Johnny Reb III Rule Review

 Johnny Reb III is a game that is suppose to recreate American Civil War Combat on the table top.  It is an independent game published by On Military Matters.

My Reviews are going to be graded like classes in College; A,B,C,D,E.  At the end we will get a GPA which will determine if this game makes distinguished honor roll, honor roll, passes or fails.  A good game should at least pass with a C average. 

The categories I will be grading are 1) Presentation/Product/Package, 2) Game Rules/Mechanics, 3) Historical/fantasy Cannon Accuracy, 4) Cost/time, 5) Good Time and Memories

1). Presentation/Product/Package.  Johnny Reb is a 1996 rule book that you can only buy in PDF format now.  There are no Miniatures, QRS or blogs to help.  It is truly outdated as a product.

D

2). Game Rules/Mechanics.  The highlight of the game is the order chit system.  You issue orders at the same time blindly which creates a cool cat and mouse game.  Truly a highlight of the game.  Also Casualties are tracked by number of models in a unit.  An older system but works well.  My only complaint is the overly complicated charge mechanic.

B+

3). Historical Accuracy. Johnny Reb does create the skirmish level of combat well and the blind orders do create a fog of war that help recreate the period.  However, constantly looking at charts takes away from the experience.

B-

4). Cost/time. This is not bad for Johnny Reb.  If you want to recreate Little Round Top, you won't have to buy a lot of miniatures and it will take 2 hours or so to resolve and planning at the GM level does not take long.

B

5) Good Times/Memories  It is just another war-game.  Not Great Not Terrible.  Maybe not the most memorable.

C

GPA is 2.40. There are better ACW Wargames out there with more modern rules and better support