Nicholas Barker Either there are few new games around or on the horizon, or I am falling out of touch. I'm not playing much these days apart from old favourites such as Breakout Normandy, Krieg!, Rommel in the Desert and East Front. (Although I am meeting a friend next week to try out his copy of For the People.) At least wargames have a longer shelf life than computer games, so I will be going back and dusting off Anzio and Modern Naval Battles. (CHV: There seems to be a lot about. You always struck me as a man who likes to play on prepared ground so may be averse to trying some current stuff. As your favourite games are certainly of very high quality worthy replacements are going to be difficult to come by). I look forward to two of the forthcoming Columbia releases: a WW2 Pacific strategic using the Victory system and a WW2 quick playing area game. Victory itself seems to have polarised opinion. It is a block counter WW2-based abstract game, one month turns, 60 mile hexes, units are corps (infantry, armour, marine, airborne), air wings (fighter, dive-bomber, heavy bomber) or groups of capital ships (battleship, carrier, submarine). Boards are geomorphic. The game is superficially attractive but is more of a game kit than a finished product. The scenarios are hopeless, although Columbia are publishing more on their Web site, so you will have to invent your own for an interesting game. The system is quite easy to learn and could certainly be used to entice a novice. For example, each point of monthly production buys a single step of any type of unit. Victory also lends itself readily to multiplayer games. It moves along rapidly and there is plenty of action. So why do I have reservations. First, it is one of those games where a raft of expansions is being planned. Buy these and you will have spent getting on for £200. My general experience has been that games cannot cope with too much add-on expansion. For example, Squad Leader was broken by the time of its third or fourth revision. Whether or not you like ASL (I do not) it was at least a recognition that by that stage a complete redesign was needed, although I would have preferred a move back in the other direction to the simplicity of Squad Leader. At the very least, you end up struggling with multiple rulebooks. Secondly, the simplicity leads to weird options. For example, in a basic scenario you start with 10 points of monthly builds. With that you could build 10 infantry divisions (reasonable) or 10 battleships (not reasonable, in fact silly). In a month, a fleet can move 6 hexes by strategic movement, which is 360 miles, which is 12 miles a day. Clearly a fleet is not going to steam full speed ahead for a month, but it would be nice to see the design justification. Thirdly, the game has, very reasonably, a distinct bias to the defence. But the basic scenarios give both players equal forces. If you are an exciting and proactive player you will attack anyway. If you are an old fart like me you will readily grasp that the best way to win is to do nothing and build up your forces and eventually counterattack an exhausted attacker. So if both players are trying to win you have a very dull game. The answer of course is to have proper, balanced scenarios and I think that Columbia have been rather naughty not to do this at publication time. I do think that Victory has potential as a game, although it will irritate anyone who expects historical realism unless they are willing to invent an awful lot of house rules. Interestingly, it has aroused huge enthusiasm in a lot of people, judging by the Columbia Web site. Part of the attraction seems to be the lack of historical grounding and the scope for tinkering. Certainly, Columbia seems to have found a winner. They tell me that Victory has sold better than any of their other block games which, when you think of the back-breaking effort that must have gone into getting the far more complex East Front right, only goes to show that life is unfair. Victory is the equivalent of the airport book with the gold-embossed title. So let's hope that Victory makes Columbia lots of money and that they are able to keep the less readily accessible stuff in print as well. We will have to agree to differ about the Patrick O'Brien naval books, which also seem to polarise opinion. They are certainly not literature, although it is hard to think of a historical novel that is (Vanity Fair maybe?). (CHV: Anything by Dumas, Zola's stuff was contemporary so I'll leave be, Duggan writes well and he can "do" women, and Gore Vidal's Civilization is a good tale with an interesting philosophical element. O'Brien reminds me of G.A. Henty whose work I read a lot as a child, have you read the one about the Wild Geese or the lad serving with the Carthaginians, wizard stuff?). Stung by your dislike of them, I recently re-read the lot to see whether they could stand that, and I thought that they could. I like the prose style, which is literate, and the construction that avoids over-egging the pudding. The dialogue is certainly a bit stilted and wooden at times but it is arguable that that is how many contemporary people spoke, much of the time (Boswell, Smollett were only a little earlier). O'Brien cannot do women, however, but they do not feature much. There is plenty of effing and blinding where appropriate, for example when Lord Keith is speaking. O'Brien gives virtuoso displays of learning, and you either like that sort of thing or find it tiresome. Personally, I thought that the characterisation and psychology was ably handled, far better than you would normally expect to find in an historical novel. At least the characters develop over time. I found the book very funny at times, and