wargaming in 28 mm and sometimes smaller: Another GB-CoC Playtest: Barossa

Myself and Adam got another chance to test the General Bonaparte meets Chain of Command ruleset last Thursday. The playtest version is now at v2.4 and is really coming together. It had been 2-3 months since we played the rules so they were a little rusty in the first turn or 2, but then things came together and the game moved along. This game was based on the Battle of Barossa with some heavy substitution in the OB because of my figure collection but for those who are interested in an authentic OB set up for GB-CoC one can download a version here.

You can see that we got through several turns, it was a real back and forth game with cavalry, unusually playing a significant part. An excellent Action Report is on Adam's blog The Fencing Frog. We tried Adam's modified movement rules and they worked well. There was some discomfort with the range of the variable movement as now in the ruleset. For example, infantry battalions in column move 3d6, Adam has adjusted this to 2d6+4" thus adjusting the possible movement from 3"-18" to 6"-16". This played out well, we will have to see how the other play testers feel about this.

Overall, I am still enormously impressed by the rules. They play very well and the mechanisms are quite simple and the game moves smoothly. My main observation from this game is that it is very difficult to play a division per side game with 28mm figures on a 4x6' terrain. It really confirmed my choice to shift to 18mm Napoleonic gaming for this size terrain (I find this the most convenient size to transport and the club has mostly similarly sized tables).

Still some questions about ZOC and supports that we are hammering out in the play test group now. I have also put together an FAQ which one can download here. I will try to keep it updated. Finally a photo from the game showing the action.