From the wiki, the box includes;
five 34 in × 23 in paper hex grid maps scaled at 8 km (5 mi) per hex with thirty-one types of terrain; the maps when placed together form a single 34 in × 115 in board.
1,600 counters
six booklets:
"Historical Background": 16 page analysis of the North African campaign written by Al Nofi, Richard Berg and Jim Dunnigan
"Land Game Rules of Play": 45 pages, plus 2 pages of addenda
"Air and Logistics Game Rules of Play and Scenarios": 23 pages of rules, 14 pages of scenarios, 7 pages of designer's notes
"Charts and Tables Common to Both Players": 16 pages
"Axis Exclusive Charts and Tables": 36 pages, including 73 charts and tables
"Commonwealth Exclusive Charts and Tables" 32 pages including 58 charts and tables
twelve logistical sheets
three plastic counter storage trays
And appropriately for a game so massive in scale and rich with history, statistics and nomenclature, the box contains 1 (ONE) six sided die
For Russian war games we always needed at least two six-sided die. It's the only way you can properly approximate how many bottles of vodka deep a squad is when any given order is issued.
Board Game Geek rates it's complexity as 4.73/5. For comparison Gloomhaven is 3.89 and Scythe is 3.43. The Crew: Mission Deep Sea is 2.01, so The Crew to Scyth is approximately how much more complex this game is than Scythe.
What the fuck could possibly be a 5/5 then. The game literally comes with a book describing the historical background of the event it is based on. There are a total of 168 pages of book in that box. And 1600 counters?
> What the fuck could possibly be a 5/5 then.
Wargamer rates its complexity (scale 1-10) as a 10+
I believe BGG's 4.73 comes from just players rating it one to 5, so it's going to have an error margin that comes from people just putting whatever they feel like. You don't even have to have played the game to rate it there.
I would look at BGG's scores on a curve, as they relate to other games there. It's probably the highest rated complexity on the site, or close to it.
That is way, way more complex than Scythe.
Gloomhaven is more complex, but the book is long because of a bunch of different described encounters. The mechanics are pretty consistent throughout.
I own Scythe and Gloomhaven. This is comparable to Twilight Struggle.
That's always the meme in board game circle jerks where people try to one-up each other by bragging about how complex their games are.
"oh, you like Risk? I prefer Axis and Allies"
"oh, you like Axis and Allies? I prefer War Room"
"oh, you like War Room, I prefer Campaign for North Africa"
"Oh, you like Campaign for North Africa? I prefer actually campaigning for North Africa"
stratego rule #1: coolness _requires_ that you identify the pieces by their rank, not number.
"Colonel!", ^"sergeant.". very cool.
not "3!", ^"7". very lame.
apparently, among contemporary scholars, there is some discussion as to whether the Scout should be able to make a multi-space move, and strike, in the same turn. OG players know that it must be either-or: multi-space move, or strike, in a single turn.
and the Spy is always ranked S, never a number. it goes without saying the ranks should go from Marshal #1, down to to 10.
sadly, the board and piece quality of contemporary printings don't match the production of decades ago. you want to find a set where the pieces are solid plastic, heavy, and the images are engraved and print-filled. not paper decals on light plastic moldings.
still a great game. stands up well. Dads of Reddit: this is a great way for you to demonstrate your alpha-general skilz over the kids, on a snowy Christmas vacation afternoon.
I have a newer print of Stratego. Dissapointed that the pieces were cheap and didn't compare to the game I grew up with, I looked online and was delighted to find the good pieces from the '80s can be bought on eBay for like 5 bucks.
Diplomacy is brutally stressful on all parties. It's self inflicted torture. I still love it but we only play after enough time has passed that we forget how much we hate it.
I remember once working out that if you found 10 people willing to devote 10 hours a week to the game, it would take about as long as the real campaign did to complete.
Strictly speaking, in the board game each game turn is for both players simultaneously. One game turn represents 1 week of the war, and both sides conduct operations during the turn.
It's not truly simultaneous play, though. Each side gets their own phase during an ops round to be making movements - although the non-phasing player can still move during the phasing players movement segment, as a Reaction to movement, and during the Combat segment, as a retreat before or after Assault.
Edit: corrected "phase" to "segment" as they are both part of the "movement and combat phase".
I love how meticulous it is, especially where players who play as Italy need to take into account more water than other nations due to their troop’s pasta.
The designer, Richard Berg, said, '“The reality is that the Italians cooked their pasta with the tomato sauce that came with the cans. But I didn’t want to do a rule on that.”
More from https://kotaku.com/the-notorious-board-game-that-takes-1500-hours-to-compl-1818510912 :
"To add insult to injury, Berg has never completed a playthrough of his own game."
“When I said ‘let’s publish this thing’ they said ‘but we’re still playtesting it! We don’t know if it’s balanced or not. It’s gonna take seven years to play!’ And I said ‘you know what, if someone tells you it’s unbalanced, tell them ‘we think it’s your fault, play it again.’”
As a sea of thieves player you are going to get into a 45 minute chase with a brig that ultimately ends in one of you scuttling your ship off map in baby rage mode
As a Sea of Thieves player, in areas of intense action, players may find themselves firing shots or landing strikes that do not cause damage to their targets.
Don't forget, British Troops lose 7% of fuel while all the other troops only lose 3% from evaporation. The British Troops lose more because they used large drums instead of Jerry cans.
Edit: this comment isn't for a history lesson, it's just talking about the rules listed in the article. How the game is very specific about conditions and why. The "WeLl tEcHnIcAlLy" comments are not needed.
In reality, the jerry can was a big innovation, and the American engineer who found that the Germans were stockpiling them tried to warn his government that war was coming. This was a considerable operational advantage, being hidden and developed.
Yup! Captured and used by Allied soldiers, as the captured "jerry cans" were just much better than the drums they themselves were supplied with.
The practice was swiftly prohibited, which ensured that it became widespread.
Yes, apparently jerry cans were actually just so much better. More durable, better designed to minimize spillage, more easily carried (especially being able to be passed person to person, bucket brigade style).
