Saturday, June 18, 2011

Why WAB & WECW?

I was just reading a discussion thread on the new release of Beneath the Lilly Banners 2 which, from my understanding, hits this period square on. There was much 'passionate' discussion about simultaneous movement which, I gather, features within that set. As you may gather, I have no experience of this system. It follows on from another observation of mine that many wargamers tend to follow trends and invest a lot of time in keeping up with new release rule sets.

None of these features of the hobby and those involved in it ever made much sense to me. I'm certainly not disagreeing with peoples preferences and interest in rule mechanisms but I certainly fall squarely into the camp of, 'If you like something - stick with it'. I suppose this is why I've gone to the effort of adapting WAB and WECW specifically because it is a system which I have grown familiar with over the past ten years and quite like. It is also one which I hope I am demonstrating is open to adaptation and variation.

There has been concern expressed that WAB is somehow a dead format as no new supplements are due for release in the foreseeable future. Some have shown  that it is time to move on to the latest thing in rules and lists which will be supported by a publisher with ongoing releases. Perhaps this is a WAB thing and that such a commercial approach had engendered that expectation amongst younger or newer wargamers who have entered the hobby over the past decade or so.

I have certainly decided to stick with a system I know. More importantly, I'm sticking with one I enjoy. I don't tend to experience the frustrations others seem to about rules and see nothing wrong with 'house rules' or one-off scenario rules to cover any specific characteristic of a battle or campaign. I certainly am not of the school of thought which demands that a rule system cover every and all eventualities from life as represented on the table-top.

So, if there are gaps in any of my lists or core rules amendments, please feel free to change them and especially share them.

1 comment:

  1. I used to use WAB for my Viking/Norman/Saxon armies. I did change a lot of the rules to suit myself and my chums and stuck with them for years, like you say, with all the goings on in WAB land lots of people are abandoning them, one of my mates re wrote WAB with other bits thrown in and we all think they play a lot better, so its a probable goodbye to WAB from my little group, but each to their own. BLB are a great set of rules, both the 1st and 2nd editions, take a look you may be swayed???
    Love the site by the way!!
    Ray

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