Greetings,

Here's a review of AP's "Soldier Kings" for the Grognards page. Keep
up the good work!

**************

Avalanche Press has released a real gem in its new (2002) "Soldier
Kings: The Seven Years War Worldwide."

The premise of the game is a fascinating one, and it is a topic I have
long wanted to see addressed in a game: the Seven Years War (1756-
1762) between France/Austria and Prussia/Britain (among others) was
the first true "world" war--the first global conflict, with battles
fought in Europe, the Caribbean, the East Indies, North America and
India.

Avalanche Press does not disappoint in this regard. The game features
two absolutely gorgeous maps (I can't praise the maps enough--they are
head and shoulders above any other wargame maps I've ever seen in
terms of sheer physical beauty), one of Europe and another consisting
mostly of the Americas, with inset maps of India, West Africa, and the
East Indies, plus a chart showing you how to move by sea from inset to
inset.

There are a few quibbles I have with the map. Louisiana and Quebec are
not directly connected, but in reality France controlled the
Mississippi River valley in this period; in the game France needs to
form an alliance with an independent American Indian power called the
"Pays d'Haut," in order to be able to control the interior of North
America. Bengal, in India, is not listed as a port--so how does
Britain reinforce its possessions there? There is no Kingdom of the
Two Sicilies; the "Sicily" and "Naples" areas are given as
independent. It is not at all clear what sea area Brazil is adjacent
to, but it looks like the Caribbean rather than the South Atlantic
(which makes no sense). But these are minor quibbles.

The various regions of the globe are divided up by areas--actually a
point-to-point system featuring area boxes connected by lines, some of
which are orange to show that they're mountainous. Each area shows you
who owns it initially (using flags, which are cool), and shows how
much the area is worth, and its Fortification Value.

The Fortification Value is an excellent way of showing how warfare
worked in this period. Armies apparently need no supply (they forage
off the land, but suffer attrition during the winter months) and they
can traipse around the map wherever they please. If you occupy an area
you don't actually control it; your armies are milling around in the
countryside but you don't get any economic benefit for being there. In
order to control an area you "besiege" it--you need to attack its
forts. Only after a successful siege do you put a "control marker"
down in the area with your flag on it, and annex the area to your
empire and economy.

Essentially you win the game by conquering territory because the more
territory you have the more money and manpower you have. Looking
around the map at the relative value of different areas is a good
history lesson in itself--you appreciate why so much interest was
given to the Caribbean in this period: France itself is worth 14
resource points, while France's colonies in the Caribbean (the
Windward Islands, Leeward Islands, and Haiti) are worth 17! Britain's
holdings in the Caribbean (including Jamaica and the Bahamas) are
worth far more than the "Thirteen Colonies" along the eastern seaboard
of North America.

Combat is pretty standard for Avalanche Press games (even their recent
re-do of Third Reich): you roll dice and hit the other side on a roll
of six. This leads to a lot of nail-biting.

There are seasonal turns, four per year. The winter turn is used for
attrition and some other logistical stuff, so you get only three turns
per year of campaigning. The game lasts from 1756 to 1762 for a grand
total of 28 turns in the campaign game. There are yearly scenarios
which just use the European map and focus on Frederick the Great. You
only use the world map in the campaign game. Since I hate scenarios I
haven't looked into how these Europe-only games work.

There is a lot of diplomacy in this game. In the grand campaign game
there are eight player countries (France, Austria, Britain, Spain,
Prussia, Holland, Turkey, and Russia). Backstabbing is permitted and
encouraged, although it is hard to see how the game can duplicate the
pivotal moment of the Seven Years War, when the Tsaritsa (there is no
such word as "Tsarina," btw) of Russia died and her successor broke
off his alliance with Austria and allied with former enemy Prussia--
thus saving Frederick the Great from imminent doom. Almost anyone can
ally with anyone else but there are some forbidden alliances thanks to
the realities of history; Prussia and Austria can't ally (it was the
conflict between Prussia and Austria that started the Seven Years War)
for example.

There are also a ton of possibly overrated by extremely colorful minor
countries, all with their own units and flags. You can win them over
to your side by a rather cool but simplistic system--pick a minor when
you draw an Event Card allowing you to do so, and roll dice for it.
You can modify the die roll by paying bribes. There are historical
modifiers to each die roll, which make sense. For instance, it's
easier for Turkey than for any other power to make an alliance with
the (Islamic) Khanate of Crimea. Still, the modifiers are not
decisive; in the first game I played, Protestant Sweden teamed up with
the Catholic bloc against Prussia, while Catholic Bavaria signed an
alliance with the Protestant Prussians. My favorite is the Iroquois
Nation, which is a minor power in this game with its own armies! Alas,
minor countries can't leave their home map--so France can't transport
thousands of screaming Iroquois warriors to go fight in Saxony.

The game has a lot of (manageable) chrome, like leaders, minor
countries, and event cards. All these put together give you a real
feel for the period.

There are it seems some glitches with the rules; in the Naval Combat
Example on p. 10 it says that a British Admiral is killed in combat on
a modified roll of 10, but in the rule on p. 11 it says you need to
roll a 12 or more to kill a leader. And a few of the explanations are
sort of ad hoc and goofy--such as Rule 7.5 which forbids players from
spending more resource points than they have (which is sensible
enough) on the grounds that "The Enlightenment did not recognize
deficit spending." (Tell that to Louis XVI, who lost his crown and
later his head thanks to the massive debts he piled up during the
Seven Years War and the American Revolution.)

The only real fault I have with the game (and it is a minor fault) is
that there isn't a whole lot of historical background material here
for the wargamer to whom the eighteenth century is a vaguely dark and
mysterious age. It may be hard for some gamers to get excited about an
era where men ran around in wigs and tights. But "Soldier Kings" is
worth a spin. It has got me interested in the eighteenth century like
never before. So buy the game, crank up your Handel and Mozart CDs,
put on your wig and battle with musket, sword and cannon for control
of the globe.

R. Ben Madison
Join the Kingdom of Talossa!
http://www.execpc.com/~talossa