Wars of Beleriand, a Silmarillion board game, preview video.

 

 A short video by Winfield showing the Wars of Beleriand game parts and pieces etc. and a little about what will become of it.

Wars of Beleriand board game. The Silmarillion wargame.

 Wars of Beleriand board game. The Silmarillion wargame.  

However you want to say it...

This is the rulebook for a sort of late stage playtest copy of the unpublishable Silmarillion board game I designed. There are just two of them and they are each unique one-of-a-kind handmade prints. The rulebook itself is 136 pages divided into 53 sections. It uses a case system for easy reference. The game maps are printed on canvas (again, two of them, each unique), maybe not the best choice of materials, tbh.There are a few hundred counters and chits and markers and some card chart thingies too. It's a two-player game. One side is the Noldor and co. and the other player is Morgoth and all his baddies. It's asymmetrical in that each player plays a very different game. 

But this is as far as it goes. All the components are stand-in roughs. Lots of hand drawn things and visible corrections. Also some blatantly swiped graphics including a piece by Tolkien himself, a John Howe and the cover of the Ronnie James Dio album "Lock Up the Wolves."

Though unpublishable, I would like people to know that someone made a quasi-simulation of the Silmarillion in the hex and counter form of tabletop game. It's 20 turns long. And Nienor is in there somewhere too. 

And now it goes in a box on a shelf until the year 2090 or something.

Wars of Beleriand Update.

Still on it or back on it, really. 

Typing up the rulebook. Tweaking some graphics. But that about wraps it. There were some things - still are -- in the endgame latter stages of play, situations that only arise during the endgame part of the game, that weren't thoroughly played through before. Unique situations and things. The last few Turns are the most mechanically complex parts of the game. I'm sure there are things I missed, but...it should work and we'll correct as we go from here on.

Probably just release the rules online, post a link somewhere, something. 

Wars of Beleriand.

The Silmarillion board game, aka WOB.

Or...The Dispossessed.

Anyway.

Another unusual and interesting (to me) situation. 

I was playing as Morgoth and my opponent marched Thingol and a sizable host of Sindar out into the open onto Anfauglith and sort of left them there, sitting ducks. They were annihilated and when Thingol dies in WOB, Melian follows (though no VPs are awarded to the MorP for Melian's elimination under these circumstances).

Consequently, with no Melian deployed on the Game Map, the Fence of Doriath (or Girdle of Melian) is deactivated and we see here a very lonely Luthien all by herself in Menegroth with only an adjacent Galadriel unit to keep her company. The Edain haven't arrived yet (this is Turn 7) and it's just an unusual situation that amuses me. Shows the value in having diversity in playtesters. 

I would never have allowed this to happen as the Noldor Player, but I am pleased that it did happen. 

 

 

 

Silmarillion board game.

Silmarillion tabletop wargame?

 

I think I like "The Dispossessed," though.
Cirith Ninniach.  It just isn't that important to the overall narrative (or strategic) situation. I thought about making a special hexside that only good guys can use and that is an impassable hexside for bad guys, but ultimately the area is so strategically unimportant that adding that little piece of detail would just be superfluous. Another block of text and cross-referencing for the already bloated and probably incomprehensible rulebook. (As of now the rules are 25 pages with a few sections yet to be written up, so I'm thinking it's going to be at least 30 pages in the end, really more depending on space requirement for illustrations.)

Amon Rûdh. Should there be a special rule for hex 1121? Turin can hide there and attack with impunity or something? There are already several exceptions and special abilities for the Turin unit.

Wars of Beleriand 

The Silmarillion Wargame. 

Or is it the Silmarillion board game?

Anyway, tweaking and testing continues, but it's done in all its essentials and then some. Been trying out some different chrome-ish bits lately to spice up combat, but it's really just cosmetics and theme at this point and could be wholly abandoned without any significant effects on the whole.

The pic above here...One planned map edit is to take that Northward kink out of the Narog near Nan-Tathren. Should dip South. There WAS a reason earlier for it to kink North that way, but I can't remember what it was...something in the text, I think.

And here below:
This is a HIGHLY unusual and rare occurrence: a Silmaril laying unclaimed out in the open just outside Eithel Sirion.
Many heroes and villains died terrible deaths to make this possible...

In 1977 a company called West Coast Games published a small run of a solitaire adventure board game based on “The Hobbit” called “There and Back Again,” designed by John Williams. It is rare, ugly and unlicensed.  I really like it.

(These two images are from boardgamegeek.com.)

Even though the map isn’t used much in the game - I redrew it.
Trying to capture an early 80’s Avalon Hill - Dragon Pass- sort of feel - and just doodling.

- Nate Dray

For more info on this game check out the Board Game Geek entry:
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/6833/there-and-back-again

For more on on Tolkien board games see these sites:
http://www.freewebs.com/tolkienboardgamecollecting/
http://www.boardgame.de/tolkien.htm