Hannibal Hits the Table!

I got the opportunity (finally!) to play Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage yesterday. Wow. This game deserves its reputation!

We used my (up unitl now) unpunched copy of the game to play. I collect games, true, but I collect them to play, not as an investments or as display pieces. Getting an unpunched out-of-print game on eBay is nice, but only because it means the game is complete. Games are meant to be played.

By luck of the draw, I played Rome. After one play, I'm not prepared to knowledgably discuss the strategy of the game but I can say both sides feel like the other side is in the better position. For me, that's always a good sign.

Not knowing any better, I started off the game with an invasion of Africa and an attack on Carthage. That was a mistake and resulted in the destruction of the entire invasion force. Oops. This debacle was not as hard to recover from as I thought it might be. Rome is nothing if not resilient.

Fighting Hannibal without an overwhleming force or a good General (and both is better!) is a recipe for disaster. I managed to keep Hannibal out of Italy for the most part. Perhaps my opponent was simply not aggresive enough. I'm not sure what I would have done different had I been playing Hannibal, but I do come to the conclusion that the Carthagenian player cannot let Rome set the pace of the game. Hannibal and Carthage must take the battle to Rome and force Rome to react to Carthaginian moves. Give Rome the strategic inititive and time and perponderance of force will grind the Carthgenians down.

In the end Hannibal was killed in a battle in Northern Italy. Scipio Africanus was the victorious Roman general. At this point in the game, with three turns left, the my opponent was winning on points. With Hannibal gone and having lost a number of armies in other battles, my opponent felt the game was a lost cause and conceded. Personally, I'm still not sure a Roman victory was assured at this point, but maybe I'm too conservative to see the obvious. I think Rome would have won, but I don't believe it was a guaranteed victory. The loss of Hannibal, do doubt, is a hard blow to the Carthagenian hopes for victory.

Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage is a "card driven" wargame. Card Driven Games (CDGs) are a relatively new addition (the first one, We the People was published just over ten years ago in 1994) to the wargaming family. I find I really enjoy the card driven games. Something about the card play adds something to these games that make them much more appealing to me than a "traditional" hex and chit boardgame. I haven't had the opportunity to play many of the card driven games yet, so I'm always looking for chances to play these games. They are just so much fun!