A few years ago I wrote to the Dobbin House restaurant manager to inquire as to the whereabouts of the diorama. Here is his response:

Mark,

The remains of the diorama were taken by the previous owner, who now lives
in Ardentsville, PA. Although, I don’t know if they still exist. Thank you
for your interest in the Dobbin House.

Chris

Sadly, Civil War Commander are the most disorganized, poorly put together rules I have seen. They may give a good game but teasing the game out of the rule book as written is very challenging. in the first place it is written like a series of notes the GM might write to himself.

The constant use of acronyms, abbreviations and sentence fragments makes these a real challenge to wade through. Additionally, the lay out on the page is chaotic and hard to scan. The player aid cards are mostly text, not charts, and many modifiers and exceptions are inserted in the rules as text rather than lists or charts. And many of these things are undefined. For example, fire modifiers include the note: “-1,-2,-3 Cover.” I assume this is for, say, light, medium and heavy? But nowhere are these kinds of cover defined.

Finally there are two other major design issues that I cannot get past: ranges. A smooth bore musket fires up to 12”. Easy enough. But there are three ground scales. This means they fire between 400 and 600 yards at brigade level, between 300 and 400 yards at regiment level, and between 200 and 300 yards at battalion level. Leaving aside the issue of what the range of a smooth bore musket really is, this confusing ground scale will have some very strange consequences.

Second, to think that 5 stands representing a brigade will behave exactly the same way as 5 stands representing a battalion seems to me a mistake. Wheeling a brigade of 4 regiments is very different from wheeling a regiment. The same applies to command and control. Your neighbor’s elbow is a critical variable in commanding a regiment. But it has little to do with a brigade.

Check out the pics of another AWI game that Steve Huckaby and I put on here in Erie, PA at the MiseryBayGamers group:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MiseryBayGamers/photos/album/912544655/pic/list

Enjoy!

Tom Beach

FALL IN! ‘09 War College keynote speaker Ed Ruggero will give a multimedia presentation: “The 82nd Airborne Division in Operation Overlord, June 6-9, 1944.” Ed is co-author of the US Army Field Manual “Army Leadership” and author of several books, including “Duty First: West Point and the Making of American Leaders”, “Combat Jump: The Young Men Who Led the Assault Into Fortress Europe, July 1943”, and “The First Men In: US Paratroopers and the Fight to Save D-Days.” Ed has appeared on The History Channel, the Discovery Channel, CNBC, and Fox and has spoken to audiences around the world on leadership, leader development, and ethics.

Thank you for taking the time and trouble to review this book. We deeply appreciate it.

Your readers will likely want to know that we have just received advance copies of The Maps of Chickamauga, by David Powell (text) and David Friedrichs (maps). It is 320 pages, full color, 126 full page maps, orders of battle (Tullahoma and Chickamauga), notes, bib., and index. Wargamers will love the never-before-seen detail and possible scenarios. Here is a weblink: http://www.savasbeatie.com/books/Chickamauga_book.htm

Thanks again.

Theodore P. Savas
Managing Director
Savas Beatie LLC