This overview provides historical perspectives on the Democratic Coalition playable faction in The Weimar Republic, as well as some insight as to how the faction functions in gameplay terms. For overviews on the NSDAP, KPD, and Radical Conservatives factions, be sure to check out my earlier posts on Inside GMT.

Introduction

Like several aspects of Weimar political life represented in The Weimar Republic, the existence of a unified Democratic Coalition throughout the Republic’s entire lifespan is an abstraction for gameplay’s sake. While the Social Democrats (SPD), the German Democratic Party (DDP) and the Centre Party wrote the democratic constitution together in 1919 and then formed a strong unified front defending democracy during the Republic’s first year, they soon lost much of their initial support. With the three parties often having differing views on things like worker’s rights and capitalism in general, the Coalition suffered internal tensions and were often forced to compromize their republican ideals – for example, striking parliamentary deals with the Conservative Party (DVP) were a frequent necessity.

As the Republic underwent its most severe crisis in the early 1930s, when all democratic institutions were under constant attack and gradually collapsed, the Coalition was effectively disbanded. While  its failures and shortcomings are apparent in hindsight, the Coalition’s spirit of compromise and democratic rule did survive through several crises and crucibles that would easily have toppled weaker regimes – something that must be considered a major achievement in itself.

The Coalition being one faction in The Weimar Republic is partly a tribute to that achievement, but also a game of “what ifs”; what ifthe democratic parties had managed to stick together and steer the country away from extremism and towards the progressive, tolerant welfare state that was promised at the outset? What prices would have to be paid for their success? What means would be justified to achieve that end?

United we stand…

While the Coalition always remains one faction in The Weimar Republic, its internal unity can not be taken for granted. The three parties’ ability to find common ground is represented by the unity track on the Coalition player mat. When the track is at Strong, only three reforms are needed to make the sudden victory reformation counter available, as opposed to the usual four. We’ll discuss reforms in a bit, but suffice to say that the reformation counter being more readily available is always a good thing.

On the other hand, if the unity track is at Fragile, no reforms can be placed at all, which usually means sudden victory is out of the question. Needless to say, this is a highly undesirable state of affairs for the Coalition.

The unity track is influenced by by several event cards, as well as by the Reichstag Seats special card which is held by the runner-up in the latest general election and playable once per election period, with a decrease of Coalition unity as one of its effects. The Coalition player may increase unity as an action, at the cost of one middle class sympathies pawn (for a detailed description on how these pawns function, check out the Radical Conservatives faction spotlight post).

Economy and progress: the achilles heels of German democracy

Much like the other factions, the Coalition must use their influence cubes to dominate Germany’s political landscape. Unlike the other factions however, the Coalition find themselves in a special type of conundrum: they start out in a very strong position that is only bound to get weaker as the game progresses. For them, the challenge is not spreading their influence, but maintaining it. And this is not just a matter of simply holding on; losing key regions and cities could quickly spell disaster if the situation spirals out of control. As those Coalition cubes are getting eaten away by Communists, Conservatives and National Socialists, the Coalition player must decide on a course of action that both guarantees victory in the next election and prohibits the other factions from establishing themselves too firmly in any important space.

The challenge is made even greater by the fact that the economy track is in a slow but constant state of flux between hyperinflation and mass unemployment. As the track moves towards the former during the Crisis era (the first act of the game), placement of Coalition influence becomes impossible – people simply resent the government too much for them to make any sort of impact. And if the track reaches hyperinflation, one Coalition influence is removed each turn – a type of crisis no government wishes to find itself in. During the Decline era, which starts off with the Wall Street crash, the track will move towards the other extreme of mass unemployment, making for a steep increase in KPD and NSDAP influence placement as the working classes flock to these radical movements.

So, what can be done? Well, the Coalition may be torn apart by internal strife, beset by enemies on all sides and forced to handle a crashed economy, but being government they have access to more powerful tools than any other faction. For example, their ability to strike deals with the United States gives them access to a lot of money, represented by the in-game currency of leverage.

This versatile currency can be used directly on map to remove strikes and provide election bonuses, but also to grease the wheels of the economy. Each leverage counter on the economy track blocks the movement of the economy counter, and enough of them even reverse it. This might stabilize the economy enough for the Coalition to stay in power, but it is slow and costly; actions spent on deals and leverage are often direly needed elsewhere as the extremist factions take over key areas and violence erupt all over the country. Also, too heavy a dependence on American dollars can be a liability when the Great Depression arrives – dollar dependence counters that steer the economy track even more towards mass unemployment after 1930 are part of the package when striking deals with the US.

Is it worth it? In the end that is of course up to the Coalition player, but historically the hyperinflation that culminated in 1923 was disastrous for Germany and jeopardized the very existence of the Republic. Avoiding that type of situation could very well be worth a temporary period of political instability.  

