"DBR Revival?" Topic

With DBR back in print, do you see DBR catching on again?

It should certainly be easier to get new players into the game.

It would be nice if it did. As a general set of rules for the period, I've always liked them. The problem was always, IMHO, that people expected them to be DBM with guns, and they weren't.
The lists could do with some editing and clearing up typos, though.

It would be nice if it did.

Although I have never played DBR in a tournament, I enjoyed playing it a lot, and have many fond memories. I had a good solo game fairly recently. So far, I have only used it for the Great Rebellion (English Civil War and associated conflicts in Scotland and Ireland).

I suspect it will be difficult as FOGR seems fairly strongly established at least in the UK.

I would be surprised. Nothing to do with the quality of the rules: just wargamers are victims of shiny syndrome, and I can't recall a revival ever becoming the hot new rules set again.

Our group in Trowbridge played DBR back in the day, but it seemed awfully slow and in many cases rather boring. I much prefer the various DBA variants covering the period that can be found on the net

DBR 1was an excellent game and I played hundreds of battles mostly as large battles with the club. Most of the games that we played were not Central European or ECW. We played American Asia Africa mideast. Lots of fun. The locals did much tournament play also.

Then as it always is the case Phil revised the rules. However this time the result was not better as is the case with DBA three. Play became more tedious, tournament play diminished immensely in the US. Too bad, I have many Renaissance era armies languishing On the shelves. My opponents did not want to downsize to the very interesting DBA based Renaissance games. So they turned to Saga, Fogger and FOW and other non-Renaissance games. The version in print now is not an improvement, it's just a reprint of the previous less useful version with the army lists not fixed.

It won't be easy to get new players involved because the cadre of old players is gone. As we all know, and as Phil has himself said, the easiest way to learn his games is to play with someone who knows them.

It was interesting to read Bob's opinion of version 2 of DBR. It is a long time since I played version 1, but I do have an impression that I enjoyed it a bit better than the second version (which is still a good game, in my opinion). Unfortunately, I don't think that my copy of version 1 followed me to my present home.

I managed to learn to play DBR without a more experienced player (as I did with DBA and HotT). Must admit that I never really managed to get to grips with DBM, though.

I think that Bob and I will just have to agree to disagree about DBA Version 3.0, though. :-)

This is my favourite set of pile and shot rules. My friend and I continue to play version 2 with no problems and I also play solo and enjoy the rules very much.
We have fought Italian Wars; Tudor; ECW in England, Ireland and Scotland; Eastern Europe; Ottoman expansion; Moghul and Portuguese Colonial.
We have never played in a tournament but are completely satisfied with a system that allows us to play so many different armies and scenarios.

It's still the only set that really lets naval forces play a significant part in the game. Important if you're doing colonial wars, Malta, Dutch wars or the Armada campaign.

I still use the version and update that came out in the Reiter years ago – the DBR version of DBA before there was a DBR