From: Cremona Luca Subject: REVOLUTION FRANCAISE Hi Alan and thank you for your welcome in CONSIM-L. Unfortunately I have to connect and disconnect me from the group because of my job. When I am out for few days I cannot afford to read every message (last week I got more of 1000 of them ...) so unfortunately I cannot guarantee to be always in ... LA REVOLUTION FRANCAISE from Azur Wish is a little different from the other games of this manufacturer, but I think it is very good, as it is the first game That I know that cover the REVOLUTION itself, with all the politics involved. (1) - THE MAP shows the whole of France, divided into "departements" (or "zones" in games terms) plus includes some tables (to keep track of the actual "force" of the players, who is in prison, who is keeping money, named ASSIGNATS, and finally who is going to ... lose his head in the "guillotine"). Th overall impression is not as high as in other games of AWE, but it is functional. (2) - THE COUNTERS as usual are BEAUTIFULL : you get 480 of them ("big" size a la Panzer Leader) splendidly coloured and including portraits (from famous paints of the period) of all the leaders (Lafayette, Chouan, Robesperre, Marat, Danton, carnot, king Louis XVI, etc.). (3) - THE NUMBER OF PLAYERS may vary from 3 (?) to 8, each one beeing assigned one of the political parties (or "tendences") of the period. You may support the king through the "Royalistes" party (but watch your head, after the first turns), or the conservative "feuillants", or les indecises du "marais", les republicans of "gironde", les democrates of "la montagne" or the terrible (during the hot days) peasants of the "sanculotte". You may play the HYSTORICAL game (or basic game) or the OPEN game (that introduces new rules to the basic version) : you will learn some revoluctionary terms, as ASSEMBLEE NATIONALE (the Pariament), VENDEMMIAIRE, GERMINAL, etc. (the revolution names for the months, in the example September, march, etc.) TERREUR (yes sir, it is time to cut your head), etc. The Sequence of Play is as follows : - Iniatial NEGOTIATION PHASE when the players discuss together (a la DIPLOMACY), determine SPECIAL (casual) EVENTS (political, economical,etc.), determine the ORDER OF PLAY (based on the controlled regions plus fame), the declaration of the GOALS for that turn (you gain points if you succeed), and finally you place your PERSONALITIES on the map (at least one in Paris, and the others were you wish in your regions). - ACTION PHASE when you have a certain amount of "actions" available (based on your fame and a die) : you must "pay" each action with a variable amount of "assignats" but you basically may arrest other personalities, "buy" some of them (oh yes, also during the revolution a good "envelope" could resolve many problems), rise or suppress a revolt, rise or calm the "commune", propose new laws in the Assemblée Nationale (to be voted by all the "deputés"). - JUSTICE PHASE you arrested some of those Personalities, and it is now time to process them, and as we all know justice is "nearly" blind : this means that the sort of all those prisoners depend very much on theyr political tendence and the ... actual form of govern (or anarchy). In other terms if you are a revoluctionar during the king govern you do not have many chances to sort out of the prison (la Bastille), but if you are a royalist during the "terror" you may bet your head that nothing good will happen : "père Guillotin" will experiment his invention on you, probably (at least untill he will go under the same process himself). - MILITAR PHASE all that decided it is time to see if it is possible to fight the many countries that attack France : you will find 4 types of Armies (Revoluctionary Army, Royalist Army, Allied Armies and "Commune de Paris" Army), regulars or voluntaries. Of course you first need a War Declaration (from the French Govern or the Allies) and then you place your units, move them and combat (with two dice on a CRT that uses your current "fame" to determine wich column has to be checked) - INTERPHASE finally we have to check the Economy, to gain some "assignats" and to just your current "fame". To win you must calculate your Victory Points (each "tendence" has different goals, of course) and you may find one of the following situations : (a) - The royalist win : the Absolutist Monarchy is re-established (b) - The revolution win : you have to check wich tendence won to know if France has still a Legislative Parliament or if you have a permanent "Diretoire" In summary this is a Political game, with some military involved, but a very subtle game indeed : I have not yet played it with the 8 players sugested by the author to really enjoy it at its max, but the combination of politics, beautifull counters, etc. give me full satisfaction. While we are discussing AWE games, have you already seen the new HISPANIA ? It was an amatorial game (made in Germany by Andreas Steding) that Bruno de Scorraille (the owner of AWE) bought and printed in a professional way (splendid map, 640 super beautiful counters). It is BRITANNIA based on Spain, and actually Andreas is working on a projet to do the same for ITALIA in order to link (in the future) all those games into a GREAT EUROPA game. In Italy we already have a game based on the Britannia system too (PENNSULA ITALICA, from the company CAMELOT) and I think that some French gamers are preparing GALLIA (or FRANCE), so I am really curious about the final result. For those interested in European Productions AWE already printed the following games : - EUROPA UNIVERSALIS (Multiplayer : Europe 1492-1792) - EUROPA UNIVERSALIS EXTENSIO 1 (more counters and extra players) - GRAND SIECLE (MP : Europe 1661-1789) - LA FOI ET LE GLAIVE (MP : Religion Wars Europe/Arab Countries : VII century) - SALVE (a very easy naval game ... Naval Battle style) - XENOR (MP fantasy game) All those games have the same artistic treatment, and super counters : I only have to remark that the boxes are too light (easy to crash), but otherwise I think that their production have very high standards. I think that Bruno de Scorraille was searching for some US distributor for his games : if someone interested is reading those notes please contact him (16 rue Bachamont - 75002 Paris- France). You may tell him that you got from me this information. Let me also list some of the games from CAMELOT (a group of gamers who decided to also open a shop, sell strategy games as a side-business and to print some games - all the games have an English version of the rules ... well ... an Italo-English version like the text you are reading now, but if you have something to complain please do it IN ITALIAN !!!!) : - BARBARIANS (Uns invasion of 400 a.c.- "zones" wargame for 2-6 players, with 800+ counters and a big map : graphic fine, difficulty 3 on 10 ) - EAGLES (BLUE MAX system applied to WW II, with 100 individual airplanes for the BATTLE OF BRITAIN or similar combats) - MALTA (EAGLES expansion with another 100 airplanes, mainly italians of the "Regia Aeronautica" : you may fly the Mc2000 "Saetta", or G 50 bis "Freccia", or bomb with SM 79 "Sparviero" or Br20 "Cicogna", etc. The game system is very well known and I think that this game shoud be in each collection) Unfortunately I do not find now the complete list, but you may write to Giacomo Fedele via Piacenza 24 - 20135 Milano - ITALY (again, you may say that you got the information from me : Giacomo is a very good friend and a very nice guy). If someone needs moer information, please contact me Ciao a tutti ******************************** * Pietro Cremona * * "Old hand" Wargamer * * Cesena (FO) - Italy * * E-Mail : asterix@linknet.it * * Phone : ++ 39 547-335121 * ********************************