sometimes quite touching, and there is a keen interest in food and wine, which appeals vicariously to my own gluttony. (CHV: Perhaps, but the characters seemed damned poor company, the sort of people you meet in the City, worthy and intelligent I have no doubt, desperate to display their knowledge and driven by demons other than mine. My real problem with O'Brien's characters is that I really do not care a monkey's .... what happens to them, in fact if they came a pearler I might not weep the bitter tears of Petra Von Kant.) By contrast, the Flashman books are okay, but surely this is a cardboard cut-out if ever there was one. You could describe Flashman himself in a couple of sentences and (a bit like James Bond) you would know as much about him as you would after reading a dozen of the books. Finally, I like O'Brien's restraint. Rather than piling on the action and having one damn thing after another, the action is rationed and, I think the better for it. I have not read any Georgette Heyer, so I cannot comment on your comparison of her to O'Brien, although I am a little surprised that you are a reader given her rather dainty reputation! I doubt whether anyone can be persuaded to change their mind about an author since likes and dislikes are so subjective but if you were tempted to have another stab, try The Mauritius Command which is complete in itself and has a more conventional level of action. Finally, I will end by admitting that I do not really like historical novels (or science fiction books for that matter) since they are so badly written. O'Brien is no Evelyn Waugh, or even an Anthony Powell, but I prefer him to Forrester, who seems to me to be head and shoulders above the rest of the historical novel gang. (CHV: I'll grant you O'Brien is ahead of Forrester or those Bolitho novels, but I would not read them either. I like Flashman because he amuses me and is rather closer to many folks I meet than the Plucky Chaps of O'Brien. As a coward I enjoy my heroes as cowards, as an exponent of seeing things unsentimentally I find Flashy's views entertaining and he is, like me, an outsider prospering cuckoo-like in the body politic. That recent novels are becoming formulaic is sad but to be expected. I noted O'Brien got a high-brow sniffing at on the TV recently - I shudder to think of their reaction to Bold Sir Harry!) Steve Thomson I am glad you have made some progress in overcoming your self-effacing, shy reluctance to express an opinion.CHV: He's a diamond geezer that Steve Thomson! David Fox Looking forward to Chariotlords, although if Rick is doing the graphics you could have a long wait in store. I will be surprised to see Lutzen before Origins, and the Moskowa reprint will have to rush to beat the Millennium. I'm afraid that Ed W. is reaping the bitterness of staking his company's pub schedule on Rick Barber; at this point I would start shopping for a different map artist to try to shake Rick out of his complacency. CHV: The map is being done down France way, but the Tilsit Editions have banned the impalement counters lest it scare twelve-year olds – quelle erreur! Perhaps it the reaction the mamans of these little horrors that they really fear. Luc Olivier I just finished PA #97, as interesting as the precedent. You like French games more than I do! Something strange is that you find La Guerre De L'Empereur good and For the People not very good, because friends of mine who try both have an advice opposite (see the next Vae Victis). (CHV: I have not played the former, but one problem it does suffer from is that it seeks to simplify and there is a school of thought that is intellectually challenged by those who do not parade their knowledge. Equally, the game may too simple by far. My views on For the People are given in this issue). I agree with you about Sun Never Sets; the rule for captured rifles is stupid because a 4 strength English can arm a 10 points Zulu or Mahdist. We had the same problem you talk about with Zulu War. I won a first victory against redcoats and capture some guns, next battle I win initiative and pulverise English with my four 10 points zulu heroes! Good but strange! I tell it to Miranda but no answer ! I suggest to give only one point of strength by gun captured not one for each point of strength. (I'm clear?). (CHV: Indeed, it is rather like the artillery rule in the game which limits the effect, its not the number of guns you capture, it is the number you can employ. The use by a few Zulus of rifles, held at arms-length, to fire from the Oskarberg hardly counts as rolling volleys. This rule needs a lot of tweaking. I recently downloaded a very interesting article on the subject from the Savage & Soldier web-site). Thanks for speaking about frenchies but what about my own Vieille Garde and the great Academie du Wargame... I'm very frustrated. CHV: Tiens! Luc is the editor of Veille Garde a French magazine which publishes reviews of games as an entry to the Academie du Wargame, a group of highly intelligent gamers who like a damn good excuse to get together for a good meal. [Ed: surely, meet to discuss the finer points of the hobby]. Nicolas Barker Will you be planning a 100th edition celebration in due course? I share your reviewer's doubts about FTP. It is quite fun to play but I don't know about the history (the leader rules are all wrong) or the balance; the USA has a very hard time. CHV: A celebration, hmn what delectations could we offer? Suggestions please! J.H.White I wish to say how much I appreciate receiving the magazine even though I am a non-contributor. If I could write I would for I have been interested in the Hobby since first seeing an ad in the Sunday New York Times for Gettysburg (Avalon Hill