Labyrinth (board game)

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Labyrinth: The War on Terror, 2001 -?
Game data
author Volko Ruhnke
graphic Donal Hegarty
Rodger B. MacGowan
Leland Myrick
Volko Ruhnke
Mark Simonitch
publishing company GMT Games
Publishing year 2010
Art map-based conflict simulation
Teammates 1-2
Duration 180 minutes
Age from 12 years

Awards

James F. Dunnigan Award Design Elegance Award 2010: Winner
Charles S. Roberts Award 2010: Best Post-WW2 Era Board Wargame

Labyrinth: The War on Terror, 2001 -? is a two-player board game released by GMT Games in 2010 . It is a map-based conflict simulation that shows the war on terrorhas on the subject. In the two-player game, one takes on the role of the United States and the other takes on the role of the jihadists. With the help of event cards you try to achieve completely individual game goals with your own options for action. The game can be played in about three hours. There are rules for a solo mode, in which the actions of the jihadists depend on those of the player and are also taken in response by the player. In 2016 an expansion was released under the title Labyrinth: The Awakening, 2010 -? simulating the events from 2010 onwards (Arab Spring). A second expansion titled Labyrinth: The Forever War, 2015 -? has already been announced. The German edition of the game was published in 2018 by Udo Grebe Gamedesign .

Theme and equipment

The game scenario is the war on terror that was declared after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 . One player takes on the role of the United States, the other that of jihadists. The game board focuses on the Middle East and the adjacent areas including Southeast Asia and North Africa to Europe. The game material includes:

  • 1 game board
  • 156 counters
  • 120 playing cards
  • 15 wooden dice
  • 15 black wooden cylinders
  • 1 rulebook
  • 2 player aids
  • 4 six-sided dice

Game mechanics

As in the Twilight Struggle, the game is played by two players against each other. One player takes on the role of the United States in the war on terror, the other the role of jihadists. The game board represents a map that shows the Middle East and the neighboring areas including Southeast Asia and Africa to Europe.

The countries are divided into the following categories:

  • Muslim: Countries with a majority Muslim population (Sunni or Shia mix). They have a variable quality of governance ( governance ; Good / Fair / Poor / Islamist Rule) and a variable orientation towards the USA ( alignment ; Ally / Neutral / Adversary). You are the main target of both players as the USA player tries to spread good governance while the jihadist tries to bring the countries under Islamist rule.
  • Non-Muslim: countries with a Muslim population in the minority. This also includes the Schengen states and most of the European states. Their governance is always good or fair and cannot be changed; Instead, an important element is their posture , i.e. the preferred strategy adopted in the war on terror, with hard posture symbolizing military operations and soft posture diplomacy. If too many countries adopt a posture different from that of the USA , the chances of success of American operations deteriorate.
  • The Iran is a special case. In terms of rules, it is de facto a Muslim country with permanent Fair Adversary leadership / orientation. The US player can therefore not perform any operations there, which is why the jihadist is good there. B. "Park" cells.

Country subcategories:

  • Schengen: 7 countries (groups) in the Schengen area: Scandinavia , Benelux countries , Germany , France , Spain , Italy , Eastern Europe . They are all considered to be contiguous; Moving cells between the Schengen states is therefore automatically successful.
  • Oil Exporters: Countries with significant oil exports that are worth additional resources in certain events: Algeria / Tunisia, Libya, Iraq, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, Indonesia / Malaysia.
  • WMDs: Countries with weapons of mass destruction that the jihadist can obtain under certain conditions: Russia , Central Asia (meaning former USSR states), Pakistan .

The specialty of Labyrinth is that the goals of the two players are different. While both players fight for the same goal with similar actions in the thematic predecessor Balance of Terror, both players have completely different goals and options for action in Labyrinth. The jihadist is trying to destabilize the region by bringing the countries to 3 or 4 while having to keep Americans 'reputations down in order to influence the Americans' dice bonus. The jihadist tries to expand his cells and has to increase his funding through attacks, as this influences how many cards he can play and how many cells he can place.

