Grant, Featherstone and rule sets today.

Started by Norm, 23 June 2019, 02:59:42 PM

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Westmarcher

Quote from: jimduncanuk on 23 June 2019, 07:01:41 PM
I still use Featherstones Horse and Musket rules whenever we play an Old School ACW game with very few modifications.


That would be brilliant, Jim. This could be a life changing moment for me  ...  :-S  ;D
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.

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Ben Waterhouse

I'm with Norm on this, most of my armies are now are 24 infantry and 12 cavalry, with very basic rules. Life's too short.
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Westmarcher

[Wondering now if the following should be opened up as a new post in the Rules section: but I'll carry on here]

This notion of mine that the ACW rules I played away back over 45 years ago were another version of Featherstone's (i.e., not the simple rules mentioned in his book) is still puzzling me. I came across this link in Vintage Wargaming showing the cover of Wargames Newsletter Rules:-

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_SH2iJHS2LjA/TFWCIbEnc4I/AAAAAAAAGxU/XufqXTxvq5w/s1600/Athenal+cover001.jpg

By the looks of it, Wargamer's Newsletter Rules (Donald Featherstone) were published by Athena in 1987 (124 pages)
(but also possibly printed by Imperial Press, 34 Imperial Crescent, , Doncaster DN2 5BU?).

It includes 10 sets of Rules from 1000BC to 1944 one of which is "American Civil War Rules by Donald Featherstone." I do not know if these are a re-print of the simple ACW Rules in the book mentioned by Norm or the more advanced rules I recall playing.

The rule sets included are:

1. Rules for Ancient Wargames 1000 BC - AD 900 by Tony Bath
2. Medieval Rules by Tony Bath
3. God for Harry! England and St George! Wargame Rules for the Medieval Period by Donald Featherstone
4. Rules for the English Civil War by Donald Featherstone
5. Rules for the 1750 period in Europe by Tony Bath
6. Napoleonic Rules by Donald Featherstone
7. American Civil War Rules by Donald Featherstone
8. Rules for late 19th Century wargames by Donald Featherstone
9. Rules for 1917 period wargames in German S.W. Africa (including rules for early tanks, armoured cars etc) by Donald Featherstone
10. Rules for 1944 (Normandy) Wargames by Phil Barker.

These Rules were also individually available to order from Donald Featherstone. 8 of them (on the list)(excluding Don's Medieval and English Civil War rules) are listed in a notice in Wargamer's Newsletter from December 1967 at 3s 6d each or the set of 8 for a guinea, including postage. I am under the impression this is how my then wargaming buddy acquired the ACW rules (he also purchased Napoleonic rules but we never played these).

Does anyone have this edition of Wargames Newsletter Rules?

Other than infantry units being 45 figures strong (including 5 officers)(with or without six skirmishers?), cavalry units consisted of two squadrons only. For artillery firing, we also had to make a shell burst template consisting of 6 circles for long range and 4 for short range with a die roll deciding which circle the shell exploded in. You could also take pot shots at officers but to find out if your shot hit  the officer, you threw a die again with (something like) a result of 3 or 4 hitting the target, 5 or 6 the person to his left and 1 or 2, the person to his right. Unfortunately, if you missed the target, we teenagers took the other results too literally, accepting without protest that it was possible that some poor guy nowhere near the officer could get hit by a wildly off shot!  :-[ 
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.

Leman

That's certainly how I acquired Don's ACW rules, but unfortunately they are long gone, although I have donated all my old copies of Wargamers Newsletter to the Liverpool club.
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FierceKitty

I can only say I'd have flogged off the whole collection decades ago if the hobby hadn't grown up (exponentially in the case of rules).
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kustenjaeger

Very interesting initial post and subsequent thoughts.

I picked up Charles Grant's Battle early on though I did not use it much.  I did not really get into Featherstone (for some reason I bought his Advanced Wargaming years before anything else) and have only really read rather than played Charles Grant's other rules - though it is possible a version of The Wargame (18th century) may get played at some point.

Regards

Edward

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grahambeyrout

I started with Featherstone, and soon dismissed them as childish. Now 60 odd years later I regard them with nostalgic affection, but do not play them. I do however play the odd game based on Charles Grants SYW and Well's Little Wars rules, even if I have to tinker with them to accommodate my multiple figure bases. Again this is nostalgia