Blue & Gray Deluxe Boardgame

This game hit UK shores (Second Chance Games) last year and while I fancied a low complexity series of ACW games, I felt that this was perhaps a bit too simple and that the lack of command and control would allow units to be continually doing fancy footwork and moving outside of their Corps area of operations to get those perfect attack odds etc.

Anyway, particularly of recent time, I have to come feel that the collection would benefit from some short, easy play games that would particularly fit our face to face gaming sessions, which perhaps too often, are bringing new purchases to the table which don’t fit our available time slot and are not ‘well enough known’ through previous plays to get that slick, enjoyable game going, where you know what you need to do and the game has already previously jumped the hurdle of being initially explored and liked by both players.

So I took another look at the new Blue & Gray (Deluxe Edition) from Decision Games - could this be a useful title to have on our face-to-face shelf?

The game itself is beautifully presented (the clue being in the Deluxe Edition). It is a collection of eight battles that the hobby first saw in 1975. They were published as two quad games, Blue & Gray vol I (Antietam, Cemetery Hill, Chickamauga, Shiloh), later followed by Blue & Gray vol II (The Battle of the Wilderness, Chattanooga, Fredericksburg, Hooker & Lee - which covers Chancellorsville).

The Deluxe edition presents the original rules in the first eight pages of the new rulebook and the games can be played fully from them, providing an old school or nostalgic sentiment for those of us who were pushing cardboard counters around in the lates 70’s!

In addition, there are numerous other rules that the players(s) can add as they see fit. These come in two flavours, Optional Rules that were added over time to later editions of the game and Variant Rules, which are rule proposals appearing in both the Moves and the Strategy & Tactics Magazines, submitted by the fan base. New counters are included to be used with additional rules. The normal unit counters are simply laid out, with the combat value printed large (thank you).

Collectively, the extra rules allow the gamer to take this game to a play level more of their own choosing. So looking at some of these bolt on rules, you get command range that encourages players to keep their respective corps together, cavalry rules and a ‘Shattered’ rule. The latter is particularly interesting as it was added to deal with the fact that the original Combat Result Table allowed a side to put in low odd attacks to tie the other side down, with the worst result being a rebuff, attacking was a fairly safe bet!

The variant has a new 2D6 CRT that now includes the combat results of Defender / Attacker shattered, which effectively reflects the unit taking so many casualties that their combat factors are halved for the rest of the game. In a game that has mandatory attacks against units in their Zone of Control, I imagine that will bring much more nuance to decision making.

When reading reviews on the games, there are obviously going to be those battles that gamers feel are the better ones and ‘the one’ that they feel is the weakest. It is interesting to note that the original Cemetery Hill game had divisional strength counters for the Union and Brigade level for the Confederates, resulting in a bit of a miss-match, but a variant has been added that gives additional counters to break the Union order of Battle down into a more equitable foe in terms of unit scale.

Regardless, I shall simply work my way through these battles and decide for myself which ones will see the most play. Playing time is estimated at 1 - 2 hours, hex scale is 219 yards, game turns represent 75 - 120 minutes, complexity is described as Very Low, while solitaire suitability is described as High (i.e. a player can play both sides without system obstruction). 

   

All the maps in this edition are mounted onto board and the overall presentation is very nice. Decision Games are bringing out a few similar quads which fall into ‘a blast from the past’ category, which I for one am pleased about, but I am a little wary of their development control as the recent ‘Battles of the Ardennes Deluxe’ game, high on my interest list, seems to have some issues that might leave a person buying and paying into the ‘Deluxe’ aspect, being a little disappointed. Apparently, Decision Games are to print a correction counter sheet for the Ardennes game, though the rulebook will rely just on some errata sheets that the gamer prints off. 

In truth, last year I had both the Ardennes game and B&G games on pre-order with my UK store, but once I started hearing complaints about the Ardennes game, which was published first, I promptly cancelled both pre-orders.

However, Blue & Gray Deluxe appears free of these sort of concerns and it ticks all of the right boxes to give a deluxe feel, so it enters the collection.

The game is on the expensive side and I have approached that from the point of view that the expense is divided by eight different battles that should see repeated play …. I hope I am right!  

I will post again once I have a battle or two under my belt. I’m sure a big take-away for me will be having eight battles governed by just one set of easy play rules and that increasingly I want to play a game without a heavy rulebook behind it.

As for the Ardennes game, I hope at some point, once the errata counters are printed, I may feel the same about getting that game, but that is for another day.