Truly Machiavelian Renaissance Games

Secret Victory:
Sha Na-Na

By Otto Schmidt

You could not care less about the war, the Elves, who rules them, which provinces the Atholli’s have or even which you have. Your generals and your Harem forced you into this war, they have made you leave the security and safety of you palace and library, and they disturb your inner peace and your contemplation of the fruitless, pointless nature of human existence. They all go on so and exaggerate so, but you know there’s nothing to be gained by any of this and that in the end it will all end badly.

No one sees what you see, they all are fixated on these trivial and tawdry aims in this life, and Ben Elux, your general, an expatriate Atholli who wishes to be king in his former homeland, is the worst of all. He is a religious fanatic who wishes the new faith in Atholli extirpated. He believes in an eternal life. What pointless rubbish! There’s no hope, no chance - everything is futile, everything dies and decays, what’s the point. You can’t fight City Hall! You can’t get blood from a stone! What’s the use of complaining, no one listens? O woe is you. We’ll lose anyway, our troops are not good enough. And those Zwiss, they cost so much, What good are they, what good is any of this. Why did you even bother to get out of bed this morning? What are you going to do when your goose is cooked?

1. You get four Victory points if Benelux is killed.

2. You have four wagons with 100,000 florins each. You get one victory point for each wagon of 100,000 florins you have in your possession at the end of the game.

3. If the Atholli Army wins the day you GET three victory points. This is no misprint! If they win you can have Benelux killed and most of your advisers and harem - a good excuse to get rid of the nagging, officious, troublesome, busy-body lot of them.

4. If you can get Ben-Elux so exasperated with your negative attitude that he attacks one of your units you can have your army attack him and exterminate him and you get FIVE victory points.

5. For each of your units that moves you LOSE one victory point. BE CAREFULL! You must not give the appearance of being a coward! Your guards are loyal but they will murder you if they think you are a coward. They respect you as being a wise philosopher, man of learning, and mystic. However if they ever have a crisis of confidence the umpire will instruct you to roll one die and if the result is a 5 or 6, they will murder you and march of the field. In this case, paradoxically, you will die happy, pointing out the futility of human existence for all time, and the worthlessness of human striving. You will get six victory points for a moral philosophical victory, and the end of your own personal suffering.

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