December turned out to be a bit of a disaster. I was down with a stomach bug (the less said about that the better) and Nathan was laid up with gout. The problem there was that Nathan was providing the French for the planned Napoleonic game, so that didn't happen. Luckily Chas was allowed to pass through the border from North Devon into civilisation, so the Marlburian game went ahead. Vince's unbiased and fair report is below. Hopefully some pictures will appear at some point.

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On a crisp bright morning Chas, myself and Steve Mathews met for the big December game.

The UK representative for "Wargames Soldiers & Strategy", Guy Bowers, turned up to cover the game, write a review of Rank & File rules and take huge numbers of photographs. Just as well we had a large number of 28mm figures on the table!

Chas confidently deployed his French & Bavarians anchored on a line of 3 villages, with his cavalry in column behind. The man himself sat in his coach well to the rear.

After a brief conflab Steve volunteered to "do the decent thing" and fling himself on the right flank and centre to draw in Chas's reserves, whilst I took the left hand village and broke the weakened line. With his reserves gone, I only had to issue the "brigade will exploit to their front" order to the Austrian cuirassiers and Chas would be taking wine in our camp.

Well, that was the plan.

Steve sent his division across the marshy ground and positioned a brigade of Dutch guard to assault the village. Fire could not touch the defenders and the brave Dutch were checked as they tried to force the issue. Elsewhere guns played along the line to little effect.

Girding their loins, the Dutch launched another battalion at the village and back they came again. Meanwhile in the centre Prussian infantry and Austrian dragoons threw themselves on the French infantry.

Wurtemberg horse tried their luck on the other end of the line and were sent packing for their pains.

Again and again the allies threw themselves at the French and went back in the same old fashion.

Eventually Steve took the righthand village and I took the lefthand one. Now was the moment and the remains of a brigade of horse charged the French cavalry. Back they came and the triumphant French cavalry got a face full of cannister and musket balls from the supporting Prussian line for their pains.

Cuirassiers cut down horse and infantry shot up cuirassiers and still Steve ground slowly forward.

With night falling a truce was agreed. Chas sat safe in his coach, the Allies held the villages, but only the crows had a good day. Despatches were dictated to scribes on both sides, telling very different stories of how the day had gone.

All in all a good game to a very fast set of rules. The horse and musket set from Crusader are not as well structured as the ancients version, but they give a fast flowing game and a decent result.

You can't legislate for luck and Chas should be ashamed of the pact he made with the Devil.

December 12th - Napoleonics & Marlburian

December's games will include both a Napoleonic battle, to be played using the Black Powder set of rules, and a Marlburian game using Rank & File. Gus is setting the Napoleonic game up, as Nathan is pretending to be sick. I have no idea what the forces involved will be, except that one side is very likely to be French! And here is our very own Napoleon!

Vince and Chas (if he is allowed out) will be putting on the Marlburian game. Again, I have no idea which forces they are using, because nobody tells me nothing.

New Blog Invite

I'm in. Now about the Chuckling Chas fan club.....

The Rogues Gallery

Jon, club "Presidente" and owner of way too many figures!










Vince, owner of many an army and master of none!










Gus, Napoleonic fan and idle git (he's a union rep!)









Will, son of Jon and demon dice roller. Way too many 6's to be natural!








Andy, who comes down from way up north, beyond Bristol even.











Steve, who isn't as old as his hair looks.










Chucklin' Chas, who precribes to the theory that quantity is better than quality.









Nathan, who thinks he's Napoleon but isn't that tall.









Jason, yours truly, who can lose with any army.

Some pictures from previous games we have played

25mm Napoleonic's using Principles of War







1/300th WW2 Battle of Britain using Bag the Hun







25mm WW2 Battle of the Bulge game using Rules of Engagement.






25mm American Civil War, using Civil War Battles rules






15mm WW2 using PBI2

New's from the front.

In October a few hardy souls gathered to fight an Ancient's battle using the Impetus rules. One bunch of loin-clothed chariot riders fought another bunch of loin-clothed chariot riders. Here is a report from Vince, commander of one of the bunches of loin-clothed chariot riders. In the first picture you can see the "Hand of Vince"!


The Hittite king surveyed his forces with concern. He had just received word that the vassal Chasadder and his army would not be turning up today. Surely some treachery. A quick message to Rameses Andy Lama Lama Ding Dong resulted in a compromise being reached regarding a redistribution of forces. This left the Hittites fielding a unit of sycophants and half naked girls , but needs must. The long awaited battle was back on.

The Hittites deployed with a division of heavy chariots, light infantry and skirmishers on the left and lights chariots, light infantry, skirmishers and girls in the centre and right. The Egyptians put their chariots on their right, deployed the Sherden warband in the first line and the regular infantry and archers in the second.

Immediately the Hittite chariots on the left surged forward to engage
their opposite numbers. Well, all bar one squadron that went disordered and stayed that way until the last moments of the battle. In the swirling melee the forces became intermixed.

Meanwhile one unit of Sherden were engaged by the girls et al and
soundly beaten. The sight of their comrades being pursued by dancing
girls, fan bearers, serving boys etc must have inspired the other unit of Sherden as they went through every Hittite unit they met like the proverbial hot knife.

On the other flank the Hittite infantry saw off the skirmishers in the broken ground, but were routed by the regular archers.

Despite a valiant and protracted battle, Ramese's chariots squadron was routed and the Pharaoh proceeded to direct his forces from a secure hiding place well in the rear.

Having exhausted and finished off every unit they had met, the girls finally succumbed to an assault by the Royal guard led by Steve. Well
there is only so much even a professional "entertainer" can take. The
Hittite leader wisely found a safe bolt hole in a wadi and stayed there.


With the Hittite chariots victorious but scattered and most of the rest of his army having remembered they had "left the gas on", Muwattalish decided the nearest fortified town looked a good option and retired from the field.

All in all a good bash which we all enjoyed. The rules played well and gave a free flowing and realistic fight.

Anyone who thinks chariots are easy to handle should give them a try !

What we do.

We play with toy soldiers! At least, that's what my wife says.

We wargame, once a month, every month. There are a core of about 10 players who turn up 90% of the time, plus several others who grace us with their presence when work/family/rugby will allow.

There are no main periods that we do, between us most things are covered. In November we played 15mm American Rebellion (or Revolution) and 15mm WW2. Next month has a large 15mm Napoleonic game planned. We also game in scales from 1/3000th to 25mm, periods from Ancients to 1980's, on land, sea, in the air and in space!

The picture above is from a large 25mm Ancients game we played in September, involving 6 players and lots of figures.

New Blog as the website has problems!

Hi and welcome to the Devon Wargames Group's blog, which is replacing the previous website due to technical issues.

More will appear soon, this is just a tester.