Thirty Years War

by

Wargame Design Studio

 The start of the Thirty Years War is normally taken to be the Third Defenestration of Prague in 1618. I had not known about the other two defenestrations until quite recently. The first was in 1419 during the Hussite War and the second took place in 1483. Technically, defenestration means to literally throw out the window. It now also means to throw out of power abruptly. The 1618 occurrence was when the two Imperial Regents and their secretary were tossed out the window of Hradcany Castle in Prague. Although they fell from a great height, their landing in a pile of offal meant they escaped with no real harm. So, if you are visiting Bohemia my suggestion is to take a room on the first floor in case you upset the populace.

 The throne of Bohemia was then offered to Frederick V Elector Palatine (one of the electors of the emperor in the Holy Roman Empire). Because of the shortness of his reign, he was called 'The Winter King'. This, in turn, started the Thirty Years War, one of the first wars that involved most of the countries of Europe. While ostensibly a war of religion, it sometimes had Catholics fighting Catholics and Protestants against other Protestants.  

 The warfare that took place at the time is usually written as the dividing line between older forms, (not much changed from ancient times) and the newer gunpowder age. The push of the pike gradually faded under the weight of a matchlock's ball. Some of Europe's greatest generals fought during the thirty years span. These included Turenne, The Great Conde, Gustavus Adolphus, and Wallenstein, among others.

Some Campaign Screens

 So, let us see what Wargame Design Studio has to say about their game:

"At the start of the 17th Century, Europe was in turmoil. Although largely centered on Germany and, at least initially, considered by many contemporaries to be a religious rather than political conflict, the Thirty Years War was in fact part of a complex series of interlinked conflicts. Some of which, such as the Dutch revolt from Spanish rule and the lengthy military rivalry between France and Spain, had their origins in the previous century. This title will weave in and out of these various conflicts with a focus on the larger battles and more predominant characters such as Tilly, Mansfeld, Gustavus Adolphus and Wallenstein.

The Bohemian Revolt of 1618 leads the way with initial battles between the Catholic (Imperialist) forces and the mercenary led Protestant (Anti-Imperialist) forces at Sablat and White Mountain. With the failure of the Catholics to completely crush and demoralize the resistance, the Palatinate phase began which would lead to larger battles and stretch through 1623.

1625-6 would bring in a new phase with the entry of the Danish king Christian IV of Denmark aligning with other Protestant forces to challenge the Hapsburg Empire. Poor performance on the battlefield and loss of major leaders such as Christian of Brunswick emboldened the Hapsburg Emperor Ferdinand II to try and clamp down on the situation in 1629. This would spur the Swedish king, Gustavus Adolphus, to enter the fray on behalf of the Protestant cause. This change would lead to the first defeat of Catholic forces under Tilly in more than a decade, at Breitenfeld in 1631. This would also see much larger actions taking place over the subsequent four years.

This ebb and flow would continue across the continent with new armies being raised and battles being fought in many areas of the continent. Civilian populations, commerce, and civilization itself would be shaken to the core for most of the region during this time and the effects of this conflict would be felt for generations to come. When the dust began to settle the "Holy Roman Empire" had been weakened beyond repair and the rise of the modern nation-state was solidifying."

Two zoomed in 3D Battle Screens

 This is a list of some of the battles:

Includes battles from all aspects of the war - major encounters to small skirmishes. 80 stand alone scenarios and 2 campaigns. A sampling would be:

White Mountain

Mingolsheim

Wimpfen

Hochst

Fleurus

Lutter

1st Breitenfeld

Rain, the River Lech

Ingolstadt

Lutzen

1st Nordlingen

Wittstock

2nd Breitenfeld

Rocroi

Freiburg

2nd Nordlingen

 Their names shine out from the past. Lutzen, 1st Breitenfeld, Freiburg, and Rocroi where Frederick the Great and Napoleon, among others, read about and learned their craft. The war spans from the age of the Tercio until its fall at Rocroi to the Great Conde.

