I recently played "Paths of Glory" by GMT, a board game for two players that portrays the WWI conflict at a Strategic Level. The Players take turns alternating the activation of units, playing event cards, reinforcement cards or replacement cards. There are six activation steps in each turn and the turns cover a quarter year except for turns 1 and 2, which are monthly. During each activation, the player can play cards as previously described, there is always more a player wishes to do than cards or activities limits allows. There lies the crux of the game, is it more important to activate and move that unit, bring in reinforcements, raise your sides war level or any other of a myriad of choices. As certain cards are played, the War status level of that player and the combined War Status level will increase. This increase in the status of the War bring about new cards into a players hand as their faction enters Limited War and then Total War. These additional cards provide differing abilities to the protagonists, for example the Allies can enter Italy or the US into the War, the CP Player can set up Bulgaria. Obviously the greater an opponent's war status the greater choices become available, only knowledge of the cards through a few playing’s will avoid discomforting surprises. Units are at Army level except for a number of Corp counters, these units cannot deal out the firepower of the Armies nor withstand the punishment an Army could. They generally replace a damaged Ar my and serve as last chance "speed bumps" in the way of larger forces. It rewards a player to retain corps within his reserve, should an Army be eliminated and a Corp not be available then the Army is permanently eliminated. The map ranges from France to Kiev, Baltic coast to Italy and a corner of the map has the Near East represented. The map has squares representing various areas of Europe and the Near East, each square can accommodate 3 counters. Connected areas are indicated by lines, some of which are only traversable by restricted nationalities. Terrain is represented in spaces by easily discernible symbol, mountains, swamp and forest being examples that modify combat in various ways. Movement allowances for the various units are reflected on the counters. One point that seems strange is the fact a unit can move as easily in swamp as open terrain, clearly it appears illogical that a unit can move as far in the diverse types of terrain represented. Victory is determined by accumulation of Victory Points, these garnered by capture of cer tain areas of interest to the combatants and the play of certain cards. This clearly reflects the almost abandonment of casualties as a concern to nations at the time, loss of units is irrelevant to determination of victory. Overall, a good effort by GMT at a difficult subject -- well worth playing and attempting to master. Back to Table of Contents -- Kriegspieler #9 To Kriegspieler List of Issues To MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2000 by Kriegspieler Publications. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com