Control to Catastrophe: Caesar

 As I have noted for some time, I am in the process of developing a grid based ancient-medieval rule set.  Well is is almost done.  It is with the layout designer and so I hope that it will be available early in the new year.  I am in the process of doing the photography and am very pleased with the way the design has evolved.  It is a long process made longer by the fact that I am also preparing the followup book for Renaissance warfare, Control to Catastrophe: Maximilian.

On the colonial front, I am still chipping away at the Zulu War game.  I have developed a very different core mechanic that might define this game.  As I said earlier this year, BFE2 will remain as is. If I release an updated version of the game it will be just to correct and complete a couple os sections. There will likely not be a BFE 3. Instead a very different game is being developed that is slated for a lower level of action.  Just not sure how this is going to develop.

Anyway, here are some images from the last photo shoot for CtC:C. This is are diagrammatic images so not very artsy. The terrain boards are meant to suggest the gaming grid. I have a cloth too as you can in the first image.

D-Day

 So, D-Day is done and dusted. It was a huge effort to get the games prepared but the effort was worth it. My friend Stephen brought over Gold Beach and I did Omaha and Juno. Without going into a long AAR I will just say that Juno went historically with the Canadians taking their objectives. Gold and Omaha were not true to the past. The British found themselves hung up on the beach defences suffering too many losses before pressing on to neutralize the positions inland. The US assault forces were badly mauled with only one draw (exit) being cleared. German artillery was particularly nasty on the Americans.

Here are a few pictures. Alas, not many pictures were taken due to the pressures of running the game. And sadly too much game detritus obscures the hard work lavished on the terrain and miniatures. But I hope that the impact of 42' of beach front is somewhat evident. Thanks for looking.

 

Very little colonial gaming happening as I get ready for a huge D-Day 80th anniversary game

 As the title suggests, I am getting ready with bespoke terrain for a 42 foot long representation of Juno, Gold, and Omaha to be played with Rapid Fire Reloaded.  Fortunately, Gold is being presented by my friend Stephen. Much of the terrain was made about 10 years ago or more, but I never had a chance to present the full scenarios of either beach (Juno or Omaha) because of table requirements - each needs a 16' table and I have 12'. Of course, presenting both of these beaches has meant a lot of additional things required like beach obstacles and the scenarios themselves have evolved with new versions presented by the Rapid Fire Reloaded team. For example all the German positions now have to have wire fully enclosing the positions - not something the original scenarios required.

All of this has absorbed most of my gaming time and I will post lots of pictures when the game is played later this month. In the mean time, we did play Rorke's Drift again and my Swiss are slowing coming together. Only 4 more units to paint (for now).  Here are some pictures (since I know that no one really wants to read anything...just give me pictures!).

Happy 2024!

 Once again a long delay in posting.  I hope that all of you had a wonderful holiday season and wish you all the best for 2024. This is going to be an important year for me. I have two books prepared for released. CONTROL TO CATASTROPHE: ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL is a grid rule set that I hope to have done for June or July.  The follow-up, CONTROL TO CATASTROPHE: RENAISSANCE will be done (hopefully) for December.  I have been working on these books for the last 2 years and I am very happy about how the games play.

I have my BFE based ACW rules ready too. BATTLES BETWEEN THE STATES has been played for over 5 years and work extremely well. I aim to release that book for 2025.  That rule set was a driver for several rule changes for BFE but colonials are getting a fresh treatment with campaign specific books starting with the Zulu War followed by Sudan and Afghanistan.

All of this is very exciting for me and I hope a few others will enjoy the games I develop.

So, again, happy 2024!

Grid Game: "Control to Catastrophe"

 My new game is developing very nicely and I am feeling like it has largely arrived at a place where it is 'stable.'  Small things will change and I am constantly looking for ways to further simplify the game, but the core rules and special rules for period specific doctrines and units have been well tested and work really well.  I am also really aware of the need to not only inject tension into the game, but also fun.  Since this is definitely NOT a tournament set of rules, I can add rules that reflect history and can turn the game in new directions dramatically.  This would not fly in a tournament set and might annoy those that prefer a controlled competitive set, but reflect history quite well.

A big issue for any game designer is how prescriptive one can be regarding unit organization and basing. Initially the game was actually driven by a particular approach to unit organization. Since those early days the game has changed to make unit representation completely up to the player.  That said, game play is facilitated by having units organized to reflect the 3 basic unit sizes -- however you want to do that.

Here are a couple of pictures of the same units in three different forms of representations.  We have played games using both of these approaches and one half way in between (I have three different gridded cloths to accommodate the different unit sizes.  Of course, I always prefer the 'grand manner' approach and so most of the games are played with the big battalions!  Note that in grid games unit size (which measures its ability to absorb hits) varies by depth since all units are assumed to have the same width (the grid box width).

Much too long!

 It has been much too long since my last post.  Since then much has been going on.  The ACW rules are written and in proof reading.  The ancient-renaissance (early-modern) grid game has developed really well and is with several groups for play testing; I am very excited about this game.  A 3rd edition of BFE is well under way with some interesting changes that partly stemmed from the ACW game.  In addition, the dice-based movement and morale system (that replaces the tables) was recently play tested and worked really well.  In fact, so well I am inclined to use it more than the tables especially for games using Zulu or Mahdist armies.

So lots of developments.  The big challenge now will be to layout and publish.  I am planning on hiring someone to do the layout.  Selling with be handled by Amazon for print copies and I will set up a web page for PDFs.  

Playing with Speed Paint

 There was a lot of fuss made when the Citadel Contrast Paints were released.  They were expensive and so I didn’t bother.  But the Army Painter Speed Paints were even more enthusiastically embraced and were cheaper.  So I got the starter set.   Initially I tested them on a unit of Celts Sloshing the Speed Paint straight onto the white undercoat. It worked well but I find any kind of wash technique on white a bitty messy and muddy.  I definitely feel that one has to frame the washes with solid paint on things like belts and other accoutrements.  I also found that they did not work on the shields which made sense; lacking crevices to flow into the whole purpose of the product was lost.  So, the shields got solid colour, painted designs and conventional highlights.  Overall I was quite pleased and it went quickly.  

I tried another technique on a small unit of cavalry.  This time I did a zenithal primer, starting with black and dry brushing the whole figure (horse and rider; I always glue everything together before painting) with white.   Once dry I used a brown Speed Paint on the horse and in one coat got a very pleasing effect.  Score!

Overall I like these paints.  I will continue painting my Napoleonics, Renaissance and SYW collections with a black undercoat and deliberate highlighting in 3 layers.  But for some ancients and colonials this set of paints works well, especially those with simple tunics.