Search Results for: people power

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Congress of Vienna Designer’s Notes (Part 1 of 2)

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Introduction (By CoV Editor Fred Schachter): I had the pleasure of first viewing a gorgeous, virtually professional quality, playtest version of Frank’s Congress of Vienna game some years ago. It was most impressive. At the time I was working and living in the Phoenix, Arizona area and enticed a local gaming buddy (and now good friend) Dick Sauer into sharing my enthusiasm for Frank’s creation and to become CoV’s Game Developer.

Improved versions of the game followed and during 2019 the game was presented at GMT’s Spring “Weekend at the Warehouse” and at the CSW Expo in Tempe, Az. where we had a blast playing games, under Frank’s supervision of course, with myself, Mark Herman, Luke Billingsley, Mark Simonitch, and other wonderful gamers who enjoyed Congress of Vienna’s easily learned mechanics and fun, exciting, action.

Gene Billingsley introduced Frank, a native of Spain who traveled a long way to join the CSW Expo festivities, during the event’s “Meet GMT’s Designers/Developers” session. The rest, as they say, is history and the December 2019 GMT Update announced Congress of Vienna as a new P-500 addition. 

This article introduces Frank to InsideGMT’s readership and provides information and background regarding Frank and his game. If you wish to meet Frank, Dick, and their local team of play testers, as well as a GMT delegation, there’ll be opportunity to do so during January 2020’s Bellota Con III gaming gathering in Badajoz, Spain. With that… take it away Frank!

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The Terrible Year Part 2: The Paris Commune

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In the article below, first-time designer Fred Serval writes about the specific context and events of the Paris Commune. You can find part one of this series here. For more information on this game, see the December 2019 GMT Customer Update.

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Introduction to FAB: Crusader Part 3 – Unit Overview

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In this article we look closer to the various unit types and their special capabilities.

Armor

In FAB: Crusader, there are two types of armor-class units and assets: armor and recon. Armor units/assets are tanks and each pip, or step, represents roughly 30-40 tanks. Armored recon and armored car units/assets are battalions with lightly armed vehicles and/or cars that trusts on speed and dispersion as protection. When the rules call for armor-class units, it includes both tanks and recon units. When the rules call for armor or recon, it only applies to that type of unit. The difference between the two types in combat are as follows:

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Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East: Meet the Indus Valley Civilizations (or “Dravidians, Harappans, and Mauryans, oh my!”)

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Below is a replacement, prompted by GMT fan feedback, for the fourth in a series of articles from Mark McLaughlin showcasing the 16 civilizations in Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East.  Please note there’s an associated map change: PACTYA, in the map’s SE corner, is now MOHENJO-DARO. You can find the first three articles in the series here.

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Combat Sequence in Seas of Thunder

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The concept for a combat flow chart is as old as the hills in war gaming. While I don’t think Neal, Chuck or myself broke any new ground on the concept, I think our implementation of the system is quite a pleasant and engrossing experience. One glance at our system should make it clear that we were heavily inspired by the War at Sea and Victory in the Pacific system and I’d like to acknowledge that lineage at this moment. If we hadn’t had those masterpieces to build upon, we might have had a much tougher time creating a stable foundation for our game. You should see as we get into the game however, there are fundamental things that I disagreed with in those original systems and felt the need to either adjust or just plain toss away in Seas of Thunder.

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The Wall Must Go!: History of the Berlin Wall Explored Through the Lens of 1989

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Below you will find another fantastic article from Clio’s Board Games, this time discussing the history of the Berlin Wall through the lens of GMT’s 1989: Dawn of Freedom. You can also find this article on Clio’s blog. If you are interested in Clio’s Board Games’ other articles in the 20th century German history series, you can find those listed below. Enjoy! -Rachel

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Historic Characters in Banish the Snakes: Brigid

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The first set of six characters from Banish the Snakes that we described were contemporaries of Patrick — or even his predecessors. We now begin the first of six characters that rose to prominence in the following century or so, and played prominent roles in completing the conversion of Ireland to Christianity. In a historic game, they begin shuffled into the deck of event cards. Of course, you are not restricted to the historic order: you can choose to start with some of these people instead, and shuffle others into the deck.

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Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East Design Background and Differences from Ancient Civilizations of the Inner Sea Part 1: General Background

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Introduction by Fred Schachter: I’m having a Game Developer’s blast working with Designers Chris Vorder Bruegge and Mark McLaughlin on Ancient Civilizations of the Inner Sea (ACIS)’s successor, Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East (ACME… yeah, we’re aware of the Coyote/Road Runner cartoon alliteration, seems worth a guffaw or two, eh?).

The purpose of this article is two-fold. First, to provide background regarding the historical environment players will experience playing ACME (and why the game contains certain design elements) as well as explain, at least on an overview basis, the differences between ACIS and ACME.

To best appreciate this article, some knowledge of ACIS is helpful. GMT has a wealth of information regarding ACIS on the game page.

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Introduction to FAB: Crusader Part 1 – Why We Fight

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Why did we decide to do a game of Operation Crusader? Despite the fact that we love making games, we’re not entirely sure ourselves. There are many reasons why we think that the battles of North Africa make great gaming stuff and why the campaign was so fascinating, but at the forefront must be the place itself and the mystery and spectacle that surrounds it. At first we thought that the desert, is in a sense, a (nearly) literal sandbox where we can study tank to tank combat and fighting in near laboratory conditions. But as we read on and on, piling combat histories, academic studies, and oral narratives upon each other, we discovered that desert combat was anything but clinical.

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Historic Characters in Banish the Snakes: Palladius

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Any series of articles about the people involved with the introduction of Christianity to Ireland must, of course, start with Palladius. Wait, what? Not Patrick? No, the first bishop of the Christians of Ireland was Palladius, the scion of a prominent family in Gaul. His father held the office of praefectus praetorio Galliarum (“Praetorian prefect of the Gallic provinces”) but he pursued a life in the church, and was ordained as a priest around AD 415.