Saw this yesterday on UK high street shelves. The issue theme is 'When water got in the way during WWII' (Allied beach landings and river crossings 1944  - 1945).

The mag always does a lot of work on their cover, usually getting a modeller to do a detailed diorama, but the subject here doesn't seem to be front lit enough, giving an uninspiring murky effect.

No such murkiness inside though - it is as gorgeous as ever.

They have 8 pages of product review, so there is plenty of new stuff about.

As well as the themed stuff, there is plenty of other periods covered. A Swabian War battle using Lion Rampant rules, A Campaign of Sulla's second civil war (Rome), in which there are 3 scenarios with more to follow in the next issue.

The last Welsh Prince (war of 1812), there is a second order of battle for anyone wanting to play a smaller battle with Baron Wars rules.

There is a skirmish between prospectors and Sioux warriors, with an eye on What a Cowboy rules, but with a few other rules cited, such as Dead Man's Hand.

The themed games have scenarios that use Bolt Action, Battlegroup and Rapid Fire.

There are two 'Let's Play' articles, one on 'Packing Heat' (American gangsters) and one on the new Flames of War 'Dunkirk' box.

Add to that the usual opinion pieces, modelling pages and book reviews, then the whole mag delivers a lot of interest.

They say the next issue is The War of the Third Coalition - can't wait.

I am not able to make the Partizan wargame show today, so look forward to the various blog and video reports when they come in.

These come in sets of 6 and are built by S&A Scenics in the UK.

The two packs here totalled £30 plus postage, giving just enough to get my Jena battlefield going for the Warlord Games Epic figures.

The good thing about terrain suppliers is that they keep their materials constant, so that you can order additional packs later on to slowly build the collection... until you can do a Teutoburg Forest battle! :-)

I just need some buildings now for the two villages in my scenario and while waiting, I can paint up a few more Epic bases.

As mentioned on the blog, I will likely first test out the scenario using my 28s and have the Austrians act as proxy for the Prussian/Saxon force.

Lannes attacks Lutzeroda

I have completed the ground work for the conversion of the situation in the recent boardgame, so that it can be played as a figures game with the DBN rules.

The map is a fair representation of what was occurring in the boardgame and a scenario layout is suggested over on the Battlefields and Warrior blog, with additional rules and observations that the figures game will need as it bridges one game format to another.

The post is up on the blog here; LINK 

https://battlefieldswarriors.blogspot.com/2026/10/converting-boardgame-to-figures-jena.html

Following on from the Jena-Auerstaedt game, I have been working away on transferring part of the boardgame battlefield to the figures table for a DBN scenario.

The first draft of that is shown here. I am pleased to say that it has moved on since to something more recognisable as a battle map and deployments, orders of battle etc. I am quite pleased how that is going.

I need the new scenario to work with DBN, but also to remain true to what the boardgame was doing.

In the background, the Prussians gain a painted Epic scale commander and a foot artillery battery. These armies are slowly moving forward, but there is not too much pressure to get things done because some terrain that I want to use with these figures has sill not arrived.

Until the big clear out last year, I did have oodles of this Epic stuff and a mass of terrain to go with it. I have to smile (or cry) at the de-clutter nature of getting rid of stuff only be re-buying it at some point!

However, making this new scenario up has at least given. me an order of battle to work towards in the first instance to get a playable game going. 

This is a 12-turn game covering two battlefields that were fought close to each other.

It all went rather well and during play, a slice of action came into view that might transfer to the figures table for the DBN project. Some research to be done there!

The first three turns are night turns, then there are two fog  turns, so it is around turn 6 that the meaningful stuff starts.

Even though this is more game than simulation, I felt that by the end of play, I had a better understanding of what the battles(s) were about and any more reading that I do on the subject will hang off that framework.

LINK

https://battlefieldswarriors.blogspot.com/2026/10/jena-auerstaedt-1806-boardgame.html

The Jena-Auerstaedt boardgame from the Napoleon at War Quad (just reprinted in a deluxe version by Decision Games) was set up last night.

It is a fairly quick playing game, but with a back/leg flare-up I will play it over the course of the day and perhaps into tomorrow.

In its simplicity and presentation, the game is proving a good quick way for me to visualise how the two battles relate to each other, together with insight into the timetable and tempo of the action.

The game does allow some opening options that give room for the Prussians to change their deployment, though I have gone with the historical set-up.

I will be on the lookout for a local situation to arise that looks interesting enough to lift it from the game and take it as an isolated scenario to create a figures game for the DBN system.

While it is a nice simple game and that underpins its charm, I do wish it had some command and control to keep brigades and divisions together, so that they act in a more cohesive way.

Some notes and photos are being taken along the way, so this may end up as a blog post at some point.

Having decided that line infantry bases would be represented by three ranks of infantry, there was a need to make the light units easily identifiable. Traditionally figures are simple base in a more open order fashion, but the Epic shoulder to shoulder strips prevent this.

These light units are typically those formations that were trained to both fight as line and also  be accomplished in moving into open order, so we are looking at units like French Legere and Prussian Fusiliers.

The planned solution was to create bases with two ranks of formed line and then put some single skirmishers thrown out in front, to visually represent this dual ability.

My first test base rolls off the production line today. These are Prussian fusiliers and to my eye, they do exactly what is needed. The whole base just needs a blast of matt varnish and they can join the assembling army.

