New Campaign - Ready For The Off

The new campaign using version 2.0 is all set up and ready to go and the format is going to be a little different from before as James has recruited four players from the Yahoo Piquet Group to play the heads of state by email:

Pete:	France
Colin:	Spain
Al:	Venice
Jason:	Papal State

The battles will be fought by the Ilkley Lads using James’ excellent games table and his collection of 16th century figures.   They will be running a 'side bet' victory points league to keep things competitive.



As you can see from the above picture the board is ready for initial deployments.

The map was printed from the A4 version as a nine page poster (not possible with a Mac apparently) enlarging it to 34" x 22".  The map was then taped together and put behind a sheet of Perspex on a 'notice board'.

This is a great tip for anyone using the large paper maps supplied with most military board games these days - it keeps the map free from wear and coffee mug stains, and allows counters to slide around easily.

James, as is the author’s privilege, will not be using the counters that come with the game.   He prefers to use bits and pieces from his counter box. For this game they comprise:

• Painted chequers with round sticky labels (in the centre) for armies.
• Skittle men for agents.
• Poker chips for florins (yellow = 20, red = 10, blue = 5, white = 1).
• Big tiddlywinks for possession markers (red, blue, yellow, green).
• Small tiddlywinks for the trackers (red, blue, yellow, green).
• Black and white tiddlywinks with numbers on for improved fortification and siege markers, etc.
• Small plastic gold coins (from a broken Las Vegas fridge magnet) for paid markers.
• Small plastic chequers with crowns on (red and black) from a couple of Christmas cracker draughts games for influence chips.
• Cigar boxes, clearly labelled, have been sorted to keep the players markers and Ruse De Guerre cards in.
• Lastly all the Pike and Plunder playing cards have been cut out and placed in card sleeves for easy shuffling.

So everything is all set and ready to go.  James will be writing regular campaign and battle updates with card by card, phase by phase and blow by blow accounts.  This should help explain how the game is played along the way.