Free war / strategy board games

[Dveman115]

I've been looking for a free war / strategy game that isn't to hard to understand, and should be meant to be played in one sitting. Diplomacy is sort of what I'm looking for, but It was meant for a lot of people and to be played by (e)mail. So it needs to easy enough to understand how to play within an hour, has to be meant for a small number of people, and it can't drag on for hours on end (axis and allies is great, but while not free, it doesn't consume an incredible amount of time). So, any ideas?

EDIT: Oh, and I have to be able to make all the assets myself. Just a map and pieces would be nice. I can print an unlimited number of pages, so that isn't a problem...

[ancestral]

I've been looking for a free war / strategy game that isn't to hard to understand, and should be meant to be played in one sitting. Diplomacy is sort of what I'm looking for, but It was meant for a lot of people and to be played by (e)mail. So it needs to easy enough to understand how to play within an hour, has to be meant for a small number of people, and it can't drag on for hours on end (axis and allies is great, but while not free, it doesn't consume an incredible amount of time). So, any ideas?

EDIT: Oh, and I have to be able to make all the assets myself. Just a map and pieces would be nice. I can print an unlimited number of pages, so that isn't a problem...

So you're looking for a tabletop game?

[Dveman115]

Board game, table-top game...it's all the same in my book. Any suggestions?

[Dave]

Settlers of Catan?

Carcassone?

These aren't "war games" per se, but they are strategy board games, and they are quickly played, and lots of fun. IMO strict "war games" diverge from being playable in a short amount of time.

David

[Sgt. Groovy]

Chess?

[Rhuvaen]

Wallenstein should be a good fit (currently on the market as Shogun, a remake in a feudal Japan theme). Economics and strategic assessment play a big role, and are cleverly implemented (you'll never be able to do as much as you want in a turn). There are custom rules for 2-player games, I believe.

Wallenstein can be tried out on http://www.spielbyweb.com, where you can also check out the rules.

I don't know any "free" games of this type that are really any good (and most strategy games have a lot of components which need to be of a certain quality to enjoy the game and stay on the board).

[jb]

axis and allies is great, but while not free, it doesn't consume an incredible amount of time

Axis and Allies is indeed free.

http://triplea.sourceforge.net/mywiki

[Dragonchampion]

Or, if you look long enough, you will find the 1998 version free.

[Turuk]

Battle for Moscow

I can print an unlimited number of pages, so that isn't a problem...

I would kill for this many free prints.

[unsung]

axis and allies is great, but while not free, it doesn't consume an incredible amount of time

Yes, yes it does. Great game, but I've seen it last well over 6 hours. In fact, most people can't set it up in less than an hour.

[ancestral]

I'll put my vote for Puerto Rico. Definitely not war and very much strategy, it's resources based, in the Caribbean of course.

And not only is the tabletop version awesome, there's a free online version too.

http://www.phial.com/puerto-rico/

(Should be Win, Mac, and Linux.)

[Jetrel]

Yes, yes it does. Great game, but I've seen it last well over 6 hours. In fact, most people can't set it up in less than an hour.

Games like axis and allies, Risk, etc, were just made to be played on a computer. They succeeded as board games only because strategy games are very addictive, as we all know, and people were willing to put up with the time cost to play them the only way possible.

It was always barely tenable, except for the few freaks who could actually afford the time cost. I'm not sorry to see the physical/traditional strategy gaming genre die to computer equivalents of the exact same games. Good riddance. Playing them on a physical board sucked - I've been there, and I know.

[Velensk]

I would disagree. There are some things that the computer does make much more convinent. However there are also many things that always feel better when you're playing them in person. Admittedly, I don't like playing risk on or off a computer and I whole heartly agree that Axis and Allies works better on a computer. However there are some war games that just wouldn't be as fun to play through that interface and without the interaction.

[Turuk]

I would disagree. There are some things that the computer does make much more convinent. However there are also many things that always feel better when you're playing them in person. Admittedly, I don't like playing risk on or off a computer and I whole heartly agree that Axis and Allies works better on a computer. However there are some war games that just wouldn't be as fun to play through that interface and without the interaction.

Agreed, I've played them on a physical board as well (they are not that old), and I have good memories of getting together with some buddies and sitting down to play through a game for a night. If it took longer than that, you can just put it up somewhere to finish later or tally up who was in the best position to win, and that was that.

[Jetrel]

I would disagree. There are some things that the computer does make much more convinent. However there are also many things that always feel better when you're playing them in person. Admittedly, I don't like playing risk on or off a computer and I whole heartly agree that Axis and Allies works better on a computer. However there are some war games that just wouldn't be as fun to play through that interface and without the interaction.

Agreed, I've played them on a physical board as well (they are not that old), and I have good memories of getting together with some buddies and sitting down to play through a game for a night. If it took longer than that, you can just put it up somewhere to finish later or tally up who was in the best position to win, and that was that.

You can play videogames in person - It's called hotseat. Or a 'lan party'. It's exactly like playing board games in person, except the games suck less. I'm not arguing that it was impossible to have a good time doing tabletop games; I'm arguing that it's better on a computer. It's like the argument between reading news on paper, versus reading news on a computer.

Seriously. Imagine if wesnoth took 2-4 times longer to play than it does now (no rule changes). Be honest with yourself - would you still be able to play it? I know it would be so slow that I wouldn't be able to enjoy it at all. For me, once I played risk on a computer, it was "once you go black, you don't go back." The first time I played a computerized version, I pretty much permanently swore off the board version. It was like taking rocks out of my shoes. I haven't played a non-computer strategy game in years, and I'm not looking back.


Believe me; if anyone is a canonical case for someone who should like this stuff, I am. This is coming from a guy who designed about 2 (primitive) wargames when I was about 10. I have the natural urge to do it. I didn't call them 'wargames' then; we were just looking for something more interesting to do during our lunchbreaks than tabletop football or "pogs", but looking back, it's exactly what they were. I even had hitpoints, terrain, and movetypes. (The terrain was drawn onto a sheet of graph paper, and the units were little "multiple of a cell-size" cutouts of graph paper. We had infantry, tanks, planes, and each of them had different rules for moving over different kinds of ground. It was like Advance Wars on graph paper, for a modern comparison.) It was fun to design it, but the actual play of it was all a sham. It sucked; we got like 2-3 moves into it and the lunchbreak was over. We tried it for several weeks and finally stopped playing it in disgust. It was vaporware; we liked the idea of it, but actually playing it wasn't fun because it took too long.