January 3, 1777. The Battle of Princeton. The Continental Army is breaking.
Two brigades of British regulars have caught Washington's rearguard in an open field, and the Americans are beginning to run. Their commander rides directly between the two converging lines of musketry, close enough to hear the balls pass, and forces his horse to a halt. He turns to face his men. He shouts. He waits. And then, remarkably, the line steadies.
Washington's decision to place himself within twenty metres of two British infantry lines was not exceptional courage. It was standard practice. In the American War of Independence, a general's physical presence on the regimental line was not a dramatic gesture - it was the primary instrument of command. The radio, the telephone, the written order delivered by galloper: none of these things existed. What existed was a man on a horse, visible above the powder smoke, audible above the volleys, whose authority was the only force that could stop a panicked regiment from dissolving into the countryside.
No other period in military history rewards tabletop wargaming quite as richly as the AWI for this reason. The mounted General in Andy Callan's rule system for WoFun Games is not a game abstraction. He is a precise historical portrait of how command worked between 1775 and 1783, and why battles were decided by the man holding his horse steady under fire rather than by the officer studying maps at headquarters. This article traces five moments in the Generals' War - and shows how each one maps directly onto the decisions you will face across the tabletop.
The Problem of Command in the Smoke
Before the first shot is fired at Princeton, Bunker Hill, or Cowpens, it is worth understanding why the AWI placed its generals so close to danger in the first place.
The problem was smoke. A single volley from an 18th-century musket regiment generated a wall of grey-white powder smoke roughly one hundred metres wide and two metres deep. A second volley, fired before the first had cleared, reduced visibility to almost nothing for the men behind the line. In European set-piece battles fought across open farmland this was manageable: the ground was flat, the flanks were identifiable, and the enemy was unlikely to appear from an unexpected direction. In North America, with its woods, broken terrain, fences, and streams, smoke could turn a disciplined advance into a directionless crowd within minutes.
Linear tactics - the kind both sides used throughout the war - demanded that infantry move and fire in tight formation, with each company dressing on its neighbours. A regiment that lost its alignment in the smoke lost its cohesion, its fire effectiveness, and, rapidly, its nerve. The mechanism for restoring that alignment under fire was a mounted officer. He stood higher than the smoke line. He could see the regiment's position relative to the enemy, to the flanks, to the ground. He could ride to the breaking point, make his authority visible, and bring the line back into order.
This is why the American Revolution PD collection and the American Revolution WoF collection both place such care on the command figures that accompany each regiment. The flag-bearers, the mounted officers, and above all the army commander are not decorative additions - they are the functional mechanism through which 18th-century battles were controlled. Understanding that makes every decision the mounted General takes on your tabletop feel earned.
Washington's Method - The General Who Would Not Be Defeated
Washington lost more battles than he won. At Long Island in August 1776 he was outmanoeuvred so badly that only fog and a skilful night withdrawal saved his army from destruction. At Brandywine in September 1777 he was flanked on the right and driven from the field. At Germantown in October the same year a complex four-column attack dissolved in the morning mist before it could be coordinated.
He won almost none of the battles that should have finished him. He won the war.
The argument historians have been making since the 1950s is that Washington understood something his British counterparts consistently underestimated: keeping an army in being is itself a form of victory. As long as Washington's force existed and could take the field, Britain faced an unwinnable problem. There was no position to occupy, no capital whose fall would end resistance, no political target whose capture would produce an armistice. The war could only be decided by destroying the Continental Army - and Washington never let that happen.
In Andy Callan's rules, this operational insight translates directly into the General's mobility. He moves up to 8 base widths per turn, can join any regiment in the line, and - critically - can be ordered toward any crisis point on the battlefield before any infantry move. A general who is never in the wrong place can always choose his moment. Washington's genius was choosing, again and again, not to be destroyed on the British timetable. At Trenton, on Christmas night 1776, he chose his own. With 2,400 men in boats crossing an ice-choked river, he struck the Hessian garrison before it could assemble, took nearly a thousand prisoners, and gave the Continental Army something it had not possessed since the summer: a reason to believe it could fight.
The AWI Starter Pack 18mm places you in command of exactly this American army: 2 Regular Infantry regiments with commanders, 2 Militia Infantry regiments with commanders, 2 Skirmisher (Riflemen) regiments, 1 Artillery regiment, and the Mounted General whose decisions determine whether your line holds or breaks. All 427 figurines press from 5 Plexiglass sprues and slot into 62 MDF bases measuring 30x20mm - ready for the table without a drop of paint or glue.