The American wants to prevent the jihadist from doing so and is trying to turn off the terrorist cells. He tries to stabilize the region by bringing the states to a political value of 1 or 2, and to keep the reputation of Americans in the world high. With him, the number of cards he can play depends on the soldiers on the game board. The more soldiers he sends to the states of the region, the more expensive the fight and the fewer cards he is allowed to play.

The OP value of each card is also used differently by both sides. While the American must play a card with a value of at least 2 in order to influence a country with the rank 2, but this operation is automatically successful (only for War of Ideas must be rolled), the political orientation of a state determines which of the jihadists Number he has to roll the dice and the value of a card, with how many dice he can roll. The success of the jihadist's operations is therefore a matter of chance. This makes it much more difficult for both sides to act in a very asymmetrical way in countries that the other has under control.

The events of the cards can either be clearly assigned to one of the two players or can be neutral. If a player plays a neutral card or his own card, he can choose between the event or operations with the card value (OP value). If he plays an opponent's card, he can only use the value of the card for himself, but the event that helps the opponent is still carried out. There are also several point bars that show the reputation ( prestige ) of the Americans in the world, the funding ( funding ) of the jihadists and the victory points of the two players.

There are rules for solo mode. In this, the player plays as USA, while the actions of the jihadist are controlled by flow charts . The actions are therefore relatively predictable; this advantage of the player is compensated by the fact that, for. B. US-associated events are not executed when played by the AI .

With the release of the first expansion, Labyrinth: The Awakening, 2010 -? The AI ​​has been further improved and an AI has been added for a solo game with reversed roles (player jihadist, AI United States).

In addition to the goals, the possible actions of the two players also differ greatly from each other:

United States operations

  • War of Ideas : a diplomatic operation to convince countries of the strategy of the USA, thereby influencing their posture , increasing the reputation of the USA, winning allies or improving their governance in Muslim countries (main goal of the game for the USA). The chances of success are very much dependent on the prestige of the USA.
  • Deploy : Use, transfer or withdraw your own armed forces in Muslim countries.
  • Disrupt : (dis) disrupting terrorist cells and increasing one's own reputation. Active cells are removed here; Sleepers are activated. If there are no more cells on the board, the USA has won.
  • Alert : Issue of a terrorist warning that thwarted an attack. If the jihadist planned the attack with a weapon of mass destruction, it will be confiscated, i. H. the marker is removed from play.
  • Regime Change : Military overthrow of a country under the rule of the Islamists. Certain events make the fall in Libya or Iraq possible even without the Islamist Rule,
  • Withdraw : Withdrawal of troops from a regime change operation.
  • Reassessment : Change of US strategy ( posture ) from hard to soft or vice versa.

Jihadist operations

  • Jihad : Jihadto weakenthe governance of a Muslim country. Sleeper cells used for the operation are activated. If the attempt fails, the cell is removed.
  • Major Jihad : An attempt to bring a Muslim country under the rule of the Islamists in order to improve its own financing and to achieve the ultimate goal of the game. A successful takeover of Pakistan by the Islamists also gives the jihadist three weapons of mass destruction.
  • Plot : Planning a terrorist attack in order to attract donors, make countries overreact and thereby worsen their stability and arouse distrust of the USA. One attempt is possible per cell; Sleepers are activated here. A successful attack with a weapon of mass destruction in the US immediately wins the game for the jihadist.
  • Recruit : Recruiting terrorist cells to carry out operations such as jihad (jihadist operations always require cells in the affected country). Recruiting in countries under the Islamist Rule or with an active regime change operation in the USA is automatically successful. The number of cells that can be transformed is of the funding ( Funding dependent); however, events may cause additional cells to be placed.
  • Travel : Relocation of terrorist cells to other countries. Active cells become sleepers, making it difficult to destroy them; therefore travel within a country is also possible. Trips within a country or to neighboring countries are automatically successful, other countries must be rolled; if the attempt fails, the cell is removed.

