SELWG 2022 : A Good Day

The other Sunday I had the pleasure of attending SELWG 2022, at the Lea Valley Athletics Centre in Norrh-East London.

As you can see, it's rather a splendid venue, no shortage of space and quite an improvement on the old location at Crystal Palace.  I met up with my old buddy Dave ( St Cyr on Wheels ), and we followed our usual habit - toured the games first, then a spot of lunch, and finally a look at the trade stands, and a little retail therapy/essential purchasing.  I took a few photos of games that looked good, as follows :

SEEMS - Battle of Britain

South East Essex Military Society ( SEEMS ) put on a rather nice-looking Battle of Britain game entitled Attack of Eagles  - the aircraft were 1/144 scale ( Revell, I think they said ). Luftwaffe Ju-88s and Me109s crossed the British coast, as some of 'The Few' come to meet them.  

'Retired Wargamers Reloaded' had a splendid WW2 game Eagles and Lions at Carentan ( 15mm,  I think? ).  It looked lovely, and that church was quite something! The Germans were defending in depth, and as you surveyed the battlefield, more and more concealed A/T guns and other defensive positions became apparent - just as it should be!  

Carentan - allies advance on the splendid model town

German defenders: quite a few A/T guns lurking here  

Deal Wargames Society showed  Luxembourg 1940 - something of a walkover, one would imagine, Panzer Divisions vs. the 'home guard' of a medium-sized town, in effect!  

Deal wargamer's Luxembourg 1940

There was some help from the French Armee de l'Air, however.  I liked the bomber (below), but I am still  struggling to identify it, even  after spending far too long on Wikipedia looking at French bombers 1939-45..

I'm told it's a Potez 63-11...

The League of Gentlemen Anti-Alchemists - Ducrot's Day Out was a 'Sharpe Practise'  Napoleonic game with excellent figures and scenery 

Shepway Warganes Club's Cold War game   Hahausen 89 looked great too, I liked the typically Germanic wooded terrain ( we all need more trees, I reckon )  and a brilliant model of a Russian missile-launching AFV in action!

The Society of Ancients are always reliable, they had the Battle of Gaza 312BC, using Impetus rules. I must say I always liked those big pike blocks and elephants etc, if I ever venture into Ancients I think Alexander and his Successors would be my choice.  ( 'dipping a toe' into it with  DBA's small  armies is on the increasingly long wish-list ).  

Gaza 312 - phalanxes get stuck in

Prince Rupert's Bluecoats had The Storming of Bristol ( ECW ) using Donnybrook rules, they were very friendly and happy to chat and the layout  looked good. The players were in period costume ( I think perhaps they take their name from the Sealed Knot regiment that they are members of ? ) and I liked the 'old school' trope of leaving 'casualties' lying on the table, giving a sort of visual guide to how the fighting had ebbed and flowed. 

Storming Bristol  ( + player's hand, oops! )

 

Too Fat Lardies were out in force, running several games with their rules. One was Strength and Honour Spartacus revolt  in 2mm ( I'm sure that when recruiting players, they could not resist asking 'who is Spartacus...' )   

Now in principle the idea is great, the rules are very well-regarded, I think, and I did wonder about trying 2mm - but somehow, the look of it left me a bit cold, and I think it is due to the tiny figures. Of course it's great to represent whole Legions as units, but they are just a bit too minute for my taste. It may be a trivial thought, but I wondered if perhaps a bit more bright colours - flags, standards etc - would help, or if Napoleonics with their vibrant coloured uniforms might work better?  This is of course only personal taste. 

Close-up of 2mm Legions

Also from the 'Lardies, a 'Chain of Command' game - The Northern Perimeter at Oosterbeek 1944. Fantastic scenery and models! 

Too Fat Lardies 'Chain of Command'

 'And finally'..  Milton Hundred Wargames Club showed a Vietnam game, which had an interesting concept of fighting in 'The Delta' - US patrol boats on a search and destroy mission against the Vietnamese. It made for an intriguing combination of land and water-borne movement, and made it difficult for those on land to move around since they were forced to cross bridges to reach the next island, and were very vulnerable while doing so.  Sadly I forgot what the rules were...but it was really interesting. 

