Tag Archives: Imperial Struggle

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Book & Game Pairings from Clio’s Board Games: The Rise of the Great Powers and Imperial Struggle

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Back to the book & game pairings to educate & entertain about a certain historical topic! Today, we’re looking at the power struggles of the 18th century with Britain and France occupying center stage, often called the Second Hundred Years’ War. Our book & game for this topic are The Rise of the Great Powers 1648—1815 (Derek McKay/H.M. Scott) and Imperial Struggle (Ananda Gupta/Jason Matthews, GMT Games).

Check out my previous Book & Game posts here:

Eastern Front: Russia’s War and No Retreat! The Russian Front

Reformation Era: Four Princes and Here I Stand

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Twilight Struggle vs Imperial Struggle – Comparison

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Twilight Struggle (TS) and Imperial Struggle (IS) are two great creations of the Ananda Gupta & Jason Matthews duet. We waited a long 15 years between the publication of the first (2005) and latter one (2020). Both titles prove to be deep, immersing, and very replayable designs thus no wonder that they have pretty broad pool of fans.

What is more, those games share a lot in common but on the other hand, have also vivid differences. In this article I am going to discuss them!

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Robert Walpole, Earl of Orford, Through the Lens of Imperial Struggle

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Below you will find another fantastic article from Clio’s Board Games, this time discussing Robert Walpole through the lens of GMT’s Imperial Struggle. You can also find this article on Clio’s blog. Enjoy! -Rachel

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Imperial Struggle Strategy Analysis: Initial Game Setup

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While I deem it too early to provide a definitive review or a solid strategy guide for Imperial Struggle, some aspects can definitely be analyzed. One of them is of course the initial set-up of the game, which is specific to each nation and provides different opportunities. What follows is analysis of the major game dimensions with a brief summary of each. A more detailed article – what to do with those opportunities – will follow once I play more games of this fantastic title.

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Imperial Struggle: Further Examples of Play

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A few weeks ago we released the Extended Example of Play so players could get a feel for Imperial Struggle’s gameplay. One sharp-eyed reader also spotted a glitch, which will be fixed in the shipping version.

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Imperial Struggle: Extended Example of Play

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The Extended Example of Play for Imperial Struggle is up! You can read it here. The example consists of the first Peace Turn and the War of the Spanish Succession; when it ends, the players would move on to the final turn of the Succession Era.

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Playtesting Imperial Struggle

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It is 2019 and Imperial Struggle is so close to players I can almost taste it. Thanks to Joel Toppen’s heroic work on the VASSAL test kit, the game has received much more intensive playtesting than it ever has – probably more in the last four months than in the rest of the development cycle combined.

Playtesting is such a challenge. Often, a designer will rely on two types of playtesting. The first is repeat play from a trusted group, sometimes a face-to-face hobby group that is generous with its time and tolerant enough to try a game that is definitely not finished. That type of testing is wonderful, but the same people testing a game against one another over and over will inevitably lead to favored lines of play getting much more play than others.

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Imperial Struggle Development Update: Ministry Deck, Event Cards, and New Art!

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It is October 2018 and the Imperial Struggle continues! Thanks to the heroic efforts of Joel Toppen, we are on the verge of electronic playtesting via VASSAL, and I’ve been tweaking cards and cleaning up rules all summer. The game is playing very well on paper; now it’s time to find the problems that only a larger volume of games can reveal.

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A Struggle Anew: Imperial Struggle and Its Older Cousin

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Imperial Struggle: The Global Rivalry Between Britain and France, 1697-1789 enjoyed an active social life in the last three months of 2017. With appearances at GMT Weekend in the Warehouse in October, and then at the San Diego Historical Games Convention in November, more and more players have been able to sit down with the game and give their feedback. And one theme recurs: “This game isn’t as much like Twilight Struggle as I had expected!”

It’s true. Twilight Struggle is more older cousin than sibling to Imperial Struggle. They share a dream, scope, and player fantasy; but mechanically they diverge quite a bit. How could they not? Imperial Struggle covers twice Twilight’s length of time, and encompasses four major wars between the two protagonists. More fundamentally, the Cold War mentality – and thus the player’s emotional experience – is not the same as the 18th century dream of glory.