Mike Reed - Jan 29, 2006 10:42 pm (#12107 Total: 12132) “Disneyland... where you can burn down the village, torture the civilians, steal the treasure, sell the brides, and sing in a drunken stupor... as long as you don't rape the women." - Anon. cross-posted from the Twilight Struggle folder... Foiled by a 13-yr old... Well, finally had time this afternoon while home to play a game of TS with my son. Doubled as a 'learning experience', as we read the explanation text behind each of the event cards as they were played. Total time including teaching the game, the extra reading, and play was about 3-1/2 to 4 hours. Game moved along at quite a clip, despite the impediments. My son, the Premier of the Evil Empire, won... Things looked up for the US early, with the Marshall Plan firmly helping get some control of battlegrounds in Europe, amongst other things. It hurt a bit that I had all three scoring cards in my initial deal. Got Europe beefed to the point where I was able to score with Domination. Was a wash in Asia, and a timely grab of Lebanon & Israel gave me Domination in the Middle East. Meanwhile, he used Werner von Braun & some other dice to get some dog into space...while all I did was blow up a rocket on the pad. A lot of good back & forth, seeing me about lose my entire foothold in Europe & Asia due to revolting Vietnam & a bunch of Socialists...I tried again to launch an Animal into space (Fidel), but once again, it blew up (with a little solace that it would be some time until that happened again. THAT, happened right after a shuffle, and the Commies were in Cuba, with Defcon sitting at 2). In the meantime, the Sovs had their lunar probes, orbits, you name it, I still was blowing up a series of Monkeys, Dogs, and Horses... A well-timed ABM treaty allowed me both a reduction of Defcon to 3, with a subsequent degrading to 2 when my newly released troops descended on Havana and got Fidel out of there pronto (helps to roll a 6 on the Coup Attempt). Seeing that I was making a power play into Central America, he rightfully guessed I had the scoring card, and counter-couped into Nicaragua, at least getting himself presence there. Then a bunch of zealot priests start teaching the Catholics in Latin America that they should be free of our yoke, and the red fever spread into South America... About this time, armed with a bunch of Chinese weapons, the Commies invaded Cuba again, forcing out Ricky Ricardo's cabinet and installing one of their own. To make matters worse, not even a clash along the Chinese-Soviet border could make things less rosy between those two communist countries, as a successful Cultural Revolution by Chairman Mao had the USSR and PRC all kissy-face again. The war had now shifted into a new phase in Africa & South America, as the Arabs made peace with Israel (for the most part). Nonetheless, a bunch of hippies were holding the US' hand, and caused a big ruckus when a brush war (so nicely given to me as the event by Missile Envy, the brat) in Angola made it to the nightly news. Things were looking grim...but fortunately, the successes of a domination of Africa were able to fend off a likewise domination of South America by the Soviets...all the time while some Russian clown was circling the moon (but at least the latest animal, an Iguana, was successfully in space for the US). All was looking rosy at the beginning of Turn 6, with the election of a Polish Pope heralding a turn of the balances in Europe, yet there was an ace up the Soviet sleeve...the reshuffle had so nicely placed the South American scoring card back into Red hands, and the result was an auto win for the forces of Evil. All in all, quite the play. My son was able to pick up the nuances of the game quite well by the middle of the second turn. He's pretty good at picking up wicked combos, and the back-to-back turns of SA Scoring, though they did me in, wasn't the ultimate reason for my downfall... I especially liked his timing in Turn 5...plays the China Card to get 4 ops, which he uses to Coup a US-controlled Cuba, and gets the jackpot when he rolls a 6. Follows that up the next turn with the Ussuri River skirmish, gets the ops to place running over Central America, leaving the somewhat moot (scored in turn 3) Asian influence to me. Next op, he plays the Cultural Revolution, and takes BACK the China Card (face down as it was in my hand) ready for his use if needed in Turn 6. Ugh. One question did come up with regards to the space race benefit of 'discard held card'. Since he had two 'held cards' as a result of playing the China card that turn, could he still only discard one card, or both? Moot in our game since he only wanted to discard one, but worth finding out. Excellent game, excellent teaching tool. Pat yourselves on the back guys, great game...even my wife was interested in the commentary when she passed by the kitchen table.