Milton Hundred - from the Swale 'Delta' to the Mekong

 

There were loads more games, of course, I just couldn't photograph them all ( I admit I have a blind spot with Fantasy/Sci Fi - sorry! ) . Of course other bloggers will have posted masses of pictures of the show - Tamsin at  Wargaming Girl especially has a comprehensive set, I think she managed to photograph every single game!   Special mention to one I forgot to photograph - Tunbridge Wells Wargames Club using 'Paperboys'  paper model Trafalgar-era ships for an 18th Century Naval Battle Spanish Gold.  A great alternative to what can be pretty expensive ship models in some proprietory rules systems/games. Dave has the Paperboys Trafalgar book and a taste for the age of sail, and it got him thinking.  

We broke for lunch - the one issue we had with the show was that I think  there were only three catering vans, one doing  Burgers, one Greek Souvlaki etc, one for teas and coffees. With a rumoured 700+ visitors, the queues for food got pretty long and slow-moving - although I'd concede that there might not have been much room for more caterers.  There was however, plenty of seating available, with the banks of spectator seats around the running track in the main hall as well as some tables outside.

After lunch, a selective  tour of the trade stands. My biggest purchase was not at all photogenic, being a pack of self-adhesive magnetic paper from Magnetic Displays. These should allow me to make unit bases for my Pike and Shot infantry, which are based in ones, twos and threes to allow flexibility of regiment/battalia/tercio size, but are a bit of a pain to move on the table with lots of small bases! The plan is to mount all the small groups of figures on magnetic paper, then use steel paper to make unit-size movement bases at whatever size is required. I could also line the storage boxes with steel paper, for safer storage. So, I was pleased with that purchase, saving the P&P.

I am still picking up odds and ends ( in a completely unplanned way ) for the 'D-Day Dodgers' ( WW2 in Italy ),  and I noticed that a couple of traders did 20mm Indian Army, so I bought a few samples - Sikh, Gurkha and Rajputan command groups ( 4 figures per pack ) from SHQ, and a pack of  6 Gurkha riflemen from the Combat Miniatures range sold by Stonewall Figures, whose proprietor had come all the way from Cornwall. Both traders very pleasant to deal with, and the figures look nice. More for the painting backlog.. 

Test-purchases: Indian Army from SHQ ( left ) and Stonewall

On the same theme, the 1:72 Model Figures stand usually produces something, and this time it was Italians - a must for an Italian campaign, and they can fight on both sides!  This set from Strelets are probably more suited to the North African campaign, I admit ( those with sun helmets and feathers might not be so useful to me ! )  but I'm glad to have them, they will fit in somewhere. The box art is interesting - I wonder if the makers have pasted-in the faces of friends/colleagues onto the picture?  

 

Last but not least, a visit to Helion's stall and a nice chat with the guys there, who I had spoken to before at their 'Festschrift' for Christopher Duffy, and I came away with a copy of Barry Hilton's new book about wargaming the late 17th Century,  Every Bullet Has Its Billet.   Not sure I will ever actually game this period, but having seen some reviews it just looked to be a good read! The author pays tribute to Charles S Grant's From Pike to Shot which covered a similar period,  and which I have a treasured copy of - but I think Barry covers a wider range of armies, and gives quite a lot of space to Naval affairs too, of which he is an afficianado.  Lots of really nice pictures of figures and ships etc, and it looks to be a good introduction to a lot of different armies and conflicts. It feels like a similar concept to George Gush's lovely old Renaissance Armies from the 1970s, and I think it will be a worthwhile piece of reading. I will try not to get tempted by figures for the Polish/Lithuanian Commonwealth just yet, though..

 

And that was about that.  having arrived about 10:30 am, I said my goodbyes to Dave as we left at about 3:30 pm - the time had positively flown. Having arrived quite early, I had wondered if I might give a participation game a go, but there just wasn't time ( probably too much time on shopping! ) . So that will have to wait for another time. Having got the show 'bug' again, I am wondering about 'Warfare' at Farnborough next month...