Another important usage for leverage is the progress/reaction track. Abstractly simulating the general political sentiments within the country, this track is crucial as it makes both reforms and middle class sympathies available. The former – meant to represent both liberal and social democratic reforms with deep-reaching effects on society – are required on map for the Coalition to place their sudden victory reformation counter, while the latter can be used to improve internal unity, as discussed above. Obtaining middle class sympathies is also a way of negating radical conservative and NSDAP’s chances for victory, as both these factions require the Mittelstand’s supportfor their sudden victory conditions. But increasing the progress level is not risk free, as it allows the reaction level to increase, greatly benefiting both the radical conservatives and the NSDAP. Just like with the economy track, the Coalition player must decide whether implementing progressive reforms is worth the cost in money and stability.

You and whose army?

Speaking of stability, at some point the government will have to use harsh measures to defend democracy. As discussed in earlier faction spotlight posts, politically motivated violence erupted in various forms and contexts and at irregular intervals throughout the Republic’s lifespan. This was not only destructive and often lethal to the people directly involved, but also destabilizing on a higher level, threatening the fabric of society and the very idea of democracy. After all, if the democratic system can not guarantee law and order, or even defend itself, why would ordinary people want to support it?

In The Weimar Republic, everything from beer hall brawls to full-scale street battles are handled by the same system, where the assault action is the central mechanic. The concept is simple: all units have a survival value, which represents both combat prowess and general survivability. When an assault takes place, both sides add up the total SV of their involved units to determine their attack strength and defense strength, respectively, and then roll a D6 each. The rolls are modified by things like strikes, uprisings, leverage and parliamentary control, with the aim of rolling lower than your strength. The highest difference wins, and both sides remove units (and possibly influence) equal to the opponent’s difference. This means that violence can be costly, and not only in this direct way – the assaulting faction, victorious or not, must remove one influence from the space in which the assault took place, reflecting the public’s revulsion towards the violence. On the other hand, the faction with the highest total SV in a space have supremacy there, which is a key mechanic for dominating the game.

Special rules like the united front rule (allowing any faction to use any other faction’s units, if agreed upon) and the sworn enemies rule (forcing Communist Worker Militia and National Socialist Sturmabteilung to confront each other if sharing a space) provide both flexibility and historical flavor to the combat system, but perhaps the most important special case when it comes to combat is the loyalty of the Coalition units. As discussed in the Radical Conservatives faction spotlight, the Freikorps militia is something of a double-edged sword for the Coalition. These irregular units are more powerful than both Worker Militia and SA, but their counters are double sided, which means that they may be flipped, possibly defecting and joining the Radical Conservatives as Rogue Freikorps.Since these potentially treacherous units make up a large part of the Coalition unit pool, the government must be very careful when deploying “their” Freikorps. 

The other type of Coalition units, the Reichswehr of the regular army, are the strongest units in the game despite being severily limited in number (the Treaty of Versailles restricted the size of Germany’s army to 100.000 men). These units can be extremely useful, but are hard to come by and suffer from similar loyalty issues as the Freikorps. Historically the German military leadership were no friends of democracy, a fact that commander in chief Hans von Seeckt made no secret of. Under his leadership, the Reichswehr gradually came to isolate itself from the government and become a “state within the state”, circumventing the Treaty of Versailles by adopting clandestine training and armament programs, often in cooperation with the Soviet Union.

In game terms, the questionable loyalty of both Freikorps and Reichswehr are represented by the loyalty checks that the Coalition player must perform when these units are involved in combat against the Radical Conservatives – the faction to whom most Freikorps irregulars and many military personel belong ideologically. Based on the state of the progress/reaction track, a loyalty check determines whether the unit in question will carry out the Coalition’s orders or not. If the reaction level is higher than the progress level, Reichswehr units refuses to act against the old élites, and Freikorps may even defect and join them (in game terms, the unit is flipped).

The Democratic Challenge

In many ways, the Democratic Coalition is one of the more challenging factions in the Weimar Republic. Managing the economy, combating extremism both ideologically and with military force, implementing reforms, and trying to maintain parliamentary power – all at the same time – may seem like a daunting task. Much like its historical counterpart, the in-game Coalition could very well find itself breaking under the pressure and, in the end, fail to save German democracy.

But since The Weimar Republic is a sandbox of “what ifs”, this is just one of the potential outcomes. What if the Coalition manages to profit from the other factions’ internal rivalry and thus keep any one of them from growing into a real threat? What if the economy is stabilized early on so that the government can focus on maintaining parliamentary control in key regions and then implement their reforms? What if democracy prevails through the the use of extreme measures and massive bloodshed? Is that still democracy, or a new form of tyranny?

The outcome is up to you, the players, and hopefully The Weimar Republic will provide food for thought and further questions rather than fixed answers.

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