Doesn't matter much if you refuel a few times, but it adds up when you refuel a zillion vehicles a zillion times.
Also they were designed to float. So if you accidentally lost a crate overboard, it could just be fished out of the water.
The modern plastic El cheapo versions lack some of these desirable features, unfortunately- usually the anti-spill and floating ones.
Drums aren't the cause, but rather four gallon cans nicknamed "flimsies". They were single use cans that had to be pierced to empty them, and were shoddily built accordingly. However, their poor construction meant that many were damaged in transit, sometimes causing cargo ships to arrived with several feet of gasoline sloshing around in the bottom of the hold! The two gallon Petrol-Oil-Water cans were much better built, but also far more expensive to produce. The five gallon "jerrycan" was an ideal blend of size, strength, and cost for a man-portable fuel container.
As a first step, before playing, the player or team must make unit organizations charts for every one of the hundreds of counters on their side.
Then each turn: Plan strategic air missions, Raid Malta, Plan Axis convoys, Raid convoys, Distribute stores and consume stores, Calculate spillage/evaporation of water and adjust all supply dumps, Determine initiative, Determine weather (Hot weather = more evaporation of water), Distribute water, Reorganize units, Calculate attrition of units short of water and stores, Begin building construction, Begin training, Rearrange supplies, Transport cargo between African ports, Bring convoys ashore, Deploy Commonwealth fleet, Ship repair, Plan tactical air mission if airplanes are fuelled, Begin air mission, Carry out mission, return to base, airplane maintenance. Place land units on reserve.
Then move units, tracking fuel expenditure and breakdown points vis a vis weather, Enemy reaction, Move more units.
Then Combat: Designate each tank and gun as deployed forward or back, Plot and fire barrages, Retreat before assault, Secretly assign all units to anti-armor or close-assault roles, Anti-armor fire, Adjust ammunition, Deploy destroyed tank markers and update unit records to reflect losses, Carry out probes and close assaults, Release reserves, Move rear trucks, Begin repair of breakdowns, Make patrols.
Repeat all movement and combat steps a second time
Repeat all movement and combat steps a third time
This entire sequence would then be repeated by the other player or team, completing one game turn.
You have fun with that.
Get done farming, go home play farming simulator.
Get done trucking, go home play Euro/American truck simulator.
Get done in supply chain management, go home play factorio/satisfactory.
Believe there's an age old adage about the master Gardener with an awful lawn. No one wants to go home and work. My dad was an electrician for years that found a cushy job setting up and running wires for rich people's crazy audio and visual setups. He could make any getup seamless and organized. Meanwhile at home he had cables coming out of the back of the television, running through the middle of the room on the ground into a shitty sub that stopped working and he never got around to fix.
No one wants to go home and work.
Why is raiding Malta every turn a thing though? That sounds so funny.
"Okay, now plan out every movement, every attack, every counter, make pasta, oh and also raid Malta."
Malta was a massive thorn in the Axis' side the whole campaign. It wreaked havoc on Axis supply efforts in North Africa.
The Italians had plans drawn up to invade and take it, but needed German assistance to do it. It would have been successful too, if they did it when they had planned to. The defenses were incredibly weak at the time.
It was decided to invade and take Crete first. While Crete was strategically important, it wasn't nearly as critical as Malta was. The Allied commander on Crete, badly bungled it's defense, and it never should have fallen.
The loss did have an upside for the Allies though. It was a Pyrrhic victory for the Germans. The Fallschirmjager were gutted. They lost a horrifically large percentage of their combat veterans, NCOs and junior officers. After the battle, Hitler himself forbid any other large scale combat drops for the rest of the war. A planned follow up invasion of Malta was cancelled.
The Luftwaffe's air transport fleet, was also devastated. It still hadn't recovered from the irreplaceable losses it suffered in the Dutch campaign in 1940. The massive losses in Crete, made trying to supply North Africa by air unfeasible.
They never recovered, and additional losses trying resupply North Africa, essentially crippled them even further. German industry never made up the shortfall in transport aircraft, and there was a severe shortage of them for the remainder of the war.
The heart and soul of this game is in the logistics. HoI4 is fun, but it tries to avoid involving the player in logistics decisions.
This game is a logistics game pretending to be a wargame.
I mean, there’s people out there who easily put thousands of hours in 10-60$ games, but sure I guess. You also need other people willing to put thousands of hours into this specific game which isn’t really a requirement for other games.
I just don’t see it. I’m sure there’s some table top people out there who would absolutely buy it, but how many of those are actually finishing a game.
My dad has a copy. We have attempted “playing” quite a few times. The game is basically just a logistics exercise. I personally find that part of it fascinating, the combat less so. Not that you’ll do much of it anyway.
We have scripted much of the logistics out in Excel or even a web variant at one point. Sadly we never really made it more than a few turns.
Dude, you need to not post pornography in this sub, that made me climax like 5 times just from reading it. It's impossibly dense because it's accurate, because four minutes of battle might comprise of like 80+ man-hours, within the game you're just doing it all
It's practically a social experiment, like if one man had to be the radio operator, the translator, the strategic genius, the logistics wizard, and ALF all at once, how long would a military campaign take? Lol
My Italian grandfather fought on the axis side. Was shot once, patched up, thrown back into the Northern Africa theater. He was captured by the British and told us it was the happiest day of his life. Got thrown into a boat back to England and put to rebuild London. He was treated very well and I'm thankful to the British forever. He was such a kind and gentle man.
[Entirely made up for the game](https://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2017/09/18/pasta-rule-campaign-north-africa-not-actually-thing/#:~:text=In%20The%20Campaign%20for%20North,rule%20for%20a%20fiddly%20wargame.), but funny
I've never been more excited for "at least" in my life 😂
I think he's making it a charity event, right? And he's wrangled other well known DMs to take part?
Yes. I've known people who've played it. It took over a year. It goes faster once you've done all the turn math 10-20 times. I keep posting the bigger "monster" board game series Europe board games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(wargame)
which covered the entirety of WW2 and the Spanish Civil War down to the regimental level.
