For episode 12 of the We Intend to Move on Your Works Podcast Pierre and I played the latest hotness - Rebel Fury by Mark Herman. We are big fans of Gettysburg, the C3i game that originated the system used in Rebel Fury, but we emerged from our time with this game a little skeptical of some of its changes. But will our skepticism override Alexandre’s desire for a good bargain on an interesting looking game? Listen to find out!
A Year(ish) Abroad
On the 13th of September, 2024 I moved to South Korea.
Not permanently, at least I don’t intend for it to be, but for at least the next year this is where I live. My partner has a job at the local university, my daughter is in the kindergarten, and I’m doing stay at home dad stuff plus whatever freelance work comes my way (hey, if you’re looking for an editor or historian, get in touch).
WItMoYW ep. 11 - Glory III by Richard Berg
We’re Back to Berg baby! After a mixed experience crossing the mountains, the boys are trying one of Berg’s takes on Antietam, arguably the most influential battle of the American Civil War. Originally published in 1995, the same year as the first GMT edition of Three Days of Gettysburg which would spawn the modern era of GBACW, and substantially revised in 2002, Glory is a light hex and counter from one of our favorite designers. Will we like it more than GBACW? You can probably already guess!
Rebel Fury by Mark Herman
I’m not going to bury the lede, I don’t like Rebel Fury. Nobody is more surprised about it than me. I really like Mark Herman’s Gettysburg, the originator of this system. It’s not my favorite game ever, but a hex and counter game that emphasizes movement and doesn’t overstay its welcome will always find a space on my shelf. While I shamefully haven’t played the follow-up on Waterloo, even though it’s on Rally the Troops so I have no excuse, I was excited to see what Rebel Fury brought to the table. My initial impressions were positive – it kept that core movement system that I liked but expanded the play space to encompass a set of large (and gorgeous) Charlie Kibler maps. The added chrome seemed fine and offered the tantalizing prospect of a little extra depth to the game, so from my initial pre-release preview I was feeling positive. Unfortunately, once I got my hands on it and started playing more my experience began to sour. The changes to the original system started to grate and certain scenarios exposed some of the core’s weaknesses in less flattering ways. If it wasn’t for a certain game that shall go unnamed, I would say this was my most disappointing experience this year.
Chancellorsville by Stephen W. Sears
I’ve always had a weird relationship with Chancellorsville, but I like to think it’s not entirely my fault. Growing up in Virginia it’s hard to avoid it, especially if, like me, you lived an hour away and your dad liked to take you and your brothers there on random weekends to get out of the house. Chancellorsville looms large in the mythic lives of Robert E. Lee and “Stonewall” Jackson. It was also top of the pile in the “what’s the biggest Civil War Battle” debates that were somehow considered small talk in my home state. With all that baggage, it was hard for me growing up to not develop a slightly contrary preference for battles like Gettysburg and The Wilderness. That meant that I never really dug all that deeply into Chancellorsville, and I let the battle’s myths define it rather than learning about it for myself. On a recent trip to my parents’ house, I decided to correct this and I chose my father’s copy of Chancellorsville as the method since I had previously been really impressed with Stephen W. Sears’ book on Gettysburg. I am pleased to announce that Chancellorsville is at least as good as Gettysburg and may even be a bit better. This is a great book.
WItMoYW ep. 10 - Fire on the Mountain by John Poniske
This episode Pierre and I branch out into the Maryland Campaign, with John Poniske’s take on the Battle of South Mountain, published by Legion Wargames. This is a hex and counter tactical game with a beautiful Rick Barber map and unusual rectangle unit counters. We liked but did not love it, and had some thoughts on some last minute errata that was introduced post-publication. I hope you enjoy it!
Gettysburg 1863 by Grant and Mike Wylie
I set up the second day first. I did this because I wanted to tackle something that seemed a little more straightforward to put the changes to the system through their paces. I figured I would want to try the full battle at some point, which meant playing the first day, so for my experiment I chose the second day. Because Pickett’s Charge sucks. This was potentially a mistake – the logic was sound, but I forgot how boring I find playing the second day. Don’t get me wrong, from a historical analysis standpoint I think I prefer the 2nd of July, it has such drama and tension, but when it comes to wargames, I often find it tedious – mostly ill-conceived charges and brutal death. A tedium of attrition to resolve.
