Introduction by Fred Schachter – Congress of Vienna (CoV), Assistant Designer & Editor: What a wonderful and pleasurable journey it’s been in this “labor of love” regarding Designer Frank Esparrago’s Congress of Vienna game. Previous InsideGMT articles were devoted to various aspects of the game (see: GMT Games – Congress of Vienna); but with this piece Frank focuses on the game’s production status as of January 2024 in elaboration of what was shared by the 1/18/24 GMT January Monthly Update: January 18, 2024 Update from GMT: New P500s, Art Samples, Production Update, a Free Download, and More!! (mailchi.mp). So, take it away Frank!

A GAMER’S QUESTION PROVOKES A CONGRESS OF VIENNA STATUS REPORT:

I have written this InsideGMT Blog article because many of the GMT community expressed interest and enthusiasm regarding the Congress of Viennagame.  To this was often added concern about just when this game will be printed.  Myself, as well as other CoV Team members, repeatedly encountered this question during conventions, game club meetings, private messages, and comments on social networks.  This is understandable after more than seven years of, at times, slow development since the game’s gestation as a concept for applying GMT’s Churchill game mechanics to the Napoleonic Wars.

Along the preceding-described lines, I received a gentle request for an update on Congress of Vienna (CoV)‘s production situation from Daniel Slimak via BGG, and, as I shared his curiosity, I had posed the same question a bit earlier to Kai Jensen, who oversees CoV’s “Final Production and Editing”. Kai is the wonderful and talented person who transforms our play test material (gameboard, rules, scenarios, player aids, detailed example of game, solitaire rules and a host of components…) into easily understandable and enjoyable form.  She does this not only for veteran gamers, but for players of less experience, by imposing clarity, eliminating duplicative content, and solving inconsistencies and rule bugs.  She does this with the superb contributions of game graphics artist extraordinaire: Terry Leeds.

I contacted Kai last month and can now highlight and share with you the following extract from the email response I received from her.  This candid and transparent reply perfectly summarizes Congress of Vienna game’s current production status.  Kai replied thus: 

The Art Department is finishing up the booklets and player aids now. “

“Once those final pieces are completed, we have to do two rounds of proofing. One is specifically to double-check all the case number references on all the various materials to be sure the cards, map, etc. match the correct numbers in the booklets. Then we do one final proofing just checking for typos and obvious errors with someone who has not been part of the project to this point. This last run-through is pretty quick but still manages to catch some things that to rest of us have been working too closely with the materials to even see anymore. It’s funny how that works, but it’s a thing.”

“Given the holiday season and the upcoming Chinese New Year holiday that shuts our printer down for about a month, I anticipate we will be ready to send this off to the printer by the end of February. The end is in sight!”

MY GMT GAME PRODUCTION PLANNING EXPERIENCE:

Well, that’s the latest 2024 production situation regarding Congress of Vienna.  It hopefully satisfies patrons who are awaiting game delivery and especially for its future players. Now, I’d like to share with you what the game developer -Dick Sauer-, the main designer of the Solitaire Game with its Bots -David Schoellhamer-, and Assistant Designer & Editor -Fred Schachter- and I have been doing since our last InsideGMT article. 

Once the development of the game was complete thanks to the contributions of more than eighty play testers and hundreds of games played, we began receiving the invaluable help of GMT’s Kai Jensen, with whom Fred had the pleasure of working with before, e.g. regarding Hitler’s Reich (Second Edition Rulebook) and Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East.

She saw the Congress of Vienna project from an outsider’s perspective: she did not know the game, nor is she an expert on Napoleonic Wars history, but she’d review all the copious game material we prepared: Gameboard, Rulebook, Playbook, cards, counters, Game Aids, Bots: This approach helps GMT’s graphic designers have more homogeneous material, without discrepancies and potentially “devastating” content inconsistencies. 

I believe in the final development of a game; it is especially important that someone outside the game development process participates in the project.  This is because they’re free of prejudices.  It is aseptic to the development of a game and Congress of Vienna is no exception. I insist on this because I believe the people most involved with the project, myself and the CoV Team, became reliant on various “oral rules” and traditions… things we instinctively did when playing once we achieved understanding of the game system.  This kind of mental “muscle memory” helps with play testing, but is a danger in effectively teaching the game to those who’ll exclusively rely on its printed form.

