AWI with Ahistorian

This week wargaming chum Matt invited me over to his place for an AWI game.
Matt's just moved so this was a chance to show off his gaming room.
He's also playtesting some rules of his own devising Tree of Liberty and I suspect I was drafted in as the "lowest common denominator" tester - if I can understand it they must be really nice and simple.
Now although I have read a book about the AWI and last year I helped Steve Jones at Salute with his mighty 28mm display game it's not really a period I can claim much, or indeed any, real knowledge of.
However the rules are nice and simple to understand - they're also very short at just two pages. Short and simple - a bit like me - this was going to be fine.

Matt set everything up and I made the dread confession that I'd never actually played a 15mm game before. It's a scale I've never quite got my head around - my one attempt at painting some 15mm ECW ended in failure as I tried to lavish the same level of detail on as I applied to 28mm models.
Matt, being a generous soul forgave me my sins and we were able to get on with the game.

I declared my preference for the righteous redocats meaning Matt would be forced to field the perfidious American forces.

The British deployed in column along the road, with the Colonial terrorists revolutionaries arrayed along the fences

Before the game Matt had advised me to avoid using single units to charge off ahead of any support. Especially elite units as it was easy to get carried away.

Here we see the Fusiliers which I used quite brilliantly to illustrate his point.

After initial success they were thrown back into the river and fled the scene. Oh.

The Colonial rebels largely hung out on the fence line on the left, whilst their militia riflemen spread out along the ridge.

A firefight broke out across the stream - meanwhile my second line deployed ready to storm the wheat field.

Having learned the lesson of the Fusiliers I wisely sent some support up behind them.

This time British success on the wooded ridge was more enduring.

The Scots in particular made bloody work of the riflemen.

After an initial reverse the British infantry hurled themselves into the cornfield and began to drive off rebellious Marylanders

In the meantime cavalry had arrived in support of the British column.

The Scots, their danders clearly up, ploughed through three units of militia before falling on some colonial regulars and driving them off with tails between their legs as well!

And with that the craven Colonials melted away into the American wilderness.

I very much enjoyed this. The basics of the rules were very simple and gave what felt like a historical result and awarded historical play (at least as far as my limuited knowledge understands things).
The mechanics of combat rely on dice multiples, which I never quite got my head around in this game, but they were easy to look up each time - probably something that would come after only a few plays.

All in all a very pleasant evening with good company and a great looking table and models.
Matt is hoping the rules will be up for sale in the not too distant future.