The Militia Problem - Raw Troops and the Panic Test
Daniel Morgan had commanded troops in every kind of action the AWI produced by January 1781. He had been with Washington at Trenton, fought Burgoyne's regulars at Saratoga, suffered the disasters of Camden. He understood militia better than any American general alive - which is to say he understood exactly what raw troops could not do.
At Cowpens, South Carolina, on January 17, 1781, Morgan gave his militia precise and limited orders: march to the front line, fire two volleys at close range, then fall back around the left flank to rejoin the reserve. Not retreat. Not flee. Fall back in order. Two volleys. That was the job.
It worked because Morgan had designed his entire battle plan around the known behaviour of 3rd Class troops under fire. In the advanced rules Andy Callan describes in the AWI rule system - free to download via the American War of Independence rules page - Raw or Militia units take a Panic Test whenever they lose a company to shooting, face a bayonet attack, or see friends running past within 4 base widths. Each company already lost reduces the test roll by 1. The test is failed on a final score of 1 or less. Morgan knew that the test would come - it always did - so he gave his militia a task they could complete before the fear arrived.
Tarleton's British dragoons, chasing what they assumed was a route, rode directly into the Continental regulars Morgan had placed behind the ridge. By the time Tarleton understood what had happened, he had lost 110 killed, 200 wounded, and 500 captured. He escaped with barely 140 cavalry. It remains one of the most complete tactical victories in American military history, executed almost entirely through an understanding of how frightened men behave.
The Militia Infantry regiments in the Starter Pack, illustrated by Peter Dennis across both the American Revolution PD and American Revolution WoF collections, represent exactly this kind of soldier - capable of decisive action in the right circumstances, fragile in the wrong ones. The 3rd Class panic mechanic is not a disadvantage to be worked around. It is a design challenge to be solved, as Morgan solved it, by thinking carefully about what you are asking your raw troops to do.
Danger at the Front - When Generals Fell
Personal command carried a price. The closer a general stood to his regiment, the more likely he was to share its casualties.
Edward Braddock was shot through the lung at the Monongahela in 1755, struck down while personally rallying his panicking regulars in a road ambush that foreshadowed almost everything that would follow in North America. Hugh Mercer, one of Washington's most trusted brigadiers, was bayoneted six times at Princeton in January 1777 when he refused to surrender after his horse was shot from under him. He died of his wounds nine days later. At Cowpens, Banastre Tarleton led the final cavalry charge himself - the last throw of a battle already lost - and had his horse killed under him before escaping on a borrowed mount.
Andy Callan's rules encode this with clinical precision: whenever a unit led by a General loses a company to shooting or fighting, roll a die. On a 1, the General is wounded and out of the battle. He cannot re-roll anything for the remainder of the game. The army, it is noted, simply ignores his loss and carries on fighting - because in the smoke of battle, they do not know what has happened to him. There is something genuinely sobering about that detail. It is historically accurate. Mercer's men fought on at Princeton without knowing he was dying in the snow fifty metres behind them.
The General can also re-roll a failed Panic Test for any unit he has joined - but if that re-roll also fails, he runs with the unit and quits the battle entirely. It is the most dramatic single moment the rules produce: the general who stayed too long, whose presence was the only thing holding the line, leaving the field at a gallop while his regiment dissolves behind him. It happened. At Brandywine and at Camden, American generals caught in retreating formations were swept away with the men they were trying to rally.
The American Militia White Flag unit and the British And Hessian Light Infantry regiment - 36 figurines at 28mm or 72 at 18mm on a single Plexiglass sprue, with 6 or 12 MDF bases respectively - represent the troops your General will be placed beside, and potentially lost beside. The AWI Starter Pack 28mm scales both armies to the 40x30mm base standard for a 120x200cm mat, giving Peter Dennis's illustrations their most detailed treatment and making the mounted General an unmistakably commanding figure on the table.
How to Play - The AWI Rule System Explained
Andy Callan's AWI rules are written specifically for the American Revolution PD collection and are available as a free PDF download from the American War of Independence rules page. The same rules come included digitally with every Starter Pack order. They come in two versions - Basic and Advanced - which share the same core but differ in tactical depth.
Setup. Two players each command an army built from Infantry companies, Artillery, and a Mounted General. A company is a single base - 2 ranks of 4 figurines for Infantry, 1 gun and crew for Artillery. All measurements are in Base Widths, which makes both 18mm and 28mm scales play identically: one Base Width is 3cm for 18mm (bases 30mm wide) and 4cm for 28mm (bases 40mm wide).
