These rules produced by Warhammer have had quite an airing in the Society of Ancients excellent magazine, Slingshot. At first I was put off by the 'Warhammer', which to me meant Fantasy with a big 'F', which is not my scene. Then I got talking to a few gamers I know locally and they started to sing the praises of WHAB. Thought no more about it then out came Armies of Antiquity (AoA) which are the army lists to complement WHAB.
Quick flick through and Yes! Samurai! Quick read and then a slow read followed by a thought that I agreed with Jervis's introductory comments and that I could game to these criteria. A trawl of all painted and unpainted 25mm Samurai figures, mostly from Village Green and Dixon showed I had unwittingly over the years recruited a sizeable army and a quick points check put them in the 3k+ bracket. However they were not in 'units', so much deep thought over catalogues resulted in a final Army Order of Battle (AOB), which must remain secret in case any future opponents are reading this. A nice selection of mounted Daimyo's from David Barnes, as a birthday present, could have sunk the carefully point orientated army but what's a few extra generals when all said and done.
With the order despatched for the necessary reinforcements it was time to get the famous 2" paint brush production line into operation. You will note I have barely mentioned the reason for all this activity and expense, The Rules. Well, I was doing the 'last thing at night read' with them and it didn't work because it kept me awake with new ideas etc. Changed my reading from WHAB for some books from university and dropped off with no problem. Then Slingshot #201 arrived in which Jervis quite rightly does not enter into an argument over WHAB and Peter Hall begins a series of a battle reports using WHAB, more incentive to delve into these new rules.
No sense in going on about the actual rules, I'll leave that to others. I will look at what you get for your money in the excellently produced book.
One thing I really need with new rules is a Quick Play sheet and with WHAB it's a case of zap to page 132/3, photocopy them back to back and they work for me. Always with a new set of rules it takes my tired old brain awhile to get into the swing of things and with 70 pages in WHAB, that's a lot of brain cells due to bite the dust. There is also a section on collecting an Ancient Army, in which there are tips on painting, storage, basing and just about everything a new gamer for this period needs to know and there are some handy tips for the more mature gamer [in which group I class myself]. Next we move onto 'Scenarios', but worry not, there are only eight (8) of them for you to fight your way through.
On completion of these there are instructions on 'Scenery', which deals with the creation thereof. Should you wish to know how you got on in your latest battle there is a chapter on 'Victory', which is close to every gamers heart. By now I am at page 86 and am confronted with 'Fighting Campaigns' - a soloists dream. Once you have worked your way through that section you are confronted with those colour photographs of troops which make me get impatient with the Goddess of Fortune who is delaying my win on the lottery. After which I will purchase myself some troops of this high class, I wonder if they do Samurai?
A phase by phase colour painting guide to doing your army, followed by how to base comes next, with of course a few beautiful photographs of the finished figures in action. Buildings are the next item on the agenda and very good they look to. The next chapter will have those, unfortunate enough not to have a location where they can set up a game and leave it in situ, drooling. It shows views of Alan Perry's Games Room, which can be extremely well described as "Wow!" Back to the black and white sketches of Romans in Battle Array, which fills one page and opposite an Ancient British force which fills another. Leaving page 115 there is a wealth of information for you before you arrive, mentally exhausted at page 144.
What a really pleasant surprise when I finished reading the page to discover that after the details of the Society of Ancients, which one would expect, the final words in this amazing tome were the details of the Solo Wargmers Association! This was unsolicited by us and is a great honour.
Since scrawling this I have put on a few games on my table and at my local club. I have decided that not only can I use these rules and have an enjoyable game, but it has given me the incentive to dig out all my Ancient warriors and get some 'serious' table top encounters going.
While cataloguing my units I have also been digging out those unfinished chariot units that still require basing. Why? You will just have to wait and see! A good majority of the guys in my club are familiar with Warhammer rules techniques and this has helped me tremendously in getting into WHAB. The lads are now being lured into Ancients and quite a few 25mm and 15mm armies are being planned, purchased and painted.
In the limited amount of time I have had to play with these rules I feel they have put the 'Game' back into Wargaming, which suits me fine. Value for money, you may ask? I should say so and I'm looking forward to the next set of Army Lists, whatever that maybe. May the dice be with you.
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