I hope you've enjoyed reading about SELWG 2022, I certainly enjoyed visiting it, and many thanks to all involved with the organisation of the day.  Next time,  some thoughts on In Deo Veritas rules, and a look at Twilight of the Divine Right, which cover a similar period and format of game, so comparisons will be interesting. Meanwhile keep well, everyone.

In Deo Veritas : battle of 'Kirchendorf'

 A couple of posts ago I set out the likely forces and terrain for a Thirty Years' War battle, trying out Philip Garton's In Deo Veritas rules and using my 70s/80s vintage 15mm figures.  This week I played out the game, and there follows a sort of battle report, and some reflections on the rules. 

So, the inital setup:  having discovered the 'selfie screen' on my camera allows a birds-eye view of the battlefield,  here are the armies in their starting positions. The French are in the  North ( top ), Imperialists to the South.

Let battle commence...

A quick review of the armies in keeping with the period, the units in each army are grouped into 'Wings' - in this case each has left and right wings of  Cavalry, and left and right wings of  Infantry. 

The French have 4 brigades (each of 6 figures)  of cavalry on each wing. Their left wing of infantry has 2 brigades (each of 16 figures) of foot, plus 3 companies (each 3 figures)  of detached musketeers in the woods, and their right wing infantry has 3 brigades of foot and a battery of field artillery.  This gives a  total of 14  brigades plus artillery. All units are designated 'Trained',  except the commanded musketeers who are 'Veteran' and one of the right-wing foot brigades is 'Raw'. 

The Imperialists have 5 brigades of cavalry and one company of dragoons on each wing,  Their left wing of foot has 3 infantry brigades and one battery of field artillery, and the right wing of foot has 2 brigades of infantry and one battery, plus 3 companies of detached musketeers in the woods.   Hence a total of 16 brigades plus the dragoons and guns.  All units are 'Trained' except the dragoons and the commanded musketeers, who are 'Raw'. 

Now the kicker - although the French have a slightly weaker force, the scenario ( actually the ECW Battle of Cheriton, 1644 ) specifies that the objective for both sides is 'To control the road off the table to the South'  So the French ( playing the part of the Royalists ) simply must attack, attack, attack!  They are going to have to do very well to win - but at least it gives a strong incentive to 'get stuck in', and should result in a proper scrap. 

 The rules specify that for each turn,first  each 'Wing' is given an order, which can be 'Hold', 'Attack' or 'Withdraw'.  Then the wings are moved one at a time, and this is determined by a card draw, where each wing has a card - I used 8 cards from a normal pack of playing cards, each card representing one cavalry or infantry wing. So there is no 'player turn', rather the various wings of both sides move in a random sequence decided by the card draw. Once all moves have been made, the resulting combats are resolved - shooting first, then melees - with the order of resolving combats decided by the winner of a die roll between the players. I liked this method, as the random sequence of moving brigades injects some nice uncertainty - will my cavalry wing be able to extend its front before the opposing cavalry can charge? 

Given the scenario objectives, the French pretty much had to issue 'Attack' orders to all wings from the start, while the Imperialists could simply order 'Hold',  but the Imperial Commander gave his left wing of cavalry 'Attack' orders, sending them forward to meet their French opposite numbers. Thus on turn 1, battle was joined as the opposing cavalry met on the West side of the field.  

French(top) suffer congestion on the right; opposing cavalry engage on the left 

 

