These rules replaced those produced
in January 1971 to cover the period 1750 to 1850. They incorporated an alternate play
system instead of the then fashionable simultaneous movement in accordance with detailed
written orders and were intended to speed up play and reduce arguments. They also
included a new method of choosing terrain based on actual battlefields, and a command
structure incorporating brigades, divisions and corps, and considered the personalities
of individual generals. Further research, including study of contemporary drill books,
led to changes in ground and time scale and a reconsideration of weapon lethality under
combat conditions.The extension of the period back to 1685 includes all Marlborough's battles, Sedgemoor, the Highland rebellions, and the early battles of Frederick the Great, as well as the Seven Years War, War of American Independence, campaigns in India, French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars covered in the previous set. To go earlier than 1685 requires consideration of armoured pikemen and three quarter armoured cuirasiers, while to go later than 1845 sees the introduction of the Colt revolver by Texas Rangers in the Mexican War, of the Dreyse breechloading rifle by Prussia against Denmark and of the expanding bullet muzzle loading rifle, together with the replacement of rigid lines by thick skirmish formations.