Review History of War

	Rating	Grade (1-10)
	Graphic Presentation	9
	Rules	7
	Playability	8
	Replay Value	9
	Overall Rating	8,25

PRO	Very high replay value because of the limitless deck combinations
CONTRA	Not all questions are answered by the rules

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History of War
Review #1
written by: Andreas Ludwig

Graphic Presentation HOW is a card game with the cards portraying military units, countries and actions. The designers obviously wanted to have a very high quality presentation for their game, this is why all cards look really good, offer a large amount of information and are printed on strong, glossy paper. Here definitely everything was done right!

Rules The rules consist of a two-sided sheet of paper, containing colorful images of the different play zones and card types. Generally, these rules are clear, but the font is a little bit small and the sequence of play somewhat hidden on first glance. We simply created our own sequence of play as a player aid sheet, together with some comments. The game isn't overly complex, considering the game mechanics, but despite this fact, we had some problems getting into the game in the first place. Maybe this was because we both didn't have any experience with collectible card games. I guess a Magic-the-Gathering player will get into this game more easily. Some game situations were not covered by the rules, so that it is useful to print out the FAQ, available on the official website. In case of doubt, questions can be posted in the official HOW internet forum where the traffic is quite high and a competent answer will be given within minutes by the designers themselves.

Playability The same as with the rules. If you don't have any experiences with this kind of game, you could have some problems, but after the first game these problems are solved. By playing the game one gets a better grasp of the concept than by reading the rules since it's a rather unusual concept. Once you got into the game, HOW plays very smooth and you get a first impression about the numerous possibilities and depth of the system. It becomes clear that HOW is a game where the experienced player has advantages over the newbie, for it is quite difficult to judge the importance of the different elements when you have no experience with the game. Although the single steps play fast, a HOW game can take some time, so that it isn't a game "just played", as you might think when seeing the small card packets. Finally, luck isn't an important factor in this game (besides drawing new cards), because all decisions you make decide the game. Battles are a comparison of different, but fixed attack- and defense values without using a die or other random systems.

Replay Value Very high! HOW is played as a system, where you not only have the random effect of drawing new cards which changes from game to game, but you also play with your individual decks! This means that you create your own deck before playing, which can differ strongly in units and their possibilities. Then you challenge your opponent who also created his own deck. This experimental phase will continue over many games, while you improve your deck from game to game to finally get the "ultimate" deck - this is why HOW will never get boring, but is always challenging.

Creativity I don't know other collectible card game systems, so I cannot juge how innovate this game is. One important point is that HOW doesn't belong to this kind of collectible card games which needs a permanent financial investion because you are forced to buy new cards to remain on a good level. In this point HOW differs from the Magic system, which may be an innovation in this genre.

Simulation Value I won't call HOW a simulation because it isn't detailed enough in its single game aspects. It portrays a strategic / operational level and deals with resource management, allowing to build new military units and to bring them to the front. There's some confusion about the game level, though, because you have single units on the cards, but you often fight to conquer whole islands or countries and as far as I know the game level isn't actually given by the designers, so it's rather abstract.

Solitaire Factor In my opinion, no card wargames should be played solitaire, because this spoils the Fog of War effect.

Can be compared to HOW can't be compared to other card based wargames I know and play. It belongs to a different "faction" and has more in common with Magic - The Gathering than with Up Front. Lightning D-Day's combat mechanics vaguely remind me of HOW.

Short Review When we played HOW for the first time (only using the basic Axis / Allies starter decks, not our own decks), we thought it to be one of these short card based wargames we already knew and played. But we spent hours and hours with our first game and had to realize that it was at least uncommon for us classic consim players. We had some problems in the beginning and it took a while until we got accustomed to the game mechanics. After this, everything went well and we had a thrilling game with hard battles for the different countries to the very end. What I think to be very interesting is the aspect of creating and improving your own individual combat deck. Denny and I prefer different factions in WWII games - she playing the Americans and British, I the Axis and Russia. So it was quite easy for us - I bought the Axis starter deck, she bought the Allied Starter deck. Now each of us can buy the extensions available for our factions and work on the decks, which improves the game. One of the first things we realized was how important it is to choose the right countries which have to be conquered during the game - after each of us had conquered one country, two more were battled for, but we both decided to ignore one and fight for the other - because one of the countries didn't provide enough "flags" (and victory points) to reach the 15 victory points. Battles are not simple "destroy them all"-combats, but use a great deal of tactics. One of the main facts is to build up "death zones" in the respective countries. The game concept is that 4 countries are placed on the table. All countries provide a different number of flags and victory points. Now each player tries to bring units into the countries and some units have one or more flag symbols and if they remain in a country after battle, they count for the respective owner. At the end of each game turn, you count how many flags you have in a land and compare them to the flag number of the country where your units are. If you have the same number of flags with your units as indicated on the country card, you conquer it. The opponent tries to do the same and if you managed to build up a strong military presence in a country, you can try to reduce his flags by attacking and destroying his units. The opponent can "block" your attacks with cheaper, flagless units to protect his valuable units, and an attack must be planned quite carefully. If you didn't consider your opponent's abilities to block your attack, you can lose more in your attack than the defender. In a game turn, the player's role change once - first the attacker declares his attacks, and then the defender can (if his cards are not "locked" which is the term for used units) fire back at you. Then follows the defender's attacking phase where the attacker can block these attacks. In the next turn these roles change, so that the player who was the defender in the last turn now has the first chance of attacking in the next turn! This is quite tricky and offers some good tactical depth. The game permanently switches between attacker and defender, so that it is recommended to use a "marker" to indicate which side the attacker is (we used a Memoir 44 tank, standing besides the respective player). The overview can be lost quite easily, because one game turn consists of 15 different phases. Generally, I like HOW and I strongly recommend it to every wargamer!