The combat system is relatively simple - for each melee combat  'player 1'  rolls a number of 'to hit' dice for his unit ( a cavalry brigade gets 3 dice, for example ) - advantage or disavantage factors cause the number of dice to be increased or reduced - and 4,5 or 6 is a 'hit'.  Then the opposing unit rolls 'to save' dice ( a cavalry brigade gets 2 saving dice ) , with modifiers again affecting the number of dice rolled, and a 'save' requiring a 4,5 or 6.  Subtract any 'saves'  from the 'hits' suffered - and then in turn  'player 2' rolls his 'to hit' dice for his unit, and 'player 1' rolls 'saves'.   The final numbers of hits on each unit are compared, and the result of the combat depends on the difference between them.  Equal hits means 'stand-off' and the melee continues; a difference of one hit causes 'Recoil' with the loser forced back,  a difference of two causes 'Rout', and three or more is 'Destruction' of the losing unit.   There is no recording of casualties - rather the level of disorder of each unit determines their fate, going from 'Sound' to 'Disordered', Disrupted', 'Routed' and finally 'Destroyed'. I used my trusty 1p and 2p coins placed next to units to show disorder levels ( 1p = 'Disordered', 2p = 'Disrupted' etc ).  Shooting uses a similar method of 'to hit' and 'to save' dice, indeed using the same charts of modifiers, with the 'hits minus saves' result potentially causing different levels of disorder in the target.

In this opening cavalry fight, 2 brigades of Imperial Harquebusiers met 2 brigades of French horse, and the dice favoured the Imperials. On the first fight the Imperial 'Blue' brigade scored 2 hits and the French 'Conde' brigade 1 hit, resulting in Conde having to recoil - in the second fight the Imperialist 'Red' brigade scored 1 hit to the French 'Turenne' brigade's none, and Turenne were forced to recoil. So, an early setback for the French cavalry.  I learned quickly that I needed to leave a decent space between the lines of units in each wing - if a unit is forced to 'Recoil' and contacts its comrades behind, they too suffer an increase in disorder.  That seems entirely right for the period - indeed for any grouping of units in multiple supporting  lines, in any period ( It makes the characterisitc 'chequer board' formation of infantry brigades in 30YW armies entirely sensible - a good example of rules making the players use correct period tactics ).

On turn 2, that cavalry melee continued, with the French die-rolling improving and achieving 'stand-off' results, while the rest of the French army simply advanced, their infantry incoming into range of the Imperial artillery, who concentrated fire on the leading red-coated brigade in the French Right wing, and 'Disrupted' it - good shooting. 

Turn 3, the French were now suffering a bit of congestion, as the available space narrowed - their left-hand infantry had to close up to allow the left wing cavalry to expand  their first line to a two-brigade frontage.  The Imperial right wing of cavalry could have taken advantage of this to sweep forward in a massed charge - but their orders were to 'Hold' -  'Scheisse', muttered their commander.   

On the other flank, the Imperial cavalry did better - in the  continuing  melee, the Conde brigade suffered 2 hits to nil, gained two levels of Disorder,  and were the first unit to be Routed, while Turenne was again 'Recoiled'. When a brigade is Routed, its parent Wing must test for Fatigue, and the French right wing cavalry failed this test and became 'Fatigued', which meaning it must be issued 'Hold' or 'Withdraw' orders - so the French Right wing attack was stalled.  

But the French must press on - on Turn Four, their right wing Infantry charged, reaching the Imperial guns. However,  with the Imperialist cavalry having the advantage on that flank, a brigade of  black-armoured Cuirassiers from their second line were able to turn and attack the French right wing's 'Bleu' infantry brigade ( a 'Raw' unit )  in the flank. Meanwhile on the other side of the field,  French left and Imperial right wing cavalry met, the Imperials having remembered to order 'Attack' this time! So there was combat nearly all along the lines - good stuff! Or so I thought, but the Dice Gods disagreed with me - after a lot of 'to hit' and 'save' rolls, every single melee combat was inconclusive,  with even the Raw infantry brigade attacked in the flank managing to hold on.  I guess it just happens sometimes - once close combat is joined, it can be a slow grinding, attritional business. 

The French infantry attack stalled rather  -  the rules specified that the attacking infantry moved to 'close range' and exchanged fire with the defending guns before charging home, but the concentrated fire of both Imperial batteries told, the attacking infantry were 'Disrupted', and thus when they reached the guns, their melee rolls were ineffective. The guns only suffered  a lesser 'Disorder' result from French musketry.Hardly a smashing impact on the Imperial centre. 

Turn 4: contact all along the line. Centre-left French Bluecoats flanked by Cuirassiers! 

