WAR ROOM - New Larry Harris Game

Tan n you YG. I have signed up for the bulletins.

Ditto!

Awesome!

Thanks for the link YG!

So, thats it then ? Global 40 really was the last A&A game ? No more games with plastic miniatures. Larry have joined the Block gamers

Aaaahhhhh! I need my non block pieces !

@Narvik:

So, thats it then ? Global 40 really was the last A&A game ? No more games with plastic miniatures. Larry have joined the Block gamers

Well, they say it is a prototype, so there is still chances that they will come up with something that is not as butt ugly as the blocks they use…  I am looking forward to see that kickstarter and to see if they have stretch goals, etc…

Looks Terrible. Look at Africa its not even remotely realistic looking or south America. Round board is stupid. People own rectangle shaped tables. On top of that just stacks of roundels representing armies. Don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Harris is synonymous with plastic bits moving on large map with buckets of dice. Arrg.

I bet blocks are it.  Plastic minis are $$$ and Nightingale games looks pretty small… 3 guys working out of a house(s)… not that there is anything wrong with that.

The game maybe is more focused on supply and logistics?  That would be interesting.

I’ll try to keep an open mind but I’m not encouraged by this. I like playing with little plastic army men. If you’re going to make a game with a bunch of blocks, then you might as well just make a computer game of it instead and forget about all of the little blocks. It would probably make a decent strategy computer game.

Counter type war games have been around since the dawn of commercial war gaming in the early fifties. Still a large contingent of war gamers play these style games. Doesn’t appear to be any blocks, just thick counters. Block games are different and add a level of fog of war to the mix. That’s not really what it’s  looking like what is going on here.
The circle map is a different idea, but not unique, Victory in Europe by Columbia games has a circle map of Europe.

Pre-production photos are just that, pre-production. Let’s wait and see what it will be looking like come fall on kickstarter, and if there are any differences.

If anything, it is different, I applaud Larry Harris for trying something new.

@The:

If anything, it is different, I applaud Larry Harris for trying something new.

Me too. The site does use the “secret” word, which suggests the addition of a dynamic that is missing in a&a. Whether that is as in block games or Diplomacy or whatever I await with interest. Look forward to the opportunity to play it.

@Private:

@The:

If anything, it is different, I applaud Larry Harris for trying something new.

Me too. The site does use the “secret” word, which suggests the addition of a dynamic that is missing in a&a. Whether that is as in block games or Diplomacy or whatever I await with interest. Look forward to the opportunity to play it.

That “secret” part caught my eye too. Maybe units are counters, so the opponent(s) won’t know which types of units you have? But hey, who knows…

My first thought upon seeing the tiles in the new game was that it might be possible to play the game with sculpts borrowed from A&A…but then several potential objections came to mind.

First: the tiles are numbered, and it’s reasonable to assume that the numbers have a specific function under the game rules…possibly a unit-identification system related to the secret orders mentioned in the game description.  The lack of numbers on the A&A sculpts may make it difficult or impossible to apply those rules.

Second, the new game doesn’t appear – at least from what we can see – to have the same diversity of unit types as A&A.  Instead, it seems to use three basic shapes: squares, circles and oblongs; I assume these represent armies, air forces and fleets respectively.

Third, the game uses stacks – literal stacks – of tiles.  It’s not clear how these stacks work or what they represent, but they may not correspond to the A&A concept of stacks of mini poker chips to indicate how many units of one type are on the board in a particular location.  On the other hand, and in relation to the second point which I mentioned, it’s perhaps significant that each stack in the prototype, as far as I can tell, contains the same colours of tiles – green, blue and tan for the square pieces, for example – regardless of what national flag sits on top of the pile…which perhaps implies that the tile colours represent unit types or unit numbers rather than nationalities.

Fourth, the map may not provide enough space to deploy A&A sculpts as replacements for the game tiles – even if the function of those tiles can somehow be replicated using sculpts, which I suspect can’t actually be done.

Gargantua did some play testing with Larry on this new game.  I am going to see Garg in a couple weeks.  I’ll try to wring some more details from him then……  :wink:

That is, if he will tell me anything…  :lol:

@Karl7:

That is, if he will tell me anything…

In fairness, he probably won’t because playtesters usually operate under a non-disclosure agreement.  On the other hand, the War Room website says there will be demos of the game on June 24 and July 28-30, and I assume that the game will become publicly discussable after the June 24 demo, which is next week.