of course) when working in Switzerland in October 1958. CHV: A clear ten years lead time on me then, I purchased 1914 during a visit to London in August 1968 (man). We went to London and all I got was this dumb game..... as the T-Shirt says. David Fox A fine thing but no sooner do I nominate the Duke of Bassano (CHV: His Grace Jean-de-Dieu Kranz Duc de Bassano) than Consimworld is invaded by the barbarians, turning what had formerly been an Athens of intellectual game debate and historical discussion into the Jerry Springer Show. Hundreds of posts to scroll past that say little more than "You're stupid and your mother's ugly!" Swell. But don't despair, there is still plenty of good information and illuminating discussion to be found, you just have to wade through the insults and name-calling to get to it. (CHV: Wade being the operative word). As I write this, the Consimworld server just hiccuped, erasing a week's worth of abuse. The Duke works in wonderful but mysterious ways... In the Good News/Bad News department, the Bad News is that Ulrich Blenneman decided to cut back on Moments in History's pub schedule, zapping my Austerlitz (cries of sorrow and lamentation) as well as Richard Berg's Risorgimento and Jack Greene's Russo-Japanese War. The Good News is that, upon hearing this, Gene Billingsley of GMT promptly said "When can you send the game to me?" so expect Austerlitz to pop up on GMT's P500 by the time this issue steams over the horizon (songs of great rejoicing). If everything moves along Austerlitz could appear by the Fall/Winter of 1999 (isn't that a Prince song?). And so passes Avalon Hill. While I mourn its loss, I can't get very melancholy about it* the only AH games that I still play are Basic Squad Leader and Raid on St Nazaire, and with the significant exception of Atlantic Storm none of their recent releases have really thrilled me. But I did get started in wargaming with Tactics II and Waterloo, and they were one of The Hobby's founders, so we say a Te Deum for AH and move on. (CHV: a Te Deum, you Papist rogue, not in my magazine you don't). If we are looking for one cause of their demise (if there is just one cause), I would point towards their unimaginative, unsuccessful computer game line. Given a stable of successful, high-profile board games, AH managed to turn them into dull, drab computer games. And in case nobody noticed, the computer market generally doesn't go for dull and drab. So their lack of sales combined with the immense costs involved in establishing and distributing a line of computer games led the powers at Monarch Avalon to cut loose Avalon Hill and sell it to Hasbro. It should be noted that Avalon Hill did not "go out of business;" Monarch chose to cut the Avalon Hill line. And Hasbro didn't fire all of those fine people (CHV: smarmer!), Monarch did, under the brutal logic that without any more games, why do they need game design employees? For its part, Hasbro has recently made some favorable rumblings about continuing AH's more successful titles, such as Diplomacy, Kingmaker, and ASL. So stick that in your Witherer, buddy. (CHV: Oh David you are such an innocent, there was nothing successful or high profile about their boardgame line, it appealed to a tiny number of gamers, less than a pimple on the bum of the gaming body politic. And as to who sacked the staff, why their employers of course no one else could, but are you seriously suggesting they did not do so without the agreement, or at active request, of Hasbro? When you've seen as much corporate blood as me you'll know better). Does American College football ever receive coverage across the waves? If not, this was a fine season for military academy football. Army beat Navy 35-31 in a hugely exciting game, while Air Force won the Western Athletic Conference championship in fine typical Air Force "Grind it out, wear them down, and beat them in the 4th Quarter" style of football. Now if only the naughty Iraqi's would field a football team, we'd have them then, by golly. CHV: The Iranians did just that and look what happened. No, College football's only impact on the UK is those excellent collections of Lusty Lovelies in Playboy – Girls of the Whatever Conference, wahay!. Marcus Watney Following your recommendation, I went and bought Svea Rike and have now played it twice at the club, once with four players, once with three. I am not quite as thrilled with it as you, but that may be Sweden's total inability to win wars in either game! That in turn is no doubt due to the players eschewing commanders, with fatal results for the nation. Next game, maybe I'll buy one. The second game (with three players) was particularly weird. After two of us were Poltava'd, Denmark attacked us with the result that the whole of Sweden was without owned fiefs! Still the Danes attacked, and I had to lose a palace in lieu this time. The game ended with the player who had played the Poltava card on us winning on History cards. While I recognise the game is very clever, presently I feel uneasy at the lack of control I have over my own fortunes. Of course, this may just be poor play on my part. To me, the game belongs to the Republic of Rome genre, where inevitably the first games are won by the system thanks to player selfishness. What I really liked was the pressure of time. Sixteen turns sounds ample to develop a strategy and bring it to fruition, but growth is far slower than one might expect, and I repeatedly found myself having to decide between continuing planned expansion or pausing to make some opportunistic grab. Decisions on card play were also excruciating: I found playing a card at the 'correct' moment (tax especially) was often counterproductive as I just became the