A classic game and with figures!
When I moved to London in 1978 and started attending the Newham Wargames Club based at Eric Knowles’s shop in Manor Park, East London I took part in a number of games which were all highly entertaining and then a new set of rules came out that kind of took the edge off the genre for me. These were called Once Upon A Time in the West and seemed by comparison to be rather more complex than the original Old West Skirmish rules. This was the time when ever more complex rules seemed to be the way forwards but were inevitably at the cost of playability. As a result my interest withered on the vine somewhat although I did rather enjoy anything US Cavalry related - Pony Wars or B Troop Ain’t coming back were a club favourite and I am pleased that a new version has recently been released by Baccus, the 6mm people.
The latest version of Pony Wars in hardback
My recent and rather splendid acquisition of a complete 26 volume set of the Time Life series The Old West has certainly given me plenty of material to think about. There are now vast ranges of Old West figures depicting all manner of types from the period and in a variety of scales. Whilst it does not necessarily mean I shall be reaching for figure catalogues, a few figures for a skirmish style game would certainly not be a problem.
Time to watch some old Westerns again methinks - perhaps the Cavalry trilogy along with Rio Bravo and of course, the Spaghetti sequence.
Purely for research of course….
12 comments:
The Battle of the Little Bighorn game looks a cracker, I never came across this one before, nice to see it. My father was a western fan and read tonnes of stuff and we watched every western film/tv series going must admit not really followed anything western based in years, may have to do some research like you suggest!!
Just sent you the littlewars TV gunfight rules - they look fun and there’s a freebie campaign too!
What a terrific looking game!
When I was in the Canadian Army I had the good fortune to take part in a staff ride of the Little Big Horn. We were all mounted on horses supplied by a local Crow Indian band (they mostly used the horses to compete in rodeos) and were guided by an ex US Army colonel who had a crazy amount of affection for Custer. What sticks with me years later is how how broken the ground here is. There were many places where you you could be within a kilometre of a thousand men and not know it. Custer had good advice and warnings from his scouts and didn't take them, but I think almost to the end he didn't appreciate how badly outnumbered he was.
I've heard good things about the Baccus rules.
Cheers,
Michael
Hi Donnie,
The whole western thing in the days of my youth was very much routine fare for me - along with Commando comics and Airfix. In many ways I thought I had grown out it when I looked at more ‘conventional’ military history. With the experience of years I can see now that certainly there is a lot of potential for some cracking narrative driven games - based on the gunfight or the cavalry operations.
You are never too old to change your opinion!
The board game as I recall was all about the US Cavalry getting away from the tribesmen - if you closely at the map you can see the two blue triangle exit areas. I am pretty certain that as the US Cavalry I do not recall ever achieving that!
All the best,
DC
Hiya Mad Padre,
Wow! That must have been some trip - and on horseback no less! It was a simple but fun game and copies can still be found on the net. I was always taken by the stylised map. If you look closely it has been fashioned to look like an animal skin stitched to a frame. The figures are OK although most sets now could use a little repaint - they were produced from soft plastic. Come to think of it one could easily get the figures required in 28mm for added flavour.
All the best,
DC
Hello there JOB,
Good to hear from you old chap (email incoming) and many thanks for the rules - free is always the best price to pay!
Salute on Saturday so I may have a look for some gunfighters…..how fickle am !?
All the best,
DC
I remember the Battle of Little Bighorn game…
A friend of mine had it and I think we must have played it every day after school….
To be honest I wouldn’t mind owning it now 😁
All the best. Aly
Hi Aly,
There are a few sets flying around on eBay and like you, I would quite happily get a copy again!
All the best,
DC
Add in 'Casey Jones', 'Champion the Wonder Horse' and 'Alias Smith & Jones' and I think that covers much of standard tv fare when I was a kid. Then of course the seemingly omnipresent Western films that we were treated to. Some have stood the test of time, others less so.
Recently played a game of "Once Upon a Time..." myself .. Real nostalgia as I played it to death back in the day... https://steve-the-wargamer.blogspot.com/2023/03/firing-into-brown-28-skirmish-at-long.html?m=1
Hi Steve J,
Gotta love a good western film! I always enjoyed Rio Bravo with Dean Martin proving that he could act as well as sing for sure!
“By the river, Rio Bravo……”
All the best,
DC
Hi Steve-the-wargamer,
We played it a lot back in the day and I always liked the Return volume as well as all the film character tie ins. The quick draw rules were also good fun in a spaghetti western Spanish guitar kind of way.
All the best,
DC
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