Both players can also save up to 2 operation points as reserves and thus achieve the required points for an operation even with several smaller cards together.

Scenarios

The game is based directly on the historical context. Therefore there are different starting lineups, whereby the players are of course free to develop their own scenarios:

  • Let's Roll : Situation right after the 2001 terrorist attacks ( 9/11 )
  • You can call me Al : like Let's Roll, but with Al Gore as President of the United States and a focus on diplomacy and humanitarian interests instead of overthrowing the Taliban regime (alternative reality)
  • Anaconda : Situation in early 2002, with ongoing intervention in Afghanistan; Some terror cells have escaped in neighboring countries
  • Mission accomplished ? Situation at the beginning of the Iraq war 2003; for the USA a more demanding scenario

Extensions

In 2016 the first expansion appeared under the title Labyrinth: The Awakening, 2010 -? which slightly changes the rules and takes up the events of the Arab Spring and the resulting civil wars as a topic. Two new countries have been added with Nigeria and Mali; Iran can also assume various new roles. With the expansion 120 new event cards will be added to the game. It can be played in seven different scenarios; the two shortest scenarios require a maximum of seven moves. It is also possible to play a campaign with both sets of cards.

The second expansion is called Labyrinth: The Forever War and deals with the time from 2015 and its events, such as Donald Trump , populism , Brexit . This expansion has not yet been released, but can already be pre-ordered from GMT Games; there are also pictures of some cards to be seen there. A release date has not yet been announced (as of August 2019).

Game development

Labyrinth is a card-based war game or a conflict simulation. It was conceived by the US game designer Volko Ruhnke, who had his first success in 2001 with Wilderness War , also a card-based war game, and published it by the US publisher GMT Games . He developed the system known from the balance of horror with the use of cards and relocated the game to the current time. The possibilities of the players have been adapted to the new setting compared to the known predecessor, which makes the game highly asymmetrical. Despite the fact that the game is a conflict simulation, military capabilities play only a minor role. It is necessary to fight the influence of the opponent with political means. Labyrinth was first announced in November 2009 in the publisher's internal crowdfunding project P500. After reaching the number of pre-orders required for production, the game was taken out of the project in early 2010 and released in October.

After the game was released, it wasn't a year before a remake was announced in June 2011, which was released in October 2011. The publishing house Bard Centrum Gier was named Labirynt in 2012 : Wojna z terroryzmem 2001 -? released a Polish version of the game. Three years later, under the title Labyrinth: La Guerra al Terrore 2001 -? published an Italian edition by Asterion Press . In 2016 a third English edition of Labyrinth was published, which was delivered in a larger cardboard box, in order to include the expansion Labyrinth: The Awakening, 2010 -? can also be stowed in the box. The box is also available individually for owners of one of the two older editions. A German version of the game was published in 2018 by Udo Grebe Gamedesign .

Volko Ruhnke incorporated his experiences from the system of asymmetrical warfare into his extremely successful COIN series , which began in 2012 and 2013 with the games Andean Abyss and Cuba Libre .

review

Labyrinth has received multiple praise, but also met with numerous reviews. The game is considered to be relatively easy for beginners, but the relatively large luck factor that comes from a relatively large use of dice is criticized. The topic and the implementation are praised for the dense atmosphere, but it is acknowledged that the war on terror, which is still a topical issue, can be a deterrent for some players.

After its appearance, the game was nominated for numerous prizes and won two of them:

  • James F. Dunnigan Design Elegance Award 2010: Winner
  • Charles S. Roberts Award 2010: Best Post-WW2 Era Board Wargame

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Trevor Bender: Labyrinth: The Forever War - Challenges in Designing a Simulation Game Based on Current Events. June 28, 2019, Retrieved August 8, 2019 (American English).