Des hosted Iain, Max, and me in the Shed of War this Sunday, and we gave the Joy of Six scenario a good run. I believe that you can read a rule set ten times, but you will always learn at least ten things when you sit down (or stand up) and play them! This held true this time as well, and I think we are in a good position to at least give the impression that we know the rules to some extent. It was a sunny and warm day, perhaps better spent on the beach, but there was a battle to be fought. Max took the role of the French, Iain the Prussians, and Des commanded the Wurttembergers and the Saxons.

Here are some updated graphics. I had made a number of errors on the previous ones and changed the colour scheme (all the information is from the excellent scenario in the Big Bloody Battles (BBB) rulebook).

Further information can be found on the BBB group pages (I linked to it in the previous post).

Anyway, it was an ebb and flow of dice rolls, but the French resisted the onslaught until turn 9 (when we wrapped up for the day). By this stage, there was hardly a line left to withstand the overall mass of the Prussians and their allies. The game works well for four players, although the Saxon/Württemberg player and the opposite part of the French section take a while to get started. This is due to the nature of the battle and the geography, not a scenario design problem—it actually created a more focused part of the battle where we all were able to start learning the minutiae of the rules.

I am not an expert on this period, just a happy tourist, so for whatever it is worth, I really enjoyed the rules, and we will most certainly play more battles with these after the Joy of Six show.

Anyway, let’s have a look at the pictures.

/ Keep on toysoldiering!