Here is an old game from the mid eighties. I played it for the first time last night and it was surprisingly fun. The idea is that America is getting invaded by the east, west, and south by three separate groups. The invaders are not allies and though destroying America is the common goal they can and do fight each other.
It is a game kind of like A&A. There are different pieces and they do different things. The invaders have a finite number of units and I like that. So, once they lose a unit it is gone and can't come back. America though gets cards that determine where and how it gets reinforcements. This turned out to be uneven. THe east invader had most of the America forces come up near him and include some bad rolls and he was getting his butt kicked. I was the south invader and few cards effected me and I was able to conquer more cities then the other two guys combined. In the last round of the invaders getting more units though the 2 cards America pulled didn't give him any new troops and that pretty much sealed it for him.
Anyone else have this game gathering dust in your closet? It seems to have held up really well as far as playability. Our game took 4 hours since none of us remembered anything and what we thought we knew was mostly wrong. But I doubt our next game will last half that long.
Anyone else have this game gathering dust in your closet? It seems to have held up really well as far as playability. Our game took 4 hours since none of us remembered anything and what we thought we knew was mostly wrong. But I doubt our next game will last half that long.
It's a very good game. In general, as a 2 player game the invaders should win. As a 4 player game (where the invaders might not work together as well as possible) it is a bit closer. My best friend and I played a year ago and have it on google calender to play in 2017 :-)
The general secret to winning with America is to hold in the East and make sure the West never moves up more than one space per turn (and less on the fast path near the south). The it largely turns into:
A) How the big battles in the East go
B) How the South does.
Having the US retake cities is huge. The invaders need to try to stop that. In general if you get cards that show up in the south at the right time you can retake things fairly easily. The West and East are a lot harder.
As a variant you can either:
A) Give the American player one or two cards at the start of the game that he can play whenever (but only 1 per turn)
B) Let the American player draw an extra card and discard one of his choice.
We've done A a lot and 2 cards seems about right (slight US advantage maybe?) Also starting out with a laser or two makes a huge difference (I think the game suggests this) but I like the cards better.
It has the "way too random" problem going for it, and with a set of horrible rolls in the East the game can be over quite quickly.
The US's ability to retake cities and thus get more cards was big. The funny part of our game was that the East invader was doing so bad he rarely took cities and the other two invaders did so well when they took the cities there was no way to get them back. I think america might do better trying to lose cities they can get back just so they can get the extra cards.
The US's ability to retake cities and thus get more cards was big. The funny part of our game was that the East invader was doing so bad he rarely took cities and the other two invaders did so well when they took the cities there was no way to get them back. I think america might do better trying to lose cities they can get back just so they can get the extra cards.
That's pretty risky as the defense has such a big advantage.
The thing is that with lasers and reasonable reinforcements in the west/south you can often retake a city. Which leads to more cards which leads to more chances to repeat...
I like the ruleset, but the design (of requiring the invaders to have a LITTLE bit of infighting but not too much) makes it less than ideal.
For example...in a two player game where one person controls all the invaders and NEVER infights with them....its almost impossible for the US to win.
Conversely, in a 4 player game where the invaders fight a little bit too much....its almost impossible for them to win (usually due to the massive amounts of lasers that exclusively target bombers until they are all toast, then moving down the line of usefulness to helis then tanks).
Of all the games in the Gamemaster line, I rank them as follows....
Shogun (Just like risk but WAY more strategy)
Axis and Allies (Great except for the guy stuck with Russia)
Fortress America (Balance issues mentioned above)
Broadsides and Boarding Parties (an exercise in dice rolling luck, little strategy)
Conquest of the Empire (Catapults rule the galaxy....broken)
I have all but CotE sitting on one of my many gaming shelves and Shogun is the only one to get some action. We usually play one of the other A&A games when we want an A&A fix.
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Inside my hands these petals browned;
dried up falling to the ground,
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I pushed my fingers through the earth,
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Those were great games we used to play quite often back in the day Fortress America was fun but it never got the amount of replay that A&A got. A&A used to get really interesting when some would get luck with research and get heavy bombers etc. I don't think we ever had someone play only Russia. Maybe because if we had that many people we would just end up playing DnD.
__________________ I play 4E, it's too bad we cannot discuss its flaws yet without flamewars and thread crapping.
If any of you are interested in online Fortress America play, we have a yahoo group, a ranking ladder, and an on-line version of the game (with a few minor mods to facilitate on-line play).
Given your comments above, I think that some of you may learn some new tactical lessons by playing a broader set of opponents. Bombers in detroit or Minneapolis doesn't sound right & USA always losing in 2 player games doesn't sound right (although its about 55-45 in the invaders favor in our experience).
For official "ladder matches" leading to rankings, we use a 2-out-of-3 method to balance play rather than changing the game itself. Sides for the third game are based o how well each of the first 2 games were won.
This is a great group that avoids the flame wars so common in other gaming groups, so if you do sign up, please keep it that way.
USA always losing in 2 player games doesn't sound right (although its about 55-45 in the invaders favor in our experience).
If you were the invaders and played them separately, then yes it would probably be a fair game.
What has happened in my experience, however, is that when one person controls them all and plays them as ONE BIG TEAM it allows the eastern seaboard to get overwhelmed (With the south taking a right and taking Florida and leaving the SW to the western invaders), which ruins the americans day.
Of course, I haven't played a TON of games, but I have played 20-30 of them in my lifetime and this has been my experience. Its been so long since I have picked up the dice for this one that better tactics may prevail.
What we've generally seen is that the USA is a bit harder to learn to play, because most strategy games reward agression, but the USA player must perform a slow tactical withdrawl with precision counter attacks, and maximized felexibility in unit positioning to be available to multiple fronts.
I can't imagine the Invaders winning against a good USA player with the southern Invaders heading for florida (of course, I haven't seen it, so I could be wrong). A good USA player won't let you past D.C. and Atlanta in the East, and will basically allow the west to advance 1 territory at a time by denying the helo special move with a row of defensive positions 1 space beyond the adavnce. It usually comes down to whether Blue & Yellow can capture & hold Memphis, St. Louis, and Kansas City, while red hols Florida, Atlanta, and DC.
Come test any theories about an unbeatable invader against some of our veteran players. BTW: Not all matches have to be ladder matches. Many new members of the group will play a few "friendly" games before challenging someone to a ladder match.
I was America today and lost. I kicked butt early rounds but I had unlucky cards in round 4 and 5 getting only one card that gave units. Round 7 I got 5 cards but the dice turned against me and I was unable to take back enough cities to keep the game going.
I played this a lot with my brothers in the 80s. It nearly equaled Shogun in repeated play. Shogun was our favorite, Axis and Allies second, with FA a close third.
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