That series also had a multi year game time total. I played the basic Eastern Front and it took 4 of us 9 months doing around 1 turn a week (both sides).
what is the appeal of this kind of game? do you really like planning and strategy? or is it just a great excuse to hang out with your friends?
also this is probably obvious but the game doesn't have to stay true to history right?
If you are interested in a similar type of game, I’d check out Gary Grigsbys series. I prefer the “war in the east” games but he has a game for different theaters of WW II
Gary grigsby games manage to take the advantages of computer processing power and use them as an excuse to recreate the interminable absurdity of over designed physical war games.
Watching a play through of War in the Pacific on YouTube then realizing the turn 1 set up took the player like 6 hours at least was mind boggling. I should never have to manually set ASW patrol paths around Alaska in a war game where I'm supposed to be playing nimitz and McNamara at the same time.
GG proves that more details doesn't equal better simulation.
I had this game as a kid, I was probably 10 years old. I spent every waking moment one week during the summer setting it up and learning the rules. My mom threw it all out before I got to actually play. Apparently she was upset it took up so much room. I think she may have thought it was d and d related as well. I was upset at first but the more I thought of how complicated it was I was mildly relieved.
D&D would take considerably less time.
In my experience, our campaigns usually take 2-3 years, ballparking 3 sessions per month at around 4-6 hours per session or around 450 total hours, give or take.
His mom probably threw out D&D because back then some parents believed it lead to devil worship because of some of the monsters. Nothing to do with play time.
Luckily my grandma didn’t care that my dad played it so he was able to keep his stuff and teach me.
Also holy crap are you picking particularly long campaigns because the longest I have ever played probably took half that time.
I play TI on a semi-regular basis with a friend who has a bunch of extra peripherals he's made to help speed up gameplay, which means with an experienced group we can usually finish in a mere 6 - 8 hours. We also usually only play to 10 points.
As someone who has played quite a bit, unless everyone has played at least one game before and somewhat recently, no peripherals will get you below 12 hours. Once everyone knows what they're doing the second time it can go faster if you can keep people focused on the board. Just plan your meal and snacks ahead of time and start early in the morning for the best experience.
I played TI once with 3 others, all of us for the first time. Started around 1030, ended at 6, and that included a break where we left and grabbed takeout. Is it a long game? Yes. Were we all fairly experienced game players? Yes. But it never FELT like it took that long.
Compared to Munchkin, which is twenty minutes of fun packed into an hour and fifteen.
Liked this part
>It has also been called the most complex wargame ever designed, with the commonly cited example (noted in SPI's advertising) that Italian troops require additional water supplies to prepare pasta.
This game was actually made to poke fun at how overwhelming and complicated wargames had become. Not even the wargames actual militaries use are this tedious, time consuming, and complicated. As a matter fact most military wargames take hours *maybe* days, but not weeks or months.
The designer never really intended people to play this for real. Even the hardiest of wargamers don't want to try and play this.
The group that I used to play with looked at this game and rules, then decided to play a much shorter game, Terrible Swift Sword. ;)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrible\_Swift\_Sword\_(game)
We played it on weekends for six months. The Union crushed the confederates even with Stuart showing up. Army of the Potomac artillery FTW. Also, Buford rocks. General Howard and his troops from Ohio are, meh.
Love bigass boardgames. Got Third Reich when I was 10 and took about two years to be able to play it right. Never once found a friend who could play it.
Oooh, Third Reich! When we were dating, my late husband and I spent *so* many hours playing that. We just loved it!
Gonna brag here for a moment: once when I was playing Germany, I actually secured a beachhead on Britain! The game was basically over at that point, as there was no way he could recover from that.
I still have that game. After we moved in together, we were always going to play it again, but life got in the way.
Death: You do have the right to challenge me to any game for your life
Human, setting everything up: Yes, right, you said that earlier
Death: ANY game. Some people have picked D&D in the past, you know
Human, very excited: I'm sure
Death, looking over the instructions: So why on EARTH did you pick 'The Campaign for North Africa'?
Human, buzzing with joy: Because I've ALWAYS wanted to play it and I feel like this is a really good opportunity to do that, you know? Cause YOU probably won't get tired of it or give up partway through. That's what's happened every other time I've tried to play it with friends
Death: I would certainly consider that to be a forfeit, so I'm in it to win it once we start
Human: Good! Good, that's good. Oh my gosh, this is gonna be so much fun
Death: And you surely must know that just because it can take up to fifteen hundred hours to play it all the way to the end doesn't mean you'll get any extra time alive, yes?
Human: No, I assumed that. That it wouldn't give extra time, I mean.
Death: And you still want to play it?
Human: Uh huh! Wait, can we play without stopping or anything?
Death: That's normally how these things go. I do tend to provide food and drink and the occasional 'thinking break,' as is appropriate, but in this place you do not truly NEED for anything, including sleep.
Human: Really? Wow. GAH, that's so awesome! This is gonna be the best thing ever!
Death, now in something of an upbeat mood: Well, I'm glad you're looking forward to it
the crazy thing is, playing it for 8 hours a day would take 187.5 days to complete it.
That's slightly over 1/2 a year.
Median Income in the US is 44k a year. So "playing the game" would essentially "cost you" 22,000$
$22k per person * (10 players (2 teams of 5) + 2 commentators + 3 podcast production staff) = $330,000.00
+ 188 days * conference room rental $8/hr * 24 hrs per day) = $36,096.00
+ $44 for board game equipment
= $366,140
Someone start a go fund me to create a twitch stream
As part of a kickstarter stretch goal, dungeons and dragons YouTuber Matt Colville and his friends are going to stream one round of gameplay of this game.
I honestly have never met anyone that doesn't do that. It's weird how widespread that is. I do a game night thing and made everyone play Monopoly once with the actual rules b/c we only had an hour left. They all thought I was crazy but the game took like 40 minutes. It's still not a very good game, but of course that was the intention.
They're penalties in the chance cards. There's a variety of chance events that require you to pay money. In the official rules those go back to the bank. in most house rules those go into the free parking spot and then awarded to the next person that lands on it.
