Friday, January 5, 2018

Rebels and Patriots – Wargaming Rules for North America: Colonies to Civil War



We are glad to announce that we (Daniel Mersey and Michael Leck) are once again teaming up with Osprey Games to bring you a new set of wargaming rules!

Rebels and Patriots will be a set of easy to learn and fast-moving miniature wargaming rules offering you the chance to lead small armies of soldiers across the North American continent in the late eighteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries. The rules are written with a focus at conflicts on the North American continent from The French and Indian War (1754–1763), through The American War of Independence (1775-1783), War of 1812 (1812–1815), Texas Revolution (1835-1836), Mexican–American War (1846-1848), up to the American Civil War (1861-1865).

Rebels and Patriots will help you to refight company-sized skirmishes, ambushes, escort scenarios, and other tasks performed by a small company of soldiers rather than a full army. Game play is intentionally easy and cinematic, and your success is driven by the quality of the officers leading your company: the rules play up the feeling of adventure, where Heroic Officers lead their men to glory…

As with our previous rules, we’ve focused on the overall ‘feel’ and ‘flow’ of the game, rather than worrying ourselves about the minutiae of historical simulation. Our design goal has been to write a set of broad-brushstroke rules that depict the Horse and Musket era by combining elements of our Pike and Shot wargaming rules The Pikeman´s Lament and Dan´s colonial wargaming rules The Men Who Would Be Kings. The aim of the game is to roll some dice and move some models in a Horse and Musket battle game inspired by American history between 1754 and 1865, enjoying yourself as you do so.

More than anything else, we once again wanted to work together to create miniatures game for an interesting period of the history that is easy to play and enjoyably fun. We hope you will agree that we’ve done so: when Rebels and Patriots is released in early 2019, you’ll be able to judge this for yourself!


Below some pictures from one of the first playtest games of the Rebels and Patriots rules, all minis painted by my matey Jesper and are from his AWI collection.










32 comments:

  1. That’s great news, I have a small French Indian War collection.

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  2. Now this has definitely tickled my fancy!
    Cheers
    Matt

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  3. Can't wait, have all of Dan's other rules and really like the system

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  4. Very interesting development will look forward to reading it 😀

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  5. So how many figures a side, roughly, are contemplated?

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    1. The same amount as for The Pikeman’s Lament i would say. 50-70ish

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  6. This sounds really interesting! I've been playing around with creating some ACW games using TMWWBK. I'll just shelve that and wait for this publication! All the best with the playtesting!

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  7. I'm trying not to buy new minis this year (the leadpile's too big), but with this being released in 2019, I may have to get cracking on some AWI starting this Summer or Fall.

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  8. Good news! I may need to revisit my AWI organization.

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  9. I've been thinking of tweaking TMWWBK to play the F&I War, so perhaps I'll just wait for these.

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  10. Looking forward already to seeing this on the shelves. Mexico too you say? Perfect!

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  11. Guess what, I were just thinking about how to use The Men Who Would Be Kings for the Ameican Civil War...

    By the way, I guess new this rule-set works just as well for skirmishes during European wars of the same period.

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  12. Great news, I'm really looking forward to these rules.

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  13. We have had a lot of fun using Pikeman's Lament and TMWWBK for Napoleonic and ACW games.

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKCbyPfVAAYhb1a.jpg

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C4Q20bdUMAAV88T.jpg

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  14. Have had the privilege to play test - Thanks Micke! Check our experiences and AARs here: My AARs etc. now completed on play testing: https://25yearsofminis.blogspot.fi/2018/01/play-testing-rebels-patriots-new.html

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  15. I can't wait to see these rules published too! I'm already thinkering about using them in 19th century post Napoleonic Wars: Italian Wars of Indipendence (aka Risorgimento) 1848-1861!

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  16. Whaaaagh! My prayers are answered!

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  17. Excellent news!! Really excellent! I have wanted to play some ACW for years but haven't the time, money or patience to paint massive armies. I was kinda thinking of Sharp Practice, but my familiarity with the PL and TMWWBK systems mean that this will be a 'must-buy' for me instead! Some Perry ACW box sets have been ordered in anticipation and I shall be dusting off those pots of 'Union blue' paint!

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  18. Glad that you liked the news about our rules. :)

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  19. I've already placed an order with Galloping major, very excited about these rules.

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  20. I hope Dan doesn't forget to have army lists for the Fenian raids.

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  21. Wonderful news! I havet close to one hundred acw miniatures painted and based. Thinking of rebasing them using your 1-2-3 system. Do you recommend that basing system for these rules?

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    1. Thanks Markus!

      The 1,2,3 basing are the Sugested one in the rules, bit if you played Rampant rules you know basing are not that crutual, but i indeed recomend the 1,2,3 basing 😁

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  22. I really like Mersey's clarity in writing and explaining rules. But I'm worried about this summation. It appears that the authors' have no intention of trying to even get the "feel" of the period, let alone "simulate" it. Will there be any difference between these rules and Pikeman's or Men Who?
    Tell me why it will be better than Muskets and Tomahawks!

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