 Turn 5 - on the Imperial left, the cavalry melee continued, with the French 2nd line ( of mercenary 'English' horse now facing  the victorious Imperial Harquebusiers. The French infantry wings continued their attack - the left wing of foot now contacted their  opposing Imperial Guns, while the right wing foot tried to press forward while also dealing with cuirassiers on the their flanks ( the Red-coated brigade which had been Disrupted by the early artillery fire gamely charged against the black cuirassiers ). On the Imperial right, those brigades of horse already in contact continued fighting, while both sides tried to extend their frontage to the East,  by wheeling out units from their 2nd lines.

Now for shooting - and what shooting. The lone  Imperialist dragoon company on their left wing having swung inwards, gave a volley into the flank of the leading French 'Redcoat' foot, and scored 2 hits - and there were no saves. Two hits on an already Disrupted unit - the Redcoats broke and fled, 'Routed'. What's more, they crashed through the frst-line Green-coated brigade to their right - inflicting 'Disorder'. That would not help the Greencoats' melee rolls, though to their credit, their musketry drove off the gunners in front of them with a 'Disrupted and Recoil'  result - 3 hits! All the same, those plucky dragoons had inflicted complete chaos to the French infantry attack. 

Melee - the Imperial right-wing Harquebusiers were not to be denied - both 'English' horse brigades were forced to recoil and Disrupted, their entire wing now being in a parlous state.  The black Cuirassiers fighting both red- and blue-coated French foot dealt a smashing blow - 2 hits to none on the redcoats, who promptly routed but also faced a further Disorder test, and failed, resulting in their destruction.  To make matters yet worse, on the Imperial right the French Chevaux Legers were forced to recoil in melee by Imperial 'Green' cuirassiers, and they recoiled straight into the other Red-coated French foot which had been routed by Dragoon fire. It was all too much for those redcoats, the extra level of disorder inflicted causing them to disintegrate. Disaster!   The French right wing of foot now had only one brigade in fighting condition, and that brigade was being attacked in flank by cavalry. It was the French commander's turn to mutter -  'Merde' , or perhaps stronger words.  Some consolation was however given by the King's Musketeers on his left wing,  who won their melee against Imperial 'Blue' Cuirassiers, who were routed off the table and thus out of the fight. 

After all that trauma, the French right-wing infantry amazingly passed their 'fatigue' test and remained sound, but the Imperial right wing cavalry, having lost a cuirassier brigade, rolled badly and became Fatigued - so no more 'attack' orders for them. Some relief  for the French, then, but their situation still looked pretty bad!  

 

Battle rages in the centre - both French 'red' units were doomed

On Turn 6, the Imperial commander went for the coup de grace, with the three brigades of his left wing of infantry given 'Attack' orders, aiming to sweep away the one surviving  French brigade opposite. His right wing of foot, however were told to 'Hold', and be prepared in case the 'Fatigued' cavalry wing to their right gave way. On the French side, right wing horse and foot were both given  'Hold' , but on their left, both horse and foot kept up the 'Attack' in hopes of breaking through to the Southern road - this might be seen as a 'brave'  choice.. The French foot duly charged into contact with their opponents, and the opposing cavalry  extended frontage such that both sides had all four remaining brigades in melee with each other. But it all fell apart - the charging French green-coated foot were stopped in their tracks by Imperialist musketry and 'Disrupted', so could not charge home, and their left wing cavalry lost badly, with Chevaux Legers routed and two Curiassier brigades recoiled, only the Kings Musketeers hanging on. Over on the French Right, their cavalry was finally defeated, with both 'English' brigades routed - so 3 out of 4 brigades gone.  The brave bluecoat infantry were finally routed too, by the flanking black cuirassiers, so the entire  French right wing of both horse and foot were out of the fight. Surely, the end? 

how it ended - badly for the French

 

And so it proved, as 'Fatigue'  tests left the French right wing of cavalry 'Exhausted'  ( must withdraw ) and both right wing infantry and left wing cavalry  'Fatigued'. There followed a 'General Will' test on the whole army - duly failed by the French, having no less than 7 out of 14 brigades routed or destroyed. Failing this test meant defeat for them.