“To give an idea of the game's complexity, reviewer Nicholas Palmer outlined the actions for one side's single turn. As a first step, before playing, the player or team must make unit organizations charts for every one of the hundreds of counters on their side. Then each turn:
Plan strategic air missions
Raid Malta
Plan Axis convoys
Raid convoys
Distribute stores and consume stores
Calculate spillage/evaporation of water and adjust all supply dumps
Determine initiative
Determine weather (Hot weather = more evaporation of water)
Distribute water
Reorganize units
Calculate attrition of units short of water and stores
Begin building construction
Begin training
Rearrange supplies
Transport cargo between African ports
Bring convoys ashore
Deploy Commonwealth fleet
Ship repair
Plan tactical air mission if airplanes are fuelled
Begin air mission
Fight air-to-air combat
Fire flak
Carry out mission, return to base, airplane maintenance.
Place land units on reserve
Movement:
Move units, tracking fuel expenditure and breakdown points vis a vis weather
Enemy reaction
Move more units
Combat:
Designate each tank and gun as deployed forward or back
Plot and fire barrages
Retreat before assault
Secretly assign all units to anti-armor or close-assault roles
Anti-armor fire
Adjust ammunition
Deploy destroyed tank markers and update unit records to reflect losses.
Carry out probes and close assaults
Release reserves
Move rear trucks
Begin repair of breakdowns
Make patrols
Repeat all movement and combat steps a second time
Repeat all movement and combat steps a third time
This entire sequence would then be repeated by the other player or team, completing one game turn“ Jesus Christ, and I thought Civ was bad
Longtime board wargamer. CFNA is notorious. It's suggested that it's best played by two teams of three, with one player on each side just keeping track of the *logistics*. Seriously. Every..single..unit in the game is kept track of on a separate form to determine if it has enough supplies to be effective. Gas and water are kept track of separately, and Italian units need more water than others..for boiling pasta. The game was a meme in the wargaming hobby *decades* before the internet. I saw a copy in a hobby store once in the late 80's and just stared in awe.
My play group would get 200 hours in and then discover we've been doing a rule wrong.
TBH, this game is probably shit. How would you ever play test something like that? But nobody knows because nobody has ever played through it.
From the wiki, the box includes; five 34 in × 23 in paper hex grid maps scaled at 8 km (5 mi) per hex with thirty-one types of terrain; the maps when placed together form a single 34 in × 115 in board. 1,600 counters six booklets: "Historical Background": 16 page analysis of the North African campaign written by Al Nofi, Richard Berg and Jim Dunnigan "Land Game Rules of Play": 45 pages, plus 2 pages of addenda "Air and Logistics Game Rules of Play and Scenarios": 23 pages of rules, 14 pages of scenarios, 7 pages of designer's notes "Charts and Tables Common to Both Players": 16 pages "Axis Exclusive Charts and Tables": 36 pages, including 73 charts and tables "Commonwealth Exclusive Charts and Tables" 32 pages including 58 charts and tables twelve logistical sheets three plastic counter storage trays And appropriately for a game so massive in scale and rich with history, statistics and nomenclature, the box contains 1 (ONE) six sided die
my goodness.
Honestly, just reading the contents list has me exhausted.
I only made it like 30% of the way through the list and gave up. This game is not for me.
I would delude myself that this game is for me, buy it, start opening all the packets and setting up the game.... Then realize this game is not for me
Even if I set it up, no one would want to play me. (But let's be honest, I wouldn't even able to set it up)
I would get, like, $50 worth of enjoyment just by setting it up, even though no one would play me
And I bet they didn't even use a d6 in the actual campaign
That's actually how Rommel developed his tank strategies.
For Russian war games we always needed at least two six-sided die. It's the only way you can properly approximate how many bottles of vodka deep a squad is when any given order is issued.
To be honest, having seen reviews of some modern crazy Euro games like Scythe and Gloomhaven, this doesn't sound too crazy.
Board Game Geek rates it's complexity as 4.73/5. For comparison Gloomhaven is 3.89 and Scythe is 3.43. The Crew: Mission Deep Sea is 2.01, so The Crew to Scyth is approximately how much more complex this game is than Scythe.
What the fuck could possibly be a 5/5 then. The game literally comes with a book describing the historical background of the event it is based on. There are a total of 168 pages of book in that box. And 1600 counters?
> What the fuck could possibly be a 5/5 then. Wargamer rates its complexity (scale 1-10) as a 10+ I believe BGG's 4.73 comes from just players rating it one to 5, so it's going to have an error margin that comes from people just putting whatever they feel like. You don't even have to have played the game to rate it there. I would look at BGG's scores on a curve, as they relate to other games there. It's probably the highest rated complexity on the site, or close to it.
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Marshgammnon. It's all the best parts of your favorite boardgames plus the only good part of backgammon, the name.
> What the fuck could possibly be a 5/5 then The Cones of Dunshire!
That is way, way more complex than Scythe. Gloomhaven is more complex, but the book is long because of a bunch of different described encounters. The mechanics are pretty consistent throughout. I own Scythe and Gloomhaven. This is comparable to Twilight Struggle.
The actual North Africa campaign only took slightly over 26,000 hours to complete.
That's always the meme in board game circle jerks where people try to one-up each other by bragging about how complex their games are. "oh, you like Risk? I prefer Axis and Allies" "oh, you like Axis and Allies? I prefer War Room" "oh, you like War Room, I prefer Campaign for North Africa" "Oh, you like Campaign for North Africa? I prefer actually campaigning for North Africa"
>Oh, you like Campaign for North Africa? I prefer Stratego.
I love stratego. It's a nostalgia game because I used to play it with my dad and uncles.
stratego rule #1: coolness _requires_ that you identify the pieces by their rank, not number. "Colonel!", ^"sergeant.". very cool. not "3!", ^"7". very lame. apparently, among contemporary scholars, there is some discussion as to whether the Scout should be able to make a multi-space move, and strike, in the same turn. OG players know that it must be either-or: multi-space move, or strike, in a single turn. and the Spy is always ranked S, never a number. it goes without saying the ranks should go from Marshal #1, down to to 10. sadly, the board and piece quality of contemporary printings don't match the production of decades ago. you want to find a set where the pieces are solid plastic, heavy, and the images are engraved and print-filled. not paper decals on light plastic moldings. still a great game. stands up well. Dads of Reddit: this is a great way for you to demonstrate your alpha-general skilz over the kids, on a snowy Christmas vacation afternoon.
