Post by Eric Farrington on Apr 25, 2023 14:22:48 GMT
Well, well, well... another book from Osprey and another one in the Rampant series by Daniel Mersey. The two big powerhouses of the Osprey publishing universe are Joseph A. McCullough and Daniel Mersey. Of course, we all know that Mr. Mersey wrote the very first in the Osprey Wargaming Series; Dux Bellorum. He then went on to write Lion Rampant which was a break out hit for Osprey and one of their most popular titles. Since then, he "Co-lab"ed (as the kids say) with a variety of writer's to release various versions of the "Rampant" series titles such as Dragon Rampant, The Men Who Would Be Kings, Pikeman's Lament, Rebels and Patriots, and Xenos Rampant. He also released a variety of supplemental content for Lion Rampant such as A Viking in the Sun and Crusader States. The "Rampant Series" was so popular there are also a number of boot-leg versions out there including for Chariot Wars, Napoleonics, Ancients, and probably more. Plus, Daniel Mersey has created a number of other non-Osprey games to boot. He is now the Wargame Designer in Residence at Edinburgh college. Needless to say, he is one of my big inspirations and I am always interested in what he is putting out into the world.
As you can tell from the list of links I put in above, that I have Lion Rampant from the original Blue Book series. So, why did I spend the money on this version? The original one is still a very serviceable set of rules! Well, I have some Dark Age armies, and Vikings, and I love me some Mersey game design... so I bought these.
So, since I have all ready reviewed the main Lion Rampant rules, I figured I would avoid most of the talk about how the game plays, and instead just focus on what I found that was new and interesting. So, let's us don our armor, grab our lance, and parade out onto the field of battle.....
The full review is on the Blood and Spectacles blog:
bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2023/04/review-lion-rampant-second-edition.html