A nice touch is that the rules have a post-battle 'pursuit' phase whereby disordered, disrupted and routed units in the losing army must dice for whether they are destroyed, and commanders of 'fatigued' or 'exhausted' wings dice for being captured - this might be quite useful in a campaign, I think. for once the French rolled well, losing only the Blue-coated foot, no doubt ridden down by those nasty cuirassiers, and the unlucky commander of their right wing of horse. With 9 brigades and 3 generals to test, it could have been a lot worse! 

Finally, you may be wondering what had been occurring in the woods? No teddy bears picnic, but essentially the Veteran French commanded musketeers advanced, and overpowered their Imperial counterparts ( a detachement of MacFarlane's Scots ) who were rated 'Raw'. But this was entirely separate from the main battle, and there was no chance to exploit any advantage gained before the main French army collapsed.  

I have rambled on far too long, so I will save my thoughts on how the rules and scenario worked,  and what I liked or didn't like, for another post.  I hope you've enjoyed reading this account anyway, and maybe picked up an idea of how the rules worked in general. It was a good game, and the rules mostly seemed to go pretty well  - the scenario was always going to be a tough one for the French!  

Next time, a bit of chat about the SELWG show, which I attended last Sunday ( and enjoyed, of course!).  Meanwhile, keep well, everyone.  

Fnurban #17 : Free Rules and well-stocked Magazines

This week I picked up the latest issue ( no. 418, October 2022 ) of Wargames Illustrated magazine, and found an interesting suprise: it features a complete set of rules for Napoleonic wargames. These are Valour and Fortitude  by Jervis Johnson and the Perry Twins, which have been specially commissioned by the magazine.  This issue  naturally goes big on the whole concept, including a feature and Q&A article on Jervis Johnson,  a scenario suggestion and  battle report of the same scenario played by the authors, and army lists and  'special rules' for French and Prussian armies. 

 

As the magazine says, 'everything you need to play intriguingly simple Napoleonic big battles'.  Of course I'm not strictly a Napoleonic gamer, but this is an interesting concept, so I am reading the rules and the articles.  Jervis says in his introduction to the rules 'I said it might be interesting to come up with a shorter set of rules designed to fit onto just four sides of A4'.   Well, technically he does just that - the core rules are on just four A4 pages, though they are pretty closely printed! No room for pretty pictures here, it's all in the tightly-written text. 

don't try to read this, buy the mag - or there's a free download!

Actually there's a bit of cheating here, as there are quite a lot of 'special rules' which are included in the separate  Army Lists articles  - given that the 'special rules'  include those for artillery firing canister and infantry skirmishing or forming square, you could argue they should really be in the core rules! But of course this doesn't really mattter, you get everything one way or another if you buy the magazine.

I read the rules, and  I can report that they passed the important test of  'finished before the bath water got cold' (!) , and that they read perfectly well. They use a brigade structure for the armies - units are grouped into brigades and activations ( and morale )  apply at brigade level, which I like as it seems the right for the period and 'bigger' battles. And the mechanisms are simple; both firing and melee are 'attacks' with similar procedures, simple D6 die rolls.   The more powerful the attack, the more dice rolled - but not 'buckets of dice'- which may inflict losses. After a certain number of losses the target unit becomes 'shaken',  and the parent brigade in turn suffers a 'setback' , after a number of which the brigade too may become shaken. Commanders can then attempt to rally shaken units/brigades -  I won't go into more details, you can get the rules yourself easily enough.

For an idea of how a basic  mechanism works I looked at a French Line Infantry ( 1812-1815 ) unit firing at a Prussian counterpart - essentially the French get 3 dice, with a 'hit' on a roll of 4,5 or 6, so I suppose they should expect to get one hit, maybe  two, for their volley. A Prussian Line Infantry unit has 'Tenacity' factor of 4, meaning that they would become 'shaken' after 4 hits. So, two or three decent  volleys from the French unit should do it - seems fairly reasonable? The Prussians' musketry ratings are the same, so an exchange of fire between these two should be evenly-matched. 