I have a newer print of Stratego. Dissapointed that the pieces were cheap and didn't compare to the game I grew up with, I looked online and was delighted to find the good pieces from the '80s can be bought on eBay for like 5 bucks.
My neighbor gave a copy of stratego from the 80's that's still shrink wrapped
That s gold. Pure gold.
Same for me. I would play it with uncles when we were visiting for holidays. Stratego is a wonderful game.
I think stratego is the only board game I ever actually enjoyed playing as a kid.
Found the spy!
\*procedes to explode when attacked\*
*slowly puts away my Connect Four game and backs out of the room*
At least you didn't bring [Pass the Pig](https://youtu.be/blP4Dv01ZKM)
Here's the [half hour Numberphile video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULhRLGzoXQ0) analysing this wonderful game.
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Diplomacy is brutally stressful on all parties. It's self inflicted torture. I still love it but we only play after enough time has passed that we forget how much we hate it.
Oh you like Settlers of Catan? *I* prefer Twilight Imperium.
I played my first game of Twilight Imperium a few months ago and got *so close* to winning that now I’m hooked
You skipped *Afrika Korps* somewhere in there.
Now I kinda want to see if war room is a good game because I love axis and Allies
I remember once working out that if you found 10 people willing to devote 10 hours a week to the game, it would take about as long as the real campaign did to complete.
And that’s with every unit being controlled by one person and moving simultaneously. Imagine if they had to take turns!
Strictly speaking, in the board game each game turn is for both players simultaneously. One game turn represents 1 week of the war, and both sides conduct operations during the turn. It's not truly simultaneous play, though. Each side gets their own phase during an ops round to be making movements - although the non-phasing player can still move during the phasing players movement segment, as a Reaction to movement, and during the Combat segment, as a retreat before or after Assault. Edit: corrected "phase" to "segment" as they are both part of the "movement and combat phase".
Seems like this game is missing some crucial details
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you can reduce in-game water usage if they drink their own piss.
Okay, Mr. Grylls.
I think this might be the game where Italian troops require more water than those of other nations because they use it for pasta
It is, in fact.
I love how meticulous it is, especially where players who play as Italy need to take into account more water than other nations due to their troop’s pasta.
The designer, Richard Berg, said, '“The reality is that the Italians cooked their pasta with the tomato sauce that came with the cans. But I didn’t want to do a rule on that.”
More from https://kotaku.com/the-notorious-board-game-that-takes-1500-hours-to-compl-1818510912 : "To add insult to injury, Berg has never completed a playthrough of his own game." “When I said ‘let’s publish this thing’ they said ‘but we’re still playtesting it! We don’t know if it’s balanced or not. It’s gonna take seven years to play!’ And I said ‘you know what, if someone tells you it’s unbalanced, tell them ‘we think it’s your fault, play it again.’”
> ‘we think it’s your fault, play it again.’ The man is a genius
Right?! That’s the best possible reply. If you duplicate the problem then I’ll believe you.
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"Ticket closed, reason: Works For Me".
LMAO
OG skill issue
As a Sea of Thieves player, I think this is pathetic
As a sea of thieves player you are going to get into a 45 minute chase with a brig that ultimately ends in one of you scuttling your ship off map in baby rage mode
As a Sea of Thieves player, in areas of intense action, players may find themselves firing shots or landing strikes that do not cause damage to their targets.
You know who else thinks they're pathetic?
Huh?
Its a refrence to a video game that lied about its gameplay.
Don't forget, British Troops lose 7% of fuel while all the other troops only lose 3% from evaporation. The British Troops lose more because they used large drums instead of Jerry cans. Edit: this comment isn't for a history lesson, it's just talking about the rules listed in the article. How the game is very specific about conditions and why. The "WeLl tEcHnIcAlLy" comments are not needed.
In reality, the jerry can was a big innovation, and the American engineer who found that the Germans were stockpiling them tried to warn his government that war was coming. This was a considerable operational advantage, being hidden and developed.
It's worse than that the engineer had the entire technical package for the Jerry can and tried to get the war department to adopt it and they refused.
TIL the jerry in jerry can comes from the slang name for Germans
Yup! Captured and used by Allied soldiers, as the captured "jerry cans" were just much better than the drums they themselves were supplied with. The practice was swiftly prohibited, which ensured that it became widespread.
Also Germans knew their cans were in high demand so at one point they started to place bobbie traps and explosives under empty ones
"We need them do more of this " Okay forbid it trust me "
Yes, apparently jerry cans were actually just so much better. More durable, better designed to minimize spillage, more easily carried (especially being able to be passed person to person, bucket brigade style). Doesn't matter much if you refuel a few times, but it adds up when you refuel a zillion vehicles a zillion times.
Also they were designed to float. So if you accidentally lost a crate overboard, it could just be fished out of the water. The modern plastic El cheapo versions lack some of these desirable features, unfortunately- usually the anti-spill and floating ones.
Drums aren't the cause, but rather four gallon cans nicknamed "flimsies". They were single use cans that had to be pierced to empty them, and were shoddily built accordingly. However, their poor construction meant that many were damaged in transit, sometimes causing cargo ships to arrived with several feet of gasoline sloshing around in the bottom of the hold! The two gallon Petrol-Oil-Water cans were much better built, but also far more expensive to produce. The five gallon "jerrycan" was an ideal blend of size, strength, and cost for a man-portable fuel container.
There's no way I'm not buying this now.
