This game is very, very fragile. A couple good rolls on one side, coupled with poor rolls on another side can devastate one of the players. We went into Turn 6 on fairly equal footing. Bill moved his Bavarians west to smack a smaller stack of protestant units. I then moved my "killer stack" with Mansfield to relieve the smaller force. We got a roll of 0 (me - bad)/9 (Bill - good), and I had to retreat. During the retreat I lost 2 generals (20% chance on each), so that force was stuck (didn't have enough command to move it). Bill moved the Spaniards in to finish off the smaller stack (no retreat -- all units and both leaders died). Now, since my larger stack couldn't move (well, I could move 2 of the 7 units off, which would only allow the Catholics to whack them separately), I had to stay and face a joint Spanish/Bavarian army. They moved in, and I won the battle (10 losses to 9, I believe), but my now decimated units were completely leaderless. At that point, we decided to call the game, as Bill's Catholics had 3 large stacks and I had a little leaderless stack and a stack of 3 militia in the south.It was ugly.
Now, I realize that extreme results can skew any game, but we just had one extreme result. The other battles were close (and I even won some). But the attrition and the leader losses (including losing King Christian earlier which meant all 4 Danish veterans left the game) worked together to make the Protestants impotent. I believe this was a big problem when I played 6 or 7 years ago. The inability of armies to avoid battle means that once losses start spiraling, the other side can just catch whoever they want and attrit them to death.
So, this second game was not really satisfying at all. I'm certainly glad we broke the game out to play, and I'll probably hang onto it, but I think it's too fragile of an engine to keep putting in my "to play" pile. Once in a great while, perhaps, when I forget why I'm not constantly playing.
6 comments:
Rob
Tell me about the Spanish Civil War game. Is it operational strategic that includes all of Spain? Is it tactical? Who makes it and where can you buy it?
Don't encourage him now!
Sorry Rob. Thought my name was going to be used on the first comment.
Boulder Games is running a preorder for Espana 1936 -- should be out in late June.
It's strategic (almost WWII, Mike -- tanks, planes, and armored cars!), and the English version will have the naval game and the extra cards (an add-on in the Spanish version).
And don't listen to Grant -- this will become one of his favorites!
Dear god, I'm not sure I can fit in any more favorites.
Odd that armies cannot avoid one another in the 30YW game when they spent a large part of the war doing exactly that. Would make it very hard to pull off some of Turenne's and Mercy's campaigns.
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