This hit UK shelves yesterday, instantly identifiable by the large free plastic Epic sprue on the front of the mag.

This is a freebie from the new Warlord Games Epic Zulu range. I understand there are three different sprues being given away.

Mine is the British with some of their native allies and it seems to give a good representation of the range, with the British done as individuals or strips of 4 figures in open order. The natives look wonderful in strips of 4 - 6 figures, done in a very irregular line. 

I think these are probably a step forwards for Epic, both in overall detail and dynamic poses.

The free sprue is not provided to non-UK subscribers (that may be a postage cost thing).

The magazine has two Zulu articles (one being a ‘what if’ Zulu scenario), designer notes on Comitatus rules (Dark Age), a replay of the Battle of Lugdnum (AD 197) using To The Strongest rules, designer notes on The Silver Bayonet rules and then other bits and bobs.

This is an oldie but goodie, number 20 in a series that is currently somewhere up in the mid 300’s.

Typical of Osprey, it is an easy read, with good maps and illustrations, together with a detailed order of battle and various isolated actions nicely touched upon over just 2 -3 pages at a time, giving focus to individual actions for scenario building .

Surprisingly the title does. not hint at the fact that it also covers the Auerstaedt battle that took place nearby on the same day.

It might be my imagination, but I think the earlier titles had more colour plates given over to uniform detail, which is helpful here. Anyway all part of firming the project up.

24th June 1941, the opening days of Operation Barbarossa, near Raseina. A lone KV1 held up a German combat group for a day at strategic crossroads.

20th August 1941, near Leningrad, a single hull down KV1, held up 8th Panzer Division, destroying 22 German tanks and receiving 156 hits!

I have recently re-bought back into the boardgame series Panzer, designed by James Day and published by GMT. 

As I re-engage with the rules, I went for a knock-about with a lone KV …… there is a bit more about this over on the Battlefields & Warriors Blog.

LINK

https://battlefieldswarriors.blogspot.com/2026/09/the-formidable-kv1.html

The core base module of Panzer by GMT is out on the table. It is quite a meaty game, so I am just pushing a few tank counters about to build up some rule memory.

I have visited this game before, so there is some familiarity, but as always, it is the spotting rule that has been causing me the most work to get to the bottom of and by visiting the BoardGameGeek Forum, it does indeed appear to be a common area of difficulty. The principles are pretty straight forward, but the rules, now in their third edition, would benefit from revisit and perhaps a play aid could be added, strewn with examples.

Anyway, I have put out a bit of a mismatch, simply to stretch what I need from the rules. 4 x Pz IIIM are up against a pair of KV-1S (42)s. The Pz III cannot frontally penetrate the KVs, so I will be looking at manoeuvre, while adhering to command ranges and the number of orders that can be given.

As I have been here before, rather than just using the beginner rules, the 'advanced' gun/armour system is getting dragged in, together with command rules, which deals with command radius and orders.

My first couple of turns were a bit awkward with a lot of rule referencing, but quite quickly, the processes are returning. It will just be a case of repeat, repeat, repeat, while the basics get nailed!

I must say, it is lovely to be getting back to this.

Moving to my first DBN French Line infantry base, I went for the usual 3 ranks of the 55mm strips that I will be using for this project, but the command strip (the front rank) has the flag bearer and drummer on the far right as you look at the picture.

For a single base unit, this put the flag far too much off centre, so I cut the strip into two 5-man halves and swapped their positions, bringing the flag and drum to the centre of the base - you can see the cut line on the strip's own puddle base (clicking on the picture will enlarge it).

The problem with this is that the two halves sit further apart due to the those two figures in the centre having full arms present, rather than the compressed arms that these strips typically use to get that close order look,  making the newly combined figure bases a tad too wide for the base - the solution is to shave down the arms of the two mini strips where they meet and keep them flat. 

This gives a tighter fit and visually looks better. A bead of plastic cement glue down the pared-back arms will ensure that the whole line sets straight, unified as one piece.

Anyway, it works, so I will do six more to give the core infantry needed in a 12 point DBN force.

Much of what I mentioned about the Prussian limber applies here. This is the Warlord Games French foot artillery limber for their Epic series.

The blister pack comes with 6 horses, but I have only use 4 of them and that is enough to fill an 80mm x 30mm base.

In DBN, these can be used to represent the baggage that each force keeps in their rear area and in other games they can be used  for their normal function as gun limbers.

Working with this model took me back many years to my teenage time of collecting Airfix napoleonics. I had painted the British and the French armies. My mother had told next door about the strange interest I had in toy soldiers (instead of girls!) and they said they had a nephew with similar interest.

Anyway arrangements were made for a visit to our dining room table. I put out the armies and my wonderful Airfix Farmhouse. 'Peter' (if I recall rightly) turned up with a few metal 28's (probably 25's) amongst which was the most fantastic horse and limber base in the world. I can still get a visual memory of that wonderful piece ...... my mind was awakened to what lay beyond the shelves of Woolworths and my wargaming would never be the same again - thank you!

While I am at it, I just wanted to mention a quick thank you to those who have contacted me to say that they have enjoyed the DBN content and video links, enough, that they have bought their own copies of the game. I very much look forward to your thoughts and plans getting revealed.