These “oral rules” were not really written into the Rulebook.   Some are alluded to in various places, or are simply mistakes, that after reading and reviewing many times can remain hidden from our eyes (the pride of the wise!). Kai’s job is to approach all game material as an unblemished beginner and make them easy to read and understand. Furthermore, she manages to make the rules’ reading more enjoyable, orderly, and easier to comprehend than it was before she intervened and put her editorial talents to it. All this is done with a lot of common sense, positive attitude, good humor, constructive spirit, experience, and deep industry knowledge. Thanks Kai!

The 2023 summer was hectic.  It involved sending, proofreading, and polishing all game materials via multiple exchanges of communications. While Kai focused on the Congress of Vienna Playbook, Rulebook, and Player Aid Charts & Tables, she also reviewed the game’s other components. These communications also appropriately involved the game’s graphic designer -Terry Leeds- to make the process of CoV becoming ready-to-print faster and more efficient. Kai has done an amazing job, in absence of final and awaited revisions, which include finding typos and making certain the rules numbering is correct.   I find this process simply perfect and functional. 

PROFESSIONAL GRAPHICS FOR MY FIRST GAME DESIGN!

In this article, I include examples of the impressive work done by Terry Leeds, our graphic designer. I will start with an image of the latest game box back draft.  In it you can see portrayed in magnificent fashion most of the game’s components (wooden pieces, counters, cards, and gameboard). In addition, scenarios, game contents, playing time, complexity and solitaire suitability ratings are described.

Next, we below show some CoV tables from the Quick Start Player Guide.  This Guide makes it easier and faster for a new, yet experienced gamer, to become more quickly immersed in CoV’s game system and only rely on the main, lavishly illustrated, Rulebook when needed. Most rules are no longer necessary to constantly check as players apply them through memory.  Only referencing tables, key components, and information on the gameboard should be necessary for experienced Congress of Vienna players to enjoy this game’s exciting action. 

But the key to this excellent GMT job in preparing a game for publication is the Rulebook. For me, it should be orderly, complete, without gaps, precise, reassuring and solving any potential rule doubts as well as being entertaining, visually attractive, and with a good index that accesses the main design concepts. I think Kai and Terry’s work has gone in this direction.  Congress of Vienna players will judge this work for themselves! 

For this reason, I present a comparison of rulebook pages in their latest draft form, both quite different from one another. The first page, Illustration #5, shows readers some components of the game. The second, Illustration #6, is located towards the end of the Rulebook. It provides a detailed example of battle.  It should be noted that while CoV is a diplomatic and negotiation game, it takes place at the end of the Napoleonic Wars.  Consequently, the game includes many military operations and battles at a high strategic level… yet with something of an operational feel due its wide variety of military cards as well as an optional rule for adding a Tactical Battle Matrix to the game (see: A Congress of Vienna Option: Adding Tactical Flavor to Battles (A Tactical Battle Matrix) Part 1 of 2 | Inside GMT blog ).

A DIFFICULT EDITORIAL DECISION REGARDING THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA PLAYBOOK

However, as the production planning process proceeded, it was realized that some sections of the Playbook originally planned for inclusion had to be removed because that initial, albeit tentative Congress of Vienna Playbook was over 120 pages and almost a book in of itself about the end of the Napoleonic Wars.

Consequently, Kai helped us decide that the “Historical Introduction”, “Strategies for Each Major Power” (separate InsideGMT articles, e.g. here’s the link to the France piece: Strategies for France in Congress of Vienna (Game Opening Considerations) | Inside GMT blog, “Designer Notes” and a “Card Manifest” (for all 70 CoV Game and Leader Cards) Playbook sections would likely remain only in GMT’s website for the game.  This major editorial decision, which has yet to be finalized, will result in the published game having space for CoV’s Solitaire Rules and Bots.   

CLOSING THOUGHTS AND FUTURE PLANS:

After reviewing the Map Board, Game Components, Rulebook, Quick Start Player Guide and Player Aid Charts, we were done in preparing Congress of Vienna for GMT production planning. Our work on CoV could pause until we received the final graphic design for review and rules’ numbering, as well as identify and correct possible typos and minor bugs!

