Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards

Over the last few years, my brother and I have been modifying Global 1940 (hence Axis & “BRO”-llies). At this point, we have added so many house rules that the game has evolved into an entirely new beast… D12 dice system, expanded unit list, advanced Technology Tree, Oil… It’s simply too much to post all at once, so over the next few weeks I will upload different elements for you all to analyze, critique, bash, and/or steal.

Today, I would like to share the Action Card and Event Card element. To date, we have created 879 Action Cards, and 78 Event Cards. Yes, you read that correctly. I’m still figuring out the best way to share such a huge collection, so you will have to hang tight. In the mean time, though, I will describe how we use them.

Event Cards

At the beginning of each round, one Event Card is drawn. The events include impacts on weather, special combat situations, bonuses, and even detriments of all flavours. If applicable, the Event Card affects gameplay for one entire round. At the end of the round, the card is discarded (along with its effects). The process then is repeated until the game is over. Most of our games last between 10-15 rounds, so each game is different. Here are a few examples:

Once the Event Card has been resolved, we move on to…

Action Cards

Each side (Axis and Allies) draws 5 new Action Cards after the Event Card has been resolved. This means that the German, Italian and Japanese player shares a pool of Action Cards (same goes for the Allies). Each side cannot hold more than 7 cards in a round, so if you exceed this amount after drawing, you have to discard down to 7 (you choose which cards you want to get rid of).

Action Cards provide special bonuses for nearly every aspect of the game (combat, mobilization, movement, technology, etc.). Here is a brief run down of the rules:

1. You can only play one card per phase of your turn (Tech, Purchase Units, Combat Movement, Non-Combat Movement, Mobilization, Collect Income).

2. During combat, you can only play one card per combat round. During combat, the Attacker declares if they are using a card. Then, the Defender declares if they are using a card. At that point, both are revealed simultaneously, effects are applied, and then the rolling begins. There are some cards that happen after rolling has taken place; if you play such a card, you can’t have played a card at the beginning of the combat round.

Here are a few examples of Action Cards:

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

I can see where they are not over whelming for game. You can pick and choose 1 for each phase in turn.

We chose to make it this way so that you can’t stack cards in a phase or battle. This limits their power a bit, and forces you to make hard choices of when to use certain cards.

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

It doesn’t slow game down A bit ?

We have found the game isn’t really slowed down much. First of all, we have a maximum of 7 cards in our hands at a time, which is fairly easy to keep track of. Second, I have made an effort to honour Larry Harris’s mantra of KISS; most of the cards are very straightforward and self explanatory. Third, during game play we make an effort to plan which cards we are using and while our opponent is doing their turn.

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

How many games have you played with them ?

How many years have you used them ?

I have been working on these cards for the better part of 7 years, and have played countless games with them (don’t get my wife started). The first four years I would consider the development phase. I started the project out small, with only a handful of cards that were modelled off of the National Advantages from Axis & Allies Revised. They weren’t pretty either. I simply used a Mircosoft Word document and printed them on basic paper (yuck). After nearly every game I tweaked the cards, added some, and removed some. I spent a lot of time considering how the cards impacted the balance of the game. As you can imagine, there were a lot of issues to work out. I toyed with higher and lower hand limits, cards that were too powerful, and mechanics that don’t exist anymore. About 3 years ago, I became more or less satisfied with the balance and streamlined mechanics of the cards. Since then, I have only had to tweak the odd card for clarity. This has given me tons of time to playtest the cards, which made me feel confident enough to move on to the next phase of development…

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

From pictures got to be a bunch unless you designed them to look like they came from WW2.

I had a month off of work this summer, so I made it my goal to beautify the cards. I took my drab MS Word document and transformed them into what you see today. I intended to make them look like they came from WWII. Boy, it took forever, but adding the historical images and using the military typeface really adds to the immersion. I had the cards printed on 100# cardstock and cut to size at the local university print shop. This ran me about $90CAD.

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

These cards would also work great for smaller campaign games but tweaked or reduce the whole number of cards.

Absolutely. Once I finally get them available to you guys, feel free to do just that.

@SS-GEN said in Axis & Brollies : Action Cards and Event Cards:

Great cards. Thanks for sharing. Looking forward to seeing more.

Thank you! It has been a labour of love. Not a problem for sharing… It has always been my plan to share with the community, I just wanted to wait until I felt like the cards were “ready.” I am figuring out the best way to share these with you guys… Stay tuned!

I play face to face exclusively… I suppose I’m a bit of a luddite for saying this, but table top A&A just has a magic that can’t be replicated on the computer.

I have some time this weekend to get this stuff to you guys.

As promised, here are the PDF Files of Doom:

Action Cards

Event Cards

D12 Unit Rules and Card Backs

For a discussion on my D12 unit list, check out this thread on the House Rules page.

Have fun!

No problem, SS Gen. I figured it was worth immortalizing it all in case I get hit by a bus or something.