Tag archives for Megagame Makers
Days of Fire by Samuel Katz [Book Review]
I picked up Days of Fire as part of my background reading for the Divided Land megagame last Saturday. Samuel Katz was a member of Irgun in the mid 40s, and Days of Fire is his story of how Irgun pushed Israel into being. Days of Fire Days of Fire is aptly titled, Palestine from 1944 until the end of the British Mandate was a turbulent place. Thousands of people were killed or wounded in the violence and more were dispossessed. Even before the British withdrew there was a civil war. Irgun were an extremist breakaway group of the Revisionist Zionists. A bit like PIRA three decades later. Mostly they tried to cause chaos and avoid killing people, although sometimes their warnings went unheeded, like the bombing of the King David Hotel. Katz started as a secretary to the South…
1866 Megagame – Offside Report
The Prussian Team for Game 2 of 1866 and all that assembles. Yesterday I played in an 1866 megagame, well in one of two 1866 megagames. Megagame Makers ran two simultaneous megagames about the 1866 bruderkrieg (between the Prussians and the Italians on one side and the Austrians and their allies on the other). One of the most interesting things about today's 1866 megagame was that there were two entirely identical games going on at the same time. The only difference between the 1866 megagames were the players. Both games had the same briefings, maps, counters and mechanics. The end results were quite different, although in both cases fairly close to historic. Certainly within the bounds of plausibility. My role in the 1866 Megagame Unusually I was playing the megagame. This was because Alexander came to play in his first…
Megagame – Watch the Skies 2: Global Conspiracy
This is a copy of an article from my game blog On Saturday I was the lead control for the East Asia region in Megagame Makers largest game so far, Watch the Skies: Global Conspiracy. You can read rather a lot about it on twitter, facebook, reddit and a number of blogs because there were over 300 people involved in this megagame. Look for #WTS2 to find some of it. So my role started some time ago, the first Watch the Skies megagame, with a mere 50 players, was filmed by the chaps at Shut Up & Sit Down and megagames became insanely popular. I missed WTS because of family commitments (it was my daughter's birthday weekend). WTS2, and just about every other megagame, got booked up overnight and I couldn't get a space on it. Jim Wallman had a plan…
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Megagame – Funeral Games II – pt.2 – Cassander
This is the second part of my offside report on the Megagame Makers megagame 'Funeral Games II' which I played in on Saturday. It covered the period following Alexander the Great's death and the struggle by his successors to attain power. In the first half of the game I played Antipater, until he died of old age in his bed, then I played his heir, Cassander. Cassander This afforded me a moment to breathe. I was reincarnated as Cassander, my heir. As it turns out Perdiccas got killed and he became my younger brother Alexarchus. Another player also got reassigned then too and played the middle brother Pleistarchus. We had a short breather and plotted how to establish ourselves as powerful, the downfall of Queen Olympias and the rebuilding of Thebes. Cassander''s Objectives Gain control of Macedonia Expand your power…
Megagame – Funeral Games II – pt.1 Antipater
Today I played in the Megagame Makers ''Funeral Games II'' which was the second outing of a classic Megagame of what happens after Alexander the Great dies. As such it involves a mix of military operations, politics and personal relationships to cement power and block others from achieving it. My starting role was as Antipater, one of three regents agreed by Macedonian Assembly in Babylon in the days following Alexander''s death. Antipater was the Governor of Macedonia, Regent and Strategos of Europe and Head of the Hellenic League. The only person with more legitimacy than him to command is Perdiccas, another Regent who is in Babylon with Alexander''s body and the two Kings (Philip III and Alexander IV). At the beginning the Greek city states have revolted under their Democratic leaders. Democracy was out of favour, the Macedonians prefer oligarchs.…