1775 Rebellion

Bruce popped by last night for a game of 1775 Rebellion by Academy Games. This is a new game I got last week from a kickstarter. It is similar to their 1812: The Invasion of Canada game but I think more interesting. You can play with 2-4 players and things kick off in 1775 as below.

The game has a random activation sequence within each turn and what an active player can do is then dictated by the card(s) he plays. Combat is via iconic dice and we referred to the QRS exactly once (can you play more than one event card per turn? yep) during the game. The winner is the guy with the most colonies (there are 15) at the (variable) end of the game.

Bruce was for King and I for Congress. Bruce's strategy was to lock up the north and then take the middle states and eventually squeeze me to the edges. My strategy was to hold as much of New England as I could, sew up the south and then try to time an offensive with the end game point to strip him of colony control.

Mid-game I was in control of the south but Bruce held the north and the middle of the board. I kept waiting for a water movement card so I could land behind him in the north and grab Nova Scotia and Quebec but the card never came. So I launched an offensive through New York as well as one in the south to strip him of control of colonies when I triggered the end game (below). This also severely cramped Bruce's ability to deploy reinforcements.

Overall, an interesting game that (after one play) seems to recreate some of the geographic and logistical dynamics of the AWI. The politics of the war is conveyed through control of colonies (and the other guy's efforts to destabilize them). It certainly seems to have more layers than 1812 and the native allies mechanic is quite interesting. The variable end point adds a certain amount of tension--you can't let the other get too far ahead because he might be able to end the game before you can climb back.

Up next: I will bring this out to the club next week. With cooler weather, I have returned to the painting table (what a mess!) for the first time in more than a month and am close to finishing some more 1/72-scale 7th cavalry. I think the just need some gunmetal, the dip and basing.