"A book review of "Brothers Divided" at the House of War" Topic

Howdy all!

Just wanted to let folks know that, in addition to a Unit Showcase of some 15mm ACW Federal Artillery, I've posted up a review of "Brothers Divided," the new ACW skirmish scenario book from Scott Mingus! I've included a few photos and a breakdown of the book, so please do come by and take a look!

link

How do the scenarios play out?

I am flattered!

Thanks Lord Ashram for the kind words!!

Brothers Divided sold VERY well at Cold Wars, so we are off to a great start with this planned series of Brother Against Brother scenario books.

I am sold. Can I wait until Barracks Battles or do I mail order it now. Who is selling it?

Lord Ashram,
I have to say that your wargaming room is the nicest and most classy looking wargaming area I have ever seen! It is a showpiece in itself! Your 15mm artillery look great also!
Yes, Scott's book is beautiful, and I am flattered that he used pictures of my figures and scenery in it. I am slowly building my 28mm ACW army and scenery back up again so that I will be able to play his wonderful scenarios. Scott also ran a beautiful looking game at "Cold Wars" on early Saturday, and I was also fortunate to pick up his new book "Flames beyond Gettysburg". Thank you Scott for all your contributions to Civil War History and Wargaming!

Hi Rusty Musket!

You can place Internet orders through a variety of gaming merchants, including Scale Creep, Battlefield Terrain Concepts, Age of Glory, and The Last Square.

And, John, you are too kind!

Ah! I just figured out that Fire Zouave is John Mayer! One more piece of the puzzle!:) Glad to hear you are building the collection back up… a guy should always have some ACW figures around:)

Oh and thanks for the kind words about the wargames room! I am very happy with how it turned out:)

Indeed, the one and only John Mayer of Round Top Miniatures. John continues to expand his line of excellent 10mm ACW buildings from the Battle of Gettysburg, a line that includes several neat buildings.

Doug Kline of Battlefield Terrain Concepts had a custom-made mini-diorama / wargaming terrain piece for sale at Cold Wars; the vignette used FireZouave's 10mm Bryan House and Bryan Barn from Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg.

…But has anyone played out a scenario(s) yet?

Hey!

Sorry I missed your post… I am reluctant to post about how scenarios play because quite frankly scenarios play different for everyone; it depends more on the player, I find, than the scenario itself! However I can say that the scenarios are easy to figure out, multi-layered, and not overly complicated:)

There were a couple dozen playtesters involved in the project. I have sent the scenarios via e-mail to members of the BAB Yahoo Group and requested them to playtest them, and I received many helpful ideas which were incorporated into the final scenarios.

You may want to post your question to that group; they may have their notes from the playtests!

And, feel free to ask me about any particular scenario; I would be happy to answer any questions on it.

Sorry, I haven't played any of the scenarios in this 1st edition, but I played two of the scenarios in the upcoming 2nd edition and found them to be very interesting, fun and challenging! I have fun just building the battlefields, buildngs, terrain and such for the scenario. I don't like to have to think up a scenario and the order of battle, arrival times and all that detail to get started. I played these scenarios a few times and each time it was a little different, but still lots of fun!

Hi

Is there eny selling Brothers Divided in England/Europe?

Hi Paqu73!

Principles of War has carried my three previous wargaming scenario books for Johnny Reb 3. I would assume they will also carry this book. Why not contact them or your favorite dealer and ask them to carry Brothers Divided? Customer demand will help them decide whether to carry this new full color skirmish-level scenario book.

Scott

Scott, all of the scenarios in Brothers Divided are built around cavalry (on one side or the other). Were there small purely infantry skirmishes in the Gettysburg area that could have been included in the book or were infantry-only skirmishes a rarity?

In the early days of the Gettysburg Campaign, there weren't many infantry-on-infantry encounters with the sole exception of the Battle of Second Winchester, which I couldn't develop into any interesting scenarios that were translatable to the Brother Against Brother rules. I did make a decent Johnny Reb 3 scenario that I will run at Fall In and print in CHARGE! to coincide with the release this autumn of my new book from LSU Press on the Louisiana Tigers.

The Brothers Divided series is in chronological order, so Volume 2 will be virtually all infantry action from the actual Battle of Gettysburg.

Some of the scenarios coming late this year in Brothers Divided Volume 2 include the Louisiana Tigers' entry into Gettysburg on Day 1, the 73rd Ohio's skirmish on Day 2, the burning of the Bliss Farm on Day 3, and the probing attack of the U.S. Regulars on the Rose Farm on July 4, plus 6-7 more.

Scott
scottmingus.com

Thanks for that Scott. I am very impressed with the quality and format of Brothers Divided Volume 1 and add my voice to others highly recommending it. We have only played the Thoroughfare Gap scenario so far. All of the information needed was clearly presented and it was great fun.

As with my five Johnny Reb 3 scenario books, I made no attempt to balance the scenarios for playability, but rather, as a historian, I much prefer to present the tactical situation actually faced by the commanders and then see what the gamers can do with the situation. You will find in Brothers Divided a wide variety of challenges, some of which may be particularly difficult for one side or the other. However, the idea was to make these as interesting and diverse as I could.

Thanks for all the kind words!

Resurrecting this a little bit…

I picked up a copy of Brothers Divided at Cold Wars and was greatly impressed by the quality of the work. I've not yet had a chance to try out any of them yet due to the fact that we have no cavalry (yet)! I had a chance to briefly meet Scott at Historicon as well as quite a few other Brother Against Brother (BAB) fans. The release of these scenario books has really done a lot to raise the awareness of this my favorite set of ACW rules within the hobby.

Kudos to Scott and his collaborators for that!

You are most welcome!!!!