In previous installments, I have described the “main characters” in Banish the Snakes: the historic people that players represent in their attempts to convert Ireland. But now I’m moving on to the “supporting cast” of historic characters, people who were notable in the history of the time and show up in the game on Event cards. The first article in this “supporting cast” series can be found here.
The solo rules (”SR”) pit the human player against three Bots. Each Bot has a distinct personality induced by its preferred area of influence: military influence (red), political influence on the Senate (blue) or influence on the populace through bribery or other means (yellow). The SR recommend, but do not require, that the military Bot be the red player, the political Bot the blue player, and the populace Bot the yellow player, thus matching each Bot’s color with the color of its preferred area of influence. The human player becomes by default the green player. Note that human players can appoint one or several Bots to replace their missing human counterparts. For the sake of simplicity, the remainder of this note will discuss games with one human player facing three Bots. I will also assume that the optional emperor rules are in effect and that the fixed set up providing for all cards to be played has been adopted.
Introduction by Congress of Vienna (CoV)’s Editor, Fred Schachter – To familiarize the InsideGMT audience of what designer Frank Esparrago accomplished with his fun and exciting Congress of Vienna game, now a GMT P-500 offering which has “Made the Cut” (thank you patrons, thank you so very much!) please reference previous InsideGMT articles covering a wide range of CoV topics. These contain background which will help you better appreciate this article. Use the following link to access this material: https://www.gmtgames.com/p-850-congress-of-vienna.aspx .
The CoV play test team, now mostly using VASSAL due to being geographically disparate, have enjoyed many exciting Congress of Vienna games. The team has held interesting debates considering how to best play each of Congress of Vienna’s fourMajor Powers: France, Russia/Prussia, Britain, and Austria. This article reflects their most recent musings regarding AUSTRIA as described by game designer Frank Esparrago. This seems a fitting follow-up to the prior article concerning France’s options.
The game rules this article alludes to will unfortunately need to remain implicit: a restriction an article format such as this compels which readers shall hopefully understand. That said, take it away Frank!
Note: If you would like to view any of the below images in a larger size, you can click on the image and it will point you to the full image file.
Compiled below you will find the thirteenth through fifteenth installments of an ongoing design diaries series from Border Reivers designer Ed Beach. (The previous installments can be found here.) He regularly publishes new design diaries and other updates on the “Reivers and Reformers” Facebook group, so if you would like to read those as they are released you can do so here. Enjoy! -Rachel
