From August 10 through August 16, Age of Longbow Volume I is Wargame Design Studio’s Game of the Week and is on sale for the first time since its release. If you have been waiting to take the field in the Hundred Years’ War, this is a perfect opportunity to command the armies that fought from the bloody fields of Crécy and Agincourt to the final struggle for English France.
Age of Longbow Volume I puts you at the head of the English, French, Burgundian, Breton, and other forces that fought across western Europe. Lead a great army in battle, seize a vital crossing before the enemy can reach it, or hold a hard-pressed garrison until relief arrives. It is a richly varied medieval war, in which archers, men-at-arms, terrain, and command decisions all matter.
The Long Struggle for France
The Hundred Years’ War was a sequence of campaigns, truces, and political crises extending from 1337 to 1453. Its roots lay in the peculiar relationship between the two crowns. The English king possessed Gascony in southwestern France, but held it as a vassal of the French king. When Charles IV of France died in 1328 without a son, Edward III of England asserted a claim through his mother, Isabella, Charles’s sister. The French magnates instead chose Philip VI of Valois. In 1337 Philip confiscated Gascony, giving Edward both a grievance over his duchy and a larger claim to press.
« Et ces archers d’Angleterre, quand ils virent cette ordonnance, passèrent un pas en avant, et puis firent voler ces sagettes de grand’ façon, qui entrèrent et descendirent si ouniement sur ces Gennevois que ce sembloit neige. »
‘And those English archers, when they saw this order, took a step forward, and then sent their arrows flying in great numbers, which rained down so thickly upon the Genevans that it looked like snow.’
— Jean Froissart on the English archers at Crécy, 1346
The first phase showed how an English army could use mobility, sea power, and disciplined infantry to challenge a wealthier kingdom. Edward’s forces raided northern France, the chevauchée destroying property and provoking the enemy to battle. In 1340 the English fleet won at Sluys, securing the Channel. Six years later Edward landed in Normandy, marched north, crossed the Somme at Blanchetaque, and took position near Crécy. The French attacked on 26 August in disorder, their Genoese crossbowmen and mounted nobles struggling against English and Welsh archers protected by men-at-arms on favorable ground. The victory opened the way to the long siege and capture of Calais.
War spread well beyond the main frontier. In Brittany, a dispute over the duchy’s succession became a local civil war linked to the wider conflict: England supported John de Montfort, while France backed Charles of Blois. Fighting there combined sieges, ambushes, and small-field actions with the large battles of the royal war. Scotland was also a French ally; an English victory at Neville’s Cross in 1346 removed David II from the war. These parallel contests consumed resources and prevented either crown from concentrating solely on France.
The Black Death interrupted operations, but the fighting resumed with even greater effect. In 1355 Edward III’s son, Edward of Woodstock—the Black Prince—led a destructive raid from Bordeaux. The next year, while returning from another chevauchée, he was intercepted near Poitiers by King John II of France. The English chose a defensive position among hedges and vineyards. French attacks failed to break it; an English counterstroke struck the French flank, and John was captured. The capture of a king produced an acute political and financial crisis in France, yet it did not yield the decisive conquest the English had hoped for. Taking cities and governing territories required more than winning a battle.
The Treaty of Brétigny in 1360 appeared to settle the question. Edward received an enlarged Aquitaine free of feudal obligation to France, while renouncing his claim to the French crown; John was released for an enormous ransom. But the settlement pleased neither side for long. The Breton succession war ended with Montfort’s victory at Auray in 1364, preserving English influence there. England also intervened in the Castilian civil war. The Black Prince defeated Henry of Trastámara at Nájera in 1367 and restored Pedro I, but Henry soon recovered the throne with French support.
Charles V reopened the war in 1369 and changed its character. His constable, Bertrand du Guesclin, avoided offering the English another Crécy or Poitiers. Instead, French forces targeted isolated garrisons, recruited discontented local lords, and forced the invaders to disperse. At Pontvallain in 1370, du Guesclin caught an English force under Robert Knolles at a disadvantage and shattered it. The French naval victory at La Rochelle in 1372 further weakened English communications with Aquitaine. By Charles V’s death in 1380, much of the land won at Brétigny had been recovered.
The war then slowed amid domestic crises. England faced rebellion and the troubled reign of Richard II; France suffered factional conflict and the recurrent illness of Charles VI. The English crown changed hands in 1399 when Henry Bolingbroke became Henry IV. His son Henry V renewed the continental war in 1415. At Agincourt, his exhausted army again used ground, stakes, archers, and compact men-at-arms to defeat a much larger French force. The subsequent conquest of Normandy and the Treaty of Troyes in 1420 made Henry heir to Charles VI.
“This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remember’d;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother…”
— William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act IV, Scene III
That settlement collapsed after Henry V and Charles VI both died in 1422. French resistance gathered around the Dauphin, later Charles VII. Joan of Arc’s relief of Orléans in 1429 and the French victory at Patay restored momentum. Charles VII built more reliable taxation, artillery, and permanent military companies. In 1450 French forces recovered Normandy at Formigny; in 1453 they defeated the last major English field army at Castillon, where John Talbot was killed attacking a fortified French artillery position. Only Calais remained English. For players, the game’s campaigns reveal why this war cannot be reduced to the longbow alone: success depends on choosing ground, preserving armies, securing strongpoints, and knowing when a raid, siege, or withdrawal serves the larger war.
If you would like to explore the weapon that became synonymous with these campaigns in more detail, we also have a dedicated historical article on the Rise and Decline of the Longbow.
What’s in the Game
Age of Longbow Volume I includes 94 scenarios covering all sizes and situations, including a solo tutorial scenario plus specialized versions for both head-to-head play and play against the computer AI. An additional 49 scenarios are available in the Campaign aspect.
A range of maps is included covering all the significant locations fought over during the war and some of the lesser-known locations.
The order of battle files cover the various forces that participated in the campaigns, with other formations added for hypothetical situations.
Campaign and Scenario Editors allow players to customize the game.
A sub-map feature allows the main maps to be subdivided into smaller segments for custom scenario creation.
Design notes cover the production of the game, campaign notes, and a bibliography including the sources used by the design team to produce this historical simulation.
Age of Longbow Volume I provides multiple play options, including play against the computer AI, Play by E-mail (PBEM), LAN and Internet live play, as well as two-player hot seat.
Book and Video Recommendations
Allmand, Christopher. The Hundred Years War: England and France at War c.1300–c.1450. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Curry, Anne. The Hundred Years War, 1337–1453. Essential Histories 27. Oxford: Osprey Publishing, 2002.
Green, David. The Hundred Years War: A People’s History. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2014.
Sumption, Jonathan. Trial by Battle: The Hundred Years War I. London: Faber and Faber, 1990.
Sumption, Jonathan. Trial by Fire: The Hundred Years War II. London: Faber and Faber, 1999.
Sumption, Jonathan. Divided Houses: The Hundred Years War III. London: Faber and Faber, 2009.
Sumption, Jonathan. Cursed Kings: The Hundred Years War IV. London: Faber and Faber, 2015.