From: "Paul Aceto" <paceto@ihug.co.nz>
Subject: GMT's Clash of Giants: initial impressions
Date: 28 October 2001 06:22

GMT's Clash of Giants (WWI Battles of Tannenberg, The Marne) arrived on
Friday and I had a chance to push the counters around over the weekend.

So far, two thumbs up.  I do most of my gaming solitaire, and this game has
the things needed to make solo play work in my book: 1) low counter density;
2) lots of variability; and 3) clean, simple rules.  I'm into turn 12 of the
15-turn Tannenberg game, one I thought would be an easy Russian victory but
is turning into a Russian marginal loss after a major battle near Gumbinnen.
I'd say each side needs only 2-3 minutes to move and fight.

Some other observations:

Good looking map.  There are large sections you'll probably never use.

As mentioned above, clean rules.  I haven't had any questions yet.  There is
one general booklet (8 pages) and battle-specific rules in a second booklet.

The counters are functional and on the large side.  Grey for Germans, green
for Russians, blue for French and tan for British.  The counters have
different shades to denote which army or (in some cases) corps they belong
too.  Most units are divisions, with some brigades.  Most too are infantry,
with some cavalry and one cavalry-like Jaeger unit.  And, since the Marne is
included, there is a "Paris Taxi" marker to get a unit to the front quickly.

One of the unique aspects of this game design is at the beginning of your
player turn you roll for each army to see how many movement points it will
have.  Each army moves in turn, and then you have combat.  In this way, the
disorganization of certain armies can be simulated by producing lots of
turns with only 1-2 movement points.  For example, the Russian 1st Army  in
Tannenberg can usually get 4 movement points per turn until it takes its
first defensive loss in combat, at which point the Army commander gets
cautious and you're more likely to end up with 1-2 MP.  All this by the way
greatly aids solitaire play, since you never really know how much the other
side will be able to do.

Combat is a bit different too.  Each unit has 1-2 steps, which serve as the
combat factor.  Units are also given an efficiency rating of 1-5.  Higher
odds produce die roll modifiers, as do some terrain features.  In a combat,
each side rolls for its units (at higher odds, the attacker may not need to
roll for all attacking units).  If the modified die roll is above the unit's
efficiency rating, the unit takes a step loss and retreats the difference
between die roll and rating.  Natural sixes are always a step loss, natural
ones never are.  So you can have a situation where a small force with 4 or 5
efficiency rating can do some damage to a larger force of 2 efficiency
rating units.

So far, playing the Tannenberg game has given me a good feel for the
historcial situation: 2 big lumbering Russian Armies inch their way toward
objectives while the Germans concentrate their forces for 1-2 major
counterattacks.

It will be fun to try The Marne next.