"Who owns these "Murat" war game campaign maps?" Topic

http//www.murat.ca/maps.htm

These maps are for a war game campaign system, I think. I can't find who owns them or what campaign system they are from. Please, can you help?

Well the root page of the site says it is Malcolm Mccallum's Homepage. There is an email address for him here:
murat.ca/Zulu.htm

Malcolm made the maps himself as well as created a web based campaign system to create interesting battle for his local gamers. I had the fortune of playing online once, but I think he found that it was better to confine it to the local gamers who were available to game out the battle. I think he's out of country and the website seems to be down right now.

The campaign was run day by day and you issued orders to your troops via messengers. Everything moved by nodes (with limits based on the major/minor roads and if they crossed rivers). Infantry moved 1 node, cav 2, messengers 3. Troops could force march (sometimes) for an extra 1. I suppose conceptually it's like some of the columbia games napoleonic 'block games'.

Once troops encountered each other there was an option for a battle (or for the commanders to withdraw). This gave some larger scope for the battles, as it would suggest the terrain, strategic situation, possibilities of reinforcements (including flanking forces showing up from other roads), etc.

The best part was the obscene amount of fog of war present. You really only knew what your troops could see 1 node away. And their report would suck if they weren't cavalry, and/or were facing enemy cavalry screens. Also, their reports would only move 3 nodes, so if you were further away, the reports would be days old, and also your orders would take days to return. Same with your allies positions, based on troop reports, or if they bothered to send you correspondence.

Thanks MajorB. I emailed him and got a very prompt response.

He told me he has made these maps "entirely available for general use."

What a great guy! Thank you Malcolm.

They are ideally suited to the kind of campaigns I run (point to point) and will take sooooo much work out of my own map production – which takes ages (using MS Paint). First I'm going to use an amended one of Italy for an Italian Wars campaign, later there are so many SYW possibilities…….

Linky no worky on the maps.

Google – Murat campaign maps – googled under images. You'll see a map like the one above, click on it and it should take you to a main page with a collage of 'map pages' – then just click on the one you want.

I downloaded these a few years ago, and have been looking for an excuse to use them – along the lines of the campaign noted above.

I find it interesting/amusing to see the towns he chose to use from the SE of England (where I live). He spelt Bicester with an 'h'. Also he used Milton Keynes, which was built as a new town in the 1960's – he would have been better with 'Wolverton'- now a MK suburb. (That comes off as a bit too pedantic, its not meant to be – I don't expect checking of every towns history!)

Also he obviously had to make a choice between town or road, and understandably chose road- You will see Royston on the 'Great Cambridge Road'. A better town would have been Hitchin- a larger town, 10 miles or so West. But this would have meant no node on the Cambridge road, and instead replacing Luton and moving the Bedford road East. The map as stands is a better gaming map, but at the expense of history.