Messing About on the River

I am very much looking forward to running a solo ACW naval mini campaign using By Sea and By River. Note that all of Mr Manley’s excellent naval rules (covering most periods) are available from the Wargames Vault 

Well the models are built and ready for action, a few games have been fought, the rules are progressing nicely so what now? A campaign of course! I had always intended to use the ACW collection on a campaign footing with the ultimate extension of this being the Americanisation of East Anglia and its coastline for a kind of ‘imagi-naval’ set up. This will be a large undertaking for sure and my recent games using some of the settings demonstrated that to do the idea justice it would rather more setting up than I envisaged. I am not averse to this but I wanted to try something on a smaller scale - as much as a learning tool as anything else. 

Enter stage third left Mr David Manley.

As well as being a Bon vivant, wit, raconteur and a throughly top bloke his passion for all things nautical and his prodigious output of naval rules makes him very much a ‘go to’ resource whenever I have a particular waterborne itch to scratch! By River and Sea is the second supplement to his hugely successful Dahlgren and Colombiad ACW naval set and includes not only every ship specification you could conceivably need for the period but also two campaign systems. There is the full traditional multi player option and, of much more immediate use for me, a solo system, the title of which I have used for this post.

This is something I am keen to try out and at last I have the models I need to do so. I can use my block armies for when the land side is involved and some of the paddle steamers can be pressed into service as supply transports (note to self: I need to build some of these, along with barges and tugs).

I am torn as to whether or not I should Dahlgren and Colombiad or my own rules for the tactical side - I will look more closely at the campaign rules to see how specific they are and what changes I may need to make.

Naturally the progress of this adventure will be reported via the blog so in the meantime I shall crank up the purple prose generator (audible groans ensued....).