However, although the game for “live players” was developed and hummed like a well-oiled machine, Fred wanted to keep testing the Bots for solitaire play (or for games with less than four players – e.g. one or more of CoV’s Major Powers would be controlled by its Bot).  This would make sure they are truly robust. Fred, as well as David Schoellhamer, our Solitaire Game and Bot Specialist impresario, are methodical, persevering, and inaccessible to discouragement.

That is why we continue to play a lot more test games.  I believe that the Bots are now more robust. Fred & David will, in the near future, publish an InsideGMT article where they’ll explain how the latest CoV solitaire game works for the Coalition: the Major Powers of Russia, Austria, and Britain.  If interested, here’s the link to the InsideGMT article regarding the French Bot (part 1 of 2): Designing the Congress of Vienna Solitaire Game, Part 1of 2: Diplomacy and The French Bot | Inside GMT blog .

During this latest testing, I normally take the human player role and David runs the Allied Bot (three Bots – one for each of the Major Allied Powers!). These games are played via Vassal, because we are in North Carolina (Fred), Oregon (David), and Spain (myself), which presents a real time zone scheduling challenge! Usually, when I play France, the Bot wins, but it should be clarified that, although I am the designer of the game, I usually lose on many occasions because I think I do not play well enough to achieve victory… although I’ve come close to doing so (this happens to me, regrettably, against humans or against Bots!).

During the autumn of 2023, the fertile and creative mind of David Schoellhamer devised new aspect to CoV’s solitaire game system, where France was not pitted against the Allies (one human, the other a Bot, and vice versa) but we tested a human Allied player (e.g. Russia), against the other three powers (in this case France, Austria, Britain, and Austria were run by Bots). Incredibly, it worked extraordinarily well, and the game was very entertaining and exciting. This modified system opens huge possibilities for CoV’s solitaire game.

However, as it seems too late to include this latest iteration with material now in the GMT Production Team’s possession (Why further delay release of the game?), we may not be able to include all these Solitaire Game and Bot aspects in the to be published edition of Congress of Vienna. But we will upload everything needed for players to enjoy this version of the game to GMT’s CoV game website, so it is fully available as soon as David finishes it.  Furthermore, the published game WILL include a playable, enjoyable, and challenging solitaire version with its Bots.

We let rest our long-time persevering and esteemed play testers, Jon Carter (California, with his Transatlantic Team buddies), Chris Leary (Kentucky) and Mirek Makajev (Czech Republic, formerly Bohemia) and others too numerous to mention. Many have intense family lives (understanding spouses/significant others, school-age children, professional careers. and multiple extracurricular to gaming activities). We want to have them rested for future endeavors! However, during the past summer, Chris reviewed all CoV documentation before sending it to Kai, as he has a great ability to synthesize with a deep and practical knowledge of the game after so many sessions playing it. Both Chris and Mirek contributed to numerous rules and modified others to make CoV game play agile and seamless.

AN UPCOMING CONGRESS OF VIENNA VARIANT – THE WATERLOO CAMPAIGN OF 1815!

Finally (drum roll, please!), I am working on other game projects (but that is another story for another time). However, I’ve always had a thorn in my side with CoV due to comments on websites, during conventions, and even in private messages, which refer to the fact that this game is not specifically about the historical Congress of Vienna but concerns the period immediately before it. I always argue back that our game is a mixture of negotiation, diplomacy, and war, and that this particular period of 19^th Century warfare ended with a final Peace generated by a Congress in Vienna.

I always believed it an excellent and appropriate title for our game! To hopefully satisfy these different points of view, I am developing a game variant that allows approaching the real Congress of Vienna as well as the exciting, dramatic historical high point, precipitated by the Return of Napoleon (after his first abdication).  It is the 100-Days period, and the final Waterloo campaign of 1815. It is a CoV variant at a level of grand strategy and politics which takes advantage of the flexibility of the regular game’s mechanics and components … But this, as I noted before, is another story! Here are some “teasers”:

Hopefully, you find the preceding a tantalizing additional incentive to support Congress of Vienna.  To those who already P-500 ordered the game, your patience with its long gestation period, its production process, is much appreciated.  Thank you for that from the entire CoV Team!

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