A meeting with Mr Peter Pig

In early November, Martin Goddard of Peter Pig fame was kind enough to come to our local Devon wargames club to demonstrate Conquerors and Kings. What better way to write a ‘Let’s Play' for Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy than to have the game's author show us how it works?

Conquerors and Kings is the new ancients wargame from Peter Pig. The original version was released in 1998, so the game boasts that it has been 24 years in the playtesting for the new edition.  The game itself covers from Biblical times to late Medieval. The army lists can be downloaded here.

While aimed at Peter Pig's 15mm range, Conquerors and Kings is designed to be played at any scale. The game uses a subtle rectangular grid system; units are free to move forward or retreat, but have to test if they want to move to the flank. As you'd expect, the roll to flank depends on the experience and type of troop and the terrain they are in. 

Adam G was kind enough to volunteer to play Martin. I had an opportunity to try the game out before the club met. Adam has done several ‘Let’s Plays' now and is quite experienced in doing them. Their game was Parthians versus Ancient German tribes and reflected the strengths and weaknesses of the armies well, I thought.  Each of the armies had its own strengths and weaknesses but were well balanced against each other.

Despite the speed and power of the Parthians, the Germans ruggedly defended their hill and prevented the Parthians from sweeping them away. On the one flank, the Germans were running out of troops and were slowly being pushed back, however, their numbers were beginning to outflank the Parthians!  Despite destroying the Germans on one flank, they had successfully outflanked the Parthians elsewhere and still held the central ground. When the points were added up (for units destroyed and territory controlled), the Ancient Germans had moved from a draw to a solid victory.

Overall, we had fun with Conquerors and Kings. The rules have some clever features, such as the terrain deployment, and countdown sequence to end the game.  I feel this is a wargame without any ‘uber’ armies. I'm a fan of Peter Pig's 15mm ranges, so the opportunity to build another 15mm scale ancients army won't go amiss with me. You can read our full report on the game in our ‘Let’s Play', which is due to appear in Wargames, Soldiers and Strategy 128.

Our sincere thanks to Martin of Peter Pig for his time.