Never Mind The Bill Hooks test game #2 (page 4), lotsa pics!

[OSHIROmodels]

How many photos?

More than when he plays with others 

[Bloggard]

and I guess you are using natural light, which works incredibly well. Many of the photos look better than 'studio' set-ups.

[Silent Invader]

That was an enjoyable read - thanks for taking the time. 

[Mad Doc Morris]

Wonderful presentation, Richard. Again.
I do envy you for that magnificent table. Or rather the space not only to deploy but to store that beast with all its paraphernalia. Luverly.

[Plynkes]

Yeah!


(Got nothing to say, so just take this as a 'like', a big one at that.)

[Hammers]

Gosh...! I need to pop some popcorn bring out the reading glasses an peruse this in full.

[NurgleHH]

Thanks lads

Card activation for units seems to be present in most of the rulesets I’ve played over the last few years. I guess it’s emerged as the antidote to the predictability of IGOUGO. It works well in this set of rules, and the random cards add a little period flavour and uncertainty, which on balance, I think is good. Their effect is minimal overall within the game, although it’s true, it can be crucial. The ‘friction’ element here is minimal compared to some currently popular rulesets - it’s only the last card each turn which misses out, and that’s not necessarily even one of the commanders’ cards.

Do you think it is possible to use it also for 100years-/Baron-Wars and maybe Italians-wars? I think ECW is to far away from the original war of the roses.

[Furt]

Great report and what a table Richard! Quite a Herculean effort with all those images and the detailed write-up - splendid!

[Captain Blood]

Great report and what a table Richard! Quite a Herculean effort with all those images and the detailed write-up - splendid!

Thanks Frank

Do you think it is possible to use it also for 100years-/Baron-Wars and maybe Italians-wars? I think ECW is to far away from the original war of the roses.

It's an interesting one, Dirk. The author has clearly gone to a deal of trouble to create and hone a set of rules that are not only playable and enjoyable, but which specifically reflect the distinctive nature of that series of bloody civil wars in England and Wales, that went on for 40-odd years in the second half of the C15th. During the course of which a couple of generations of the ruling elite managed to wipe significant numbers of themselves out. Not to mention many thousands of ordinary foot soldiers in their employ. And what the poor chap gets asked the whole time, is whether the rules are adaptable to other periods

On one level, they're just a set of wargames rules with mechanisms that could be adapted to other periods. Minor adjustments for the Hundred Years War and the Italian Wars would be pretty straightforward, and I believe those are already planned. Beyond that, personally I feel people should find rules that suit the period they want to play. The flavour of NMTBH is very distinctively Wars of the Roses. The rules are set up to represent the troop types, unit organisation (mixed blocks of bills and bows, for instance), the sort of events that typically took place (battlefield treachery!), and a semblance of the tactics of that particular conflict / period of history.

I guess, rather like the various Dan Mersey rulebooks, once you've hit upon a set of mechanics that work, there's nothing to stop it being endlessly repackaged for different eras and settings, just by changing a few of the troop types, terminology, special rules and fluff. But I suppose it depends to what extent the essence and character of the rules, and how they play, is linked to the period for which they were originally designed. Or whether they're sufficiently generic to be adaptable to anything and everything. My sense is that NMTBH perhaps won't travel well too far from their intended setting

[Atheling]

Do you think it is possible to use it also for 100years-/Baron-Wars and maybe Italians-wars? I think ECW is to far away from the original war of the roses.

I believe there are concrete plans to do just that Nurgle. HYW is likely, ECW would be very much pushing things though 

[Captain Blood]

I guess you are using natural light, which works incredibly well. Many of the photos look better than 'studio' set-ups.

Sorry Bloggard, I missed this

Thank you. Yes, just natural daylight through the large Velux windows in the roof of my loft wargames room.
Truthfully, when the sun shines it's often too bright, and when it doesn't, it's often too dark! I have to do a bit of adjustment to the images for exposure, brightness, contrast, saturation, etc, just to get them looking tonally consistent and clear.
I try not to shoot pics under the ceiling downlighters in the room. Even though they have quite a white light to the eye, in photos of games and figures, they just make everything look yellow. It's almost impossible to fully fix this afterwards.

[AndyC]

Billhooks elsewhere.....? Well it all depends on Command and Control really. WOTR is pretty anarchic, with a bunch of independently minded commanders who are barely subordinate to their notional army leader at the best of times. So the card-driven turn sequence is appropriate. But it should also work in areas of similar technology and loose command structures. Hence the decision to go for western Europe 100YW to Italian Wars in the proposed book. Not sure about anything further afield geographically or historically though. Other people are welcome to try but it's not for me. Maybe, just maybe, I might be persuaded to push it as far as Momoyama Japan, if only because I have the same sort of doubts about "Test of Honour" as I had about "Saga" and "Lion Rampant" and would like to play with my 28mm plastic Samurai again. But what really interests me about writing wargames rules is zooming in on the key differences about warfare in a specific period and setting. It's all a long-term reaction to the universal WRG Ancients of my distant youth...

[Captain Blood]

It's all a long-term reaction to the universal WRG Ancients of my distant youth...

It’s quite understandable Andy. How well I remember the school wargames club, circa 1979, pitting my Minifigs Wars of the Roses army against someone else’s Minifigs Early Achaemenid Persians under WRG 5th...

Innocent days 

[syrinx0]

Another fantastic dazzling table of WOTR.  Thanks for the pictures and write up.

How well I remember the school wargames club, circa 1979, pitting my Minifigs Wars of the Roses army against someone else’s Minifigs Early Achaemenid Persians under WRG 5th...

If only my school had a wargames club back then...   Luckily I eventually met some people who played Chainmail & Tractics. 

[Bloggard]

Sorry Bloggard, I missed this

Thank you. Yes, just natural daylight through the large Velux windows in the roof of my loft wargames room.
Truthfully, when the sun shines it's often too bright, and when it doesn't, it's often too dark! I have to do a bit of adjustment to the images for exposure, brightness, contrast, saturation, etc, just to get them looking tonally consistent and clear.
I try not to shoot pics under the ceiling downlighters in the room. Even though they have quite a white light to the eye, in photos of games and figures, they just make everything look yellow. It's almost impossible to fully fix this afterwards.

got the impression you had velux windows which must make all the difference when everything works out / you can make adjustments as necessary.
'cos the pics look great, and the best of them have a convincing sense of natural light (i.e. in terms of subtle shadows etc) which studio set-ups never quite seem to manage.