The Rules

The rules have four main sections: How to Play Gaining and Losing Armies Moving your Armies Attacking and Supporting

In the rules, Important terms are bold. Important points are underlined. Examples are in italics. Suggestions for playing are blue.

We begin with a map of the world. It's not accurate: smaller countries have been lumped together into one region, and the bigger ones have been divided into different regions. THE OBJECT OF THE GAME The object is to move your armies about and conquer other regions, wiping out the competition until you are the only player left. Some regions are marked with black dots. These are supply depots. You'll have one army for every supply depot that you control. If you lose a supply depot, you'll lose one army — whichever one is furthest from your home territory. All the players begin with three supply depots, their home territory. Each territory is marked with a different colour. As their armies move about the world, they are represented by flags that match the colour of their home territory. Whenever you successfully take over another region, the background color changes to show that it is yours. It remains yours — even if your army moves on — unless some other player conquers it. The ocean regions and the seas may never be conquered, and they will never change colour on the map. But the ocean regions — like the land regions — may only hold one army at a time. If some other army is in an ocean region, you may not go there unless you defeat them in an attack. HOW TO PLAY Once the game begins, we will have one round every two days (Okay, it's actually 46 hours. I'll need the last two hours to make all the moves, change and upload the map, and update the scores before the next round). At some time within the two day period, you'll need to Study the map Decide how you want your armies to move and write down your orders Communicate your orders in writing to the game controller (that would be me) either in person or via email Don't be lazy when you write out your orders. Misspelling or abbreviating the region names can lead to confusion, and the same is true of using symbols like arrows instead of writing "to" or "attacks". Remember: If I can't understand what you mean, your orders won't count. Below — in the Moving your Armies section — are some examples of how to write instructions.   Rounds are divided into two turns, which we'll call the A turn and B turn. At the end of each B turn, we'll count the supply depots and update the scores. This is also when you'll gain or lose armies, as described below. Be sure to label every set of orders with the round and turn, to prevent confusion. For example, your first set of orders should be labeled "Round 1A." Then the next set will be Round 1B, then Rounds 2A, 2B, 3A, etc. The deadline for communication of orders will be posted on the main page and in our classroom. If you ever miss a deadline, then you just lose that turn. GAINING AND LOSING ARMIES At the end of each B turn, we'll count the supply depots and update the scores. It's at this point that you'll gain or lose armies. If you gain a new territory during the A turn, your army must still be there at the end of the B turn to get the new army. If you lose a supply depot during the A turn, you won't lose an army until the B turn is over. The number of supply depots (the score, in other words) you control must match the number of flags you have on the map. After I update the scores, I will add or subtract flags to make these numbers agree. When I remove armies, I'll start with the one that is farthest from your home territory. Any new armies you gain must appear in your home territory. This has two important results. First, a region can only hold one army at a time, so if you have armies in all of your home regions, there's no room for a new army. In that case, you just don't get it. At the end of the next B turn, if I owe you an army and you now have room for it in your home territory, you'll get it then. Also, if you ever lose control of your home territory, you won't get any new armies until you reconquer it and then leave a home region empty for the new army to have room. No matter how many supply depots you control, if your home regions are not under your control and or are not open, you will not get any new armies. Typically you lose armies only when you lose supply depots, but there is another way it can happen. Sometimes an army will lose a battle and have to retreat. If the army is surrounded and has absolutely no where to run, then that army is squeezed out of existence. The flag simply disappears from the map, though you may get it back at the next score update. MOVING YOUR ARMIES Our armies are amphibious: they may move equally well on land or water, but armies may only move one region per round. In one round, your army may move from one region to any region that borders it or onto any body of water that borders it. For example, if you have an army in Venezuela, in one round you may move to Colombia, the Amazon Basin, Guyana, or onto the Caribbean Sea. You may not move to places like Cuba, Guatemala, Panama, or Puerto Rico until the next round because they are two regions away. Plan your moves carefully. Remember: your army has to be sitting in a new region at the end of the B turn for you to claim it. So if you're going into a region that is more than one move away, try to arrive there on the B round. For example, imagine you have an army in Guyana and you want it to move up to attack Cuba. For the A turn, write for one turn "Guyana army to Carribbean." Then in the next turn, write "Carribbean army to Cuba." When the B turn ends, you'll have a new supply depot and get another army. To move an army, just say in your written orders what army you want to move and where you want to move it. For simplicity sake, we'll just name the army after the region that it's in before it moves, either land region or sea region.   WHAT YOU WANT... WHAT TO WRITE... You want your army in Bolivia to move east and attack Brasilia, a so-far empty region with a supply depot Bolivia to Brasilia OR Bolivia attacks Brasilia You want your army in Rio de Janiero to attack Paraguay with support from Argentina, so that if Bolivia has the same idea you'll win with 2-versus-1 Rio attacks Paraguay Argentina supports Rio in Paraguay You want Chilé and Bolivia to support each other so that if Argentina attacks either one, you still defend your regions with 2 versus Argentina's 1. Chilé and Bolivia support each other You have nothing for Uruguay to do. Uruguay stands. Technically, this last one isn't necessary: unless you write orders telling me otherwise, I'll assume that your armies are just staying where they are and doing nothing. I'll never assume anything about your orders. If you don't write something down, it didn't happen. SUGGESTION: The game gets complicated, especially later on when the players left have more forces, so it's easy to forget or overlook something. I suggest you begin your orders by making a written list of all your armies. Then work your way down the list, giving all the armies something to do, even if it's just to stay put and support someone else. A good rule of thumb is "Every army does something every turn." ATTACKING AND SUPPORTING Attacking is easy. To attack a region, just write in your orders that your army moves into that region. But if someone else is occupying that region or moves into it at the same time, you haven't won your attack. The result was one army on your side versus one army from some other player. That's a tie, and it means that your army goes back where it came from. If the other army was there before you attacked, they stay there. If they attacked when you did, they go back to. Bottom line: neither army wins. For example, PURPLE orders: Libyan army to Egypt. GOLD orders: Jordan army to Egypt. RESULT: Even match, one versus one. Both armies go back where they came from. So the only way to win is for your army to outnumber the competition. In this game, we do this by having other armies support our attacks. Any army can support an attack so long as that army borders the country that is being attacked. You can use one of your armies to support another of your armies, like in the example below, or you can get support from one of the other players. This is one of the big reasons for having our players make deals with each other. For example, PURPLE orders: Libyan army to Egypt. GOLD orders: Jordan army to Egypt.                      Red sea army supports Jordan in Egypt. RESULT: Two versus one. Gold takes Egypt, and Purple goes back to Libya. To support an attack, an army must be in a region borders the region that is being attacked. It's not enough that the army borders the attacker; it has to border the victim in order to be of any help. For example, say Namibia wants to attack Angola. South Africa cannot support this attack: it borders the attacker (Namibia) but not the victim (Angola). But the South Africa army can move to Botswana in one turn, and then in the next turn the player can order "Namibia attacks Angola. Botswana supports Namibia in Angola." Sometimes it will be useful for two neighboring regions to support each other, so that if either is attacked it will automatically have the support of the other, giving it two forces to fend off the attack. To do this, just write in your orders something like Namibia and South Africa support each other. When writing down orders, be very clear about who is supporting whom where. SUGGESTION: A useful technique for holding on to a large area is use what I call "The Wall." This means that you take and hold certain regions to surround your area. Each region should have an army which supports the region next to it, building a sort of wall. The regions inside the wall usually don't need armies, so their armies can venture out and gain you new regions. Again, I'll never assume anything about your orders, including your armies supporting each other. If you don't write something down, it didn't happen.