Category Archives: Designer Blogs

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Cross Bronx Expressway: Building Historical Narrative Arcs

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As soon as an event deck was introduced to the design of Cross Bronx Expressway, it was clear that it needed to be split into periods. Covering 60 years of history, for the game to have an event from the 1940s played in the 1990s only works if you abstract away all of the historical meaning of the event itself. A deck of generic events from such a broad timespan would leave players without the context to understand the decisions the game has them make. An event deck like this would make the Bronx just a background setting without any real significance. My aim was to give players the agency to play through the history, and to accomplish this the event deck is split into six periods, each featuring a set of events from the corresponding decade to serve as historical guideposts. 

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Getting to Know I, Napoleon: Part 1: The Components

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First, let me thank everyone who caused I, Napoleon to advance up the p500 faster than any of my previous designs. Second, let me thank Richard J. Kane Sr. and Michael Ruttle for Clash of Arms’ game Legion of Honor, which inspired this design. Legion of Honor covers the career of an ordinary French soldier through the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, which raised the question in my mind, What if that soldier was instead Napoleon Bonaparte? Though I, Napoleon turned out to be a very different animal, it would not have occurred to me without LoH.

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Cavallata per Cortona – INFERNO Scenario Replay, Part 3

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Volko’s test replay of Levy & Campaign Volume III proceeds into the scenario’s first Campaign, with the formation of each side’s Plan, while he incorporates and explains some ongoing development of the game. All art shown is merely for playtest, not final. …

In the first two parts of our Inferno replay we set up this introductory scenario (set in the Spring of 1259) and then Levied some added forces. Now it’s time to Plan each side’s Campaign—the movement of troops and stuff by marching and gathering supply and their pursuit of objectives by ravaging, besieging, and perhaps even fighting each other.

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“There stands Mr. Beneš, and here I stand!” – Victory Conditions in The Bell of Treason

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Hitler gave two speeches targeting Czechoslovakia during the Munich crisis. The first speech at the Nazi party rally in Nuremberg was mainly a message to Sudeten Germans that they are “not helpless and abandoned”. Two weeks later, during the second speech at Berlin Sportpalast, Hitler targeted Czechoslovak president Dr. Edvard Beneš, revealing his world view of a fight between two men embodying their nations. Beneš was so tired from his hard work trying to manage the crisis that he slept through the whole speech. When he was later told about Hitler’s personal attack, he just smiled and replied: “That’s an honor.” The Bell of Treason is a game about the Czechoslovak decision to either concede the demanded Sudetenland territory to Germany, or to stand and fight against German aggression, even without allies and with little hope for victory. From the perspective of the decision itself, achieving victory is simple, with victory points representing the popular legitimacy of the decision to Concede or Defend. However, the strong personalities of Beneš and Hitler complicate that decision for both players. Let’s start with Beneš.

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Gameplay Overview—How to Play Bear Trap

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In this article, I’ll provide a high-level overview of the mechanics found in Bear Trap, and an explanation of the gameplay. This example of combat in a prior InsideGMT article will also help elucidate some of the explanations found here.

Note that, for the sake of brevity, the rules aren’t described here in complete detail—for anyone interested in reading further, the draft player aid and draft rulebook can be found on GMT’s webpage for the game.

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Congress of Vienna’s Tactical Battle Matrix Option Part 2 of 2 – An Example of Battle

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Introduction by Congress of Vienna Designer – Frank Esparrago: This detailed example of play shows how battles in CoV unfold. Due to a different historical period and military perspective; these use a system more complex than Churchill’s. This battle system, whose basics are well-described by a fine and entertaining video by two of our talented play testers ( How to Resolve Battle in Congress of Vienna: An Animated Voice-Over PowerPoint | Inside GMT blog) receives a layer of richness for generating additional influence in how battle is resolved. This is accomplished through introducing Tactical Chits to generate a new modifier for determining a potential battle victor.

This article is based on this piece’s previous installment – A Congress of Vienna Option: Adding Tactical Flavor to Battles (A Tactical Battle Matrix) by Frank Esparrago & David Schoellhamer: A Congress of Vienna Option: Adding Tactical Flavor to Battles (A Tactical Battle Matrix) Part 1 of 2 | Inside GMT blog .This optional Tactical Battle Matrix rule is based on the tactical battle matrixes of the excellent Avalon Hill games 1776 and War and Peace published in the distant years of 1974 and 1980 respectively. However, playing with this optional rule does increase the amount of time needed for battle resolution. What is clear is that the CoV Tactical Battle Matrix does add an additional element of fun, uncertainty, tactical flavor, and “fog of war” to resolving battles. It does this by presenting simple choices regarding the general tactics an army could use.

Additional background regarding Congress of Vienna should help readers best apprecite this optional offering. For that, please reference GMT Games – Congress of Vienna . Now back to our exposition!

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Economics in Baltic Empires

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In this article I will explain how the economic mechanics work in Baltic Empires – both in terms of how income is generated and how this revenue is then spent. Both of these are handled differently than in many other games, as I wanted something that was simple and clean, but still felt fitting for a game on the fiscally underdeveloped states of early modern Europe and the prevailing mercantilist thinking.

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Congress of Vienna November 2021 Development Update: Gameboard Narrative

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During the last six months we continued adjusting Congress of Vienna (CoV)’s components to try to make them as functional as possible. This effort included minor corrections to the rules: for example, when a rule was moved from being an optional rule to becoming a standard one or vice versa.

This always seems a problem when you carry out a game’s extensive playtest program with participants contributing many ideas and feedback regarding rule development as well as victory conditions. What’s gratifying is that through it all, the core design/development team takes a considered approached to weighing the merits of all this much appreciated input; and in the case of this November 2021 update, we’ll focus on the latest Congress of Vienna map and its rule references upon the gameboard.

This means we’ll share game board modifications made since the last published overview concerning the map as play testing proceeds. New Readers about Congress of Vienna, or those needing reminders of what this upcoming GMT P-500 listed game is about, may benefit through obtaining background regarding this game through the material deposited herein: GMT Games – Congress of Vienna and to learn more of the optional rules specifically mentioned within this update kindly reference War or Diplomacy? The Struggle Between the Wargamer vs Eurogamer Soul in the Design and Development of Congress of Vienna | Inside GMT blog

With this article, we present the latest gameboard which incorporates a variety of aids intended to facilitate play of both the Standard Game and its Optional Historical Rules for players with a grognard soul (these were referred to in previous versions as “Wargame Flavor Rules”).

As with the prior posted April ’21 update, we do not have this latest gameboard extensively in-person tested since most playtesting is conducted by Vassal for self-protection measures against COVID-19 . This results in our testing teams having representatives from Europe, the States, as well as a recent addition from the Philippines (what wonderful and talented multi-national group I’m privileged to have!). We incorporated modifications from Vassal play testers who found help them helpful to avoid needing to take time to reference, or perhaps overlook, certain key rules during play of an exciting and fun game of Congress of Vienna.