Punic Wars and 13 Days

With my life momentarily under control, I drove out to Bruce's Tuesday night for some gaming (insane fog on the way back!). He pulled out The Punic Wars, an old hex-and-counter game that we're going to use to drive another Aurelian campaign.

Pretty easy rules, no set game length, easy conversion of board gaming factors to minis. Hannibal got uppity right out of the gate, moving through Gallica, down through Italy to attack Rome (the turn after the shot below). I had just enough time to march a field army into place to set up the first  miniature battle that we'll fight next time.

At the same time, I sailed from Sicily to besiege Carthage. I am hopeful that a win at the gates of Rome will allow me to redeploy additional troops south and rub some salt into his wounds (or at least his fields).

With not enough time to fight the miniature battle but still some time on our hands, Bruce hauled out 13 Days. This is a 3-turn game about the Cuban missile crisis based on the mechanics of 1960: Election. I managed to turn the world day-glo in the first turn (oops! Trump moment!) so we reset and played again.

Very fun game (Twilight Struggle lite). I was way ahead on prestige points in the second game. Except I didn't think through the last card I played and Bruce turned it around on me and, again, I caused an nuclear inferno. This gave Bruce the win, although I imagine this is considered a marginal victory!

Good stuff! I'm working on some 54mm Hessians and am hopeful Bruce and I can continue with the Aurelian campaign next week.