napoleonic BOARDgames
I am primarily a miniature and not a boardgame player. However I like
the boardgames, i.e. the maps, the counters, the books.... Sometimes
ago (maybe 20 years?) I bought CIVILIZATION and SQUAD LEADER but I
confess that, while I read with avidity the rules and the proposed
scenarios, today the counters still remain un-punched...
With the arrival of internet I re-discovered the boardgames world
(through
ConSim World,
Web Grognards) and
eventually arrived to
Napoleon Games
(old OSG) and since I play solo with my miniatures I decided to try
again in search of scenarios, new mechanisms or new rules to aid my
solitaire plots and plans.
I own "Napoleon
at the Crossroads" (NAC) and "Four
Lost Battles" (FLB). Both games are from Kevin Zucker (the man
behind NapoleonGames) and are devoted tothe 1813 campaign in
Germany. The first covers the full autumn campaign (ending at
Leipzig) whereas the other covers the battles of Gross-Beern,
Kaztbach, Kulm and Dennewitz. I have solo-played all those battles
(See the
NB scenarios) and I plan
to play them again using the FLB cards or a similar adaptation.
what's cyberboard?
CYBERBOARD
is a free utility to play wargames by PBeM developed by Dale Larson. In
the words of the author:
"The CyberBoard board gaming system makes playing board games by
mail and electronic mail a more enjoyable experience. The system
allows you to easily graphically design the various parts of a board
game on your computer. The players can make their moves and exchange
recorded versions of the moves with their opponents. The opponent
can then play back the moves. Although many types of games may be
created using CyberBoard, games that use counters or chits such as
war games work particularly well.
CyberBoard is not an artificial opponent. It provides no artificial
intelligence capability.
My goal for CyberBoard was to duplicate the experience of actual paper
counter style gaming--at least to the extent that this is
reasonable. In its current form the system does a pretty good job of
this"
Evidently, solitaire (or solo) play is also posible with the advantage
that all the elements of the wargame (maps, charts, pieces,
markers...) are in the computer.
Game-boxes for many different boardgames have been designed and are
available in several Internet sites. The boardgame rules are not
included in the game-boxes anyway, so it is necesary to own the
boardgame to use the game-box
In these moments I own a home-designed gamebox for
'War to the death' and two other more
for the boardgames 'Four Lost Battles' and 'Napoleon at the
Crossroads'.