Slitherine

I have been playing Pike & Shot around the clock. Excellent game.

This is the first computer game that has ever really replicated the joy of playing with miniatures and a great set of rules. The period feel of the graphics, making a Spanish tercio or pike block really look like those engraved images, was a very good idea.

I played Edgehill like the early commanders and troops, rather amateurishly. But after a few games I really found out how to deploy a Swedish Brigade and what to do about those annoying hedgerows. The AI is very good and very unforgiving. I found I had to go back to school and resit the tutorials before I was prepared to win! And what joy when I did. The extra study paid off when I won at Marston Moor. I knew enough of the battle to know that The Parliamentary cavalry could undo me on my right wing. They nearly did. But my plan of holding the center and sweeping the left wing quickly really paid off. I needed those Reserves to deal with the collapse of the right wing.

I tried the Multiplayer and Online game functions, they are elegantly implemented as in some other Slitherine games. This will be easy to set up with my wargaming friends and family.

Designer Richard Bodley Scott had done an excellent job of research, game design and implementation. I'm not up to scenario design but I'm looking forward to the game community coming through as usual with some great scenarios and mods. I hope Richard will take some of his great concepts and apply them to slightly earlier periods, say Tudors back through Wars of the Roses. and perhaps forward just a little to the early Lace Wars. With a little more graphics work the game could be perfect, but Im very happy not to have to watch anarchic sprites do their thing. Wargames figures sit still on their Litko bases until moved by the gentle hand of fate, or the Armchair General. The animation here, or moving, firing effects, is just right to replicate the Wargame and history.

Very nice!

Edgehill was tough. I won on my first try, but I don't exactly know how. The cavalry fight was simple, except on the left where you have to be mindful of Parlimentarian shot as you charge. The infantry fight was a total slog. How can the Swedish brigade formation be used effectively? While splitting the infantry into distinct battaltions of pikes and muskets seems like a good idea on the surface, in practice my pikes were disordered before they could get into melee and once melee starts the 85% musket brigades aren't so hot.

Marston Moor one the other hand is now my favorite of the historical battles. Defending the drainage ditch from the horde of Parlimentarians is intense. Like you I saw that a quick charge with the left flank cavalry would be more advantageous than defending. My right flank was not overly problematic- I did not win, but I also did not lose until the final two turns. My mistake was in not realizing that my cav were impact mounted, while Cromwell's were impact pistol, meaning that putting my cav behind the drainage ditch put them at a disadvantage for the impact round.

mdavis41 wrote:I have been playing Pike & Shot around the clock. Excellent game.

This is the first computer game that has ever really replicated the joy of playing with miniatures and a great set of rules.

Very nice!

The Tin Soldiers games were the first miniatures games made. They are similar to this game but also use cards like a boardgame to add temporary effects to units.
If you like Pike & Shot and Sengoku Jidai, then you will like Tin Soldiers just as much. There are two games in the series: Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great. And they are only on the Matrix site.

http://www.matrixgames.com/products/298 ... .the.Great.