We Intend to Move on Your Works ep. 9: GCACW
For episode nine of We Intend to Move on Your Works Pierre and I dive deep into Great Campaigns of the American Civil War with Stonewall Jackson’s Way II. We have a lot of thoughts in this one, I hope you enjoy listening to them as much as we did recording them!
Stonewall Jackson’s Way II (GCACW) by Joseph M. Balkoski, Ed Beach, Mike Belles, and Chris Withers
Few wargame systems have as much veneration from their fans as the Great Campaigns of the Civil War. However, despite its dedicated fans it still manages to feel somewhat obscure - a series that is often out of print and intimidating for new players to get into. For those in the know, this system has been a touchstone of the hobby since Stonewall Jackson’s Way was published by Avalon Hill in 1992. The series was originally designed by Joe Balkoski until 2001. When Avalon Hill’s catalog was bought up by Hasbro the series was taken up by Multi-Man Publishing (MMP) who worked with other designers (including Chris Withers and Ed Beach) to update the old Avalon Hill games into new editions with revised rules and graphics.
Podcast: Shiloh: April Glory by Tom Dalgliesh and Grant Dalgliesh
In the final episode of season one of We Intend to Move on Your Works, Pierre and I finish our journey through Shiloh’s woods by discussing Shiloh: April Glory from Columbia Games. This is another classic Columbia Block game, similar to their game Shenandoah that we covered on episode two of the podcast. How did we like it compared to Shenandoah and the other Shiloh games we played? Listen on to find out!
Preview: Rebel Fury by Mark Herman
I was lucky enough to be invited by Fred Serval to be his opponent for an early preview of the final version of Mark Herman’s latest American Civil War game: Rebel Fury. We played the Chickamauga scenario, which Mark recommends as the best starting point in terms of length and complexity. Rebel Fury expands on his game Gettysburg, originally published in C3i Magazine, but has a few neat changes. The combat system has been pretty substantially overhauled, with more factors to consider around unit positioning and support between units, but the change I liked most was how headquarters now have to postures they can assume, one which benefits them in battle but limits their command range and one that allows for a wider range of movement but cannot add a DRM in battle. This is a promising looking system and I’m keen to try more. You can see our full play through of the first two turns (just under half a full game) of Chickamauga here:
Confederates in the Attic by Tony Horowitz
A common refrain I have found when reading recent books on the Lost Cause, and in particular ones with a personal relationship to the subject, is the choice to highlight two events from the past decade as marking a key turning point in our relationship with the memory of the American Civil War. These are the murder of nine churchgoers in South Carolina at the hands of an avowed white supremacist and the murder of Heather Heyer and injury of many other people during the violence around the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville. Sometimes the murder of George Floyd at the hands of police is also added into this mix as well.
We Intend to Move on Your Works Ep. 7: Shiloh 1862 by Worthington
It is once again April 1862 and Pierre and Stuart are lost in the woods near Shiloh Church. This time it is with the far less complex Shiloh 1862 from Worthington Publishing. How will they fair with naught but eight pages of rules to guide them? Will Stuart get extremely angry about the woods again? Was Albert Sidney Johnston's death a turning point in the war? Listen to find out as the deep dive into the Battle of Shiloh continues!
2023 in Review and My Top 8 Games of the Year*
I’ve now been running this blog for two whole years, but somehow it feels a lot longer. I’ve been very pleased with how it has grown over the past year and I’m hoping to continue that growth going into 2024. I received several review copies of games this year which was really gratifying and allowed me to cover games that would otherwise have probably been beyond my budget - wargame blogging is not particularly lucrative. To mark the end of the year I want to reflect a bit on how I feel the last two years have gone and then, of course, provide my top ten games of the year. As per last year’s list, these will be games that I played for the first time in 2023 not necessarily games that were released in 2023 (although unlike last year this year’s list does is that were released during the year).
We Intend to Move on Your Works Episode 6: Longstreet Attacks
Apologies for the delay - we started playing Longstreet Attacks back in July to mark the 160th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, which is why this game breaks our chronology, but the game took longer than expected and then the editing took even longer than that. Thankfully this episode is a good one, so hopefully that makes up for the delay, and we aim to have the next one with you much sooner!
