Ta Nik, found it over on Rick's Warmaster Pages

Quote from: fred. on 08 July 2016, 11:18:20 AM
Ta Nik, found it over on Rick's Warmaster Pages

It's what I keep going back to...

Thanks for that guys. I have now downloaded the Renaissance Master stuff. Shed load of army lists plus the advantage of same base frontage as FOGR and WITAOD.

I love Captain General published by the pike and shot society. http://www.pikeandshotsociety.org/

It really captures the difference between the rank and platoon firing. The basing really reflects the diff.

Here is a French Battalion


And a Dutch Battalion


As you can see both have the same number of figures so the difference is frontage.

The rules have a great command and control system that really shows the difficulty of moving unit. Fire and combat are with out figure removal and the combat between lines is very dynamic.

The authors really know the period and Ian Stanford has written numerous articles about the period in the Arqubussier (the Pike and Shot Society journal)

The rules really show the advantage of designing for a specific period and are not a catch all d6 die rolling game.

William

Thank you for the plug William

kind regards

Iain Stanford

PS ... Issue 1 of Volume 35 will be out soon ... for those of you who have not resubscribed yet

I recently played a game with LoA armies using Warlord's Pike and Shotte, the game flowed very well and the game was very enjoyable.

I think I would like to get my hands on Baroque and see how they work too.

Missed those piccies above !

Very nice work, that man.

Cheers - Phil

I have looked at Baroque and found it more suited toward ECW.
I just ordered Captain general and will compare it to BLB.
BLB seems to capture the flavor of the 9 years war very well, IMHO.

Could you expand a bit more on your analysis, please?

I'm interested to hear the opinions of those who know more about this period, and how the different rule sets map to it.

BLB is designed for the period 1660 to 1721.
It would cover the wars of LoA, Scanian war, WSS and the GNW. For anything before or after those wars there are better period specific rules.
An infantry battalion is 18 figures and a Squadron is 9 figures using this as a base larger battles can be fought with brigades and armies. Ratio 1:40.
Casualties are determined by a bushel basket die throw. This has been declared "old school" but I kind of like it.
BLB covers the difference between fire by rank and platoon fire very neatly.
Orders are issued by chits.This seems cumbersome at first, but reduces the if you do that then I'll do this  lawyer factor.
I find that it gives a game a  conclusive result in about 3 hours for a large battle.
The rules flow very nicely, and like every set they take just a game or two to get down to just reference sheet.
Just as a note, Swedes are terrors of the battle field. Best out number them by a lot.

I hope this helps.
I'll try to point out more pros and cons when I receive captain general.

Thanks that helps - I'll have another look at BLB, but first impressions seem to show it was quite fiddly

The Pike and Shot Society are in the process of sending an updated version of Twilight of the Sun King called Birth of the Age of Reason to the Printers - there will also be a scenario book

The rules have been developed by Nick Dorrell and can be played on two levels - Brigade and Regimental - they can be played using all figure scales but I would suggest 10mm might be the best scale to use

We hope to get them out by early October at the latest

kind regards

Iain Stanford

There does seem to be a resurgence of rules for this period.

I will continue to paint steadily and await further  developments on the rule front.

Is it another case of good figures spawning appropriate rules

Quote from: iain1704 on 27 August 2016, 09:14:11 AM
The Pike and Shot Society are in the process of sending an updated version of Twilight of the Sun King called Birth of the Age of Reason to the Printers - there will also be a scenario book

The rules have been developed by Nick Dorrell and can be played on two levels - Brigade and Regimental - they can be played using all figure scales but I would suggest 10mm might be the best scale to use

Will these cover large armies, like my French?

First of all what a great army Sandinista.

On your question the rules are aimed at doing large battles and you define the unit size, usually a brigade is the unit. So you could use 1 of what appear to be your units as a unit or 2 or 3 or whatever. Our figures are based similarly to yours and we usually use 2 units to be a unit/brigade.

I think you have 40 infantry units so that could be 20 brigades if you do as above. You need 24 brigades for Neerwinden/Landen, i.e. one of the biggest battles. For the largest battles like Neerwinden/Landen I would suggest 2 players a side or having a longer playing time. But most other battles should be 1 player a side and fight it in an afternoon/evening.

If you fancy something large and quick, without too much bogging down, then there is a C17th version of Too the Strongest in the pipeline.

WTF?

Gå På may be another one to consider. Although initially designed for the GNW, the Swedish and Russian Foot (like the LoA) are organised in combined arms teams of Pike & Shot in a similar fashion to those in the LoA. These rules also appear to be closer in chronological terms to the LoA than, say, VWQ which was initially designed for the ECW. 

As I recall (I've got these rules somewhere in the house but not immediately to hand so apologies in advance if I recall incorrectly), Saxon, Danish, Dutch, English and French armies and the WSS are also featured. Unfortunately, I've never played a game (only a few 'test' manoeuvres, so to speak) but one of the innovations they have as I recall, tries to replicate the deteriorating level of visibility that develops during a black powder battle as more and more guns are discharged. Although I liked other features such as the idea of units using separate officer / command figures to denote command status, one of the things that put me off them was the proscribed base sizes and number of bases per unit depending on nationality (understandable given the differing tactical doctrines and evolution of formations in that era from ranks of 6 deep at the end of the 16th century to 3 deep by the end of the WSS) - I like a more simple and standardised basing structure for my miniature war-games units (another reason was that I didn't fully fancy what was on offer from figure manufacturers in the scale I was looking for at the time I bought them - no excuse now with the release of Pendraken's LoA range!). Perhaps one of the forum members has a greater knowledge of the rules to describe them further?   

Quote from: FierceKitty on 28 August 2016, 08:32:15 AM
WTF?

Does this mean, "I was not aware of that;" or is it, "That's a jolly bad idea" ?