (each map represents one level) you can hire new troops or update your troops, you can give special artefacts to your troops or select abilities for them.
Fantasy Wars has three different campaigns, the Human & the Orc campaign have 10 levels, the last campaign (Alliance) has 8 levels, all in all there are 28 levels to play. You start with the Human campaign, once you've solved it the next one begins. The Human campaign is followed by the Orc campaign and when it's finished the Alliance campaign begins.
The story of Fantasy Wars in short form:
The first campaign is the Human campaign. Derrick Pfeil is a mercenary and King Victor hires him to defence the southern borders. During the campaign he has to fight against the Orcs that are marching into the Human territories. Derrick Pfeil gets some helpers, a mage named Master Brennock from the town of Sylent and Father Dexter, a priest. These heroes are updated the same way as the normal troops. Derrick and his friends have to fight against the troops and heroes of the Orcs which are marching through Derenhalle to Verson and Sylent. Their goal is to stop their attacks on the Humans and protect an ancient artefact. When Derrick Pfeil has won all the battles the next campaign begins.
After finishing the Human campaign the Orc campaign begins. Now the player has to help the Orcs winning the battles and march to Sylent to defeat the Humans. The orcish hero Ugraum has collected all orcish folks. Now he wants to attack the Humans and get back the land which he thinks belongs to the Orcs. Ugraum has a shaman named Ash-Hoon who helps him. Ash-Hoon knows of the ancient artefact that is hidden in Verson. The same way Derrick Pfeil had to guard this artefact in the Human campaign, so the Orcs have to get this artefact now. But...
...there are still the Elves. When the Orc campaign ends the campaign of the Alliance begins. What the Elves have to do with this? That's simple, the artefact is an Elven artefact and the daemon Farrakh is woken up by the Elven Leader Glenderin. Now it's up to the young Elven woman Teya Tael to lead the Alliance through this campaign with the help of Derrick Pfeil. And you can be sure that nothing is as it seems.
Elven Legacy, the successor of Fantasy Wars, has only one campaign playing on side of the elves. Fantasy Wars ended with the Alliance campaign and the story continues in Elven Legacy now.
The story of Elven Legacy in short form:
Derrick Pfeil killed the demon Farrakh but he made a mistake, he broke the sword and the demon's soul could escape. Now the lands of the elves are in danger and you have to correct the things that are going on. [...still playing]