Black Powder ACW Test

Game Setup

View from Union Commander's pov

End of turn 2 or 3

Played through the Black Powder rules for the first time as a test to understand them and to come up with a game to play with the local group. Used a set of mods to come up with some of the rules. The mods are by The Contemptible Little Wargames Club and they can be found here. They're very comprehensive. In fact, they suggest you play the normal BP way first and then try them out. I, of course, ignore their wisdom and dove in.

Definitely need to understand the rules better though. I feel as though I was missing something. I enjoyed them, just some things weren't feeling right.

Dave Makes the Gordan & Hague Newsletter

Dave, who's sent some content in for the blog is a wonder at converting board/mini games to more detailed miniature games. Because of this he made the Gordon and Hague Newsletter for his Battlecry adaptation using G&H minis.

Good work Dave.

Also, looks like G&H is coming out with some AWI figures.

Also, also, I really like how G&H is featuring his customers' work. That is good marketing to tie in with you customer base.

Also, also, also, he appears to have abandoned selling single stands and instead selling Battalion packs (which I believe are 3-5 stands for a battalion.) Good idea and it must be cheaper for him to do it this way as well.

His second edition of the rulebook is out and he's added some nice play aids. 

This is a fledgling company that I hope does well going forward.

Published Pics in Charge!

 First time I've seen this small magazine that comes out called, "Charge!". It's the journal of the Johnny Reb Gaming Society. Jerry who hosts the Command Decision games and Johny Reb III wrote up an AAR after the Oldtown Creek game we played and had me send some photos to the editor of the magazine. Very cool, they chose to use 4 of the pictures I took. You can see two of them above.

Also, I'm up to 40 members! Thank you all for following.

Great use of lights and minis

I was just checking out the blogs of those who've recently started following me and I saw these great pics at "Captain Richard's Miniature Civil War" - very cool stuff - completely used without permission - though I will go ask him now.
Go check out his site.

Johnny Reb III Battle for Oldtown Creek, May 10, 1864

From warweb.com

Played my first big game of Johnny Reb III at Jerry's. Same group that put on the Command Decision TOB games that I posted about awhile back: Duel at Barenton and Battle for Moselle.

From testofbattle.com

(Side note: The book that we were playtesting those scenarios for has been published. It is titled, "From Normandy to Lorraine: The American Drive to the Rhine," by Jack Strangeway. It is available at the Test of Battle Games website for sale. I still need to pick up my copy. Oh yeah, check out the credits page, my name is on there as a playtester. Send me your copies and I will sign them for $100 each...any takers?)

Back to the main topic, Johnny Reb III. Played with 8 other guys. That's a lot. I was a Union Commander, Wilstar. I handled a brigade, which in this game is 20 stands of soldiers. Each stand represents a "company" (4 men on each stand and some with 3 on a stand.)

From 2011 December Johnny Reb III

4 stands are grouped together to form a regiment and 5 regiments are grouped together to form a brigade. This era is all new to me and I'm still learning the terminology. Pat and I had the Union Right flank and we successfully managed to get more units on the hill (just one more) than our confederate foe (Ed) by game end. Though, our Union left failed to get more units on than the Confederates. Confederates won 21 stands to 12. It all came down to the last two turns of charges and testing for officer casualties. Just like at Command Con, I had more fun playing it than I thought I would.

Again, Jerry is an incredible host and all the guys: Pat, Ed, Bill, Jim, John, Rollie, and Dave (fellow noob at JRIII) were an incredible group to play with and against. Jerry's table was amazing and immersive.

Here are a few pics from the game and links to the Picasa web album.

From 2011 December Johnny Reb III

From 2011 December Johnny Reb III

From 2011 December Johnny Reb III