Black Powder - Rebellion - first impressions

Having just read through the Black Powder AWI scenario book "rebellion" I thought I'd summarise my first impression.

 Overall it's 148 pages long, of which 14 are historical background, which I skimmed through, but it provides an overview and context for the scenarios, especially for those new to the period. Then there are over 40 pages on the armies, commanders, tactics, all quite well done, and for those starting out a very good uniform guide.

Then the real meat the scenarios, 19 of them and you get plenty of variety for your money, from major actions down to grand skirmishes, all given with notes on how to adapt the rules to cover the peculiarities of the troops involved in the action. I could argue with the attributes given for some units mostly where the uni's performance on the day fell below their long term achievements, but the author does admit this. There are also some liberties taken with the terrain, such as Charlestown appearing on the immediate flank of Breed's Hill, but I think these are mainly done to create a playable scenario. In the Breed's Hill case I think it forces the Crown player to make the historically accurate direct assault. I could work though scenario by scenario, but I'd rather play some first.

One niggle is the mix of unit sizes as my preference is to try and make units standard size as far as possible as I'd rather have two standard units in a brigade rather than a large and a small just to keep it compatible with the OOB rather than because the fighting characteristics are substantially difference.

There is lots of nice eye candy, and it's tempting me to consider painting more figures like the 2nd New Hampshire in their blue coats and some new Rebel cavalry.

Could I use it with my rules? Has to be yes - just adjust the strength point up/down to reflect large or small unit I'd use 7 and 3 points. Then where more/less dice are given for fire or melee use +1/-1 to the factors. Morale should just be adjusted similarly, but watch that stamina hasn't been adjusted as well. More tricky are the special factors, Wavering could be covered by lowering the morale more. British Infantry with both first fire and steady might have their strength points increased. Mostly the changes have to be considered for each scenario.

Overall opinion - it's the best scenario book produced by Warlord for Black Powder.

 Link to Warlord