target for a raft of even worse cards from whatever player I had most offended! This does tend to encourage players to hoard cards to the final turns that may be a minor problem with the game. I took the trouble to photocopy the History and Event card translations onto coloured card at double magnification, and use these instead of the glorious originals. Although this lost something in the aesthetics department, speed of play was greatly enhanced and I would recommend this approach to other purchasers. Once we are entirely familiar with the text, we will of course revert to the fabulous art tour. Incidentally, has anybody noticed that the translation of the Land Reform card seems unrelated to the original Swedish? The translation says "Gives you two gold extra per game turn" while the original states "Ger dig 1 extra guld per furläning…" which to my admittedly untutored eye looks like "Gives you one extra gold per fief…" a very different kettle of fish. "Culture and science" being too much of a mouthful to pronounce in the heat of play, we now refer to this option (predictably) as The Third Way. It adds a certain contemporary twang to round-table discussion! CHV: I certainly play the Land reform card based on the same translation as you Marcus. The lack of control is certainly present, but it goes with the subject I fear. We find bad cards are played early and often, but I could see a variety of Mexican stand-off arising. The failure to win wars is interesting, I have rarely seen a war lost. The ability of these systems to generate different lines of events never ceases to amaze me. Andy Daglish Just played 4-player Nuts! again. The Germans have a big advantage, it seems, probably because their strength in numbers means the Americans can't afford to attack on their own turn. Still, moving these regiments and brigades around seems more in keeping with the level of the game than in, say, Breakout Normandy, where they could be squads. The signs of the really good game lying underneath numerous rules worries [opposing units in the same location? For example, paras, bypass?] are all there, such as both sides thinking they are losing simultaneously, despite numerous areas of shoddiness, some of which should have been picked up on. The placename spelling mistakes are inexcusable [I'm sure "Hertegen" was a U-boat commander!], especially as they have put accents on some letters! A pity the card are not of Verrater quality but then again they are expensive enough as they are. (CHV: Not really an area of shoddiness then!) So an amazing week in gaming -- both this game and Blue & Grey (CHV: It's called Blue vs. Gray Andy) exploding on us despite both having been out a while. I think Nuts! is the more exciting of the pair. Both have a number of similarities, too short rules [BG leaving out some surprisingly obvious stuff, like the play of the At Start cards], extremely good graphics, especially in Nuts! where the photos taken on the relevant battlefield are really very good and some not seen before. (CHV: The BvG rule problem is no problem chiefly because the answer was so obvious that almost any idiot could understand it, and Nuts! cannot claim to be clear about multiple cards in one grid location either). There is a slight problem is that some Town cards have photos of tanks etc which can be mistaken for combat units when slightly obscured by the press of unlimited stacking. Both games have somewhat boring starts though again I think Nuts! wins on period action -- you can feel old Peiper thinking on the move and suddenly deciding to veer off to the south, petrol permitting. The map-laying situation of BG is very clever except when nothing is seen of Kentucky for a long time. Forrest becomes the only southerner who knows the way to a virtual Bowling Green [to raid], and that when hostilities do commence the strength on both sides can produce dramatic results. I am not sure whether this is a "gamey" effect of not, but BG does rather require you to risk more depleted units than your prudence likes, just because a puny defence can get a red 1, as previously mentioned, and also of course you don't want to lose a space by wimping out. The possible consequent destruction of major ACW commands was deemed ahistorical by the rider, owner and trainers of For the People [as it never happened]. However its a shock & a shame that BG came out in the same year as FtP, showing that the hobby can bench-press 450lbs but catches flu every winter, and plague every summer. Certainly these are the best two ACW games, being the most playable and having pronounced qualities of design and speed of play, whilst BG & Nuts!both have entirely new, innovative & nickable cardgame features that make my long-lost Hastings card game more likely to materialise. CHV: Why is it a shock and a shame? It's bloody good news since it provides more and better games for the public showing what an interesting hobby this is. You must be some sort of masochist not to enjoy this surfeit of riches; unless of course you are striking a pose, you young rascal! I have not played Nuts! Yet but I have purchased it. My first reaction is that the "delay" in cards appearing can have some very odd effects. Great illustrations though, its problem is at £38 for both boxes it looks a bit wanky next to Blue vs. Gray for £10 from Boulder Jim. Although card games carry with them a considerable cost problem (the cost requires a larger number of sales that a boxed game) they can provide effortlessly enjoyable play. Back to Perfidious Albion #98 Table of Contents Back to Perfidious Albion List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by Charles and Teresa Vasey. 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