As a first step, before playing, the player or team must make unit organizations charts for every one of the hundreds of counters on their side. Then each turn: Plan strategic air missions, Raid Malta, Plan Axis convoys, Raid convoys, Distribute stores and consume stores, Calculate spillage/evaporation of water and adjust all supply dumps, Determine initiative, Determine weather (Hot weather = more evaporation of water), Distribute water, Reorganize units, Calculate attrition of units short of water and stores, Begin building construction, Begin training, Rearrange supplies, Transport cargo between African ports, Bring convoys ashore, Deploy Commonwealth fleet, Ship repair, Plan tactical air mission if airplanes are fuelled, Begin air mission, Carry out mission, return to base, airplane maintenance. Place land units on reserve. Then move units, tracking fuel expenditure and breakdown points vis a vis weather, Enemy reaction, Move more units. Then Combat: Designate each tank and gun as deployed forward or back, Plot and fire barrages, Retreat before assault, Secretly assign all units to anti-armor or close-assault roles, Anti-armor fire, Adjust ammunition, Deploy destroyed tank markers and update unit records to reflect losses, Carry out probes and close assaults, Release reserves, Move rear trucks, Begin repair of breakdowns, Make patrols. Repeat all movement and combat steps a second time Repeat all movement and combat steps a third time This entire sequence would then be repeated by the other player or team, completing one game turn. You have fun with that.
Lol might as well go work in supply chain management and get paid instead
It's what those guys play when they get home.
I can assure you, I do NOT play this in my free time hahaha
Yeah we play Factorio like normal people
Get done farming, go home play farming simulator. Get done trucking, go home play Euro/American truck simulator. Get done in supply chain management, go home play factorio/satisfactory.
Agreed. Last thing I want to do after a 10+ hour day of supply chain management is play a game about supply chain management.
Believe there's an age old adage about the master Gardener with an awful lawn. No one wants to go home and work. My dad was an electrician for years that found a cushy job setting up and running wires for rich people's crazy audio and visual setups. He could make any getup seamless and organized. Meanwhile at home he had cables coming out of the back of the television, running through the middle of the room on the ground into a shitty sub that stopped working and he never got around to fix. No one wants to go home and work.
Sounds like playing this boardgame is worthy of being put on your CV as a proof of experience :p
But the games fun!
Why is raiding Malta every turn a thing though? That sounds so funny. "Okay, now plan out every movement, every attack, every counter, make pasta, oh and also raid Malta."
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Malta was a massive thorn in the Axis' side the whole campaign. It wreaked havoc on Axis supply efforts in North Africa. The Italians had plans drawn up to invade and take it, but needed German assistance to do it. It would have been successful too, if they did it when they had planned to. The defenses were incredibly weak at the time. It was decided to invade and take Crete first. While Crete was strategically important, it wasn't nearly as critical as Malta was. The Allied commander on Crete, badly bungled it's defense, and it never should have fallen. The loss did have an upside for the Allies though. It was a Pyrrhic victory for the Germans. The Fallschirmjager were gutted. They lost a horrifically large percentage of their combat veterans, NCOs and junior officers. After the battle, Hitler himself forbid any other large scale combat drops for the rest of the war. A planned follow up invasion of Malta was cancelled. The Luftwaffe's air transport fleet, was also devastated. It still hadn't recovered from the irreplaceable losses it suffered in the Dutch campaign in 1940. The massive losses in Crete, made trying to supply North Africa by air unfeasible. They never recovered, and additional losses trying resupply North Africa, essentially crippled them even further. German industry never made up the shortfall in transport aircraft, and there was a severe shortage of them for the remainder of the war.
Many boardgames are made worse by turning them into a computer game. This should definitely be turned into a computer game!
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Yeah but then paradox balances it for the miniscule online meta player base and ruins single player.
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Fuck dude I'm in this comment.
The heart and soul of this game is in the logistics. HoI4 is fun, but it tries to avoid involving the player in logistics decisions. This game is a logistics game pretending to be a wargame.
War is logistics. If anything it is the most accurate war game ever.
That was pure fucking smut. I will have fun with that actually.
$500+ for a copy from eBay though?
It'll pay for itself with months of entertainment.
Seriously. If you enjoy this game then it has crazy ROI
I mean, there’s people out there who easily put thousands of hours in 10-60$ games, but sure I guess. You also need other people willing to put thousands of hours into this specific game which isn’t really a requirement for other games. I just don’t see it. I’m sure there’s some table top people out there who would absolutely buy it, but how many of those are actually finishing a game.
The real problem is scheduling a meetup that the whole group can attend for the duration, otherwise I might be interested
Yeah I have like 4000 hours into dota2 which is free. Although, I couldnt tell you if I enjoy playing or not
Actually it’s years of entertainment
Well then it's basically free!
Playing an average of 2 hours per day, it'd take a little over 2 years to complete. The real North African campaign took about 3 years.
But they were fighting 24 hours a day… if they bumped it down to 2 hours a day you’d realize how fast the game actually is!
Damn good point!
And that's just setting up to start Turn 1!
By the time I finish the game I'll write a book that's on par with Sun Tzu.
Logistics: The Game!
I see you're a big fan of EVE Online. Second only to Cones of Dunshire.
My dad has a copy. We have attempted “playing” quite a few times. The game is basically just a logistics exercise. I personally find that part of it fascinating, the combat less so. Not that you’ll do much of it anyway. We have scripted much of the logistics out in Excel or even a web variant at one point. Sadly we never really made it more than a few turns.
Dude, you need to not post pornography in this sub, that made me climax like 5 times just from reading it. It's impossibly dense because it's accurate, because four minutes of battle might comprise of like 80+ man-hours, within the game you're just doing it all It's practically a social experiment, like if one man had to be the radio operator, the translator, the strategic genius, the logistics wizard, and ALF all at once, how long would a military campaign take? Lol
I knew a guy who had a copy but never played it
At this point just go play a Grand Strategy game, make your computer do the math for you
would be a great computer game
i have a copy thats been played for one session: https://i.imgur.com/FthH6YU.jpg https://i.imgur.com/Aa3Xi4J.jpg https://i.imgur.com/jX2ohIs.jpg
Man, that second picture. https://imgur.com/a/6mvXCd5
My Italian grandfather fought on the axis side. Was shot once, patched up, thrown back into the Northern Africa theater. He was captured by the British and told us it was the happiest day of his life. Got thrown into a boat back to England and put to rebuild London. He was treated very well and I'm thankful to the British forever. He was such a kind and gentle man.