 There is a 'Getting Started' scenario along with four 'Bootcamp' ones to learn the game mechanics. In total, there are 75 actual battle scenarios. Many of these allow the player to play against the AI from either side. I have dreamed about a computer game that would allow me to fight as the Spanish against the French at Rocroi.

A zoomed out 2D Battle Screen

 Unless you were kidnapped by the Fae folk or have been lounging for a long-time underneath a piece of granite, you should know about The John Tiller games and Wargame Design Studio. Wargame Design Studio has released or updated (really done over from the ground up) a myriad of computer wargames. The list of their Game Series is as follows:

Civil War Battles (American)

Early American Wars

First World War Campaigns

Modern Air Power

Modern Campaigns

Musket And Pike (Which Thirty Years War belongs to)

Napoleonic Battles

Naval Campaigns

Panzer Battles

Panzer Campaigns

Squad Battles

Strategic War

 They also have ten demos that allow a player to test the water in almost all of the above Game Series.

 I am a solitaire wargame player at heart, and I would prefer to play that way with either a boardgame or a computer one. What Wargame Design Studio has been able to do with the AI battle/campaigns is really just amazing. Even if you are a person who does not like to play solitaire, they have you covered.  You can play their games the following ways:

Play by E-mail (PBEM)

LAN & Internet "live" play

As well as two player hot seat

A little closer in screen with the inset map.

 The game 'Thirty Years War' has really been a dream of mine for as long as I can remember. We have had games about WWII, Napoleonic, and many others. However, the Musket and Pike Era has been almost completely ignored. You had to set up a boardgame if you wanted to play a battle from the age until quite recently. Wargame Design Studio's games were/are meant to transition the boardgame player to the computer with as little hassle as possible. Of course, there is a learning curve. What in life does not come with one? Thirty Years War, and all of their games (really simulations), is an involved game with many rules and a UI (User Interface) to master. I will say that learning to play one of their games is much simpler than trying to put together some plastic castle in the wee hours of the night before Christmas. The good thing is that the UI is used pretty much across the board with their games. If you learn one of their games, it is pretty easy to learn another. Just as I was finishing this review my phone alerted me to even more updates that WDS has released. It seems updates have been coming on almost a weekly basis. 

 As far as Thirty Years War, what can I say? I absolutely love the push of the pike and a failed cavalry charge. If you are a student of history, you owe it to yourself to pick up TYW. Books are now priced almost in the same range. or higher, than WDS games. For the maps and the setup of the armies alone it is worth the price of the admission, with the added attraction of being able to put you into your favorite general's saddle and boots they are priceless. 

 Now we have to talk about the downside of WDS games. They are addictive and once you have bought one you will want more. The other negative to WDS is this. They have not yet released a game about Marlborough's campaigns or the earlier wars of Louis XIV. I am also awaiting an Ancient Battles done with the new AI and UI.

 As I have stated before, I am an unabashed fanboy of the John Tiller games that started out almost 30 years before. Wargame Design Studio has taken all of the series of games to heights undreamed of when we were first playing them so long ago.

 They have also started to have a different game go on sale every week, although the standard price of $39.99 should make them easy to afford. It is almost half the cost of an AAA computer game and with what comes with it will keep you occupied/happy for years to come. 

Robert

Wargame Design Studio:

Wargame Design Studio Store (wargameds.com)

Thirty years War:

Thirty Years War – Wargame Design Studio (wargameds.com)

                                                       Ageod's The Thirty Years War


  Gustavus Adolphus, Turenne, and the Great Conde, oh my. It also has Tilly, Wallenstein, Horn, Pappenheim, and the Cardinal-Infante, plus the whole gang of kings and princes and generals that we love to read about.

 This is a Slitherine/Matrix/Ageod game of the Thirty Years War. The game has actually been released by the Ageod part of the gaming triumvirate. They have also released such titles as, The Wars of Napoleon, The Rise of Prussia, Revolution under siege etc..

