Over The Top (S&T and Decision): An interesting set of rules from Joe Miranda on World War One. But the S&T battles (Mons and the Marne) have not encouraged me to buy the Quad box with the Brusilov Offensive, St Mihiel, and er... two others). The problem with the Two Ms is that the scenarios make no effort to simulate the position of the two sets of commanders. In Mons the Germans arrive to be confronted with a force they know will shoot them up badly and must therefore promptly start to flank with the advantage of hindsight. In the Marne the BEF and French have already started the overlap, with the Right having been pushed back and the left (6 Armee) pressing around where German 1st Army should be. I say "should be" because the Germans are not on the map but get a double turn to advance to contact (or indeed do anything they care). This means they may elect not to advance into the trap leaving one to wonder why have the French retreated? Furthermore if Von Kluck reported he had won by not advancing at all to which provincial governorship would the All Highest have consigned him? A good deal too much hindsight all around. Friedland (Azure Wish) Regimental level Napoleonics seeking to avoid the counter-fatigue of La Batailles or the blandness of the divisional level stuff. The map is garish but the counters are very jolly (rather like Games USA). The game is playable, pretty bloody (it uses rosters and replacement counters at certain loss levels) yet contains a surprising level of detail. For example there is the usual formation detail. The infantry counters have line on one side and column on the other. The Cavalry have the same but gallop around in columns switching to line for the charge. The French are very good troops but it takes some courage to attack a Russian gun-line and they really do take some knocking over. What speeds up the game a lot is some rather tough disorder rules (it takes a number of turns before you recover so that you better have a reserve line). There are also simple and complex rule versions I was impressed and look forward to featuring it next PA. Eckmuhl will be released soon with the latest version of the rules. Meuse 1940 (Vae Victis) Bitching illos as usual, uses the Tunisia 1943 system and just covers the drive across the Meuse, looks wicked. Back to Perfidious Albion #96 Table of Contents Back to Perfidious Albion List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1997 by Charles and Teresa Vasey. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com