late for dinner
2012-03-19, 02:55 PM
I recently picked up Wallenstein. It is somewhat expensive (70-80) dollars, but seriously, after 1 playthrough, it shot up into my top 5 board games. I got the newer version. It comes with the expansion as well as the dice tower has clear bases for easy "battle outcome" viewing. All of the pieces are great quality and wooden. Plus, they have rules in English. (the original game only came with German) Oh, and a VP counter is along the outside of the board, which is nice.
For those of you who don't know what kind of game it is, Wallenstein is a resource management game, disguised as a war game. If you look on the back, you think War Game, then you play it, and realize that it's more about collecting and protecting. Pretty much all of the attacks I have made on other players have been defensive. (I see my opponent moving all of his troops to one area, knowing he is probably going to attack me...so I attack him first and hope that I get rid of most of his army. (-: )
You start off the game by strategicly picking random counties. (I dont know how else to explain it.) You put your armies on them. Then, there are 10 actions. You secretly place your county cards face down on your Action Board, along with turn order bid, and as the actions come up in the game, you flip your county card over and perform that action with that county. You collect taxes to get money. When you collect taxes, the town folk get angry. You put a little revolt counter on the county. If you collect wheat or taxes from them again, they riot and attack you. It makes for some pretty strategic decisions. If the towns folk are angry, they wont help you in battle. There is a lot going on...
But...for as much as there is going on, the mechanics are quite simple. You pick up on it after a couple turns at most...provided the person teaching you is a good teacher.
Anyways, Does anyone, that has played it, use any special strategies? My main one is defensive attacking (like I described above.)
For those of you who don't know what kind of game it is, Wallenstein is a resource management game, disguised as a war game. If you look on the back, you think War Game, then you play it, and realize that it's more about collecting and protecting. Pretty much all of the attacks I have made on other players have been defensive. (I see my opponent moving all of his troops to one area, knowing he is probably going to attack me...so I attack him first and hope that I get rid of most of his army. (-: )
You start off the game by strategicly picking random counties. (I dont know how else to explain it.) You put your armies on them. Then, there are 10 actions. You secretly place your county cards face down on your Action Board, along with turn order bid, and as the actions come up in the game, you flip your county card over and perform that action with that county. You collect taxes to get money. When you collect taxes, the town folk get angry. You put a little revolt counter on the county. If you collect wheat or taxes from them again, they riot and attack you. It makes for some pretty strategic decisions. If the towns folk are angry, they wont help you in battle. There is a lot going on...
But...for as much as there is going on, the mechanics are quite simple. You pick up on it after a couple turns at most...provided the person teaching you is a good teacher.
Anyways, Does anyone, that has played it, use any special strategies? My main one is defensive attacking (like I described above.)