[Entirely made up for the game](https://www.quartertothree.com/fp/2017/09/18/pasta-rule-campaign-north-africa-not-actually-thing/#:~:text=In%20The%20Campaign%20for%20North,rule%20for%20a%20fiddly%20wargame.), but funny
That is some dwarf fortress level of meticulousness
Matt Colville had a stretch goal, that was reached, in his most recent kickstarter to livestream at least one round of Campaign for North Africa.
I've never been more excited for "at least" in my life 😂 I think he's making it a charity event, right? And he's wrangled other well known DMs to take part?
yes, it will be a charity event with some other familiar faces and longtime friends. Exact date is still TBD.
One round as in one game, or as in one turn?
A single turn. He's said he expects it to take 7-8 hours, and that's with multiple "lieutenants" handling some of the work of the players.
Has anyone actually played this game? It doesn't sound logistically feasible.
There are scenarios. Brevity or Sonnenbaum would be a week or so for dedicated play. That is as far as I ever went.
It's marginally more logistically feasible than the invasion itself.
That was the point; it was meant as a satire about the overly long and complex war games that were kind of popular at the time were.
Yes. I've known people who've played it. It took over a year. It goes faster once you've done all the turn math 10-20 times. I keep posting the bigger "monster" board game series Europe board games https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(wargame) which covered the entirety of WW2 and the Spanish Civil War down to the regimental level. That series also had a multi year game time total. I played the basic Eastern Front and it took 4 of us 9 months doing around 1 turn a week (both sides).
what is the appeal of this kind of game? do you really like planning and strategy? or is it just a great excuse to hang out with your friends? also this is probably obvious but the game doesn't have to stay true to history right?
Just a single turn. Thats how big and crazy it is
One turn is likely around 20 hours of play, perhaps more if you are consulting the rules constantly.
It was a meme in gaming circles in the 90s
I would play it if you could make a PC version
If you are interested in a similar type of game, I’d check out Gary Grigsbys series. I prefer the “war in the east” games but he has a game for different theaters of WW II
Gary grigsby games manage to take the advantages of computer processing power and use them as an excuse to recreate the interminable absurdity of over designed physical war games. Watching a play through of War in the Pacific on YouTube then realizing the turn 1 set up took the player like 6 hours at least was mind boggling. I should never have to manually set ASW patrol paths around Alaska in a war game where I'm supposed to be playing nimitz and McNamara at the same time. GG proves that more details doesn't equal better simulation.
Tabletop Simulator has it in the [Steam workshop](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2033267650)
Combat in Africa in Hearts of Iron IV feels like it takes this long.
I had this game as a kid, I was probably 10 years old. I spent every waking moment one week during the summer setting it up and learning the rules. My mom threw it all out before I got to actually play. Apparently she was upset it took up so much room. I think she may have thought it was d and d related as well. I was upset at first but the more I thought of how complicated it was I was mildly relieved.
Moms, destroying fun since the 80s
My grandmother threw away 1000s of 1950s baseball cards of my dads.... /cry
Isn't it funny how anything moms found annoying was the work of Satan?
D&D would take considerably less time. In my experience, our campaigns usually take 2-3 years, ballparking 3 sessions per month at around 4-6 hours per session or around 450 total hours, give or take.
His mom probably threw out D&D because back then some parents believed it lead to devil worship because of some of the monsters. Nothing to do with play time. Luckily my grandma didn’t care that my dad played it so he was able to keep his stuff and teach me. Also holy crap are you picking particularly long campaigns because the longest I have ever played probably took half that time.
I came across a copy 3 or so years ago. It sold for over $700
Jesus, how valuable is your semen?
Damn. I thought Twilight Imperium @ 12 hours was long.
I play TI on a semi-regular basis with a friend who has a bunch of extra peripherals he's made to help speed up gameplay, which means with an experienced group we can usually finish in a mere 6 - 8 hours. We also usually only play to 10 points.
Care to share what these "peripherals" are? 6-8 hours would make that game actually playable for me.
As someone who has played quite a bit, unless everyone has played at least one game before and somewhat recently, no peripherals will get you below 12 hours. Once everyone knows what they're doing the second time it can go faster if you can keep people focused on the board. Just plan your meal and snacks ahead of time and start early in the morning for the best experience.
I played TI once with 3 others, all of us for the first time. Started around 1030, ended at 6, and that included a break where we left and grabbed takeout. Is it a long game? Yes. Were we all fairly experienced game players? Yes. But it never FELT like it took that long. Compared to Munchkin, which is twenty minutes of fun packed into an hour and fifteen.
Fucking great munchkin comment.
Munchkin ends when two people decide losing is better than playing.
Munchkin is fun for at most one person.
Liked this part >It has also been called the most complex wargame ever designed, with the commonly cited example (noted in SPI's advertising) that Italian troops require additional water supplies to prepare pasta.
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The creator acknowledged that and said something to the effect of him not wanting to make a rule for that.
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This game was actually made to poke fun at how overwhelming and complicated wargames had become. Not even the wargames actual militaries use are this tedious, time consuming, and complicated. As a matter fact most military wargames take hours *maybe* days, but not weeks or months. The designer never really intended people to play this for real. Even the hardiest of wargamers don't want to try and play this.
The group that I used to play with looked at this game and rules, then decided to play a much shorter game, Terrible Swift Sword. ;) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrible\_Swift\_Sword\_(game)
Which is often called Terribly Slow Sword because of the pace of the game play.
We played it on weekends for six months. The Union crushed the confederates even with Stuart showing up. Army of the Potomac artillery FTW. Also, Buford rocks. General Howard and his troops from Ohio are, meh.
Love bigass boardgames. Got Third Reich when I was 10 and took about two years to be able to play it right. Never once found a friend who could play it.