There's no specified base sizes, but unit sizes are specified in the army lists, e.g. that French Line Infantry unit is 24 to 36 figures, and the possible unit formations are defined very simply but effectively. Move distances and ranges are given in inches and I assume for 28mm figures,  but it's suggested that for smaller figures and/or smaller tables, you can halve the distances ( or use cm for inches ), and/or halve the strength of units.  This all seems very flexible and straightforward, and I think that's pretty much the same throughout the rules.

Of course I have not actually played them : but Norm has, over at Battlefields and Warriors ( which may of course have rendered my comments redundant! ) , with a positive verdict - well worth a read, as ever. I couldn't help noticing that the magazine provides army lists and a scenario for French vs. Prussians c.1813, and the magazine's recent issues have included sample sprues of Warlord Games 'Epic' French and Prussian Waterloo figures - indeed, Norm used his collection of the same figures for his game. I have a feeling that the combination of these rules with the Epic figures range might be a winner - though that is perhaps  not so helpful  for sales of Perry figures or Warlord rules! 

You can download the rules, army sheets ( also Austrians and Russians, I think ) and scenarios from perry-miniatures.com for free,  but I think it would also be polite to buy this issue of the magazine if available,  to reward the work they have done - and get a nice glossy-printed copy of the rules booklet, plus the other articles I mentioned above.  About £6 for a decent set of rules and background ( and the usual selection of other  articles too ) is not too painful, is it?

 

top  piece from Brian Cameron in MW473..

 While talking about magazines, I have continued to buy most issues of the three mainstream wargaming magazines in recent months, when I see them, and am quite glad to support them. In particular  I think John Treadaway is doing pretty well  at Miniature Wargames. He has a regular squad of excellent writers like  Conrad Kinch ( whose  Send Three and Fourpence in particular is always interesting ) , Arthur Harman, Dave Tuck and Jon Sutherland ( it was interesting that Jon's Command Decision, usually historically-set column recently used a fantasy setting, I liked the 'cross-over' effect ).  And then in September's MW473 there was a really, really good piece by Brian Cameron on Wellington in India, called Sepoys and Soldiers. This was inspired by Brian's rules for the 'Maharatta' game at Salute last year - now I am not going to rush out and start gaming this period, but the piece is actually a bit of a masterclass in rules/game design and how to think about the subject. How about the bullet points below, for example  ( if the publishers object to my reproducing  their text here, I will of course remove it ) : 

 

Those should be in every rule-writer's mind, shouldn't they? Brian's piece runs to 8 pages, and I thought it was worth the price of the mag on its own, pretty much! 

 

 

has anyone seen this mag?

Having covered the other two, I'd better mention Wargames Soldiers and Strategy too - but oh dear, where is it these days?   I bought WSS 120 ( June/July 2022 ) as normal in my local WH Smith,  but what happened  then? There are still a couple of copies of issue 120 in the shop, but no sign of WSS121, and the same applies in a couple of other branches I've tried - and by now, shouldn't we be seeing Issue 122  for Oct/Nov ?  On the WSS Website,   WS121 'Warfare in the Age of Arthur' only fairly  recently seemed to appear as 'out now' ( with no dates on the cover image ), and the 'where to buy' button for the magazine gives no details of stockists.  I wonder if there has been a falling-out with distributors who supply the retailers like WHS ( other retailers are available, as they say ).   Has anyone else had this, ahem,  'issue'?  I hope WSS is doing OK.. Meanwhile, The Arthurian issue looks quite interesting, even if 'not my period' - I may have to  put in an online order, and we'll see what happens. 

I know I promised last time to report on my experience with In Deo Veritas rules and a 30YW transplant of Cheriton, but I'm afraid 'time and space, dear boy' has intervened rather - including a vey nice week in Shropshire, I admit. But the game will go ahead - I am hoping to play it ( hmm..start it ) tomorrow. So I do hope to bring you a report soon, honest.... In the meantime keep well, eveyone - and maybe even  buy a magazine?