tackles his greatest foe - another Green Vehicle...
Issue 376 hits the streets on Friday, 25th July, packed with plenty of summertime goodies to keep you busy on your holidays! Let's take a look at what's inside.
- Briefing
- In my own briefing, I take stock of the fact that this is my 50th magazine and talk about how fortunate we are to be blessed with so many good magazines in this hobby.
- Forward Observer
- Forward Observer sees Neil Shuck participating in the second, highly successful Operation Market Larden day, organized by the Wyvern Wargamers; following which, he peruses the latest Lard Summer Special and Bashnya or Bust, also from the Lardies. He moves on to examine the Wild West Chronicles expansion, before thinking hard about the latest MDF laser-cut terrain offerings and the latest Kickstarter taking his fancy for Shadows over Normandie, which mixes WWII with Achtung! Cthulhu.
- Hollow Village
- In Hollow Village, our wargames widow Diane Sutherland presents something special for those of you planning to plunge into the Dark Continent, an African delight using barbecue skewers (which you're bound to have plenty of at this time of year), rush matting, and some of those useful coffee stirrers from high street coffee shops.
- Fantasy Facts
- John Treadaway's Fantasy Facts proves that variety is the spice of life, as he looks at Nazi horrors, Judge Dredd, Spy-Fi, light goods vehicles, Gondorian fortifications, and Renaissance equipped canines in 28mm, plus SF AFVs, witches, Space Orcs, and more in 15mm.
- Forgetting the Point
- Following the controversy served up last month concerning army lists, Andrew Rolph plunges into another sacred cow in Forgetting the Point. In this substantial piece, he presents a comprehensive alternative to points systems, aimed at producing games that have both more realistic force composition, and present more exciting challenges to the players – even before the game begins! There will be some extra goodies on our website to accompany this article!
- Send Three and Fourpence
- Conrad Kinch uses his Send Three and Fourpence column to give some sage advice to avoid some of the pitfalls of the biggest 24/7/365 flea market on earth: eBay.
- Advance on Budapest '44
- This is an opportunity for David C R Brown (best known as "Dave" Brown) to come up with something more interesting than mere advertorial, on the launch of his glamorous new edition of his Battlegroup PanzerGrenadier rules, and he's been as good as his word, providing a testing scenario for MWBG readers, with a blow-by-blow explanation of how things work. We didn't have room for his map in the magazine, so you'll be able to download that from our website.
- Bridge for the Taking!
- Reader Jeff Brown has brought his talents to bear and provides us with 1:300 plans for the famous Bénouville bridge seized by a coup de main during the first minutes of D-Day, and subsequently renamed Pegasus Bridge in honor of the troops of 6th Airborne Division who captured it. As well as the bridge plans, there's an introduction by the Editor. Free bonus: As well as the plans shown in the magazine for Pegasus Bridge, you'll also be able to download plans from our website for the Orne River Bridge that was captured on the same day.
- Mongols in Europe 1237-1241
- Mick Sayce concludes his second series on the Mongols in Europe 1237-1241 with an examination of their astonishing conquests in Hungary, where yet again they met and overcame an enemy divided. Mick has also appended a list of all the manufacturers who make appropriate miniatures for the armies and enemies of the Mongols in this period.
- Brunkeberg 1471
- New contributor Jan Kärrman describes how he built his remarkable terrain for this hard-fought medieval battle, little-known outside Sweden, providing us with lots of modelling ideas and wargaming inspiration along the way. (And lots of pretty pictures that will thrill 6mm fans in particular!)
- Hex Encounter
- Brad Harmer uses his Hex Encounter column to encourage us to choose games in which the balance between the rules and the gaming experience has been well-judged, mentioning the best and the worst in this regard. Some surprises here!
- Escaping Cromwell
- Graham Burke returns with an exciting skirmish from the era of the English Civil Wars. Escaping Cromwell can be played either 'straight', or with the addition of folklore elements, such as witches. So, will you declare for the Levellers, or against?
- The Business Vanishes
- Why is running a wargames business so hard? In The Business Vanishes, Martin Stephenson addresses the infuriating situation of when you are just ready to place your annual order for three blartwargles with 'Ephemeral Miniatures', only to discover that they no longer exist. What is the secret of the disappearing wargames business?
- Recce
- Recce is dominated by rules and books this time – I'll be posting some figure reviews on the website. Subjects include The Knight who Saved England by Richard Brooks; Across a Deadly Field ACW rules by John Hill (we have not one, but two reviews of this ruleset, because two arrived on the same day and express somewhat different views); the Panzer Grenadier Deluxe WWII rules by Dave Brown; On the Seven Seas pirate rules by Chris Peers from Osprey; Dead Was Everything, a study of the Zulu Wars by Keith Smith; and Letters from the Light Brigade, a fascinating Crimean War account.
- Card Games
- The Editor has provided some top-down troops and 2-D scenery as PDFs on the website that can be printed out to whatever scale you prefer, enabling newcomers, or anyone who wants to try a new set of rules, to get going at minimal cost. As with all our downloads, go to our site and head to the "Goodies" section, which will be up and running next week.
- Battlegames Combat Stress Appeal
- And of course, we round up with our Battlegames Combat Stress Appeal, which has been jogging ahead nicely this month, and a host of messages from your favorite advertisers.