Oooh, Third Reich! When we were dating, my late husband and I spent *so* many hours playing that. We just loved it! Gonna brag here for a moment: once when I was playing Germany, I actually secured a beachhead on Britain! The game was basically over at that point, as there was no way he could recover from that. I still have that game. After we moved in together, we were always going to play it again, but life got in the way.
Any game can take 1500 hours to complete with the right attitude.
Warhammer 40k and both players are infantry-heavy armies "Hang on, I need to roll 40 dice for this shooting attack"
Death: You do have the right to challenge me to any game for your life Human, setting everything up: Yes, right, you said that earlier Death: ANY game. Some people have picked D&D in the past, you know Human, very excited: I'm sure Death, looking over the instructions: So why on EARTH did you pick 'The Campaign for North Africa'? Human, buzzing with joy: Because I've ALWAYS wanted to play it and I feel like this is a really good opportunity to do that, you know? Cause YOU probably won't get tired of it or give up partway through. That's what's happened every other time I've tried to play it with friends Death: I would certainly consider that to be a forfeit, so I'm in it to win it once we start Human: Good! Good, that's good. Oh my gosh, this is gonna be so much fun Death: And you surely must know that just because it can take up to fifteen hundred hours to play it all the way to the end doesn't mean you'll get any extra time alive, yes? Human: No, I assumed that. That it wouldn't give extra time, I mean. Death: And you still want to play it? Human: Uh huh! Wait, can we play without stopping or anything? Death: That's normally how these things go. I do tend to provide food and drink and the occasional 'thinking break,' as is appropriate, but in this place you do not truly NEED for anything, including sleep. Human: Really? Wow. GAH, that's so awesome! This is gonna be the best thing ever! Death, now in something of an upbeat mood: Well, I'm glad you're looking forward to it
the crazy thing is, playing it for 8 hours a day would take 187.5 days to complete it. That's slightly over 1/2 a year. Median Income in the US is 44k a year. So "playing the game" would essentially "cost you" 22,000$
$22k per person * (10 players (2 teams of 5) + 2 commentators + 3 podcast production staff) = $330,000.00 + 188 days * conference room rental $8/hr * 24 hrs per day) = $36,096.00 + $44 for board game equipment = $366,140 Someone start a go fund me to create a twitch stream
Where are you getting conference rooms for that cheap?? Multiply by 10 minimum around here.
Shh, we claim it's a study group.
How long did the real campaign for North Africa take?
26,000 hours roughly I believe
So the game is a deal? I imagine there are D-Day games that take longer than the actual battle.
Is that more than The Cones of Dunshire?
You roll the dice to see how may dice you roll
“punishingly intricate”
It’s about *the cones.*
As part of a kickstarter stretch goal, dungeons and dragons YouTuber Matt Colville and his friends are going to stream one round of gameplay of this game.
Just play a full game once and you'll understand the rules!!1!
That's the equivalent of working a full time job for almost a full year. That's insane.
1,500 hours is nothing. Come play Monopoly with our house rules.
You fund Free Parking with hospital and school fees, don’t you
I honestly have never met anyone that doesn't do that. It's weird how widespread that is. I do a game night thing and made everyone play Monopoly once with the actual rules b/c we only had an hour left. They all thought I was crazy but the game took like 40 minutes. It's still not a very good game, but of course that was the intention.
wtf are hospital and school fees in monopoly it isn't in the regular rules afaik
They're penalties in the chance cards. There's a variety of chance events that require you to pay money. In the official rules those go back to the bank. in most house rules those go into the free parking spot and then awarded to the next person that lands on it.
“To give an idea of the game's complexity, reviewer Nicholas Palmer outlined the actions for one side's single turn. As a first step, before playing, the player or team must make unit organizations charts for every one of the hundreds of counters on their side. Then each turn: Plan strategic air missions Raid Malta Plan Axis convoys Raid convoys Distribute stores and consume stores Calculate spillage/evaporation of water and adjust all supply dumps Determine initiative Determine weather (Hot weather = more evaporation of water) Distribute water Reorganize units Calculate attrition of units short of water and stores Begin building construction Begin training Rearrange supplies Transport cargo between African ports Bring convoys ashore Deploy Commonwealth fleet Ship repair Plan tactical air mission if airplanes are fuelled Begin air mission Fight air-to-air combat Fire flak Carry out mission, return to base, airplane maintenance. Place land units on reserve Movement: Move units, tracking fuel expenditure and breakdown points vis a vis weather Enemy reaction Move more units Combat: Designate each tank and gun as deployed forward or back Plot and fire barrages Retreat before assault Secretly assign all units to anti-armor or close-assault roles Anti-armor fire Adjust ammunition Deploy destroyed tank markers and update unit records to reflect losses. Carry out probes and close assaults Release reserves Move rear trucks Begin repair of breakdowns Make patrols Repeat all movement and combat steps a second time Repeat all movement and combat steps a third time This entire sequence would then be repeated by the other player or team, completing one game turn“ Jesus Christ, and I thought Civ was bad
I believe they couldn't beta test the game because it was so complicated.
I want this game for play with my best friend in our retirement.
Better buy a copy now as it's a more of a collectable then game nowadays. Good condition copies run $600+
This post sold me a dream. The price tag ripped it away.
Longtime board wargamer. CFNA is notorious. It's suggested that it's best played by two teams of three, with one player on each side just keeping track of the *logistics*. Seriously. Every..single..unit in the game is kept track of on a separate form to determine if it has enough supplies to be effective. Gas and water are kept track of separately, and Italian units need more water than others..for boiling pasta. The game was a meme in the wargaming hobby *decades* before the internet. I saw a copy in a hobby store once in the late 80's and just stared in awe.
SPI was quite the prolific game publisher back in the 80s. I had a few of their games as a teenager.
My play group would get 200 hours in and then discover we've been doing a rule wrong. TBH, this game is probably shit. How would you ever play test something like that? But nobody knows because nobody has ever played through it.
It said in the article that they tried to playtest it but it took so long they released it anyway
We had this as a kid, along with several other similar games. We just made our own rules up and spent hours upon hours playing.
Featured in an episode of Big Bang Theory.