The General moves first. Before any infantry order is issued, move your General. He can travel up to 8 Base Widths and join any regiment by positioning him behind its rear rank. Joining a unit allows him to move with it and use his re-roll abilities. Choosing which regiment needs his presence - and recognising that placing him in the wrong place leaves a crisis unresolvable - is the central decision of every turn.
Turn sequence. Move, then Shoot, then Fight. Infantry move up to 4 Base Widths in the open. Skirmishers move in any terrain without disorder. Artillery cannot enter woods or cross difficult obstacles. Shooting rolls dice by company type: hits on 4, 5, or 6. Artillery fires further and generates more dice. A hit removes a company from the regiment and places it in the Dead Pool.
Panic Tests. This is where the game is decided. After losing a company to shooting or melee, and when friends rout through your unit, a Panic Test is required. British Regulars and Continental Infantry roll two dice and use the highest. Militia and Skirmishers roll one die but must re-roll any 6 (once), giving them a ceiling on their best result. Subtract 1 from the roll for each company the unit has already lost, and another 1 if friendly troops are routing through it. A final score of 1 or less: the unit panics and runs. This is the moment the General re-roll is most valuable - and the moment his loss is most catastrophic.
Advanced Rules: Troop Grades. 1st Class Veterans - Grenadiers and battle-hardened Continentals - re-roll any 1s they roll, for any purpose. They can make bayonet attacks by shooting and moving in the same turn, hitting on 4-6 in the first melee round. They ignore Panic from lower-grade troops running through them. 3rd Class Raw troops - Militia and poorly-disciplined units - take additional Panic Tests whenever they lose a company to shooting, face a bayonet, or see cavalry charging. 2nd Class Trained regulars follow standard rules in all circumstances.
Victory. Calculate total Army Strength at the game's start. When one side has lost half, they are defeated. The threshold can be reduced to 40% or less for faster resolution in a large engagement.
Building Your AWI Army - Starter Packs, Full Packs, and the Collections
The AWI is the one period in WoFun's historical range where the choice of entry point shapes not just your first game but your entire campaign arc - because the General you place on the table on turn one is the pivot around which every subsequent decision revolves.
The Starter Packs are the natural starting point for new and returning players alike. The AWI Starter Pack 18mm delivers 427 figurines on 5 Plexiglass sprues across two complete and balanced armies. The American force brings 2 Regular Infantry regiments with commanders, 2 Militia Infantry regiments with commanders, 2 Skirmisher (Riflemen) regiments, 1 Artillery regiment, and a Mounted General - a total army strength of 32 companies plus General. The British field 4 Regular Infantry regiments, 1 Skirmisher regiment, 2 Artillery regiments, and their own Mounted General - a force of 30 companies plus General. The 62 MDF bases are 30x20mm, cut from 2.5mm MDF and printed with a grass texture; they press-fit from the sprue in seconds. The AWI Starter Pack 28mm scales the same armies to 40x30mm bases for a 120x200cm mat, with Peter Dennis's illustrations rendered at their finest detail across 10 Plexiglass sprues.
The Full Packs give you the entire American Revolution PD collection in a single bundle - every regiment Peter Dennis illustrated for this period, from the American Militia, Riflemen, and Continental Infantry through to the Early British Grenadiers, Hessian Infantry (Von Trumbach Regiment), British Highland Infantry, Loyalist American Infantry, Hessian Light Infantry, Casualty markers, and Commanders. The AWI Full Pack 18mm contains 1,507 figurines across 18 Plexiglass sprues with 229 MDF bases at 30x20mm. The AWI Full Pack 28mm mirrors this across 35 sprues with 229 bases at 40x30mm. Both Full Packs cover every regiment, every troop type, and every troop grade the advanced rules describe - Veterans, Trained, and Raw - giving you the complete palette for recreating any engagement from Lexington to Yorktown.
For players who want to build out specific regiments or expand one side at a time, the American Revolution WoF collection provides additional Continental and British units as standalone add-on sprues, compatible with both scales and fully consistent with Peter Dennis's PD line.
And then there is Yorktown itself. The battle that ended the war was not primarily an American victory: it was a French one. Rochambeau's veterans held the left wing of the siege lines. De Grasse's fleet blocked the Chesapeake and prevented British relief by sea. Lauzun's cavalry sealed the land approaches to Gloucester. Without France, Cornwallis could have retreated by water, rebuilt, and continued the war. The AWI French Troops Extension 18mm brings these forces to your table - allies who changed the shape of the war, and whose arrival on your tabletop opens the full strategic picture of the Generals' War.