Classical Hack: Ancient Warfare 600 B.C. to 600 A.D.

Rating:
Summary: Classical Hack Ancient Warfare 600 B.C. to 600 A.D. Rocks!
Review: Classical Hack Ancient Warfare 600 B.C. to 600 A.D. is a 38 page interpretive study of classical warfare that has unique style and a handsome presentation. Unlike most books that examines ancient warfare through the manipulation of miniatures, this book captures the flavor of classical warfare like no other such study. For those not familiar with ancient warfare and historical gaming they will find this work a doorway to making history, no matter how ancient, interesting and fun. Maybe all that D & D stuff we did as kids did have some merit. Taking myth and legends of our culture and making them fun as a game. Well Classical Hack does exactly the same thing for ancient history.

Here's why I think this book is worth owning. It has a neat color picture of Alexander the Great on the cover-done by Peter Connolly now of A & E fame (you can find him on Amazon too). Hey the picture itself is worth $24.00 U.S., just to frame and hang. For miniature collectors of ancient figures or gamers the price of this book is less than it would cost you to buy a bag of figures! What good are miniatures if you do not know the proper way to use them.

Each of the 38 pages has diagrams and art work from the last century with all manner of ancient warriors. These are cleverly used to explain how the book is used as a set of rules. Rules for playing miniature war games.

Not being familiar with a lot of other such rule books (except HG. Wells Little Wars and Young's Charge, D & D, and the slow moving if not boring tournament stuff from England) I think this is an exceptional book. Not for its size but for its interesting approach and general content. Obviously the authors have spent a lot of dry research time. That's a plus for the reader. It saves the reader (especially this reader) endless hours of their own research on a usually uninteresting subject. I suppose that if you were a die hard ancient wargame buff it would inspire you to do more.

Other things about it include a well organized table of contents and what I especially like a fine working index! Not sure I have seen much of this in similar rule books.

The book follows a pattern that is clear and gets relatively to the point. I do not like to read a lot of long winded narrative explaining how to do something. First off the book tells you everything you need to have to start gaming. Then it explains how to build the armies you will require in order to entertain yourself via the thoroughly modern manipulation of military miniatures of the ancient period.

Each section follows the game outline as you go. You easily learn all that manipulation stuff. It is not in the King's English. It is written in plain old American. Common yes. Inspiring perhaps. Clear? Yes it is.

Attempting to see if the ideas for the basic manipulation of miniatures actually worked as explained, to my surprise it did work. I did cheat a little. I used pieces of paper cut to recommended unit sizes instead of actually painting up all the miniatures. I am sure we did some things wrong but we were pretty sure we got things right. Well we knew we were having a lot of fun doing it.

This book can be a source of great interaction with others too. The more we played the more we got into the period stuff on our own. In a way the book became a tool. I used all that boring basic statics stuff I studied in high school and later college. It took a bit of time to figure out that a matrix is not just a movie thing. It can also be a chart with numbers used in a very fast play game system. We were confident enough after 5 or more games (using the book) to stick just with the end page which has a quick reference sheet. Friends that have started joining the games we put on were doing fine by turn 2 or 3 without any previous experience.

When purchasing the book I looked long and hard at the back cover. It lists all the things the book does. I did laugh a little. Sure enough after getting the book it does indeed do the things it says it does and in record time. Perhaps you can tell a lot about a book by its cover after all.

Rating:
Summary: Very good
Review: This book describe ancient warfare very well. WIth an Intersting plot and well developed characters I give ths book a 4. I give it a 4 because in the middle there is a gapse of action. Other than this the book was great.