Blue & Gray: Four American Civil War Battles is a board wargame originally published by Simulations Publications, Inc. (SPI) in 1975 that simulates four battles from the American Civil War.
Description
Blue & Gray: Four American Civil War Battles presents a single set of rules, which can be used for four different battles: Shiloh, Antietam, Cemetery Hill (an engagement during the Battle of Gettysburg), and Chickamauga. Because there are four separate games in one box, Blue & Gray became known as a "quadrigame".
In addition to the common set of rules, each battle has a few exclusive rules. Compared to "monster" wargames of the time that had more than 1000 counters and lasted for several days, each of these battles uses 100 or fewer counters and can be completed in a few hours.
Games
Shiloh: The Battle for Tennessee, 6–7 April, 1862, designed by Kip Allen, Irad B. Hardy, and Redmond A. Simonsen Antietam: The Bloodiest Day, 17 September 1862, designed by Tom Walczyk Chickamauga: The Last Victory, 20 September 1863, designed by Irad B. Hardy, Redmond A. Simonsen, and John Young Cemetery Hill: The Battle of Gettysburg, 1-3 July, 1863, designed by Edward Curran and Irad B. Hardy
Components
The original 1976 SPI edition has the following components: 400 single-sided die-cut counters (100 for each game) four maps (one for each battle) rulebook of common rules 4 rules sheets containing exclusive rules for each battle Player reference sheets
The 1983 TSR edition made a few changes to the contents: a single 34" x 22" double sided sheet contains all four maps the counters are double-sided, and the starting location is printed on each counter for ease of set-up rules rewritten for beginning players, and the exclusive rules for each battle are integrated into the rulebook storage bags for the counters
The 1995 edition by Decision Games streamlines the rules into a 16-page rulebook, and includes a 20-page Player Reference.
Gameplay
For their 1971 wargame Napoleon at Waterloo, SPI developed a simple alternating "I Go, You Go" system of turns where one player moves and then fires, followed by the other player. Blue & Gray used this system, which was subsequently also used in most of SPI's quadrigames.
Publication history
In 1975, SPI published their first "quadrigame", Blue & Gray. The new game immediately rose to #1 on SPI's Top Ten Bestseller list the month it was released, and SPI immediately released another quadrigame of Civil War battles titled Blue & Gray II that covered four more Civil War battles. Several more battles were also published in SPI's house magazine Strategy & Tactics.
In 1983, TSR took over SPI and republished a number of SPI properties under the TSR trademark, including Blue & Gray.
In 1995, Decision Games obtained the rights to Blue & Gray and published a new edition that removed the Battle of Antietam and added the First and Second Battles of Bull Run.
In 2008, Kokusai-Tsushin Co. (国際通信社) acquired the rights to Blue & Gray and published a Japanese edition in the November-December 2008 issue of the Japanese magazine Command (#83). Kokusai-Tsushin republished the Japanese version of Blue & Gray in the October 2022 edition of Command.
Reception
In the December 1975 edition of Airfix Magazine, Bruce Quarrie thought that Blue and Gray provided buyers with "four games for practically the price of one. And worth every penny." Quarrie commented that "The battles chosen make for exciting and well balanced play" but did find that three of the scenarios seemed to favor the Union. He concluded "Blue and Gray is recommended both for newcomers to simulation gaming and for the old hands as an entertaining bit of light relief from the complexities of modern boardgaming."
In a 1976 poll of wargamers conducted by SPI to determine the most popular wargame in America, Blue & Gray placed 7th out of 202 wargames, the best result for an SPI land game.
In his 1977 book The Comprehensive Guide to Board Wargaming, Nicholas Palmer called this a "Simple tactical surround-and-destroy system" Looking at the individual games, Palmer thought Antietam was "A close game."; Chickamauga gave the players "lots of options" with "a great deal of manoeuvre and roadblocking"; Cemetery Hill was "a rather bland Gettysburg"; and Shiloh was "fought in very rough terrain, which is rather limiting."