September | 2017 | Draken Games

Ok, our latest resource is now available. Dig-In For Victory! is mainly intended for wargame designers wanting some information about warfare in the late 19th/early 20th centuries. However, there’s a lot of data that is transferable to other periods, as far back as medieval times, plus some useful stuff for RPGs.

The resource contains extracts from the Royal Engineers’ Manual of Field Engineering 1911. Lots of useful stuff about digging defences, creating fortifications, building bridges, defending various types of location and blowing things up. Plus scans of the original illustrations, including some great plans for outposts and strongholds.

As this will of varying usefulness, depending what you want from it, we’re using the ‘Pay What You Want’ option at wargamevault for the first time. Click on the image below to have a look at our storefront page there, where you will have the option to preview this product.

I’m still giving some thought to the free mini-games for the next catalogue, but meanwhile another project has suggested itself to me. I was de-junking my home office when I found an old book I forgot I had even bought: a copy of the 1914 reprint of the Manual of Field Engineering 1911. It seems it belonged to a Regimental Sergeant Major T.A. Mellor of the Royal Engineers. Anyway, reading through it (to put off doing any more tidying and sorting) it struck me what a lot of great information there is in it for anyone planning a game that needs to be informed about the sort of defences or field work that could be completed at short notice.

Obviously the book is written from the perspective of the British Army at the start of the 20th Century, but it would be reasonable to assume other nations had similar capabilities, and the manual remained in use well into the inter-war years. Plus, the basic tools of axes, spades and picks haven’t changed much over the centuries, so you could extrapolate a lot of the information back to the Middle Ages if you wanted.

You could use the information to work out what sort of cover an infantry battalion could create during a war game turn, to create a realistic defence post for a skirmish game or even to work out how long the characters will take unearthing that ancient eldritch artefact in a RPG.

The book’s condition isn’t great, but I’ll scan the best illustrations and summarise the most useful information into one concise resource. More news when it’s nearing completion!