Category Archives: Examples of Play

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“Cat-Herder-in-Chief”: Playing the Mr. President 2017 Hard Scenario (Part 3)

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When last we left our intrepid President, he had spent most of his previous actions to set up what he believes and hopes will be “max odds on both upcoming wars.” And he may well have accomplished that – we’ll see. But the thing about Mr. President is that there always seems to be a new threat axis coming at you – and it can happen quickly. We’re starting the 2nd quarter of Rick’s presidency this time, with the 2nd Activation Phase of the turn, and the first half of the Activation Phase is weighted heavily toward the game opponents’ actions and Rick’s reactions. So we’ll see if or how much Rick’s threat analysis has to change and adapt by the end of the Activation Phase. – GB

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A Mediterranean Diversion: Napoleon in Egypt – Full Turn Example of Play (Part 3)

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Note: Art shown is from the game prototype and not final.

In our previous Inside GMT article, the French took Control of Cairo and started Besieging two more Mamluk Spaces. Meanwhile, the Allied Player recruited a sizable force in Thebes for a potential counterattack. Ibrahim Bey is still 8 Spaces away from Bonaparte though so the French have time to brace for impact. They will thus seize this opportunity to Assault Meniet with a low-AP card. CDG fans all know that sooner or later, we need to pick a moment to play these weak cards!

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Fleeing Down the Nile: Napoleon in Egypt – Full Turn Example of Play (Part 2)

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Note: Art shown is from the game prototype and not final.

In our previous Inside GMT article, the just-landed French force led by Napoleon rushed across the desert to surprise the Mamluk army. The French general eventually won the Battle of the Pyramids and sent Murad Bey reeling south of Cairo. Now, the Allied Player gets a chance to respond with their own card play.

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SPQR: A Guide to Playing the Game — Part 1

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The idea for this article came about after dusting off the C3I SPQR Player’s Guide published so many years ago and reading it from cover to cover. That handy guide is useful, even though outdated in a few places, in helping SPQR players understand and play the game better. The Players Guide, however, is a series of articles on a range of topics including some new scenarios but does not look at the play of the game in a wholistic manner. This guide is intended to present the game through an explanation of its rules and using one of the games more popular scenarios as a case study.

The method of presentation is one I would use in explaining the game to a new player. The discussion follows the Sequence of Play but pulls rules from anywhere in the rule book to support the explanation. I go into greater detail in some areas, less in others, and occasionally send the reader directly to the rulebook.

This article is structured into major topic sections, most of which are further divided into subsections, primarily to break up the text. I have attempted to keep cross references to internal sections to a minimum but have made copious references to the SPQR rules and play aids to support the discussion. All rule references are to the SPQR 4th Edition rules as amended by the errata dated October 2022 unless noted otherwise. After explaining the rules, I have added a section to address the often heard “what do I do” question once the game is setup. The final section has an extensive example of play covering the opening action on one wing of the Heraclea battlefield. 

Let’s begin.

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Battle of the Pyramids: Napoleon in Egypt – Full Turn Example of Play (Part 1)

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July 1st, 1798. 35,000 French soldiers landed in Alexandria. Where to next? In this series of articles, we will highlight mechanics of the Napoleon in Egypt game by simulating the first Turn of the Campaign Scenario.

The French Player is the first to go every Turn. This is especially important on that very first Turn, as they have a chance to strike hard using their overwhelming initial forces. The most classical opening is to recreate the “Battle of the Pyramids”. Cairo being four Spaces away from Alexandria, the French Player needs to play a card worth at least 4 AP to do that but they have a better idea.

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Resolving Combat in Bear Trap’s Solitaire System

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When I began developing Bear Trap, it was already a tight and competitive two-player game, much like its spiritual ancestor Sekigahara. However, the designer P.R. Daniels had ambitions to go beyond this and include a solitaire mode that would allow a single player to enjoy the game by themself. Bear Trap is a block game with a lot of hidden information, which makes designing a solitaire mode quite challenging, but Paul has come up with some clever systems to facilitate this. In this article, I want to look closely at just one aspect of Bear Trap’s solitaire mode: how combat is resolved, which highlights several of the core design principles that underlie it. For an introduction to the combat system in Bear Trap, you can read Paul’s earlier InsideGMT article here.

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Dalhousie’s Influence on the Indian Railways

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How did railroads begin in India?

Any account of the history of railroading in India must of course begin with James Andrew Broun-Ramsay, the 1st Marquess of Dalhousie Castle, referred to hereafter merely as “Lord Dalhousie.”[1] He served 8 years as the Governor-General of India from 1848 to 1856 at the very end of the first century of British colonial occupation of the subcontinent (Battle of Plassey, 1757).

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An Extended Example of Play: Or, How Insurgency and Soviet Atrocities are Represented in Bear Trap

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In this InsideGMT article, we’ll play through a few turns of Bear Trap.

The following playthrough is designed to demonstrate a few different aspects of the game, and to give you a basic sense of what it’s like to play—it’s not meant to be a demonstration of good play by the players.

In what follows, I won’t explain the game rules in detail. Instead, I’ll focus on describing what the players are doing. Insurgent play will be in green text, while Soviet play will be in red text, but I’ll also offer some commentary in italics. In all images here, all blocks are face up only for illustrative purposes; in an actual game, you would only be able to see the sticked side of your own blocks (until enemy blocks are committed in combat).

If you’re unfamiliar with the mechanics of how the game works, check out this prior InsideGMT article which provides an overview of gameplay, or take a look at the draft rulebook and player-aid (both on GMT’s product page for the game). Finally, note that the graphic design and artwork used here are for playtest purposes only and isn’t indicative of what the final artwork and layout will be like for the game when published. (What we have works fine for playtest purposes, but the GMT art department will eventually do a great job of creating something beautiful with a natural look that supports the gameplay.)

For this example of play, we’ll tune in about halfway through the game. The players have so far undergone 3 reshuffles and the Soviet player is getting close to their next reshuffle. A game of Bear Trap lasts up to 7 reshuffles, but can end earlier if a player satisfies their victory condition.