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History of War Review #1	written by: Andreas Ludwig
Graphic Presentation	HOW is a card game with the cards portraying military units, countries and actions. The designers obviously wanted to have a very high quality presentation for their game, this is why all cards look really good, offer a large amount of information and are printed on strong, glossy paper. Here definitely everything was done right!
Rules	The rules consist of a two-sided sheet of paper, containing colorful images of the different play zones and card types. Generally, these rules are clear, but the font is a little bit small and the sequence of play somewhat hidden on first glance. We simply created our own sequence of play as a player aid sheet, together with some comments. The game isn't overly complex, considering the game mechanics, but despite this fact, we had some problems getting into the game in the first place. Maybe this was because we both didn't have any experience with collectible card games. I guess a Magic-the-Gathering player will get into this game more easily. Some game situations were not covered by the rules, so that it is useful to print out the FAQ, available on the official website. In case of doubt, questions can be posted in the official HOW internet forum where the traffic is quite high and a competent answer will be given within minutes by the designers themselves.
Playability	The same as with the rules. If you don't have any experiences with this kind of game, you could have some problems, but after the first game these problems are solved. By playing the game one gets a better grasp of the concept than by reading the rules since it's a rather unusual concept. Once you got into the game, HOW plays very smooth and you get a first impression about the numerous possibilities and depth of the system. It becomes clear that HOW is a game where the experienced player has advantages over the newbie, for it is quite difficult to judge the importance of the different elements when you have no experience with the game. Although the single steps play fast, a HOW game can take some time, so that it isn't a game "just played", as you might think when seeing the small card packets. Finally, luck isn't an important factor in this game (besides drawing new cards), because all decisions you make decide the game. Battles are a comparison of different, but fixed attack- and defense values without using a die or other random systems.
Replay Value	Very high! HOW is played as a system, where you not only have the random effect of drawing new cards which changes from game to game, but you also play with your individual decks! This means that you create your own deck before playing, which can differ strongly in units and their possibilities. Then you challenge your opponent who also created his own deck. This experimental phase will continue over many games, while you improve your deck from game to game to finally get the "ultimate" deck - this is why HOW will never get boring, but is always challenging.
Creativity	I don't know other collectible card game systems, so I cannot juge how innovate this game is. One important point is that HOW doesn't belong to this kind of collectible card games which needs a permanent financial investion because you are forced to buy new cards to remain on a good level. In this point HOW differs from the Magic system, which may be an innovation in this genre.
Simulation Value	I won't call HOW a simulation because it isn't detailed enough in its single game aspects. It portrays a strategic / operational level and deals with resource management, allowing to build new military units and to bring them to the front. There's some confusion about the game level, though, because you have single units on the cards, but you often fight to conquer whole islands or countries and as far as I know the game level isn't actually given by the designers, so it's rather abstract.
Solitaire Factor	In my opinion, no card wargames should be played solitaire, because this spoils the Fog of War effect.
Can be compared to	HOW can't be compared to other card based wargames I know and play. It belongs to a different "faction" and has more in common with Magic - The Gathering than with Up Front. Lightning D-Day's combat mechanics vaguely remind me of HOW.
Short Review	When we played HOW for the first time (only using the basic Axis / Allies starter decks, not our own decks), we thought it to be one of these short card based wargames we already knew and played. But we spent hours and hours with our first game and had to realize that it was at least uncommon for us classic consim players. We had some problems in the beginning and it took a while until we got accustomed to the game mechanics. After this, everything went well and we had a thrilling game with hard battles for the different countries to the very end. What I think to be very interesting is the aspect of creating and improving your own individual combat deck. Denny and I prefer different factions in WWII games - she playing the Americans and British, I the Axis and Russia. So it was quite easy for us - I bought the Axis starter deck, she bought the Allied Starter deck. Now each of us can buy the extensions available for our factions and work on the decks, which improves the game. One of the first things we realized was how important it is to choose the right countries which have to be conquered during the game - after each of us had conquered one country, two more were battled for, but we both decided to ignore one and fight for the other - because one of the countries didn't provide enough "flags" (and victory points) to reach the 15 victory points. Battles are not simple "destroy them all"-combats, but use a great deal of tactics. One of the main facts is to build up "death zones" in the respective countries. The game concept is that 4 countries are placed on the table. All countries provide a different number of flags and victory points. Now each player tries to bring units into the countries and some units have one or more flag symbols and if they remain in a country after battle, they count for the respective owner. At the end of each game turn, you count how many flags you have in a land and compare them to the flag number of the country where your units are. If you have the same number of flags with your units as indicated on the country card, you conquer it. The opponent tries to do the same and if you managed to build up a strong military presence in a country, you can try to reduce his flags by attacking and destroying his units. The opponent can "block" your attacks with cheaper, flagless units to protect his valuable units, and an attack must be planned quite carefully. If you didn't consider your opponent's abilities to block your attack, you can lose more in your attack than the defender. In a game turn, the player's role change once - first the attacker declares his attacks, and then the defender can (if his cards are not "locked" which is the term for used units) fire back at you. Then follows the defender's attacking phase where the attacker can block these attacks. In the next turn these roles change, so that the player who was the defender in the last turn now has the first chance of attacking in the next turn! This is quite tricky and offers some good tactical depth. The game permanently switches between attacker and defender, so that it is recommended to use a "marker" to indicate which side the attacker is (we used a Memoir 44 tank, standing besides the respective player). The overview can be lost quite easily, because one game turn consists of 15 different phases. Generally, I like HOW and I strongly recommend it to every wargamer!