 This war was caused by the Bohemians offering their crown from the head of the Catholic Hapsburg Ferdinand II, to the Protestant Frederick V of the Palatinate, a small part of the Holy Roman Empire. The empire was once described as neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire. Frederick V is called the 'Winter King', because that is how long his reign of Bohemia lasted.  The Bohemians, in a fit of religious rage, threw two of Ferdinand's councilors out of a window to land seventy feet below into a dung heap. Miraculously they both survived, thus proving that politicians, like cats, usually land on their feet.  This was the spark that set off the greatest conflagration since the reformation began. On the outside it was a religious war. In reality at times Catholic fought Catholic and Protestant fought Protestant, depending less on the states' religious views than their own policy.

 The war was a high mark in man's inhumanity to man. The devastation and desolation this war caused in central Europe affected it for the next few hundred years. The sack of Magdeburg was that centuries 'rape of Nanking'. The scale was smaller, but the savagery was just as intense. The woodcuts and printed sheets of the horrors were the first large propaganda outpouring to hit Europe.

 The Thirty Years war saw the change from completely rigid linear tactics to the reforms of Maurice Prince of Orange. It also was the watershed between countries moving from half trained militia and mercenary armies, to having fully professional standing armies. 

 Enough of the history, now let's get to the game. This review is of the 1.01 version.

  The game has three tutorials and five scenarios these are:

  Tutorials:

  1. Basic Rules
  2. Recruitment, Production, and Decisions
  3. Advanced Concepts and Tips

  Scenarios:

  1. The Bohemian revolt 1618
  2. The Danish Phase 1625
  3. The Paladins 1622
  4. The Swedish Intervention 1630
  5. The Thirty Years War 1618

  The scenario of the whole war, 1618-1648, is a whopping 369 turns.

 The player chooses to play either the 'Protestant powers' or the 'Empire'. You are the leader of your coalition and control diplomacy, economics, and of course your military.

 The map is of the whole of middle Europe, with some of the scenarios focusing on smaller portions of it.

 You are given four pages of options to tweak the AI and other parts of the game to your desire. For those not faint of heart you can also tweak the 'scripts' that the game runs on.

 This game, like all of the newer Ageod games, has the decision card system to help or hurt you and to add historical flavor. It is also dripping with historical events that further the historical depth of the game.

  Your forces' supply and attrition will be your main focus.  The troops under you will melt away like ice cream in the hot sun. As Spain was described during the Napoleonic wars "a small army is defeated and a large army starves". Your armies are much like a chained bulldog, formidable only in a small area and useless out of it. You will be continually juggling your meager purse between all of the different choices that you can or have to make. Mutual exhaustion between the contending forces at times, resemble the fourteenth round in a championship boxing match (oops showed my age), or for the uninitiated, the last round of any Rocky movie. The turns are in the WEGO mode, that is you and your opponent both decide on your moves and actions and then it is played out simultaneously on the map.

 Your forces have to be integrated with leaders, with that and all of the myriad of choices you have as a coalition leader for economic,etc. It is good to see that there are so many tutorials and also that they are set up not to overwhelm the new player with too much information at once.

 The game is a grand scale work of the Athena engine. For those of you who already own Ageod games, its purchase is a no-brainer. For the gamer who has not played any of their games, there is a bit of a learning curve to overcome, but well worth it in the end. The Athena game engine is particularly well suited for time periods where the action of armies is more fluid and not stagnant as in World War I.

 This screenshot shows the landing of Gustavus Adolphus, the king of Sweden, landing in the HRE in 1630.

 Hopefully,(hint hint, nudge nudge) Ageod is already working on another of the 'holy grails' of wargaming: an operational rendering of the English Civil War. The time period almost exactly overlaps the time period in TYW. You would get the added attraction of commanding the 'Winter King', Frederick V's, son Prince Rupert as a royalist commander. Oh, and while you're at it, The Campaigns of Marlborough.

 For The Thirty Years war game might I suggest a little light reading, specifically Thomas Hobbes 'Leviathan'. Removing my tongue from its firm position in my cheek. Try this, 'The Thirty Years War: Europe's Tragedy', by Peter H. Wilson. If you are like me, and like pc and board games take a look at GMT games.



Robert

Game: Thirty Years War
Developr: Ageod
Publisher: Slitherine
Steam Release: 6/9/16
Review Date: 6/20/16