More fame

How time flies! Eighteen months ago I posted a couple of blogs about refighting Cannae using DBA3.0. You can find the posts here and here. 

The Purple Cover matches the DBA rulebook

The reason for doing this was to do a battle write up for a book showing how you could fight the Great Battles of History, using DBA3.0. I was pleasantly surprised at how well it went, wrote the thing up and fired it off to the editor. Then sat and waited. Unlike most of the other contributors to the book I'd used my standard toys and terrain. Most of the others did new armies and constructed purpose built terrain. That all took much longer than expected, and so the book didn't come out when expected, in early 2015. However, it's now done, and it looks rather good. Well worth the wait.

The battle included are:

Troy sometime BC by Pat Lowinger
Gela in 405BC by Charlie Zwinak
Hydaspes River 326BC by John Brown
Bagradas 255 BC by Joe Collins (the editor)
Cannae 216BC by Graham Evans.
Spartacus- The 3rd Servile War by Charlie Zwinak /Bob Beattie
Carnuntum 170 AD by  Robert Madrigal
Hormozdgan 224AD by Robert Madrigal
Yarmuk 636AD by Phil Steele (using Phil Barker's old flats)
Brunanburh 937AD by Joe Collins, the editor
Arsuf 1191 AD by  Dave Cliffel
Bouvines 1214AD by Phil Steele

Verneuil 1424 AD by Tom Thomas

Enguingate 1479 AD by Joe Collins

It's a good list, covering a wide range of battles in both chronology and type. There are infantry and cavalry battles as well as more balanced armies. We're already considering a second volume. The absence of a big Successor battle looks like an open goal for me.

A sample chapter, - Phil's Yarmak - is available for download here.

All of the games use multiple armies, rather than just sticking to the 12 element formula, and all have given good consideration of any special scenario rules. The authors are all, bar me, members of the DBA3 testing team, so they know their stuff in respect of the rules. I got pulled in because Phil felt the book would benefit from having a 20mm plastic game in it, plus NOT ONE WAS DOING HANNIBAL, which was a bit of an omision for a Great Battles of Ancient History themed book.

If you want a hardcopy, then you can buy it direct from the printer, Lulu here. Profits from the venture go to the Society of Ancients, so it's all in a good cause. Early sales have been encouraging, so don't end up being the last person to get one.

As for fame...well the only battle singled out for comment on the Fanaticus on-line review was mine. So I'm revelling in that.

Admittedly there wasn't anything about how brilliant the write up was, but it was mentioned.