Grand Havoc by Jeff Grossman
Blind Swords is quickly climbing the ranks to be among my favorite hex and counter systems. The chaos of the chit draw, the unpredictability of the CRTs, the manageable footprint, and the elegant presentation from Revolution Games have all wormed their way into my heart. Longstreet Attacks showed me the potential of the system, but in a form that didn’t totally agree with me. The Day Was Ours showed me that it could do approach to battle and the chaos of First Bull Run. After playing that I was pretty sure that I would prefer Blind Swords as a single counter sheet experience – low counter density leaving me plenty of room to explore the map. It was with some trepidation that I punched the two counter sheets of Jeff Grossman’s Grand Havoc. Would this cement my love for Blind Swords, or would it be another Longstreet Attacks, an almost hit that doesn’t quite land? I’m delighted to report that it was the former – Grand Havoc delivers a larger scale Blind Swords experience and seems to resolve pretty much all my misgivings about Longstreet Attacks. This is a great game, and I’m excited to talk about why.
Race and Reunion by David Blight
Every so often I read a book that so overwhelms me with its breadth and depth of information that I wish I had already read it twice in the hope of clinging to just a little bit more of its knowledge. Race and Reunion is such a book. David Blight documents the aftermath of the American Civil War, when two previously warring factions had to come to terms with still being part of the same country and make sense of the bloody years that had just passed. Conflicting ideologies competed to interpret the events of the Civil War, sometimes with violent outcomes, and in the end they created a vile system of white supremacy and oppression alongside unfulfilled potential. How emancipation transitioned to Jim Crow isn’t the core focus of the book, it is far more expansive than that, but it would do as a pithy summary.
The Worthington Civil War Brigade Battle Series
Worthington Publishing’s Civil War Brigade Battle Series by designer Grant Wylie is a rules light hex and counter system on, you guessed it, American Civil War battles at the brigade scale. It also should not be confused with The Civil War Brigade Series (CWBS) from The Gamers, which is also a brigade level hex and counter system but is far more complex and also much older, with its first published entry from 1988 as opposed to Worthington’s system which began in 2019. It’s a little confusing. Worthington’s system currently spans four games, three by Grant Wylie and published by Worthington and one game by Pascal Toupy and published in French wargame magazine Vae Victis. There are already plans for quite a few more entries as well. These are rules light games, the system rules are eight pages long with each game adding at most one page of extra game specific rules on top of that. They also generally play in two to four hours. These are fun games for fans of hex and counter Civil War gaming and are also a great entry point into hex and counter gaming for anyone who has always wanted to try them but has been hesitant to do so. They are probably not going to blow your mind, these aren’t radical designs the likes of which you’ve never seen before, but I’ve had a lot of fun playing them and if simple hex and counter is your cup of tea then I think you’ll enjoy them too. But you probably didn’t come here for the tl;dr, you came here for some nitty gritty detail, so lets get to it!
Armies of Deliverance by Elizabeth Varon
For over thirty years James McPherson’s Battle Cry of Freedom has stood as the gold standard single volume history of the American Civil War. Recently, a friend recommended Elizabeth Varon’s contribution to the genre, Armies of Deliverance, as a possible successor, or at the very least valuable supplement to McPherson’s venerable classic. Having now read Varon’s book I have to say that it is a very impressive piece of scholarship and a thoroughly enjoyable read. It certainly could act as an alternative to McPherson’s hefty tome, but with the caveat that it depends on what exactly you want out of your history of the American Civil War. It would be wrong to say that Varon is doing the same thing that McPherson did – these are two very different histories with different approaches, and both offer valuable insights into the war and the people who fought it.
Review - The Day Was Ours by Matt Ward
When I was initially looking for more Blind Swords games to try, I passed over The Day Was Ours because I thought that I had no need for another game on First Bull Run since I own and love Rick Britton’s Manassas. This was doubly true when I considered that The Day Was Ours didn’t even promise a faster playtime; I can only manage so many 5+ hour games in my life. That changed on a recent trip across the Atlantic to visit my parents. I was looking for a game I could possibly play with my dad, and I realized that Blind Swords was a good option because it would fit easily in a corner of the house, and I already knew how to play it so we could set up and get playing quickly. I also wanted to pick a topic my father already knew reasonably well, and First Bull Run fit that bill admirably. I’m glad I did because I was really impressed with The Day Was Ours. I am not without some reservations, but overall, I had a great time and I think I will manage to find room on my shelves for another First Bull Run game after all. Who knows, this may even be the beginning of an obsession.