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).
Sherwood by Buxeria
Sherwood is the latest entry in the venerable Cry Havoc system - a man to man hex and counter game of medieval warfare released by French publisher Historic-One with a legacy stretching back to the early 1980s. The system has undergone several revisions over the past decade, modernising the design and making it more approachable for new players. I’ve had my eye on it for a while since I’m always interested in anything medieval but never quite pulled the trigger on any of the recent releases. However, when I saw Sherwood I decided that this might be the perfect time to take the plunge. Sherwood aims to be an introductory volume to the series, with simplified rules to introduce the system’s core concepts but without the same detail. The core rules have been reduced to just five pages and there is even a single page “basic rules” option for playing with children.